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What Does The Hanged Man Tarot Card Mean?

Major Arcana card number 12 (XII), The Hanged One represents that liminal space of in-between, the tides of the ocean, the swell when we can feel something is morphing but we’re too deep in the mist to know what yet. The Hanged One is a card of getting comfortable in the unknown, in the watery depths of the subconscious, in the space before something occurs, and seeing what we find when we surrender to these subtle undercurrents.

Learn Tarot insights for what does the Hanged Man Tarot card mean below:

The Hanged Man Tarot Card Meaning

The Hanged One is sometimes not a welcome card depending on your nature. I personally love the slipperiness, the nebulousness, the mysticism (but I am saying this from a decisively non-Hanged One moment haha). With the Hanged One, there is no doing. We are in the liminal here, and as we all know- sometimes doing nothing is the hardest thing of all.

The Hanged One reminds me of meditation, on the outside it appears as if nothing is happening, physically we are doing nothing. But on the inside, and imperceptibly over vast distances of time, the benefits of our perceptions can become known to us. So too is the Hanged One, it is only after we are out of the waiting phase that we can see why it was so necessary.

This is a profoundly spiritual card, asking us to get still and quiet enough to perceive the shifts, and cultivate the art of patience, of waiting, of trusting the unknown. As the figure in the Colman Smith Rider Waite deck is casually hanging upside down from the right foot with legs crossed, face calm, it is not an inherently struggling card. That depends on your relationship to stillness. It is also a call to the way in which our perspective shifts when we view things from a different perspective, in this instance literally upside-down.

What you think you know is limiting.

What we don’t know we don’t know is vast.

The figure in the RWS deck (and many other Tarot decks) is also hanging with their legs positioned like a reversed 4, a call back to The Emperor. It is a reminder of the inherent power we can find in the pause, in waiting, in stillness. It is also a reminder that while things may feel foggy, we always have our own sovereignty to call upon, and that the invitation now is to relinquish control. Following on from number 11, Justice, in the RWS version, it is another reminder that all is balanced and figuring itself out behind the curtains. In the Thoth Tarot deck, it comes after the Lust (Strength) card, a signal that we have what it takes to move through this phase.

Coming before the Death card, number 13, it is a profoundly sacred moment of pre-shedding and preparation for rebirth. Before moving forward, we must gestate.

Astrologically, it is related to Neptune, the Planet of mysticism, spirituality, art, creativity, intuition, devotion, and Universal oneness. It is also the Planet of illusion, rose-tinted glasses, victim mentality and martyrdom, puritanism. With Neptune and the Hanged One, we must move slowly and carefully, knowing that things are wont to change and mutate. It is only after a Neptune transit that we can really see what the hell it was all about, once the veil has lifted, The Hanged One is the same.

Numerologically, number 12 reduces to 3, connecting it to The Empress. I find this to be such beautiful profound association. Oftentimes symbolising birth and creation, whether literal or figurative, The Empress represents the womb space, that secret hidden vessel where all of life is created. The gestation period can feel endless, timeless (again, whether of child or project), and then at the same time in a blink of an eye it is over.

Neptune and The Hanged One both operate outside of the realms of time and space. Similarly, I think it’s so sacred that actual conception has never been filmed, and so we can never know the true time of conception, there is only a window; it is with this mystery that The Hanged One operates, never clearly revealing its details but offering an out-of-focus portrait that once we begin to enter the labour portal of the Death card can we begin to understand its process (and not even then).

Overall, an upright Hanged One is a card of spirituality, detachment, and enlightenment; of seeking answers that are not so clearcut, in exploring the grey areas. Things may be evolving in the background behind the scenes, how can you get quiet enough to hear what they are? Tarot extraordinaire Lindsay Mack refers to the Hanged One as The Tethered One, and to me this begs the question- tethered to what? How can we loosen our ties and free ourselves, lighten our load so we too can hang comfortably?

The Hanged Man Reversed Meaning

The Hanged One reversed can represent an invitation to not resist this cloudiness, to stop struggling against the tides, we’ll only tire ourselves out and miss the magic of this moment. It can symbolise an even stronger need to stop and slow down, to see things from a different point of view. As the 4 depicted in the legs on the RWS version would now be upright, it can similarly be a call to step more actively into the period, to pro-actively “wait”. Just like in meditation we are not actually “doing nothing”, The Hanged One as a reversal can be a message to lean into this discovery of self, perceptions, others’ worldview, the subtlety of the current moment. It is saying to stop waiting for the waiting to be over, get comfortable like the figure.

The Hanged Man in a General Reading

When we receive The Hanged One in a Tarot reading we are being called to pause, wait, and trust that things are unfolding as should, just maybe behind the scenes out of our peripheral vision. It is an invitation to look at things with another viewpoint, worldview, or perspective. To surrender to the spiralic nature of life and lean into the ephemerality of growth. Perhaps, as a card of Neptune, we simply need to sleep on it (and our dreams may make more sense than we currently do).

The Hanged Man in a Love Reading

As with every other Tarot card interpretation, the meanings of The Hanged One in a love reading will entirely depend on the context of the situation at hand, the nature of the question being asked, where it has fallen in the spread and the cards surrounding it, as well as your own intuition first and foremost. Sometimes The Hanged One here can represent needing to wait for things to become clearer, for more information to come to light. It is not exactly a yes or no answer, but rather a wait and see. It can be an invitation to see a new perspective or check in with our own (limited) worldview. It can also be a message of needing to slow down, pause, and seek out a deeper connection.

The Hanged Man in a Career Reading

As above, the Tarot card meanings of The Hanged One can in a career reading represent many different things, in general it can be about needing to wait for more information to come to light before making a decision about something. It can be an invitation to find a meaningful purpose or life path, to follow the answer that feels spiritually aligned. It can sometimes even be a symbol of nebulousness or confusion, and again a call to seek out alternate opinions and perspectives, and to simply wait for the answer to come to light without forcing or willing it to be so or different than things are. In leadership, it can be a message to surrender and relinquish control, or that we don’t have enough information yet to make an informed decision, to simply rest in this space and be open to receiving for now.

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So those are some significations of the Hanged One Tarot card, I hope they’re insightful for you! Let me know in the comments section below if you have anything else to add or any questions.

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