This episode of Root Lock Radio delves into the first leg of the Fool's Journey within the Major Arcana of the tarot, exploring the numerological and symbolic meanings of cards zero through seven, and demonstrating how to apply these archetypal concepts to a practical tarot reading.
Mind Map
Click to expand
Click to explore the full interactive mind map • Zoom, pan, and navigate
you're listening to root lock radio [Music]
[Music]
hello and welcome to rootlock radio a
podcast for uncloaking
learning and exploring the tarot cards
my name is weston i live in new york
city and i'm your host
the purpose of root lock radio is to
help people learn how to use the tarot
so if you're new to tarot you might want
to start with episode one
if you're not new to tarot you can
probably start wherever you like
just keep in mind that each episode
builds on the conversation that happened
in the previous episode
in the last episode we explored the
concept of balance in the tarot
specifically the balance of gender
in the major arcana and the balance of
the elemental energies
in the minor arcana today we're going to
delve into the major arcana
and explore the cards of the first leg
of the fool's journey
in depth we'll also introduce a new
spread and talk about how to
translate the meanings of the cards from
the fool's journey
into an actual tarot reading because
today's show
involves so much detailed information
i'm going to type up some show notes and
put them on the rootlock tarot website
you can find those at reallocktaro.com
podcast i've also added some notes for
the previous episodes including some
pictures so feel free to explore those too
too
that said thank you so much for
listening and i hope you enjoy this episode
episode
by now you're well aware of the fact
that there are two different types of
cards in the tarot deck
the major arcana and the minor arcana
within the context of a tarot reading
the major arcana is usually said to
represent more
archetypal types of experiences while
the minor arcana cards represent more
what people say are mundane experiences
now the word mundane is a little bit
troublesome to me because it sort of suggests
suggests
that the minor arcana cards are somehow
less important
than the major arcana cards and i just
don't think this is true
the difference to me is that the major
arcana cards represent
big archetypal experiences the kind of
turning points in your life that you'll
always remember whereas the minor arcana
cards represent the day-to-day experiences
experiences
the stuff that actually makes up our
life as we live it and that's pretty
important too so when you're drawing
cards in a tarot reading
and you get major arcana cards think to
yourself this means a turning point
something big when you get minor arcana
cards this means i need to focus more on
the day-to-day stuff
i need to focus on the way i'm living my
life in the actual day-to-day moments
now in episode 2 we talked about the two
different types of balance that the
tarot emphasizes
in its philosophy the first had to do
with the major arcana and that was the balance
balance
of masculine and feminine energy that
ultimately leads to the enlightenment
that we find in the world card at the
end of the major arcana in the minor
arcana we focused on the four
elemental energies that we find in the
suits namely
fire in wands water in the suit of cups
air in the suit of swords and earth in
the suit of pentacles
so the difference here is that in our
day-to-day lives we should be trying to
find a balance between what those four energies
energies
represent so while the major arcana kind
of represents this more
long-term vision of how to live an
enlightened life
the minor arcana represents more the short-term
short-term
balance that you should achieve in order
to have a satisfying
day-to-day life in this episode we're
going to start delving
into the meanings of the cards in the
major arcana
so we're going to set the minor arcana
aside for the next three episodes
now i've introduced the idea of the
fool's journey
in the major arcana cards and the
concept is basically
that as you go from card 0 the fool
to card 21 the world you can see a
archetypal journey
through human life but this journey can
also be broken up into what i call
three legs the first leg is the magician
card one through the chariot card seven
and this represents life
from conception through adolescence the
second leg
is card eight strength through card 14
temperance and this represents adult
life and the third leg
is card 15 the devil through card 21 the world
world
and this represents end of life including
including
dying and death at each stage of life
there are different things that we focus on
on
when we are young and we are between
childhood and
adolescence we are focusing on
development and becoming the people that
we will be
in the world when we're adults we're
sort of refining our lives
and figuring out what's important to us
and what we want to emphasize
and then in the last leg of our life we
usually tend to reflect
back and figure out what it all means
and this is true of the three legs and
the tarot as well so let's go ahead and
get started
talking about the first leg of the
journey in the major arcana [Music]
one of the most important ways that the
tarot cards derive their meaning
is through numerology so as we go
through the first
stage of cards in the major arcana i'm
going to introduce some ideas about
numerology having to do with the numbers
0 through
seven if you're really interested in numerology
numerology
paul foster case's book the tarot
has a very in-depth explanation of
numerology and how it relates to the
tarot now that book is pretty in-depth
and fairly esoteric
so i don't really recommend it as a
beginner tarot book
but it does give quite good explanations
of numbers
on a number of different levels and so
you might want to take a look at that sometime
sometime
in your exploration of the tarot cards
so as we go through the first
eight cards of the major arcana i'm
going to introduce
the numerology that we have associated
with each card
what we see on the card itself and the
meaning that it has in the fool's journey
journey
and then we'll do a little exercise that
shows us how we might
translate the meanings of each of these
major arcana cards
into the context of a tarot reading so
the first
card as we've talked about before is the
fool and the fool is represented by the number
number
zero now the zero is kind of the absence of
of
everything the number zero means that
that nothing is there
nothing exists but on the contrary it
also represents
unlimited potential and freedom from all limitations
limitations
so it's sort of nothing and everything
all at once
and for this reason the number zero is
often also associated with the concepts of
of
god or the universe because god or the
universe is also sort of
everything and nothing at once you can't
find it anywhere specifically
but it's also permeating everything that exists
exists
in the world now if you look at the
figure the person
on the fool card he's very carefree he's
standing on a precipice which looks a
little bit
scary but he doesn't seem scared you can
tell he's on a journey because he has
this bundle
on a stick over his shoulder but he's
not burdened by his bundle
the sun is shining brightly the sky is
bright yellow which is a happy color
so what we get out of the fool is that
he doesn't really know
anything yet right he doesn't even know
to be scared
standing on a ledge in the mountains and
so the fool
is representing sort of all potential in
the fool's journey
the fool kind of represents a person who
hasn't even been conceived yet so all
that potential energy so when you think
of what you were before you were conceived
conceived
as a embryo what were you you were sort
of maybe
everything and nothing at once the
magician card
is represented by the number one and one
is associated with beginnings initiative
or the individual and when you look on
the card
we have a lot of fire energy we have the
color yellow the color
red some orange these are all fiery colors
colors
the figure of the magician is very erect
he's holding a wand
the sky behind him is yellow on the
table in front of him
he has a cup a wand a sword and a pentacle
pentacle
representing each of the elemental
energies and above his
head we see the infinity sign so
remember last time that we said that the magician
magician
represented sort of a conduit of energy
well we can see that in the infinity
sign we can see that in
his erect position the way he's holding
a wand to the sky
and pointing to the ground he is
channeling pure energy
we also see a lot of flowers in the card and
and
those may represent fertilization so
that's what the magician
represents along the fool's journey it's
the moment of fertilization
where the sperm meets the egg and the individual
individual
begins the individual suddenly starts to
exist out of nothing
and there's some very interesting things
about the idea of magic
having to do with conception when we
think about a sperm going into an egg
and that being the moment that an
individual starts to exist
it's almost impossible to really
understand and there's also
something called zinc sparks that happen
at this moment there's
sparks that fly from the egg that you
can see under a microscope which is
pretty magical
so the magician represents the moment of conception
conception
the high priestess is card number two
and two as a number
represents things like duplication and reflection
reflection
and receptivity we see a lot of water
energy in the card
we see the color blue which is
associated with water
and we see a body of water behind the
curtain we also see
moon imagery so we have the moon that is
in front of the high priestess and then
we also have a
full moon on her crown and the moon
is an interesting image because the moon
is actually a reflector of light so
while the sun is the creator of light
the moon reflects it back so this is
something to think about too
while the magician has a very sunlit
yellow background
the high priestess has this moon imagery
and here we have sort of
a meditative and receptive energy as
opposed to the active energy of the magician
magician
she's not an active figure so in the life
life
journey the high priestess represents
the time of gestation
when you're in the womb this is a time
when you're not moving
you're kind of stuck in one place but
it's very meditative
and comfortable and a lot of times when
we want to meditate
we seek out womb-like atmospheres we
seek out baths
in quiet places or we listen to things
like gongs which sounds
similar to the way the world sounds from
within the womb
so again the high priestess is the gestation
gestation
period now moving forward into cars
number three and four
we see how the feminine and masculine
energies in cards one and two
are translated into the role of
parenting so while the pure
feminine energy represented in the high priestess
priestess
is associated with water the parental
feminine energy which is represented in
the empress
is associated with earth and while the
pure masculine energy represented in the
magician card is associated with
fire the parental masculine energy that
we see in the emperor card
is associated with the element of air so card
card
three is the empress now the number
three in numerology is associated with
things like
development growth unfolding
multiplication and we see a lot of earth
energy in this card so you'll recall
from last time
that the element of earth is associated with
with
our home our bodies our work
our possessions our money all of the
things that keep us grounded
and comfortable and this is exactly the
role that our mother plays
early in our lives in the imagery of
this card
not only do we see a mother figure but
we also see
other earthy imagery we see the forest
in the garden
we see the cushions beneath her which
represent comfort we see
wheat growing right weed is associated
with reaping with
work with wealth so what we have here is
the mother of the
tarot deck and within the context of the
fool's journey
the empress represents the mothering moment
moment
of life so when we are first born we
first cling to our mothers her body
feeds us
she cares for us and keeps us warm and
she provides for us
when we are helpless and can't take care
of ourselves so in the archetypal journey
journey
the empress is the great mother and the
mother archetypally
is the person who you first rely on
when you come out of the womb card
number four is the emperor
and number four is associated with order
and structure and logic and wisdom
and stability one easy way to think
about this is to think about a square
which has four sides right it's a very
stable structure
and in the four card we have the air
energy of
wisdom we see mountains in his stone
throne and his armor and it gives a much
colder and much more airy energy than the
the
empress card and here we have the father archetype
archetype
archetypally fathers are for guidance
and discipline and support
so while our mother nurtures us our
father sort of
guides and disciplines and supports us
so in the journey
the idea is that once your mother has
sort of nurtured you to the point where
you can be a little bit more independent
your father steps in and starts to
discipline you
and teaches you the rules that exist
within the family
and the household and in a sense this
concept of disciplining and
indoctrinating is continued into card
five and i'd like to pause for a moment and
and
point out that often times within both
the major
and minor arcana when we look at a card
in the sequence
there is often a continuation or
a reaction against the card that comes
before it so in the instance of the
magician to the high priestess we see a reaction
reaction
against the high priestess is a
different opposite foil energy to the
energy that we see in the magician
but when we look at the high priestess
into the empress
it's more of a continuation the feminine
energy is
translated from this more pure feminine
to this parenting feminine and then when
we go from the empress
to the emperor we see another reaction
against we go from the nurturing
parenting energy
to the disciplining parenting energy and
then from card
four the emperor into card five the
hierophant we see
the evolution of the energy of
discipline and indoctrination
so it's a continuation sequence so the
number five
which is on the hirophant card is a
challenging number
it's a number of transformation and part
of this is because it's the middle
number between
1 and nine so you can kind of think of
it as a growing pains moment
the pain of growing from the first stage
to the second stage
five is also associated with meditation
and adaptation and process these are all
things that are kind of
difficult and even if they lead us to
good things there might be some pain in
the process
so the hierophant can also be called the
pope and
this card is associated with institutions
institutions
like school and church and the law the
figure we see is a priest
he is above the other figures on the
card we see some
air energy in the cold stone
around him but we also see some fire
energy in the colors of the card
remember fire is often associated with
things like religion
and spirituality so the hierophant card
usually represents these institutions
like our churches our schools and the
things in society that
dictate the way that we're supposed to
think and act and the number five remember
remember
is a difficult number of transition and
so we might
ask ourselves well do children really
like to go to school or like to go to
church and the answer is kind of no
right and the reason for that is that
they're losing some of their
freedom they're no longer able to just
kind of play and do what they want
they're starting to be told what to do
and that's what's represented in this
hero fan card the way that society
indoctrinates us
so while the emperor card is sort of the household
household
and the fatherly discipline the hirofan card
card
is the discipline that comes with
greater society and the institutions
of society so this card represents your
schooling years
in the journey now the next card is a
reaction against
this previous card and that card is the
lovers the lovers is the number six card
and number six is associated with
balance equilibrium
symmetry harmony but most of all beauty
six is the number of beauty so when we
look on this card we see sort of adam
and eve
figures with an angel presiding over
them we have the sun
shining with many rays which represents
pure happiness
and if you look at the landscape on the
card it looks very similar to the
landscape depicted on the ace of wands card
card
so we know that we have a wand's energy
a fire energy in this card
which we associate with things like
creativity and sexuality and in the journey
journey
this is sort of the moment of relief in adolescence
adolescence
through sexual expression so while our father
father
and our teacher and our priest have maybe
maybe
told us to be a certain way we have this
moment of breaking away from it when our
sexuality blossoms
so a lot of times teenagers really enjoy dating
dating
because it's such a freeing feeling and
it represents sort of their
own choice no one can really tell you
who to be attracted to
or who to fall in love with so it's sort
of regaining the individual
in this step of the journey and then the
number seven card is the chariot now the
number seven is associated with things like
like
safety and security and victory
and as we know seven is often considered
a very
lucky number people associate seven with
a very positive
feeling so when we look at the card the
chariot we see
a man or some kind of figure in a
chariot he's adorned and protected
and very confident he's holding the
magician's wand there
is a walled in city behind him again
representing protection and we kind of
get the idea that his
role is to protect this city so within
the context of the fool's journey
the chariot represents individual agency
the moment where you really break away
on your own
so this could be when you get your
driver's license
and it's sort of that idea that now
you're driving now you're finally in
charge in control you can decide where
to go
or it could be when you leave your
parents house and you're on your own for
the first time
so the end of this first leg of the
journey the journey that starts with conception
conception
is this moment of breaking away and
being on your own and being responsible
learning about the fool's journey and
the philosophy behind the major arcana
cards is one thing
but reading those cards within a tarot
reading is another and if you're
listening to this podcast chances are
you want to know how to do that so for
today's exercise we're going to do a
three card reading
using just the eight cards that we
talked about in the last segment so if
you have your deck with you
pull out those eight cards card zero the
fool through card seven the chariot and
mix them up as much as you can
it's kind of difficult to shuffle eight
cards but you wanna make sure that
they're mixed up
and not in order so what you're gonna do
is you're going to
try to think of a situation and you're
going to draw three cards
so it can be something that you need
some advice about a dilemma you're facing
facing
a choice you're having to make so draw
three cards and the first card
is going to be what to hold on to the
second card is what to let go of
and the third card is outcome so then
turn those over
and again if they're upside down put
them right side up so in my case for the
what to hold onto card i have the empress
empress
for the what to let go of card i have
the emperor and for the outcome card i
have the magician
so first of all i'm going to want to
look at this and just see if anything
intuitive happens
i see a lot of yellow and red in these
cards which remind me of sort of
fire energy so i think there might be
some action
each card has a person on it a single
person so there might be some sense of individuality
individuality
around this and remember this is skewed
because we're only using
major arcana cards so if we mixed up the
whole deck we would think something different
different
if we drew three major arcana cards but
since we're only using those cards
it makes sense that that's what we have
so for what to hold on to i have the empress
empress
and what this tells me is that in the
situation i'm facing
i should be holding on to the nurturing
mothering energy that the empress card conveys
conveys
that could mean that i have to be
nurturing that could mean that i should
align myself with a nurturing person
anything sort of in the realm of that
sort of mother nurturing
earth comfort what to let go of is the
emperor and remember the emperor is
the father card and it's very much about
discipline it's not always a bad thing
to be disciplined right
athletes have to have good discipline in
order to accomplish their goals but what
this is saying is let go of the discipline
discipline
so if someone is disciplining me a lot
maybe i need to ignore them
if i'm being too disciplined myself and
that's standing in the way of me
achieving my goals maybe i need to kind
of loosen up a little bit and
focus more on the nurturing energy of
the empress card so somehow i need to
let go
of this disciplining energy and the
outcome will be the magician
so the magician is swift action remember
it's sort of
magical action something happens the
energy is
conducted and so that says to me that
i'll accomplish my goal somehow
somehow some swift action will take place
place
so say i'm trying to accomplish some
sort of work goal i have a project i'm
working on
what this spread would say to me is i
need to work on nurturing myself and
being more gentle with myself
and taking care of myself and i need to
be less concerned with such strict
discipline and if i do whatever blockage
i'm facing will be
unblocked i'll find that swift action
that the magician card represents
happens so in addition to helping us
learn how to apply
these major arcana cards to a tarot
spread we've also introduced the new
tara spread the what to hold on to
what to let go of and outcome spread
while this is still a simple three card
spread like the past present future we
introduced in episode 1
it has a little bit of a different spin
to it so you may find situations where
this is a more appropriate spread
and i urge you to add it to your repertoire
[Music]
rootlock radio is written and produced
by me weston
music for today's show was provided by
shenandoah davis
and jerae you can find both of their
information in the show notes
on the rootlock tarot website you'll
also find notes including pictures and specific
specific
information about the cards we discussed
today you can find that at rootlocktaro.com
rootlocktaro.com
podcast do you have any questions or
comments or things you would like for me
to talk about on the show or would you
like me to do a tarot reading for you or
teach utero one-on-one
if so please email me you can reach me
at rootlocktaro
gmail.com thank you for listening i hope
you'll join us next time
for root lock radio [Music]
Click on any text or timestamp to jump to that moment in the video
Share:
Most transcripts ready in under 5 seconds
One-Click Copy125+ LanguagesSearch ContentJump to Timestamps
Paste YouTube URL
Enter any YouTube video link to get the full transcript
Transcript Extraction Form
Most transcripts ready in under 5 seconds
Get Our Chrome Extension
Get transcripts instantly without leaving YouTube. Install our Chrome extension for one-click access to any video's transcript directly on the watch page.
