Recognizing our strengths
If you see someone as Strength or see someone as 9 of Wands - what's the difference?
The
9/Wands has a "close to the end" feeling about it. An idea of, as you say, stamina--which is as much energy as "strength"--or calling up hidden reserves to face down a final attack or assault. This is the last step; however tired or weary or at the-end-of-your-rope you are, you dredge up this last bit of fiery energy to succeed. If you see someone this way, then you see them as someone you can count on when the chips are down, when no one else will come to your rescue.
Strength, however, isn't about when you find your strength or under what circumstances you discover that stamina. Strength is about recognizing what your strengths are. In some decks the card is called "Power." And what the image of maiden and lion shows is that your strengths (your superpowers if you like) may be things like patience or gentleness as much as they could be roaring vitality. If you see someone this way, then you've met someone who really knows themselves. You can trust them when they say, "I can handle this," because they know their strengths. And they also know their weaknesses and how to mitigate those.
Putting it another way, I'd say that the 9/Wands, like most minors that echo a major, is a "subset" of Strength. There are other cards that can indicate being strong in a certain situation--like say 8/Cups and having the strength to walk away. Put them all together, and you get the Strength card, the Major that isn't about a moment in time or what kind of strength you need to succeed, but about all the different types of strengths you have in you and recognizing them. This is not an easy thing to do as society will sometimes label certain strengths as weaknesses and vice versa. We can't use what we don't recognize or what we mislabel or misunderstand. The Strength card assures us that we do recognize and are rightly labeling our strengths.
Yes?