The Story of You

The Major Arcana tells the story of the fool's journey to spiritual and self awareness. Each of the twenty one cards in the major arcana correspond to an energetic signature which then corresponds to a phase in life, a relationship, people you may encounter on the path, or a specific scenario. Whether a person, a place, a state of mind, or an entire chapter of life lasting years, each card represents one of twenty one critical steps that all souls must encounter on the life path as they journey towards understanding the nature of who they are as spiritual, emotional, and physical beings on the material plane. To understand each step is to understand your self. By the end of the journey, the fool is a fool no longer, and has gained mastery over self. And yet, in reincarnation, is ready to tempoerarily relinquish this learned knowledge to undergo another transformation, en route to a higher, deeper, and purer sense.

You start as The Fool (0), a seed of infinite potential. A person at the beginning of your journey who is young naive and innocent. You know nothing of what will become of your life, and yet, you contain everything you need already, guided by God or gods and angels, ancestors, spirits, and forces of light. Of course, the opposite forces may exist and exert their presence as well, but that is for you to discover and navigate for yourself. At the precipice, you could step in any direction. This is a quantum superstate of endless potentiality. You are eager to spread your wings and fly. The balanced fool has no fear, but the unbalanced fool may have anxiety around initiating the journey, or what the path ahead may hold.

You step confidently into life and become the Magician (1) endowed with the gifts of the creator, with access to all four of the elements, earth, air, water, and fire: physical prowess, mental acuity, emotional capacity, and dynamic inspiration and drive. This is your spirit-given right to creation, to create the life you deserve, the life you want, the life that will teach you, and the life that will serve you best. The power is in your hands to create, or conversely, neglect, or destroy.

Next you encounter the element of mystery, The High Priestess (2) - the divine, the esoteric, the void. What's behind the veil. The first sense of death. Mystery calls to you. The unanswered questions that tantalize your sense of wonder, fate, destiny...what is the true meaning? What's behind the curtain? The first real question you have ever asked. She represents something you know or feel is true but cannot yet, and may never, prove, a desire for something that is ultimately unattainable in a concrete way, at least at this time on the journey. You are Seeker. Peek into cosmic consciousness. The abyss. You try not to let it scare you, but it does. The first conception of destiny, faith, free will, energy, death, transformation, synchronicity, tantra, astronomy and astrology, dimensions, the things that make the nature of our reality that we can't, and may never see or be able to truly Name. You want to know, but the time is not now.

The Empress (3) is the element of divine feminine incarnate, the earth, all things natural, your mother, recalling her in all of her feminine wisdom and glory, her ability to nurture and strengthem, to create. To give you want you need to thrive. She allows you to take from her. And you take. She is yin. Through her, you learn for yourself how to give. A role model of femininity - or conversely, a role model showing you how not to be feminine. The number 3 symbolies the two producing a third, the first taste of Union and Creation, the true essence of the feminine.

The Emperor (4) is the element of divine masculine. Your father. All things regimented, structured, disciplined, logical, and organized. Maturity and responsibility that you yourself must grow into. The role model that shows you how to get shit done, and beats you when you don't and take the easy way out. He takes you to the top of the empire state building so that you may see the world from that height, but only in your father's arms. He is severe, strategic, powerful, rational, analytical, and a leader. Depending on your experiences of father and this archetype, he can be a positive and supportive or a negative and controlling influence in development. Then it is your turn.

You step away from your parents and learn from The Hierophant (5), teachers who don't know you, but who know the world. Perhaps these teachers have been indoctrinated by systems conventional or radical, local or global and exotic. They are your guides and advisors who begin to encourage you to see how you can guide and advise yourself. The mentor and the mirror, offering you real choices in the question of Who Am I? Your first understanding that everyone starts as a student and has the capacity to grow into a teacher. Will you follow the conventional dogmas as an assistant to the Emperor, or be a radical disciple of the ways of The High Priestess?There are many teachers on the path, within and outside of the classroom, that come in many shapes, sizes, and forms. Keep your eyes open.

Then comes your first understanding of love with another. Your parents don't count. Your first love. You come to understand the concept of The Lovers (6) and carnal union, blessed by the skies. The first person outside of your family who understands you, or who makes you want to understand them. You see yourself as part of Time, a half to a whole that's better than yourself. The possibility of co-creation and co-habitation blooms in your heart when you think of them. This is your introduction to love and cohabitation, and the idea of harmony and partnership – or conversely, disharmony, fears around partnerships, traumas around loving who you want to love, or allowing yourself to receive love. Could there be someone out there for you? You meet them. Maybe you don't get them, then, but you meet them. You form the ideal.

And now, you have a goal. Perhaps you clearly see the way to get there. You ride The Chariot (7) of your ambition. Maybe it's to impress your love. Maybe it's to impress your parents or your mentor. Maybe its to satisfy an undying cuiriosity and wish in yourself, what can you do with this life? You have the tools of the magician, you've tasted some of the world for yourself, and now you are ready to take the reins, charge forward, and commit to a path. Dedicate yourself to a mission. Devote yourself to a future that requires hours and hours, years of building. You'll do it. Press on.

You hit the road blocks. Strength (8) is required. Suddenly you have come up against an obstacle - a roaring dragon, a vicious enemy, someone who wants to knock you down, side swipe you, make you small, or eat you alive and destroy you all together. A voice that gets inside your head that says "Maybe this is not the way. Maybe I can't do it." Something that shakes your foundations thus far, makes you reflect and question the choices and moments of the past, 8 a karmic number, as above so below. Strength can takes years to build, obstacle afyer obstacle, to test your resolve. Will you give up so easily? How much do you trust your self? It's up to you not to let this monster get the better of you, though it may a few times before you learn the lesson. Every time you fail, you must repeat the previous steps and start over, until you have made it past this point.

Perhaps the chariot you ride and the strength you have cultivated will take you away from the people and places you know and love, lead you off the path you thought you'd walk, and the strength required is actually the strength not to fall apart and lose yourself completely. Have you lost sight of the path? Maybe the world has decimated the very glue that you thought would hold you together forever. Maybe the world has showed you that now is not your time, that these are not your people. So you must go away and within. Away and within. Whether you become the ascetic in the mountain or The Hermit (9) in your home, never leaving for years except groceries, air, sunlight, the necessities, you take what you have learned and survive off of it like it's bread. Pared down to the bare minimum, learning to sit quiet with the monsters you have grown, learning to listen to the guides, your angels, your true self. The only thing you need to keep you alive is your own soul, your own mind, and your own memories. You learn that you don't need your parents, or your mentor, or your lover, or your enemy, in order to define yourself.

You emerge from the isolation with the turning force of destiny. The very cosmos trembles with potential. You step into the world like a fool steps into the street without looking both ways – who will you meet on the path today? Where will they point you? What will they tell you? What will the Wheel of Fortune (10) bring? A reset and a resurgence. Encounters beyond your control shape the path. You must learn to let the wheel turn, the tides come in and out, the wind blow. You have reached the second level of reality, crossed into the double digit numbers on the cards. Accept accidents. Accept chance encounters. Stay open to possibility that you could never have imagined, or to the potential of your original or newfound dreams. New friends. Divine messages. Opportunities abound. Redirect. Allow the winds of change to guide you while keeping you North Star in sight. Sometimes the path is winding, the river full of rapids and bends.

Next, a chance for reconciliation. The master number, 11. Remember what you've done before. Did you wrong your lover? Did you help your mother? What did you do in the past that has brought you to where you are now? In past lives, and in present life. Karma comes back around to remind you and hone you into the truest essence of you. Justice (11) weighs her scales. A blast from the past, be it a person, a choice, an action, a memory, a talent, a mistake, a gift, something comes to bloom now that you might not have expected, but definitely should have seen coming because it could only ever be so.

And now with the new situation that your past actions or someone else's past actions have created, you are at a crossroads. In or out. Up or down. Forward or back. Suspended upside down to view the options, you are The Hanged Man (12), somehow relaxed in your suspension. After considering from every point of view, meditating with the learned powers of The Hermit, gleaning insight from others, weighing the options, back out and start over or keep going with the confidence to proceed. The choice. The choice weighs heavy. Decision is necessary. Take time to make the right choice, but know that indecision will fester you, burn the bridges, and drop you on your head.

Let the old road die. The choice is not easy. But only one path can be taken. And the path that's chosen, whether it's the obvious choice or not, will require a sacrifice. A greater one than you thought you might have ever been required to make. It might not even be a choice, but an inevitability of time, a ticking bomb, a quiverring arrow in a tightened bow. Perhaps its only a small Death (13), a more important one with a funeral, or a grand death that stops all of time, and yet the majority of the world spins on, not noticing. Don't worry, though. Your world will keep turning in 60 more seconds. The repercussions of this choice will ripple out, remembering you. You will remember it, for years.

The time to grieve, to mourn, to heal. Heal yourself. Your heart. Your body, mind, soul. The world. put yourself into recovery and relearn your own languages. Say your sorries. Others will say they're sorry too. You get the opportunity now to become an alchemist, learning to combine the disparate parts of self, soul and world. The pain with the beauty, the creation with destruction, the great change. Where there is black there will always be white. Where there is up there will always down. The dialectic is law. Can you combine the love of your life with the desire to be seen? Can you balance your health with your self hatred? Can you honor your family, your past, and still work towards your aspirations and your future? Reciprocation. Thesis, antithesis, synthesis; this is the dialectic, this is alchemy. And in the alchemy, you relearn your own strength. Temperance (14).

Even in the face of harmonizing self, The Devil (15) will continue to rage. They come to test your purity, like a diamong in flame. The demons claw you one by one. Temptation. Desire. Weakness. Material Greed. Destruction of the mind, the body, the soul, the self. Forces of confinement will tempt you. You may fall back into your own habits, your own past. Try not to look away. When you look away is when the demons cuff you. You may want to. Temptation. Keep looking. Stare yourself in the eye. Over and over again, you must learn to set yourself free. Learn to be resilient to flame. You become the coal in the fire, under pressure, transforming diamond. If you can withstand it, you will emerge a free being. Face the enemy, within or without.

Because of the nature of the world, like a test, in setting yourself free you must again face another death. When The Tower (16) is built, it will surely always fall, crumble, be toppled, someday. There is no left without right. You can't walk two paths at once. These are the laws of Earth as we know it. Let it crumble. If you cling to the structure under fire, you will crumble with it, be leveled, crushed, and harmed. Allow the crumbling, knowing it is for a higher purpose, a greater good, what you developed , worked for, or clutched dearly, cannot stay in good faith. Let the body burn. Let the building fall into disrepair. Let the tower fall. Face the fire with the diligence you have cultivated, trusting that the destruction is making way for the right thing. An old thing or a new thing, it is the only thing. It may hurt, but that's the truth. Earthquakes, winds, and floods will try to shake you. They'll strip away everything that cannot stay. You will remain.

Invite yourself, among the chaos, to find your inner peace. In the calmness of the new void, look up. Have a glass of wine while Rome burns. While the world around you may be decimated or have already disappeared to a charred crisp of its former recognition, there is fresh earth being fertilized. Gaze at the sky and find The Star (17) so high and far removed from it all. Untouched and untouchable. A serene light. That is you, too. Go within. Or without. Up up and away to that star, your North Star, that kisses your cheek and strokes your hair whether you see it or not, whether you feel it or not. All is better than you think it is from the star's perspective. The earth, thought it is but a tiny blue dot floating in a vast void of energy and matter, , is also a dynamic and molten core of a being, a unique entity with a churning heart that puts out a magnetic field, the being within the being that we live on. Unique and unlike anything else, it is the gretest gift. You are it. It is you. And you are more blessed than you know to be alive and breathing at all with a chance to learn to walk in Earth school. Find your silver lining, no matter how thin. It's still thicker than blood.

In the silver lining, while the star kisses your cheek and the world keeps on turning further and further into chaos, the light of The Moon (18) wanes, darkens, and grows bright again, a forever cycle shaped by the dance of the earth and the sun. Recall the high priestess. The empress. The divine femmes that withheld themselves and gave themselves away to you. Now that they have given their all through the experiences of life, you have taken all of them away. In the darkness of the new moon, you must wait. Analyze the fears that come up from stillness. The dark night of the soul. Confusion demons may tempt you. Illusions may chase you in fevered dreams. Sit in stillness. Receive it all. Be a tape recorder of the ether. The moon will grow large and bright again, forever shifting through her ways.

Always The Sun (19) rises again, chasing out the darkness with life-giving light, and suddenly you have found yourself an old man in the bright of day, it's all so clearly visible now. In an old man's body. In the body of an adult unlike the body of the child you once were, and yet undeniably same. You can see now all that has transpired. You can join the celestial bodies from their view and look back down upon the earth turning, upon your puny life and the monumental events that marked the ant's procession across the dirt. You are alive. And you have a life. And you have lived. Old or not, withered or strong, you may move freely in all directions now, with clarity and lived and earned experience, you have health, energy, and power. Blessed with clear seeing, energy, and vitality, you have learned. After all of that, all is well. A sunrise over a glass ocean.

Recall what has gone about. Reconcile the bad with the good, the good with the bad. Life in review. Embody Judgment (20) and see your life clearly for what it is. Did it all even out, in the end? If it's not even, know that it's not the end. There will be more evening out, a repeat of the cycle, until all has been justified to an equal field. If the scales are balanced, rest. Either way, relieve yourself of duty. Wash yourself clean of the sins of this life and prepare for departure to the next level. Fasten your seat belt. A new life, a new view, awaits you.

From way up here, you can see, now, that you did it. You lived a life in The World (21). You struggled the turmoil and discovered the healing, reaped the reckoning and left it all behind. You rose to to highest heights and fell in plummet to the depths of the fallen. And maybe you rose and fell and rose and fell again and rose again, the phoenix. Flowers go on with their lives, blooming in the springs and summers, dying off in the summers and falls. All seasons bear their fruit. The earth is barren in the winter on the surface, but underground the seeds live on, waiting. This is also you. Waiting. Planted again. And waiting to bloom. You an access the peace of the cylce, the relief of a great world that is always connected, no matter how alone you may feel in your human delusion. All, really, is, well. You've gone the circle now, from infant to crone, you've climbed the jacob's ladder back to the very place you started. Folded over on itself in a dimensional trick, where even with every step forward, you still are journeying back to the very precipice you started from. What have you learned? Now learn it all again, but better. Apply. Make. Do. Be. Love. Lose. Learn. Listen. And retrieve. We believe in you. You are loved.

*** Note: The steps, segments, and the complete cycle of the major arcana may be repeated several times in a single life. It all depends on your soul, your choices, the hand of fate you're dealt, your journey. Life is what you make of it. The more conscious you are, the more you can learn and extract from each step. It often takes us years and years, or even lifetimes to recognize the steps for what they are, to complete the cycle “perfectly” and to release all karma accrued from hundreds or even thousands of lives lived, to get off the buddhist wheel of samsara and remain in the angelic realms, or, once having mastered self and the steps, to return to the earth plane with the intention of helping others as a bodhisattva.