15. The Devil
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Welcome to Soulchology’s worksheets, your starter-kit into an intuitive self-enquiry using tarot and astrology. I write these in my usual dry humour, which reflects the tone of my sessions too, because learning is intense enough without stripping it of humanity. A little wit makes the wisdom easier to digest!
Anyway, while full sessions include numerology, Lenormand, and therapeutic layers, these worksheets are your solo starter kit designed to get you going without frying your nervous system.
Grab your deck, take a breath and don’t overthink it. No altar required. You can read these on your lap, mid-commute, or in bed with questionable lighting. If you know current transits, great, add them in. If not, the cards still work because they’re generous like that.
And, if you shuffle really fast, they love to fling out like you’re live in an episode of Ghosts and Trevor is standing next to you.
Each sheet prompts you to connect the cards with your real life, that is, not your aspirational, one-day-when-I-journal-daily life. Pay attention to the artwork, colours, symbols, and emotional tone because tarot is layered, not linear. Study only what leaps out, don’t go looking for clues.
This isn’t about mystical perfection, it’s about noticing yourself. Your thoughts, your choices, your patterns. If you’re new to tarot and feeling twitchy about it, you might want to read my piece on Substack that gently dismantles the pressure.
My advice is to pull (or fling) your card at the end of the day, not first thing. That way, you’re reflecting and not pre-loading your brain with vague forecasts. It’s a faster way to build intuitive confidence and a more honest way to learn what the cards actually mean to you.
i. The Nutshell
Upright
The Devil is the part of you that made a pact with survival and forgot to renegotiate. It’s not here to shame you exactly although it can feel like that. What it really wants is to expose your fine print. What once kept you safe might now be keeping you small. Addictions, obsessions, codependency, and ambition are not just bad habits; they are signs to pay attention to. This card wants you to know you’re bound and there’s a need for liberation.
The Devil is also what happens when The Lovers card takes a wrong turn and forget why they chose each other in the first place. It’s the shadow of connection: where desire turns into dependency, and comfort calcifies into control. Coping mechanisms look like personality traits, and before you know it, the performance becomes the prison. But here’s the plot twist - the chains? They’re loose. You just got used to wearing them.
Finally, this card isn’t anti-pleasure. It’s anti-possession. The material world isn't the enemy; it's your hidden agreements with it that need to be examined. The Devil asks: what are you giving your power to, and what’s the cost of staying bonded to something that feeds your fears more than your freedom? The belief that you’re not good enough is often the real captor.
Keywords: Temptation, illusion, attachment, bondage, addictions, shadow work, power dynamics.
Translation: Just because it’s familiar doesn’t mean it’s freedom.
Reversed
The Devil reversed is the moment you stop doom-scrolling your own life. It’s the uncomfortable awareness that maybe you’ve been handing your power to something that’s not even asking nicely. This card is a jailbreak invitation, disguised as a breakdown.
It can signal liberation, yes - but not the Instagrammable kind. Think: shaking hands, ugly crying and late-night clarity. You might be in the messy middle of detaching from what once defined you. Toxic habits, toxic people and toxic self-talk. See The Lovers reversed for more on this. The exit sign is lit, but the hallway’s dark. Be honest: are you letting go, or are you spiritualising your avoidance? Because sometimes The Devil reversed shows up when you’ve swapped one cage for another and called it healing. You’re free but terrified of what that actually means.
Keywords: Release, awareness, detachment, toxicity, disruption, reclaiming self.
Translation: You’re not cursed, you’re clinging. Drop it like a hot potato.
ii. Illus-traits
A quick glance at The Devil’s symbolic traits in the Rider-Waite-Smith deck. What’s seductive, shadowy, or silently running the show while you pretend everything’s fine?
Chains Around the Necks – Voluntary bondage. They’re loose enough to slip off, but comfort makes a convincing captor. What are you still wearing that you outgrew five versions of yourself ago?
Inverted Pentagram – Spirit overthrown by matter. This is imbalance over evil. When survival hijacks sovereignty, the soul gets sidelined. Where have your values been flipped without your consent?
The Devil’s Gaze – Unblinking and smug. This is the part of you that dares you to flinch. The shadow is trying to get your attention, not destroy you. Are you brave enough to look back?
The Torch Pointed Downward – Illumination aimed at basic instincts. This is about asking who’s holding the torch and what they’re burning for. Are you led by fear or fuelled by truth?
The Square Pedestal – A false foundation. All form, no freedom. You might be building your identity on something you don’t even believe in anymore. Time for a structural integrity check.
The Tails (Grapes and Flames) – Overindulgence and rage. One drinks, one burns, either way, it’s about feeding something insatiable. What are your habits really hungry for?
iii. Influences
Planetary:
The Devil is ruled by Saturn notoriously known as the planet of limits, rules, consequences, and “I told you so.” Saturn doesn’t do shortcuts. It’s the cosmic bouncer at the club of your illusions, asking if your coping mechanisms are on the guest list again. Saturn’s influence here is sobering: where are you over-attached, and at what cost? This is about accountability, discipline and responsibility. The Devil asks: are you still chained because it’s familiar, or because you’re afraid of what freedom would actually demand?
Natal House(s):
The Devil resonates with the Tenth House (MC) of career, status, public image, and what props up your identity. This is the “what are you known for?” house, and when filtered through The Devil, it begs the question: have you become trapped in the version of yourself that works but doesn’t feel like you anymore? Its opposite, the Fourth House (IC) and is the literal home for the whats and whys that root your ambition. Are your choices supporting your inner freedom, or are they just masking your issues with busyness?
Astrological Sign(s):
The Devil is often linked to Capricorn because it’s the ambitious climber, the long-haul strategist, and the quietly terrified perfectionist (like, but different to Virgo). Capricorn builds empires… but it can also build prisons out of expectations. On the other side of the zodiac, Cancer holds the key to vulnerability, nourishment, and emotional truth. If Capricorn says, “keep climbing,” The Devil card interrupts with, “sure, but why and who’s cracking the whip?” The real ascent starts when you stop calling your chains a personality.
Numerologically:
The Devil is card 15, or reduced to 6; the number of choice, harmony, martyrdom, reciprocation and course correction. Fifteen brings a little razzle-dazzle with its temptation and charisma. But Six is the quiet morning-after voice asking, “So… was that really it?” The combo says: you’re not doomed, you’re just due for an honest check. What looks like bondage may be unexamined choice. Cue internal mic drop.
Element – Earth:
The Devil is grounded in Earth, but this is Earth with a mortgage, a to-do list, and a closet full of emotional debt. Earth here represents form, habit, and the stuff we cling to when the void feels a bit too voidy. Earth provides a solution: embodiment; embrace your body, breath, and awareness. Earth invites you to reflect: what does it mean to reconnect with yourself?
iv. A Day in the Life of the Devil
Well That Escalated Quickly
You’ve outsourced your power to something that promised comfort but now feels like a velvet-lined trap. You’re numbing with Netflix, doom-scrolling, or stuck in an all-you-can-eat guilt buffet. You say you’re “just being realistic,” but really you’re negotiating with your own inner saboteur. You flip between indulgence and shame like a possessed ceiling fan, spiralling but going nowhere. You mistake obsession for passion and control for safety, and somewhere along the way, you forgot how to tell the difference between what you want and what you’ve been conditioned to crave.
Adjusting the Knobs
You’re starting to notice the bait. You catch yourself mid-compulsion; hovering over the ‘buy now’ button, halfway through the third slice of resentment. You know the hit is temporary, but it’s something. You’re wrestling with the realisation that maybe it’s not the thing that has power, it’s the grip you give it. You’re starting to clock the contracts you’ve made, spoken and unspoken, and wondering which ones were ever yours to begin with. You’re aware you’re shackled and that awareness is a crack in the exit door.
Unsubscribed from Self-Sabotage
You’re unplugging from the Matrix, one delusion at a time. The shadows still show up, but now you see them as messengers, not monsters. You recognise projection when it shows its face and don’t immediately hand over the steering wheel. You know that temptation isn’t the enemy; it’s the unconscious why behind it that matters. You're starting to choose what feels true, not just what feels familiar. You’re reclaiming agency like a badass with bolt cutters.
Writing the TED Talk
You’ve remembered: the chains were optional. You’re moving through life with full consent. You’ve befriended your inner trickster, stopped outsourcing your worth, and no longer need your demons to feel alive. You don’t fear the shadow, you dialogue with it. You enjoy pleasure without losing yourself. You’re not enslaved by desire; you’re in a conscious relationship with it. You’re no longer trying to escape the cage; you’re redesigning it or walking out entirely.
v. Working with these Energies
Living The Devil with Integrity and a Bit of Liberation
This archetype reflects a choice to remain trapped. The Devil reveals unnoticed commitments, showing how comfort is mistaken for control and identity for safety. It obscures your power with desire and fear. Engaging with this card involves questioning where you invest your energy and why. It’s about embracing your darker side, understanding its needs, and deciding how to manage it. This card is not meant to punish you, it’s here to help you notice - and that noticing is the beginning of unhooking.
Track the traps
– What do you say you’ve outgrown, but still reach for when you’re stressed, bored, or lonely?
– Who or what are you blaming for your stuckness, honestly, what’s the payoff?
– What “little habits” feel comforting but quietly corrode your freedom?Examine the contracts
– Where did you agree to be less than you are, just to belong or survive?
– What roles do you perform out of guilt, fear, or autopilot?
– Can you tell the difference between a desire that feeds you… and one that feeds on you?Reclaim your agency
– Where have you mistaken coping for identity?
– What would it mean to feel an emotion all the way through instead of sedating it?
– Where are you saying “I can’t” when you really mean “I’m afraid to”?Choose conscious desire
– What pleasure actually nourishes you and what just knocks the edge off?
– Where are you still hustling for love, validation, or worthiness you already possess?
– How can you want something without needing it to own you?Redesign the cage
– Which of your limits are real and which are inherited, outdated, or optional?
– What might freedom look like if it wasn’t performative or destructive?
– What small act today would remind you: You are not your shame. You are not your mask.
vi. Building Skills
Undo the Devil’s Deal: A Reversal Ritual for Default Reactions
The Devil loves a familiar script. You get triggered, you react the same old way, and boom, you’re back in that velvet-lined cage. This exercise interrupts the loop. It’s about doing the conscious opposite of your unconscious urge, not because you’re being fake, but because freedom takes practice. So being kind to yourself is essential here.
Step 1: Name the trap
Think of a recent moment that someone kicked your achilles heel. Maybe someone ignored your boundary, or a comment sent you spiraling. Write down what happened, and more importantly, how it felt. No need to be poetic. “Furious and five seconds of dramatic texting” works just fine.
Step 2: Spot the reflex
What did that moment make you want to do? Shut down? Ghost? Numb out? Rage-clean? Be honest, this is your Devil in action.
Step 3: Flip the script
Now imagine doing the psychological equivalent of walking out the side door of Hell. What’s a small, self-honoring opposite action? Instead of shutting down, could you name the feeling? Instead of scrolling into oblivion, could you go for a walk, call a friend, or… sit with the discomfort?
Step 4: Make it awkward on purpose
Next time a similar moment arises, try the opposite move. It's not about being perfect, but about trying new things. It may feel awkward, which is a sign you're stepping out of your comfort zone.
Step 5: Debrief with compassion
Record what happened. Did it change the outcome? How did it feel to make a conscious choice instead of a compulsive one? If it didn’t go well, congratulations, you’re work in progress. Keep noticing. Keep choosing. Every time you pause instead of obey, you’re loosening the chain. That’s how the Devil loses its grip; not through denial, but through daring to choose differently.
vii. Embodiment
Alchemy is an Exorcism in Slow Motion
The Devil seduces you with non subtle shortcuts and hits you with all-or-nothing urges, persuading you that comfort is control. But here’s the quiet rebellion: turn now toward your compulsions with curiosity instead of shame. True alchemy under The Devil is about inhabiting your body so fully that the chains fall off on their own. Here’s how to start:
Smell:
What does freedom smell like? Not the fake-fresh of a scented candle, but the real stuff, smoke on denim, asphalt after rain, your own skin after a long walk. Something raw, unfiltered and ALIVE! The Devil wants performance. This is about presence.
Body:
Where are you tensing, numbing, clenching to stay in control? Is your jaw locked from biting your tongue too often? Shoulders stiff from carrying what isn’t yours? The Devil thrives in disconnection. Undo the spell: unclench your fists, stretch what’s tight, breathe into what’s braced. You’re not a machine. You’re a system of signals. Listen.
Soundtrack:
What song makes you feel like yourself? Pick something gritty and honest. Something that lets you feel pleasure and pain without needing to sort either.
Action:
What’s one compulsion you can interrupt? That scroll, that snap, that snack, what’s underneath it? Can you pause before acting and ask, “What am I actually needing right now?” The Devil thrives on automation and experiential avoidance. You’re here to reclaim intention.
Nature cue:
Find something that exists on its own terms. A wild vine growing through concrete. A crow cawing from a power line. A tree twisted but still standing. The natural world adapts, survives, and stays connected to itself. Be like that.
Notice what breaks the spell:
The Devil wants you to forget you have a choice. Please read that again. Where are you stuck in “this is just how I am”? Where could you loosen the grip without losing the edge? Alchemy here is self-intimacy, not self-denial. You don’t have to be perfect. You just have to stop pretending the cage is locked.
viii. Your Impressions
Take a good look at The Devil in your deck. This is the trickster in a tailored suit, the master illusionist seducing you with the sweet nothings you mistake for truths.
Where does your eye go first? The chains? The devilish grin? The upside-down pentagram? Maybe the lurking shadows or the way the figures seem stuck but comfortable? Notice what grabs you; the fear, the fascination, or maybe that guilty little recognition that some part of this setup feels too familiar.
Check in with your body. Is your chest tight? Your gut churning? Maybe there’s a prickly mix of thrill and resistance, like you’re both tempted and terrified to look closer. That tension is where the real story lives. If The Devil could speak, it would smirk and say, “You’re not really trapped, you’re just forgetful.” It calls you to remember where you handed over your power, where you signed contracts you didn’t read, and which chains are yours to break if you dare.
If this card shows up near The Lovers, put your coffee down. It’s a reminder that desire and devotion aren’t opposites; they’re tangled. What bindings are you mistaking for love? What shadows are masquerading as safety? Notice how this card is a sly mixed-bag teacher that’s annoying and unsettling, but ultimately here to free you from the stories that no longer serve.
ix. Intuitive Meaning
Explore what The Devil means to you as a lived experience. Reflect on moments when you saw the mask slip, both your and someone else’s. This energy reveals what fear hides, the patterns you follow on autopilot, the pleasures that numb instead of nourish, and the illusions that pass for freedom. This is about naming your chains before you can choose to unfasten them.
When have you surprised yourself by noticing the trap before you walked into it?
Where are you still trying to control what you fear, instead of understanding it?
What would it look like to stop running from your desires and start reclaiming them?
Applied insight with a three-card reading using The Devil as your anchor:
Where am I still chained by fear or habit?
What illusions am I ready to see through?
What part of me is begging for liberation, not just relief?
Pull or shuffle-fling your cards. Let the spread reveal the attachments hiding in plain sight, the stories you’re still obeying, and the power you’re ready to call back. Remember: The Devil is about shameless choice. You’re not doomed to repeat old patterns. You’re being invited to break them with your eyes wide open.
Write your own Keywords
Write three words that echo your lived experience of The Devil card:
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x. Closing Reflection: Track Your Evolving Lens
Your relationship with each card will grow over time because it’s meant to shaped by your life. Consider the prompts below to revisit and reflect.
What I thought this card meant when I first pulled it: —————————————————
A recent experience that changed how I see it: —————————————————
How I feel about it now, in my body or life: —————————————————
What surprised me as this card kept showing up: —————————————————
One way this card is living in my life right now: —————————————————
If this card visited me today as a guide, what would it want me to remember? —————————————————
Revisit these after a week, a moon phase, or a meaningful moment. Let the card evolve as you do.
If you feel a quiet sense of recognition, curiosity and want to explore it, browse the sessions page for what feels right.