Upright the Seven of Wands is read as standing one's ground, determination and the defense of a position or belief under pressure; reversed, as being overwhelmed, giving up the advantage, or exhaustion from a defense that has gone on too long to sustain.
The figure's higher ground is usually treated as the card's central interpretive fact: he is not equally matched with his six opponents, he holds an advantage, and the card is accordingly read less as a warning of danger than as an affirmation that the querent's position, however contested, is stronger than it currently feels. Readers commonly distinguish this from the Nine of Wands specifically on that basis, an advantage still held here, against damage already absorbed there.
Waite's own printed meaning, a valuable and successful engagement, superiority in a contest, is closer to outright victory than the more effortful, ongoing defense most contemporary readers now describe; the shift toward reading the card as a continuing struggle rather than a settled success reflects, once again, a general drift toward reading the picture's visible strain over the printed keyword's more triumphant tone.
Reversed, the loss of the high ground is usually read less as defeat outright than as a warning that the position can no longer be held on the current terms, an invitation to retreat, regroup or renegotiate rather than simply to keep pushing against six staves at once.