Desire needs an object. The object attracts attention.
Desire is attraction. There is no desire without an object. It is the object that elicits desire. Desire has no energy of its own. The energy arising from desire is derived from the attraction to the object of desire.
Desire is a passive force, not an active one.
Desire is a connecting force, not a separating one. Therefore desire is represented by Cups in Tarot, or Water in traditional psychology, traditional medicine, and alchemy. Not Wands, or Fire.
Each of the four elements has two dimensions. Moisture and heat.
Water is cold and moist.
Coldness means Water is passive and receptive. No heat. No energy therefore Water does not initiate action.
Water is moist thus connecting. Think of licking your finger to help turn a book’s page. The moisture connects the finger to the paper.
Think of the intensity of the smells after an afternoon rainfall. The odors travel through the moisture in the air into our noses much more effectively than in dry air.
This is the ancient traditional psychology and cosmology of the elements. And common sense. This is not my idea. This model underlies every untampered traditional esoteric system of knowledge.
Desire is a moist phenomenon. It connects the subject to the object of desire; be it physical, mental, or emotional. It is water all the same.
Desire prompts action. If there is no action the object of desire cannot be obtained. Action and desire are two different and separate things.
Fire is hot and dry. Active and separating. No moisture.
Wands do not represent desire. Wands represent the action and the direction prompted by desire.
From Cups to Wands. From Water to Fire.
Thus, Water or Cups does not represent creation. Fire does.
Cups do not represent imagination either. Conceptualization, intellectual, visual, or otherwise, is a mental matter, that is Swords or Air… I digress…
Fire is focused and obliterates anything on the way to its target. Therefore Wands represent the “fulfillment of desire” but not the desire itself.
A desire without action does not lead to creation.
Wands represent the act of creation, including the sexual act.
Desire prompts the action. Desire is not the action. The action engenders new things; that is, creation. The flame of life! The creative spark! Genesis! Let there be light!
And we must not disregard the fact that the elements or suits do not exist or operate in isolation. As depicted in the Yin and Yang symbol. One element elicits the other, one element has the seed of its opposite within it. Keeping in mind that the elements and the suits operate in a dynamic dance in two axes.
In the Major Arcana, The empress represents desire. The Emperor, action. Water and Fire. Female and Male. Passive, active.
Finally, it is worth mentioning that in a reading the Empress can be a symbol of creation or creativity. The meaning of the cards always depends on the context and the reader’s intuition and approach.
To learn about the elements from the point of view of health visit traditionalmedicalastrology.org