The Three of Swords looks painful just from the picture on the card, and its meaning is every bit as painful.

In love, friendship and work, it mostly comes out on the negative side, especially when it comes to broken promises, betrayal, slander, or being hurt emotionally.

The mood around you isn’t bright either. Whatever you do, your mind feels clouded, nothing feels fresh, you feel withered, and you’re uneasy all the time.

This card can also point to surgery, or accidents involving sharp objects. If it comes up, you need to be a bit more careful as you go about your life.

Even so, this is a Swords card, and swords mostly stand for thoughts, which are something you can’t touch.

When the Three of Swords appears, it means that thoughts, or things you’ve had doubts about, start to take shape and show their outline more clearly. A suspicion that might once have been only a rumor starts to come true. Something other people had planned starts to become real. It’s just what the card shows: the three swords work together, and the element of Air, which usually drifts along freely, gathers into a dark cloud.

In terms of planets and signs, this card is Saturn in Libra. It speaks of unfairness, balance being held back, and doing good without getting good back.

But in the end, a thought is just a thought. It isn’t a physical object that can come and hurt us. What it does best is hurt the heart (sometimes, getting hit with a real sword would probably be better).

When this card appears, the best thing to do is not to rush to pull the swords, or the thoughts, out of ourselves. Don’t rush like someone who has just been stabbed with a knife and pulls it straight out. That doesn’t really help, and sometimes it makes things even worse.

What we should do is gather ourselves and let our thoughts slowly settle. Look at the situation from many angles, then fix the problem one point at a time. That’s probably the better way.

So when you feel swords starting to pierce your heart, don’t struggle or do anything in a hurry just yet. Think slowly, weigh things up, and slowly pull the thoughts, the bad things, out one sword at a time. Of course, that wound to your heart may not go anywhere. But the dark sky behind it is sure to fade away one day.