The Star

Upright

After the Tower comes this quiet scene, and readers take the order to heart. The card is read as hope, healing and trust in the future: faith returning, a sense of purpose, and the ease of being open instead of guarded. It is one of the gentlest cards in the deck.

Reversed

Discouragement is the usual reading reversed. Readers take it as hope running low, faith in a plan wavering, or a need for small signs of progress. It is often read as a temporary low rather than a lasting one.

In love and at work

For love, it is linked with openness, healing after a hurt, and a relationship that feels like a fresh start. For work, readers see inspiration, a return of motivation and creative or public-spirited projects.

In the picture

A naked woman kneels at the edge of a pool under a night sky, pouring water from one jug into the pool and from another onto the land. One large eight-pointed star shines above her, surrounded by seven smaller ones, and a bird perches in a tree behind. The Golden Dawn gave the card to Aquarius.

In a Caelumia profile

When The Star comes up upright in a Caelumia reading, it counts toward these themes for that day, alongside the rest of the profile: Idealism, Seeking, Openness.

Sources

• A. E. Waite, The Pictorial Key to the Tarot (1910). Waite's own guide to the deck he designed with Pamela Colman Smith, with each card's divinatory meanings.
• Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn, Book T: The Tarot (1890s, published by Israel Regardie in The Golden Dawn (1937 to 1940)). The source of the planetary, zodiac and elemental attributions of the cards.

Updated September 28, 2026.