Upright the Ten of Wands is read as burden, overcommitment and the strain of carrying more than is comfortable, though the goal is close; reversed, as delegation, laying the burden down, or the burnout that follows carrying too much for too long.
Older cartomancy read a bare ten of wands as the fire suit's number brought to its fullest extent, for better or worse depending on the surrounding cards, without the specifically self-inflicted overload Smith's picture supplies; her figure carries the wands by choice, having gathered every one himself, a detail that shifts the reading from external hardship toward a burden the querent has at least partly taken on willingly.
Waite's own printed meaning, an oppressive and unjust load, though also a certain success attending on the effort, keeps the paradox central: the goal is real, and the cost is real, and neither cancels the other, a balance current practice generally keeps as well.
The Golden Dawn and Crowley's shared title, Oppression, gives the card a harder edge than the effort-rewarded reading sometimes implies, closer to a warning than to an affirmation, and the reversed card's suggestion of delegation is comparatively recent, following twentieth-century practice's general interest in naming healthier alternatives that the picture itself does not show, since Smith's figure has no one nearby to hand a staff to.