What does your rest look like?

Image description: A straight-size Black person with aquamarine braids, a silver nose ring and ear studs lies on a bright orange bed. Their eyes are closed, their full red lips slightly parted. Their face exudes a sense of calmness and peace. They wear a black shirt with golden accents and a lush, faux tiger fur coat in red, white and pink. The feathers on their coat look soft and luxurious. Their left arm reaches overhead, with their hand gently perched on their forehead, displaying their long, white painted fingernails.

The 4 of Nails can show up for us when it is time to use our nails to cut out the extraneous noise and clutter in our brains. We may be feeling overwhelmed, overstimulated, burnt out, or caught up in old narratives and binaries. This card invites you to engage in rest, whatever that looks like for you. There are so many options: sleep, play, moving your body in accessible ways, listening to music, taking a break from social media, stimming, different forms of meditation, etc. Rest can be active, and sometimes that’s what we need to step back from the cycle of our thoughts and the relentless inundation of mental inputs.

This can be a difficult energy. We may crave the change of the fives just to get out of the “stuck” sensation that the fours can elicit. This is your chance to re-evaluate your current course, however, before change comes. It’s a time to incubate, to re-assess, to take a sabbatical. It’s an opportunity to grab these four nails and use them to create a container for yourself.

However, as with any container, we must be careful that our sanctuary does not become a prison. We may want to stay in our container even though it’s time to finally re-enter the world, intent on avoiding anxiety-inducing situations. This is a good time to call in support wherever you receive it. With practice, we can begin to integrate rest into more of our lives so that we don’t feel the need to cling to a vacation or other sanctioned time to give ourselves a break.

Inspiration sources:
– Samara Kasai, Tarot for Healing Justice course
– Cristy C. Roads, Next World tarot deck guidebook