This episode of Root Lock Radio continues the exploration of the Major Arcana's "Fool's Journey," focusing on the second leg which represents adulthood and the individual's struggle with universal forces, emphasizing integration and acceptance over outright victory.
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you're listening to root lock radio [Music]
hello and welcome to rootlock radio a
podcast for uncloaking
learning and exploring the tarot cards
my name's weston i live in new york city
and i am your host in episode three we
began an in-depth exploration of the
cards in the major arcana
and looked closely at the first leg of
what we call the fool's journey
in today's episode we'll continue this
with the second leg
but before we do that we're going to
look at a way that conflict is resolved
in the tarot and see how this played out
in those cards of the first leg of the
fool's journey where we found the individual
individual
battling with society to establish a
sense of
independence and individual agency over
his life
then we'll move on to the second leg of
the fool's journey where we see the same
individual taking on the forces of the universe
universe
which leads to a similar kind of resolution
resolution
in which integration is more important
than winning
and again because there's so much
in-depth information i'm typing up some
show notes and posting them on the
rootlock tarot website
you can find those at ruelocktarot podcast
podcast
after that we'll introduce a tarot
spread that helps with conflict
resolution so anytime you're having
trouble with another person this could
be a helpful spread i'd also like to
point out that i've been posting on the
rootlock tarot instagram again
for a while i'd been doing card of the
day postings but that got a little bit
difficult to keep up with but now i've
set the intention to post a card for
each full moon
new moon the beginning of the month the
beginning of the season
and stuff like that so please follow me
my handle is root lock tarot
on instagram that said thank you so much
for listening and i hope you enjoy this episode
episode
[Applause]
in episode 3 we explored the cards in
the first leg of the fool's journey
starting with the magician and ending
with the chariot and during this leg of
the journey
we saw a theme of development as the individual
individual
struggles to establish their identity
as a person the thing that this
individual seems to be struggling against
against
is society as over the course of this journey
journey
society tries in various ways to impose
its ideas of how the individual should
think and act
on the individual and the individual
responds by trying to establish a unique identity
identity
and a sense of agency over his life but
in the final
card the chariot we have sort of a resolution
resolution
of this struggle or battle between the individual
individual
and society and rather than one side
winning we have more of a
blending or integration of the two sides
so what differentiates the chariot from
the lovers
is that the expression of individuality
that we see
in the chariot card is societally supported
supported
whereas the lovers card represents more
of a rebellion
against society and this is a style of
conflict resolution that comes up again
and again
in the tarot thinking back to episode 2
when we talked about the
balance between masculine and feminine energies
energies
in the major arcana the resolution of
this struggle between masculine and
feminine that we see in the world card
is actually just a balancing and
blending of the two which is the same
thing we see
in that chariot card we see the
individual reaching a point where they can
can
have independence and agency over their lives
lives
but this is supported by society
rather than a rebellion against society
as we move into the second leg of the
journey which represents the
phase of adulthood we'll also see a struggle
struggle
between this individual and something
outside of himself the
theme in the second leg of the journey is
is
of refinement so while in the first leg
of the
journey the fool is developing as a
person and establishing who they are
in the second leg the fool is trying to refine
refine
his life to be exactly what he wants it
to be and this
is the work of adulthood and the battle
we see in the second leg of the journey
is over control of one's life so instead of
of
battling with society the fool is now
sort of
battling with greater forces in the universe
universe
that sometimes allow us to get what we
want and sometimes
don't so let's take a look at those
individual cards
at the beginning of the second leg of
the fool's journey we find
the fool feeling confident and ready to express
express
his individual agency over his life and
that society is supporting this so in
card 8
strength which begins the second leg of
the journey we see sort of a continuation
continuation
of this confidence the number eight
is a number of rhythm or involution and evolution
evolution
or vibration and when you look at the
number eight
it looks a lot like an infinity sign
right with an
infinity sign we can imagine the energy going
going
up and down and around and around forever
forever
so we have sort of this endless rhythm
which suggests that this card is very
energized when we look at the car the
first thing we really notice is there's
a lion right and lions
tend to represent a fire energy and you
can think of the lion as representative
of freud's idea of the id sort of the
impulse or the desire
something very fiery that's within us
but the lion's just not roaring
uncontrollably we see this very
empress-esque woman
holding the lion's head taming it so we
have this sort of
grounding earth energy this woman looks
a lot like the empress which is very earthy
earthy
taming this lion and if we look at the
background we also see sort of a
fire earth balance so there's sort of
this balance between the
the passion energy and the grounding
earthy energy
and in the fool's journey card 8
represents sort of a coming out moment
the fool now
acknowledges something deep inside of himself
himself
that he wants to let out and that's that
lion so it could be coming out
with a sexual orientation or a gender
identity that people haven't expected of
you but it could also be some other form
of passion
acknowledging what you want to do with
your life saying hey i'm a dancer i'm an
artist or i want to be an accountant
whatever stands deep inside of you
that you want to let out that people
maybe wouldn't expect
or know about if you didn't tell them so
when you pull card 8 strength
in a reading think of it as sort of a
coming out moment
some sort of healthy release or
acknowledgement of something inside yourself
yourself
you're no longer holding it down or
letting it out
in unhealthy or secretive ways
you're acknowledging it and figuring out
how you're gonna work with it
in the world and this sets the tone for
the second leg of the fool's journey
when we
acknowledge our passion we sort of set a
plan to figure out how we're going to achieve
achieve
what that passion drives us to do and
throughout this leg of the journey
we push towards that but we'll also see
that things begin to stand in our way
and we realize that we don't have total
control over
pursuing our passion as we move into
card 9 the hermit
we have a sort of turning inward the
number nine is the number of completion
or attainment or fulfillment but not in
a way that you
just close the book and put it aside
it's sort of like this completion
then elevates us to the next stage
and when you look at the number nine
written out you can kind of see this
we have a complete circle but then
there's a tail off of it so it's like
we've completed the circle
we've closed the circle we've come to
the end of whatever that circle represents
represents
and then a tail dashes off of us
representing sort of a new initiative
a new beginning on the card we see the
figure of the hermit
he's in a gray robe he's got a white
beard and these are both
symbols of wisdom and this is a very
airy card
having to do with wisdom and knowledge
we see the color gray which is a very
airy color
the landscape is very mountainous and
arid looking
and also the the hermit is looking down
and if you'll remember when we talked about
about
air the air energy is elevated it's
often represents sort of a going up
above the situation and looking down on
it in a detached way
and that's what the hermit is doing here
from the top of his mountain
we also see a little bit of fire energy
in this card he's holding a staff
which reminds us of the magician's wand
he's holding a lantern
with fire burning in it so we have this passionate
passionate
fire energy in a container where we can
look at it closely
and keep it under control so in the
fool's journey this is sort of a moment
of isolation
of stepping away from society or turning
into yourself
to develop or knowledge or spirituality
and this is a suitable
step after the strength card because
once we've acknowledged this passion
that we have we want us
turn inward and explore further or we
want to
develop knowledge that will help us to
attain this passion
so this could be in the fool's journey a
time where we
turn to studying return to meditation
or sort of try to develop ourselves in a
more refined way we're trying to control
the development of our passion so when
you pull this card in a reading
it represents a turning inward moment
sometime of productive
isolation and self-development or some
sort of solitary journey
it can also represent studying or studiousness
studiousness
the hermit overall is sort of a vision
quest time whatever that means for you
it could be going off into the woods on
your own or it could be
turning to meditation or studying and really
really
refining your knowledge and your spirituality
spirituality
card 10 is the wheel of fortune and with
this card we're both entering
into the double digit numbers and we're
also entering the second
half of the fool's journey so we're
halfway between the first card which is
the fool and the last card which is the world
world
so this card represents a turning point
and you can divide the fool's journey
into three legs
but another way to divide it is before
and after
the wheel of fortune now with the number
10 we're seeing a blending of the number one
one
and the number zero so if we remember
the number one
is having to do with the individual and
the number zero is having to do with god
or the universe
what's happening here is sort of a
clashing or
confrontation between the individual
and god or the universe now looking at
this card
it looks pretty different from any of
the cards we've seen before
or any of the cards in the deck at all
there's a lot of different symbols on
the card
and there aren't any human figures which
we're kind of used to seeing at this
point now i'm not going to cover
all of the symbology in the card because
that's a lot to go into
and so once again i'll refer you to
rachel pollock's book
78 degrees of wisdom if you're
interested in learning
about the symbology in more detail but
i'll give you a quick
overview just to satisfy you for now the four
four
animals and figures that we see in the
four corners of the card
represent the four fixed signs of the
zodiac so this is the leo
scorpio aquarius and taurus uh scorpio
here is represented by its more elevated
form which is the eagle
and each of these signs is associated
with one of the
elements fire water air and earth so
we're also seeing a representation of
the four
suits of the minor arcana in this card
now in the center of the card we see a wheel
wheel
and we see the letters t-a-r-o and if we
consider that t to be both the beginning
and the end
of the word tarot we're seeing sort of
the word tarot
in perpetual rotation on that wheel and
there's also some hebrew letters and
some other symbols in there but we're
not gonna cover that right now
around that wheel we see three different
figures one
is the snake which is going down the
left side of the wheel
in egyptian mythology the snake is the
god of death
after the snake sort of nestled across
the bottom and
upward slope of the right side of the
wheel we see this red
jackal-headed man and in the same
mythology this is the guide to dead
souls the guy that takes souls into the underworld
underworld
and then sitting atop the wheel we have
a sphinx and the sphinx is the god of resurrection
resurrection
so what we're seeing here is sort of
this perpetual
rotation of death and rebirth and this
is really
what the wheel of fortune represents is
this constant
death and rebirth cycle that happens in
the universe
so what this says to us in the journey
is that we're reaching a point where
we're sort of carried by
fate no matter how much we want to
control our lives
and our direction there are a lot of
factors outside of our control that are
playing into it
and in the end though we have some
control over where we go in the journey
we're also at the mercy of fate
or destiny so going back to this example
of someone who decides they want to be a dancer
dancer
in the strength card perhaps this person
is now
auditioning for dance shows and
constantly being rejected their
particular dream
that they had and that they were so
certain of is now not being allowed to
be realized by the universe
so the wheel of fortune is kind of
telling us that that we all have
ups and downs and that we're all working
in a perpetual cycle and the only thing
that we can really rely on
is that the wheel will keep turning
we're not going to stay in one place forever
forever
and this is an important lesson because
if we feel
like we're stuck that can be very discouraging
discouraging
but if bad things are happening to us
and we know that time will keep turning
and the wheel of fortune will keep
turning then eventually we will find
ourselves in a better place and this
realization that the universe will carry us
us
through both the good and hard times and
that we sort of need to just
let it do that it's very important and
it's one of the biggest
understandings that we're going to have
throughout the fool's journey this
lesson of acceptance
of the things that we cannot control so
when the wheel of fortune comes up in a
tarot reading
it's asking us to take a look at the
machinations of the universe or fate
relinquish control and look at the big
picture and understand that
though things may be hard right now or
things may be really good right now
everything is fleeting and changeable and
and
over time our situation will change
and understanding that both helps us
appreciate the good times
and get through the bad times now moving
forward i'm gonna drop the numerology
for now
the reason for this is because
understanding the numbers 1 through 10
and the numerology behind those numbers
is crucial to understanding the tarot in
a pretty basic way
because the numbers 1 through 10 also
come up in the
four suits of the minor arcana but the
numbers 11 through
21 are only present in the major arcana
and as we get into double digit numbers
things get a little more complicated
so perhaps i'll revisit this in a later
episode but for now we're just going to continue
continue
with the fool's journey without the
numerology aspect so the next card is
card number 11
which is justice and on this card we see
the figure of lady justice
which is a symbol of judicial systems
lady justice is
typically depicted as having a sword and
a scale
and being blindfolded now the the figure
of lady justice on this card
doesn't have a blindfold on probably
because we want justice to see
clearly now we also see an integration
on this card
for the first time of the symbology
of the magician card and the symbology
of the high priestess card
remember our ultimate goal in the major
arcana is to blend those two energies
the masculine and feminine represented
in those two cards so after having this
big realization in the wheel of fortune card
card
we sort of had this watershed moment of
beginning to combine
these two things in a real way we can
see this in the
imagery of the card we have the sword
pointing up to the sky
and the hand holding the scales pointing
down to the ground which echoes
the way that the magician is holding the
wand up to the sky and then his finger
to the ground this figure is also
wearing a red robe
much like the magician and we have a
yellow background
but then like the high priestess lady
justice is seated
and sitting between two columns and
there's a curtain hung
between the two columns so we're
beginning to see a blending of these two energies
energies
which is an integration of the fire and
water energy
we're also seeing an introduction of a
little bit of an air energy
which is depicting sort of a wisdom around
around
all of this so we have the stone columns
which is rep which is similar to what we
see in the emperor card which is very airy
airy
um and the figure is seated between
these columns much like the emperor so
we're seeing this blending of
fire water energy with an air
hanging over it so what's happening for
this card is that the experiences of the
first half of the journey right because
we're moving into the second half
we're learning this lesson of acceptance
and balance
in the sense that justice comes through
no matter what as
we realize in the wheel of fortune that
sometimes things don't go as planned
in the end justice will prevail in the
course of the fool's journey
this is a moment of truth this is the
moment where things haven't gone as
planned you haven't gotten those dance
shows that you auditioned for but
something even better comes along and it
all makes sense
because you didn't get the shows that
you wanted initially you ended up
getting a better show
or maybe you dodged a bullet somehow by
not being cast in one of those other shows
shows
so if you pull this card in a reading
it's very much about acceptance
and balance and justice and the idea
that things are working out as they
should be
so if you're going through a difficult
situation and the justice card comes up
it's sort of reassuring saying
hey this may not be what you wanted or
expected but justice will prevail
everything will work out this lesson
that we've learned in this previous two cards
cards
really comes to play out in the next two
cards where it's sort of
tried we have a trial of this this acceptance
acceptance
of the machinations of the universe
so in card 12 we have the hanged man now
this card kind of scares people
sometimes when it first comes up but
it's actually a really pleasant card and
when we look at the card we don't see a
figure of someone hanging by their neck
it's not some sort of execution it's a
figure of a hanging man
hanging by his foot and his hands are
tied behind his back so
what this is saying is that there's
nothing he can do there's no action he
can take right now
but he's not gonna die he's just
suspended at the moment
and when we look at his body we see this
combination of the fire and water energy
that's starting to come together in the
justice card he's wearing a blue
shirt which is very watery and red pants
and yellow
shoes which are fiery colors and he also
has this halo
of enlightenment over him there's this realization
realization
or this understanding and it very much
brings to mind the idea of
mindfulness what this halo is saying is
that the lesson that was learned in the
previous two cards
is bringing him enlightenment in this
moment where he's just suspended or
hanging so in the fool's journey this is
a time where
maybe you're having to wait for
something and you find that maybe in the
past you would have been very impatient
and nervous and anxious about what's
gonna happen
but through what you've learned in the
last couple of cards
you feel completely content just waiting so
so
maybe you're waiting to get into some
sort of school program and you
know you're not going to hear back for a
couple of months and you're able to just
sit with it patiently
and contently maybe you are pregnant
and you really feel like at some point
in the past you would have been very anxious
anxious
about the experience of birth and the
experience of parenthood but right now
you're just able to sort of enjoy the
moment and
be content where you are because you've
come to accept the fact
that there are things that are outside
of your control and that you're in a
time where you can't really take any action
action
you're able to just sort of sit back and
relax and be mindful
during this period of waiting so if you
pull this card
in a reading uh it usually denotes
patience and enjoying or appreciating
the process of waiting
sort of being hanging or suspended in a
way that's not
entirely unpleasant because you have the
resources to just enjoy this moment and to
to
be mindful and in the moment and
compared to the wheel of fortune this is the
the
enactment of the lesson in the wheel of
fortune so when you pull the wheel of
fortune it's asking you
to look at the big picture whereas the
hanged man is saying you already have
these resources
the next card card 13 is the card of
death and this is another card that
often draws kind of
fear when it's drawn in a tarot reading
but it doesn't necessarily have to
when we look at this card we see the
figure of the deathbringer
it's a human figure with a skull face
and bone hands
he's in black armor riding a horse that has
has
white hair and red eyes and skulls and
crossbones on its collar
and then beneath this horseback
deathbringer we see
a fallen figure who we presume is dead
and then we see three different
reactions responses to the deathbringer
one is this religious looking figure
that's praying
looking directly at death and praying
and then we have a woman that's turned away
away
and seems to be maybe fainting and then
we have a figure of a child who's
looking directly at the death bringer
in awe and then in the background we
have the sun
setting between these two columns and we see
see
a shadow sweeping across the land this blue
blue
shadow and since it's the color blue it
makes us think of
emotion so maybe there's a emotional flooding
flooding
happening a sort of water energy washing
over the land
but there's also a bit of a rebirth
energy in the idea
that when the sun sets it then rises
somewhere else
and we also see a flower blossoming on
the deathbringer's flag a white flower
which also denotes a rebirthing
and so what this card represents is this
final and
most difficult test of the realizations
that we've had over the past few cards
that fate will go its own way
and that we only have so much control
over our lives and our desires
so death represents this true entering
into uncharted territory or entering
into the unknown
in which we really have to deeply draw
on these resources
of something like the justice card where
we know things are going to be okay
even though we're going into something
that's requiring us to be
very brave and requiring things of us
that we've never
been tested on before in the fool's
journey this doesn't represent
the death of the fool right because
we're not at the end of the journey yet
so for this reason
it's good to not think of the death card
as being physical death
it's more of an archetypal experience
around death so
i think in the fool's journey it's more
closely approximated to the fool
losing someone that is close to him so
if someone you really rely on or your parent
parent
or something like that dies or somehow becomes
becomes
unavailable to you it's hard to imagine
before it happens how you'll go on and
what life will be like
after the fact because you're entering a
completely unknown
and uncharted territory but what the
death card and the tarot journey in general
general
reminds us is that there is a light on
the other side
of that dark journey and you'll get
through it and you can't know now
what's on the other side but you just
have to
trust in the natural process and
archetypally that's sort of how you
should face death right if you
if you come to accept that you're
entering something that's completely unknown
unknown
but that it happens to everyone it's
entirely natural
and that it's something that you just
need to accept and go with
that's basically the lesson that the
death card is trying to teach us
so when you draw death in a reading you
definitely don't want to
read it as the fact that you or someone
else is going to die
and i advise against ever looking at the
death card in that way
instead the death card brings a story of transformation
transformation
or crossing over of some kind a
situation where you're facing the
unknown and entering uncharted territory
and you really don't know what you're
entering into or what to expect
and it's asking you to be brave and to
trust in the natural process
and to understand as you did in the
justice card
and the hanged man card that although
this is sort of
a scary experience or a anxiety inducing experience
experience
that everything is going to work out in
the end and this brings us to the final
card in this leg of the journey
number 14 temperance and on this card we see
see
a serene angel draped in white with a
halo of enlightenment around her
she's pouring water from one cup to another
another
and this symbolizes a a taming
of the emotional flow or a containment
of the water energy so the temperance
card very much
represents this newfound ability to
regulate and contain one's emotions
and it's because of this death
experience that we have the ability
to do this we see the blending of earth
and water energies
she's got one foot in the water and one
foot on the earth
and what this denotes is emotional stability
stability
because water is emotion and earth is stability
stability
we're seeing a hybrid of the high
priestess and the empress card
in the temperance so the high priest
this is meditative qualities
and calmness and stillness
combined with the sort of nurturing of
the empress
and we also see the sun rising over the
mountains in the background so it's
almost like
in this card we've gone to the other side
side
so the same sun that we're seeing
setting in the death card
is the sun that's rising in the
temperance card so we've crossed over
and we're on the other side of that
situation so there's a rebirthing
happening here and we can see that too
in the daffodils which are spring
flowers and spring is the season of rebirth
rebirth
and there's a very natural feel to this
card and remember that the death is that
natural process that
ultimately leads to an unknown but
okay place and that's where we are in
this card
so temperance very much represents this
true and deep acceptance and trust of
the machinations of the universe
and that this can lead to emotional stability
stability
in a way that we haven't seen before in
the fool's journey so in the journey
itself this represents a peaceful time
of acceptance
and a lot of times when people go
through some sort of loss
there's a time of grieving but after the grieving
grieving
comes a newfound appreciation for life
in the world and nature and that's the
moment the temperance represents is this
acceptance and appreciation that we can
gain from going into an unknown and
scary situation
and seeing just how things can work out
in the end
so if you pull the temperance card in a
tarot reading
it represents an emotional stability an acceptance
acceptance
inner peace or the idea of sort of being reborn
reborn
in a more positive and stable way or
being one with earthly nature
so when we reach the end of the second
leg of the fool's journey
we also see this struggle between the individual
individual
and what's outside of himself so here in
this case it's the
universe ending in a blending of the energies
energies
so the temperance card is representing
this acceptance
of our inability to control the factors
that are outside of ourselves
and with this acceptance we find
ourselves ready to move on to the
third and final leg of the fool's
journey which we'll cover in the next [Music]
[Music] episode
episode [Music]
[Music]
so now that we've introduced the cards
of the second leg of the fool's journey
let's do a similar exercise to what we did
did
in episode three with the first leg so
i'm introducing another
spread that's helpful if you were in
conflict with another person
so mix up the second leg of the fool's
journey as much as you can
and then draw three cards the first card
is going to represent you
the second card is going to represent
the other person and the third
is going to be advice for a resolution
so i've drawn
justice for me the hanged man for the
other person
and strength for the resolution so what
the first card is saying to me
is that i need to start focusing on the
idea that justice will prevail that in
the end
this situation will work out in a fair
way and i need to focus on that even if
i feel somehow slighted or
that things aren't fair with the other
person i have the hanged man and what
this says to me is that the other person
is in a situation where they can't
really take any action right now
they're in a suspended state and that
could be the reason
for the conflict from their side they're unable
unable
and for the resolution we have strength
so when we think of strength in the tarot
tarot
it's having the strength to acknowledge
your passions
but also to temper them so it's sort of
saying maybe to be
patient because this person is in the
suspended state
to maybe have the strength to take the
higher road
to be the first person to extend the
olive branch
and to call on sort of my higher strength
strength
in order to find a resolution to this
situation so again what we're learning
by doing this exercise is how to
employ the meanings of these major
arcana cards into an actual tarot reading
reading
but also a new spread and that's the me
them and the resolution spread which is
helpful in times of personal conflict
conflict [Music]
[Music]
rulock radio is a podcast for uncloaking
learning and exploring the tarot cards
it's written and produced by me weston
music for today's show was provided by
shenandoah davis and jaray you can find
both of their information
in the show notes if you have any
questions comments or feedback for me
about the show or anything you'd like
for me to talk about on the show
or if you'd like a tarot reading or
one-on-one tarot lessons from me
please reach out to me my email's
rootlocktaro gmail.com
and if you could do me a favor and
follow rate and review the show
that would be great i'm trying to get
some more listeners again i've typed up
some notes for this show and put them on
the rootlock tarot website you can find
those at rootlocktaro.compodcast
thank you so much for listening and i
hope you'll join me next time
on rootlock radio [Music]
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