The Archetype and The Tarot: The Detective and Eight of Wands
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The Detective Archetype
Fueled by curiosity, The Detective wants to get to the bottom of things and find the root cause of whatever the problem might be. The true crime genre in books and TV has exploded in popularity in recent years in large part because The Detective archetype is awakening within all of us. At some level, we all have an inherent desire to solve mysteries.
The Detective has tremendous powers of observation, deductive reasoning and the ability to see connections and patterns. They possess an intuitive sixth sense and can act on their gut feelings and hunches. They can also easily see what others may have overlooked.
In the light, The Detective uses these powers for good. Acting in service to themselves and/or others, they find solutions to problems and ways to make life more fulfilling.
In the shadow, The Detective can lean more towards being a voyeur and snoop. They can become obsessive—almost predatory—in their hunt for information, purely seeking the thrill of finding the answer without any consideration for potential harm caused along the way. On the far side of the shadow spectrum, The Detective’s need to have the answer might be so strong that they will resort to lying or falsifying evidence. More commonly, however, the shadow Detective shows up as an expression of mistrust in relationships, prompting us to do things like spy on our loved ones.
Some questions to consider this week:
What is our underlying motivation when we find ourselves needing to know something?
Do we have a tendency to reach for blame when we’re feeling uncertain?
Do we need to know the cause of something in order to fix it?
Does the act of figuring things out bring joy and fulfillment to our lives?
Eight of wands
In this card, we see eight sticks, or wands, flying through the air. In the far background, we can see a hill with a stream winding in front of it. The vast majority of the card, however, is a wide expanse of air with sticks flying through it. Even though the suit of wands is considered to represent fire in many traditions, I can’t help but think that this card is all about a big gust of wind. This wind has swiftly blown in, picked up these wands, and thrown them through the air in the same direction. Then the wind is gone as quickly as it came.
For me, this card carries a message of paying attention to flashes of insight and moments of realization; and of not resisting what comes through. If the wind metaphor isn’t your cup of tea, you can think of it more like a lightning bolt—a swift burst of unhindered energy, the kind that comes from the ether and flows through us like an electric charge. It can be a call to action—to allow that burst of wind, or bolt of lightning, to carry us into the next moment.
How do these two work together?
I see the pairing of The Detective and Eight of Wands as a call to not procrastinate. (😬 Not in the shame-based, fast-living, achievement-focused way that usually surrounds the notion of not procrastinating.)
This is not about procrastination in general. I think what we’re being tasked with this week is to ACT on the intuitive hits, or flashes of insight we get about the problems in our lives, those things we’re working to solve. When The Detective is fueled by that swift burst of energy from the Eight of Wands, they don’t second guess their hunches. They act immediately to bring an end to the problem.
How do you tend to respond to your intuitive hunches when you’re looking for answers? If you’re anything like me, we’ve got our work cut out for this week! Let me know how you do in the comments below.
Hi Jenna! This is my first time receiving a post from you and I wanted to tell you that I love what you’re doing here. What an excellent marriage, archetypes and tarot. Never seen them put together in this way!And since I’ve just had some inspirations pop in from the blue last night and this morning, today’s combination and the “don’t proscrastinate” message are feeling very...ding ding ding!
Jenna, I am absolutely loving what you’re giving us here, I don’t always comment because I don’t feel qualified to do so, I am learning though, this is a very new concept to me but wow! I’m not only intrigued but already finding links in what I’m reading and what I’m doing... today especially! Thank you so much for making me dig deeper and deeper into a world I’ve never dreamed of... 💫xx