2025: The Year of the Hermit
The Hermit is the Tarot card of the year for 2025
Thank you for being here! In this newsletter, I offer a brief introduction the Hermit and offer a guide to taking a look back at 2024, when Strength was the card of the year. Paying subscribers also have access to a deep dive into the Hermit and how you might want to work with this card in the year ahead.
Pulling the Hermit doesn't mean you have to go build a cabin in the woods, although if you've had the impulse to do it, why not? — Jessa Crispin, The Creative Tarot
Like every card in Tarot, the meaning of the Hermit varies from reader to reader and reading to reading. All I can tell you is some of what I know about this card. One thing I know for sure is that the Hermit asks you to look inward to see what you need. And if what you need is some time and space outside of your everyday life to think and learn and just be still… The Hermit is your invitation.
While I was going over my notes about the Hermit today, I found this passage from Michelle Tea’s Modern Tarot:
The Hermit does not get FOMO. Maybe it’s because the Hermit is old and has sort of done everything, chased the same ultimately meaningless things we all find ourselves chasing.
And that made me think about something I found while reading eulogies of Jimmy Carter:
Earlier in my life, I thought the things that mattered were the things that you could see, like your car, your house, your wealth, your property, your office. But as I've grown older, I've become convinced that the things that matter most are the things that you can't see—the love you share with others, your inner purpose, your comfort with who you are.
This is a beautiful distillation of the wisdom of the Hermit.
Before we shift into the new year, though, I’d like to invite you to take a look back and consider what you learned from Strength in 2024.
First, please let me congratulate you on making it this far. The fact that you’re here at all is an achievement and it is, I think, testament to fact that Strength must have shown up for you over the past year. When I reflect on my own 2024, I see Strength energy manifesting most clearly in the late summer and early fall, when I was working to get out the vote. Obviously, my labors did not produce the desired results. The news was bad all the way from the top of the ticket all the way down to local races—and, honestly, the local losses were more heartbreaking. I woke up very disappointed on November 6.
But I did not wake up discouraged, because I knew that the work I had done—that a whole lot of us had done—wasn’t for nothing. I learned a lot about relational organizing. This is a powerful tool, and it’s one I can use and teach to others regardless of who’s in what office. Relational organizing also has serious Strength vibes. Strength isn’t about brute force; it’s about soft power.
I also did a lot of coalition-building, which isn’t necessarily a Strength thing, but it is for me. Strength encourages us to acknowledge the aspects of ourselves that we don’t love, and I really don’t love asking for help. Or, at least, I didn’t. I’m getting used to it, I guess, and I recognize that this is important for me. I can’t do everything by myself, I shouldn’t do everything by myself, and sometimes—often—the most useful thing I can do is support someone else’s work. This is Strength.
If you’d like to reflect on your own year of Strength, I’ve got a wee gift for you: a brief introduction to this card and some writing prompts. You can download it here.
