The Hanged Man: tarot meaning, upright and reversed

A man hangs by one foot with a calm expression and a halo around his head.

Upright

suspension · surrender

Allow a pause to change the angle of understanding. Willing restraint can reveal another possibility.

Reversed

stagnation · resistance

Waiting may have lost its purpose, or a necessary change of perspective is being resisted.

In a reading

The position gives this card a particular task: a description of the situation, a challenge, or guidance. Read its image and meaning alongside the other cards and the question that brought them together.

Golden Dawn correspondence

Element: Water. This is the attribution in Book T.

Sources

A. E. Waite, The Pictorial Key to the Tarot. These notes are original interpretations of the Waite–Smith imagery, informed by that text.