Jan 26 | 2023 — The Fool
Today’s card is The Fool — the starting card in modern Tarot. The card that represents each of us in The Fool’s Journey — our personal path to enlightenment. I don’t really like to describe it as a journey to enlightenment (it sounds a little “woo woo”), as it is really more the story of our lives. The Fool “experiences” each of the major life events as depicted in the Major Arcana, essentially “growing up” physically, emotionally, and spiritually.
Traditionally, The Fool is a card of adventure and new beginnings. It shows someone who is eager to begin their story, unconcerned by the risks and warnings, just excited about the prospect of something new and un-experienced (that’s why The Fool is almost always illustrated as someone about to step off a cliff).
As this is yet another card in the Major Arcana, The Fool is a big deal. It represents BIG life events, not the little day-to-day type adventures, like the adventure you may find yourself in if you decide to have Taco Bell or Chipotle for lunch.
Message of the Day: The Fool is one of those cards that seems like it can pretty much always be a good thing. I did a reading for my son before he started 4th grade to help him calm his nerves a bit. The card that was drawn to represent him: The Fool — the start of a big adventure of learning. He was VERY excited by that prospect. But behind The Fool, looming in the distance is a tall, jagged mountain range — traditionally indicating challenges. The adventure is not a day-trip to the zoo, but a journey over time that comes with its own difficulties.
If you think about Fool moments in your life, they’re pretty easy to spot: leaving home; coming out; starting college; first serious relationship; having a kid; the death of a family member. They are monumental points in your life that required adaptation, change, and learning. Exciting, yes. Scary, absolutely.
Personally, adopting our son, now 10, was definitely one of my Fool moments. Growing up gay, I never thought I’d be married much less have a kid. And here we are: celebrating our 10th year of marriage this year and 8th year of adopting our son. We adopted our son through foster care, which meant basically a year and a half of court proceedings and challenges from interested parties. At that point in my life, it was easily the hardest thing I’d ever gone through — emotionally at least. We definitely went into things unconcerned by the risks, and we were elated on adoption day when all our hard work was rewarded.
And still, this journey continues. The mountains seem steeper now that he’s 10, a lot more pointy, but we’re also able to share and celebrate the joys and successes WITH him as he now understands and is beginning to recognize what hard work means and identify what these situations mean to him.
These Fool moments are big, certainly, but as we get older and stuck in the everyday routine of life, we sometimes pass on the opportunities that could become a Fool moment simply because we lack the energy or fortitude to handle it. Adding one more thing to our plate… sounds really dreadful sometimes. Often we aren’t given the choice of Fool moments, but sometimes we are. Learning Tarot for me has definitely been a Fool moment because it is having a monumental impact on who I am as a person.
If you had the ability to live your life carefree and without worry, what would you do? What would you invest your time in? A hobby? Volunteer work? A new health and exercise routine? New career path? Finishing the remaining seasons of Grey’s Anatomy? The Fool challenges us to open ourselves to the possibilities of starting something new and finding the joy and excitement that comes with it. The Fool naturally steps into The Magician, the Master Creator; so maybe it’s time for you to be fearless and step off that ledge to start something new.
Decks shown above:
