The Empress

I have not had the opportunity to give birth to a child. Metaphorically, however, I have given birth to many things. I often joke about “giving birth” to my dissertation—but those who know me well understand that this humor gently masks a deeper yearning: the longing to be a mother. The Empress, the great mother of the tarot, holds this longing with grace and depth.

This desire for the sensual, embodied experience of creating life seems to capture the essence of The Empress. She symbolizes fertility, passion, beauty, and sensuality. In the card, she sits on a cushioned throne, her belly full with new life, surrounded by a field of golden grain. Pomegranates adorn her robe—a symbol of abundance and fertility—while twelve stars form a crown atop her head, representing the signs of the zodiac. These six-pointed stars are made from interlocking triangles: one pointing upward to symbolize fire, the other downward for water. Together, they illustrate the alchemy of union—the fusion of opposites to birth something new. Around her neck, she wears a necklace of nine pearls, a reference to the nine planets. As Rachel Pollack observes, “She wears the universe as her jewelry” (2019, p. 46). Beside her rests a shield bearing the symbol of Venus—the planet of love, beauty, and creation—her planetary ruler and mythological archetype.

The Empress is the third card of the Major Arcana, and the number 3 carries deep meaning. It is the product of the Magician’s active, initiating energy (1) and the High Priestess’s passive, receptive wisdom (2). Together, they generate a third form: The Empress, the child of their union, “unburdened with ego and personality, experiencing the universe directly” (Pollack, 2019, p. 47).

This card is an invitation to experience the world first through the senses, with the understanding that true transcendence must begin with embodiment. “The first step to enlightenment,” Pollack writes, “is sensuality” (2019, p. 45).

The Empress offers a radical message: to know oneself, one must begin with the body. Yet the religious traditions I was raised within taught denial of the body and shame around its pleasures. The body was functional—meant for reproduction—and the pain of childbirth was cast as a punishment for women. Emotionality was equally discouraged. Feelings were portrayed as irrational, dangerous, and frequently used to justify the exclusion of women from leadership. That myth still lingers in today’s cultural narratives.

The Empress urges us to feel, sense, and take pleasure in these ways of knowing. She invites us to reclaim our bodies as a source of wisdom—an essential step in healing and spiritual integration.

Author Cole Arthur Riley (2022), writes:

“If you aren’t in your body, someone else is. The systems of this world have everything to gain from your disembodiment…Stay near to yourself. Listen to your body.”

This resonates deeply with the message of The Empress. In a world filled with injustice and trauma, disconnection from the body can feel adaptive—a means of survival. It numbs the pain of what we feel and know. But disembodiment, while protective, also quiets our inner authority. The Empress teaches that embodiment is not only necessary for healing; it is an act of resistance.

In a society that benefits from our detachment from the body—from our emotions, intuition, and sensuality—choosing to inhabit ourselves fully becomes a revolutionary act. The Empress reminds me that there is power in emotion, in pleasure, and in the deep-rooted intelligence of the body. If we dismiss these dimensions, we risk cutting ourselves off the wisdom of the natural world.

The Empress does not invite us to transcend the body but to begin there—to root down, feel deeply, and awaken through the sacred intelligence of our physical and emotional selves.

References

Pollack, R. (2019). Seventy-eight degrees of wisdom: A tarot journey to self-awareness (40th anniversary ed.). Weiser Books.

Riley, C. A. (2022). This here flesh: Spirituality, liberation, and the stories that make us. Convergent Books.

Footnote

This quote also appears on Riley’s Black Liturgies Instagram account, where she regularly shares reflections grounded in Black identity, embodiment, and liberation.