THE GREAT JOURNEY (chap. 1)
Exploring the Major Arcana, we embark on a great adventure. To approach it through a systematic method, studying each card in its symbols and Cabalistic, astrological, and numerological parallels, might seem like a dry reading to the uninitiated. Yet merely compiling a list of practical meanings might also leave the reader wondering: where did all of this come from?
The purpose of this chapter is to evoke internal reverberations for each Major Arcana card, thus enabling an easier personal insight on each one. As we discover how each card reflects our lives - which aspects and attitudes within ourselves appear in them - we grasp them more easily, leaving us with a clearer understanding as we begin the systematic approach in chapter IV.
Let us consider the Major Arcana sequence as the human being's Great Journey in search of oneself and one's personal fulfillment. Each of the 22 cards represents a state of consciousness, ranging from the potentiality of the Fool to the personal fulfillment, whole consciousness, or final culmination of the Universe.
This approach is greatly thwarted - as in many ancient and some modern decks - when we place the Fool at the end of the sequence as Arcana XXII, rather than at the beginning as Arcana 0. From this position, the Fool relates with each of the remaining 21 cards, which emerge as challenges and tests through which he transforms himself.
The Fool is the pure, spontaneous, and innocent newborn. He represents the potential state of things. Some authors associate him with unconsciousness. They could not be further from the truth. The baby knows exactly what it wants and doesn't want (better than most adults), what it likes and doesn't like; the infant acts according to deep internal references such as the instincts, which remain intact - except in the case of serious problems within the womb. The baby's corporeal memory, still unhampered by psychophysical tensions, contains all the remembrances of its evolution.
We are therefore closer to the truth when we say that the baby is potentially conscious, rather than unconscious. As we shall see in this chapter, the difference between these approaches is extremely important. The baby obviously does not fathom the enormously complex world it enters - a world replete with the neuroses of the adult mind. It is born still unaware of the oppression and violence committed against the weak, of the wars and lack of love on this planet. The child does not know that the military industry spent US$ 1.3 billion per minute in 1987, while 30 children died of starvation in that same minute. The baby is also unaware that the money spent on developing one intercontinental ballistic missile could feed 50 million children, build 160 thousand schools, and open 340 health centers.
Indeed, the baby who just incarnated into this level of evolution known as planet Earth does not need to know any of these facts in order to grow up to be healthy and happy. What the child needs is love and support. Just as a seed that contains within itself all the elements for becoming an adult tree - needing only water and fertile soil - the newborn is a perfect being, integrated and whole in itself. The child emerges from a central energetic structure comprised of its physical, emotional, and mental aspects, along with a divine atom in the spiritual realm. Nothing is missing. True wisdom lies within the baby; it needs not be imbued or taught. Schooling and university are merely informative details in the face of irreplaceable Love, so that the child may affirm itself, develop its potentials, so that it may blossom, remembering what it already knew.
Thus, as the card indicates, the baby Fool arrives smiling in awe at the unknown, free of fears, biases, and emotional blocks, living eternity in each moment.
The Fool begins to get in touch with himself and to develop a first polarity within. He begins to express himself in two fundamental ways that reflect the two basic principles at work in the Cosmos: The Masculine Principle, or Yang, and the Feminine Principle, or Yin, which in the Tarot are dubbed "The Magus" and "The Priestess", respectively.
The first expression of Yang uttered by the newborn is either a cry or laughter at the moment of birth, basically depending on whether the laws of nature are acknowledged and respected or not. The child's first response also hinges on whether the mother and infant play an active role in the childbirth, or whether the doctor is more responsible for the delivery.
Later the newborn breastfeeds, relates and communicates, screams with joy, hunger, or cold, gradually learning about its surroundings. Manifesting flights of the imagination, the baby creates, turning a can into a drum. Discovering its limitations, the child may attempt to overcome them; that is, the infant leaves the interior space to act in the exterior world. This whole process is an expression of the Magus, Arcana I.
The Priestess, Arcana II, is associated with the forces that bring the baby to look within. During those moments when the baby remains still, tranquil, and silent - sometimes with the eyes wide open as if gazing through the object it sees - it lunges into a world beyond the adult vision, perhaps in another time, perhaps inwardly. Or it may simply be sucking its thumb, totally receptive and connected to itself, intuitively understanding all that goes on. During these moments, the child surprises us with an expression of serenity and wisdom that only the enlightened are able to attain.
While the baby manifests itself through these two polarities, it also draws closer to a more concrete world: what it can or cannot do the world of rules and desires, the realm of others' expectations. This contact with the world occurs through the mother and father, who are the ''Empress" and "Emperor", Arcanas III and IV, respectively.
The parents exert the greatest influence over our lives, for what they do as well as for what they refrain from doing. They are more important for our development than our siblings, school, friends, society, the economic system, nationality, social class, or religion; they are also a highly determining factor in a child's future, as is stated in the adage, "like father, like son". Despite the great lengths we may take to undo our family programming, it is extremely difficult to outright eliminate it, as Eric Berne affirms when he paraphrases the Panchatantra, one of the oldest Hindu texts:
Thou shalt carry these five things six years after thou hast left the womb: the duration of thine days, thine fortune, thine wealth, thine teaching, and thine grave.
When the spirit begins to incarnate, it does so within its mother, the Empress. She is the first to give form, and therefore limits, to this being. She brings the spirit into the world of life and death, affording it the possibility of being born while also signing its death sentence.
The mother's emotion at the moment of conception - whether in the pleasure of orgasm, in love or in the partner's rejection, or perhaps in the fear or desire of getting pregnant - represents the first stone in the child's emotional body, which is completely united with the mother's body during gestation and a few months thereafter. Therefore ever since the womb, the mother exerts an enormous influence on the physical and psychic development of her child, accepting or rejecting, loving or hating, and/or creating expectations that generally thwart the child's growth.
The mother may feel rewarded by the forces of Life grant her the gestation and care of such a perfect creature through which she may recover her own perfection. Or perhaps she might feel punished with a terrible obligation that she would rid herself of as soon as possible.
The baby realizes very well how its life changes as the mother's love waxes and wanes. A loving and nurturing mother (not only of milk) is like a life vest for someone who has just fallen overboard in the middle of the ocean and doesn't know how to swim. Unfortunately for humanity and for life itself, it is difficult nowadays to find women who are truly available for their children, women who are able to adapt their lives so that they can be with their children and open their hearts to the new arrivals.
Thus the majority of women on this planet, particularly the married ones, feel tremendously frustrated. This is hardlly surprising in a male chauvinist system that has massacred women from all angles for thousands of years. We may also observe that many women continue selling themselves to the male chauvinists, as they continue to renounce their own individuality and freedom, forgoing the fulfillment of their dreams and the development of their potentials along with their pleasure and sexuality. In exchange, they receive an apparent security, status, and protection that the macho society claims it affords them. Women forsake their own happiness and dignity, turning their renunciation and suffering into a quality applauded by all religions.
Some women, such as Indira Ghandi and Margaret Thatcher, amongst others, compete with the macho world and can even be much more destructive than men. Women have accepted their contracts of degradation; they have said yes to their masters and no to themselves. This dynamic ends up generating so much rage that it strangles the woman's ability to love and renders her incapable of feeling anything other than rancor and desires of vengeance. So of course they wind up taking the revenge out on the weakest of all, their children, and somehow hand down their frustration.
If the rage of all the frustrations in the world were joined, the planet would immediately explode one thousand times more violently than if all the weapons accumulated by men exploded simultaneously. Eleodoro Ortiz
The mother does not easily accept the manifestations of the child's individuality nor does she tolerate its initiatives; the child's spontaneous expressions are like insults that question her own slavery. The mother says to her child between the lines, "I renounce, humble myself, and obey; you must do the same thing. You may not be free or happy, nor can you receive love, just as I am not free or happy, nor do I feel loved."
The mother closes her eyes to the boundless love that her child gives her, and turns her back to that which would undoubtedly raise her self-esteem, thus missing an important key to her liberation as she discards her child's feelings.
Babies love with an open heart and ask for contact, attention, and affection, so when they receive it they cry out in happiness. Their eyes shine like stars.
In most cases, though, the mother does not have time; there are other priorities, other more pressing obligations. The baby-child feels rejected and abandoned, and undergoes the bitter experience of proving that to receive love, to express one's feelings, and follow one's impulses are things that bring it suffering, with some exceptions. The pleasure that emerges naturally when the child acts spontaneously disappears. The family replaces it with the pseudo-pleasure of rewarding the child for following behavioral codes, amongst which the most sacred is obedience.
Obedience does not require intelligence. All machines are obedient. Obedience relieves the burden of responsibility. Responsibility lies in conveyer of the order. Just as you are very free, you cannot be condemned for your action. Disobedience is a great revolution. It means assuming responsibility for oneself. Osho Rajneesh
The more spontaneous children are, the more they are being themselves, the more they are scorned, chastised, and criticized, so they end up suffering more. Thus, children wind up believing that their love is worth nothing - that they themselves are worth nothing - and that, through some cruelty of fate, they don't deserve affection or attention. Their inner being weakens, draining the confidence in themselves and the world, so no longer are they guided by their feelings. They lose, as Don Juan might say, the path of their hearts. The mother corrupts not only her child's emotions, but also its instincts. Gradually she denies it physical contact; first the breasts, then the lap, and even the arm may be denied.
Mother and child have been forsaking this source of pleasure, love, and peace embodied in the intimate contact between the two. Later in life, the child's contact with its own body is also chastised by the mother, who says, "If you touch your weenie it will fall off", or, "If you don't keep your hands away from your thingy, worms will come out".
The child loses touch with love and goes on to believe that love means to obey, that to love is to please others, that love is self-sacrifice, renunciation. "As our Lord Jesus Christ, who loved us so much that He renounced his own life and allowed Himself to be crucified to save us," repeat the preachers and priests.
So the child begins to ask for whimsical or silly things, everything the television and shop windows have fed the eyes, since it would not dare to ask directly for what it really wants and needs: love, contact, and support. And so mother says, "If you behave, I'll buy you a chocolate."
As time passes, the child turns into something it is not and could never be, betraying its true being in order to obtain, in the best of scenarios, mere smidgens of approval. And the grandmother says," It seems as though little Johnny is more behaved now."
While the mother standardizes the child's emotions and instincts, the child draws ever closer to its father, the Emperor. The father has his own particular way of programing the child's mind, which was already functioning somewhat detached from its emotions and original instincts.
With the father's help, the mother left the son needy, so the childh turns lovingly to the father, hoping to receive love, though normally all the child receives is a good dose of nonesense. For centuries men have locked away their feelings, and when daddy is not totally absent, he fills his child with ideas: ideas of authority, discipline, order, work, money, society, and being important and/or useful in life. Using methods that are more fascist than Socratic, he obliges the child to accept the unacceptable, to respect the unrespectable, to be "reasonable", servile, and obedient, to be competitive, to harden, to seek out money and power as a way of compensating for the lack of love and freedom.
If the female sold herself to the male, then he sold himself to those with more power; he turned into a more or less important ant, incapable of questioning himself. He turned blind, cowardly, rigid, and idiotic. If he was "lucky" for climbing some step in the power hierarchy, the excessive competition and sharpening of his knives turned him into an empty shell, an old, insensitive vulture, distant and frustrated. This is indeed the example many parents hand down to their children, an example the child must swallow without chewing in order to obtain the father's approval. The father gives the "right" path, the ''practical goals", leaving the child "ready" for life, a life of slavery, of course. The father enables the existence of armies and of the false progress that destroys life.
Children are acutely aware of the anger their parents hand down when they say things such as: "don't bother me", "get off of me", "stupid", "I've already told you a thousand times", "obey me", or "you're good for nothing", etc.
The impact is so strong that the child denies its own perceptions so as not to suffer and prefers to believe the excuses its parents give, such as: "It's for your own good", "It hurts me even more", "You need to learn how to behave", and "I am going to teach you", or "If you don't learn how to behave no one is going to like you". To survive psychically from these impacts, children deform their vision of reality, no longer giving credence to what they see, to their own existence, to their own reality, to their very intuition.
As the mind falls asleep, children believe in what their parents tell them, in what they see on TV, in what the religions teach them, anything to be accepted.
In summary, we may say that the Fool weakened his Self at the hands of the Emperor and the Empress to the point of losing his spontaneity and being afraid of taking initiatives and expressing his own ideas. No longer believing in himself, he thinks he does not deserve love and loses his enthusiasm and ability to be amazed by life, thus locking away his instincts. He became a frustrated person, a beggar for attention, a monster incapable of surrendering himself to love. He may try to hide all of these traits behind some fantasy, not knowing that everything he hid continues working internally, manipulating him to unsuspected levels. Four main factors enable this sinister transformation:
Continuing in our sequence, the Fool meets the Hierophant, Arcana V, who brings the doctrines appropriated by society, adding the final touches to the personality the child was forced to adopt. The Hierophant represents the ideological power, the basic religions, philosophies, and "sciences" that help to maintain the economic power that is the System, or the Emperor. The Hierophant blesses the army of youngsters that the Emperor sends off to die.
Up until recently, the Hierophant of the West resided in the Vatican. Nowadays, it is the means of communication, the Fourth Power that produces the information and overbearing mass pseudo-culture that numbs the creativity and intelligence. In doing away with the popular wisdom, it imposes value systems that are totally extraneous to the reality of each culture. These ''values" are particularly decadent, sterilized beliefs, distilled by the international intelligence agencies based on Judeo-Christian elements.
Children and adolescents devoid of internal references fall in the clutches of these dream merchants. In order to fill the void in their identity, young people seek out something that might make them "be someone", but they can only access what is available on the market. Hence, they begin to consume trash, rags with which they attempt to rebuild their self-image, be they simpler or more sophisticated, alternative or neo-liberal, more Long Beach or more Manhatten, cheaper or more expensive - though they are always falser and can never bring deep and lasting gratification.
On the other hand, the criteria for choosing these rags have been cultivated by the nation. The child and adolescent may accept them or, detached from themselves, seek out the opposite extreme in a heavily self-destructive revolt.
Thus, the true Self becomes imprisoned, just as the artist's inspiration within the diamond in illustration II,3.
To cover up this terrible feeling of fear, weakness, mediocrity, frustration, and lack of love, youngsters dress as proud, special and invulnerable, as heroes, martyrs, and sages.
The young person is ready to occupy his/her place in society, in the military, as a lawyer, priest, politician, judge, bandit, or as an intellectual, a member of this or that party, a Joe Smith or John Doe, a number - all a set of labels. Already civilized, he is a lamb in a flock of sheep lacking their own will, apparently devoid of emotions, without even their own bodies, since even their bodily structure was afflicted by multiple tensions.
In the Tao Te King it is written: Being and Non-Being are mutually engendering
This indicates not only the fact that each quality contains its opposite to a greater or lesser extent, but also that when we enhance one aspect of reality we are actually strengthening its opposite. In other words, when we push the pendulum to the right, we are creating a force that will inevitably take it to the left. When we apply this law to our issue at hand, we may realize that the greater the conditioning, the greater the need for rediscovering our true Being. The apex of Robotization is the beginning of liberation.
In the words of the master Osho Rajneesh, "Confusion is the greatest opportunity. The problem with people that are not confused is great. If you are truly confused, then you are blessed. Now something is possible. You are on the threshold."
When we accept our ignorance, when the mind gives in and says, "I give up on having an explanation for everything," then we are taking the first step towards true wisdom.
The more programmed we are, the less available energy we have - since we are using it to block ourselves - so the flow of vitality is fainter, and, consequentially, our capacity to feel pleasure and happiness also wanes. Programming represents a threat to our Life Force. The greater the blockage and confusion, the greater will be our vital need to find a way out, so our chance of finding the exit will rise. We cannot forget the seven Greek wise men, who, when asked of the most powerful force of all, responded "need".
On a social level, as the status quo becomes increasingly alienating, the sparks of beauty and awareness shine brighter, helping us to stay alive and vibrant by overcoming the obstacles and policing nature of our thoughts. Poets, musicians, and artists can generally touch our sensitive fibers through their subtle language, fostering an internal connection and helping us to feel pleasure.
One of these beacons of light is the letter from Chief Seattle to the President of the United States in 1854, when the government intended to purchase the tribal lands.
Great is the power of beauty. The power of truth is even greater, yet something even mightier is needed to open a crack in the sinister armor of the false personality. If the programming was inscribed in blood and fire (threats, punishment, criticisms, abandonment, rejection, etc.), then we shall need something that touches our blood - the emotions - and our heart - the instincts - for an effect to be achieved. Passion, where love and instinctive desire complement each other, is the best can opener. It is no wonder that the next card sequence is the Lovers - Arcana VI.
When the fool falls in love, he begins to see not only the world differently, but also himself through different eyes. The fact that someone loves him the way he is, someone who listens to him attentively, who does not demand of him a given type of behavior, and who does not attempt to manipulate him, is a boost to his self-esteem. He begins to like himself again, to believe in himself, in his ideas, in his love, thus broadening the limits within which the programming had bound him.
In love, he finds the necessary courage to fight for what he wants. Opening, he takes off his psychic tie (or braw) and steadily gives himself to love and passion.
When loving, he can be whole in the here and now. He feels authentic with himself, so he may relish in the happy moments and even transcend. He may even feel that his love is not limited to that one person; sometimes his love reaches beyond his lover. The Fool surprises himself in loving the sunset, when the neighbors' sons seem adorable, when he is taken by a feeling of brotherhood with the mailman, etc. At some points he may feel one in love with the Universe as a whole. This ecstatic feeling also draws him closer to himself, which fills him with gratitude.
Through love, the Fool has real encounters with himself; his lover is the doorway to his first recovery. His vital energy is immediately multiplied and he feels that his life could be different. He even asks himself, "Does this state of pleasure I'm experiencing stem from my amorous and sexual relationship with Mary (or with John), or is it a manifestation of something very much my own, something that has always resided within me and that I can recover whenever I want?"
Herein lies the great dilemma: whether to continue this moment, where spontaneity and passion lead to happiness, claiming the right of pursuing one's most intimate impulses, or whether to continue with the mechanical, enslaving, and miserly routine devoid of pleasure. This choice between being oneself or continuing as a slave of conditioning is embodied in the Lovers' moment of consciousness.
This liberating alternative is extremely dangerous to the system, which perpetuates itself as long as there are slaves to feed it. In fact, the most menacing of all to the system is Love, especially when it is coupled with a free and conscious sexuality. For this reason, all of the powers at be always repressed sexual liberation. Thus, the patriarchal society from the Greek era to modern times considers love to be a disease that weakens men (not women), draining their intelligence and will power, rendering them despicable and worthy of pity. (Ovid)
It is no coincidence, with such reactionary personalities in power as Reagan, M. Thatcher, and John Paul II, that AIDS became a serious threat to humanity, imposing a more puritan behavior and leading many to return to the safety of the traditional family. Questioned for centuries, the nuclear family is reinforced as the pillar of the system.
The Lovers lead the Fool to a fundamental choice, a bifurcation into two paths. On the one side lies the risk of the unknown, of giving oneself to love, spontaneity, and pleasure; on the other lies that which is known: routines, self-control, fear, old behavioral patterns.
To change entails abandoning a whole life scheme comprised of self-impositions that nonetheless afford safety and protection. To change means to pack one's bags for a journey in which neither the destination nor the itinerary are quite clear. Internally, the Fool knows he must abandon that which no longer fulfills him and feels the urge to face the unknown. To achieve this, he gets up on the Chariot, Arcana VII in the sequence
He has yet to fulfill his potential and cannot manage to be spontaneous all of the time; he does not quite know what route to take, only that he wants to make this state of plenitude and pleasure that he knew become a permanent one.
Just like King Arthur's Knights, he sets out in search of the Holy Grail without realizing that it lies within himself. He leaves the comforts of Camelot, abandoning external attachments, to throw himself into the adventure of discovering himself, although he continues carrying the armor laden with fear, blocks, and defense mechanisms.
These glimpses of happiness that the Fool attained through passion may be obtained by other paths, such as meditation, an encounter with an Enlightened Being, through the ritualistic use of plants of power, or also through some experiences on the threshold between life and death.
When the Fool surrenders his external emprisoning protections, his most suffocating routines, and lunges himself at life, an internal and external adjustment is made, favoring the continuation of his evolution. This adjustment was previously impossible, for the routines and habits of behavior rendered him impermeable to the Forces of Existence. But now that he is more open and accessible, a change can be produced; the Fool can encounter his own karma.
Ever since the beginning of his programming, the Fool started to destroy himself and to make others suffer, especially when he turned into a powerful person. Now, to attain higher levels of consciousness and peace, he needs to rebalance his karmic equilibrium, to balance his accounts, just as an excessive consumer of alcohol, meat, and dairy products one day must subject himself to a detoxification diet if he wants to improve his health. In the encounter with Arcana VIII, Adjustment, or Justice in most decks, the Fool cleans a fair portion of his past and can therefore seal a peace with himself and with the world to continue growing in a more balanced and fluid fashion.
Here, there is no choice. The Adjustment inevitably acts out of the need to balance the Universe. To keep it from being destroyed, that which is unsustainable must be removed. This is a completely natural law behind which there is no intelligence at work. It is possible that the effects of this adjustment on the wanderer might not be so pleasant; he will probably leave this encounter quite shaken, if not profoundly de-structured. Some of his masks will be shed, particularly those that hid his vulnerability. Then he will understand that he cannot continue on his path of growth until he gets to know himself better. To achieve this goal, the Fool encounters Arcana IX: the Hermit.
Here, his attention is directed inwards. It constitutes his first voluntary and conscious internalization. The Fool commences to study himself. His approach is basically analytical, using the lower levels of the mind to know himself, to identify his fears, blocks, and behavioral patterns, perhaps to investigate the origins of negativity in his childhood that inhibited his evolution. In this effort, he unravels layers of his unconscious, establishing a link through which he embodies his true will, his forbidden and "unconfessable" desires. Thus he begins to distinguish between the True Self and the poison injected in him.
Driven by this new consciousness, the Fool engages in therapy, yoga, Tai Chi Chuan, improving his eating habits and pace of life and self-destructing less than before. He has his astrological chart done, consults the local Tarot reader, studies his biorhythms, and spends the weekend in the woods. Gradually he becomes more centered and the moment arrives when his light turns on. Now he can light the way, guide those who can see the light. His attitude can be nurturing; what he learned about himself and the techniques he used may help others.
This is a very dangerous point since the Fool can use his discoveries to carry on transforming his life, or he can let his ego take possession of them and, turning them into doctrines, sell or use these discoveries for self-promotion. This would constitute a retrogression to the Hierophant - perhaps a more alternative and modern Hierophant, but still a fanatic merchant of recipes.
More centered and conscious, the Fool leaves his relative solitude as a hermit to return to the world, to the hustle and bustle, that is, to Arcana X, Fortune, or, if one prefers, to The Wheel of Fortune. He who belonged to this competitive and aggressive world, this compulsive and stupefying, decadent and degrading world - known in Tibetan Buddhism as The Wheel of Samsara, the inertia of unconsciousness that drags us blindly to the bottom of the well of suffering - he is now able to see it from the outside.
Now he is not so easily hypnotized by the neon lights, the triumphant marches, or the glorious flags, nor is he mesmerized by the TV soap operas or the World Series, by the "technical wonders", or by the Miss Universe contest. He no longer bites the hook as he sees through the self-destructive madness of humans. He sees the enslaved slaves keeping the slave masters in power. These and other perceptions reaffirm his individuality and his center. The Fool realizes that he can live in the world without being its slave, since each situation that Existence sends him can be taken as not only a chance to learn, but also to polish his truest expression. Experiencing the energy of the Wheel of Fortune, the Fool begins to see how wonderful and unique he is. He discovers himself as a beautiful, sensual being, full of life, potentials, and value.
Cherishing his own harmony more, he begins to respect and appreciate himself, to love his body, his most intimate ways, his sex. That is, the Fool begins to love himself as he enters the Arcana XI state of consciousness, traditionally called The Force, and renamed by Crowley as Lust. It represents a state of integration in which the Fool recovers his enthusiasm, shine, happiness, and strength.
Here, the Fool says, "I love and like myself." Without this loving acknowledgement of himself, he would hardly be able to face the trials that lie ahead and achieve the state of, "I love and like you". This love he feels for himself overflows from the chalice of his heart. It leads him to unite himself lovingly with the Universe, of which he begins to feel an integral part.
In The Hanged Man, Arcana XII, the Fool surrenders himself to Existence with an open heart. He may be an apostle capable of rendering his feelings of love and ecstasy universal, viewing his neighbor as his brother. Here, he stops searching, for he discovers that to search entails missing the present. And life and reality unfold only in the present.
In The Lovers, the Fool fell in love with a person, which led him to feel happy. Although this happiness was momentary, it enabled him to make decisions that led him to liberate a part of his programming and change his life. Now, the passion for himself gives him the strength and courage to still the mind and give himself unto life. Thus he reaches the apex of his self-transformation in the next card, Death, Arcana XIII. Once again, it becomes evident that: Love is the transforming force in the universe by excellence, the energy that leads to the evolution of the Universe, of society, and of the human being.
Now we may better understand the revolutionary message of Jesus Christ: "Love one another". The lack of love establishes slavery. Its presence liberates us, and when it flows abundantly we attain bliss.
In Arcana XIII, the Fool experiences the death of his robot, the cowardly parrot that mimics doctrines within the agony of the slave. His defenses begin to crack and through the gaps appears the essence of the Divine Being that we all are. The path to discovering his being is wide open!
Radiating love with his heart in flames, the Fool pops the top on the program bottle, freeing the first bubbles of his most intimate fragrance. This liberation - though sometimes quite sudden - is actually the result of a whole process, demanding much effort and oftentimes pain, which began with The Lovers and called for a head on confrontation with the childhood programming.
During these moments, the essence of the Self permeates the various manifestations of the Fool. His most authentic nature is flowing and assuming forms and concrete expressions. This is the phase of consciousness we call 'Art', Arcana XIV, or Temperance in other decks, since all that flows as a spontaneous expression of the Self is undoubtedly art. Walking turns into a dance, words into poetry, and silence into meditation. Each gesture is impregnated with the divine beauty containing the essence of the Self.
The Fool now enters his second initiation. Now he can already do, he can already accomplish from his center. To do is the expression of the next change. It does us no good to think, say, or feel, if we do nothing. Doing leads us to new transformations, new challenges -especially when this doing takes on the quality of "non-doing" born out of a profound internal stillness that is devoid of expectations and connected with the cosmic rhythms.
Transformed by love and the practice, the Fool continues on the path to recover the wholeness of his being and his personal fulfillment. He begins with his instincts, represented by Arcana XV, the Devil. The challenge here is for the Fool to allow his instincts to express themselves spontaneously, so that they may blossom and once again become the roots of his life force.
Throughout the centuries - and, more subtly, to this day - the instincts have been denied, repressed, or subjugated, surrounded by taboos, considered sources of pain and sickness. They have been exiled to the deepest dungeons of the unconscious, only to be later manipulated and used by propaganda and the mass media to benefit the system. The Fool's redemption frees up so much energy that it enables the removal of old prisons, the physical and psychic armor with which he was still identifying. Here, on the passage by the Tower, Arcana XVI, these old armors are destroyed, so no longer does he need these protections since his vitality is so heightened. No longer will he defend doctrines; letting go of illusion, he will affirm himself in reality.
In the Star, Arcana XVII, the Fool recovers his mind and emerges more apt to harmonize with the cosmic energies. He realizes the falsity of a whole range of beliefs, definitions, biases, and arguments, thus rendering his intellect receptive, awakened, realistic, and intuitive. The Fool turns into a catalyst of evolutionary forces, and by learning to interpret the signs that Existence offers him, he is able to synchronize with it. From this point onwards, the Fool will have enough strength and clarity to face and resolve the most sinister aspect of his shadow, to recover his emotional body from the depths, in his encounter with The Moon, Arcana XVIII. This step entails facing his most dreaded fears and the terrible threats that blocked his heart in the first seven years of his life. He becomes aware of how his childhood really was and can work on dismantling the mechanisms that erase his consciousness, enslaving him and impeding him from spontaneously expressing his feelings. The Fool deals with these monsters face to face. Trusting in himself, he does not allow the howling ghosts of the Moon to bewitch him and turns them into dust on his path. On the other side, he finds the purest, most authentic and profoundest of emotions, his most subtle tenderness and sensitivity.
Diving headlong into the deepest abyss, the Fool reaches the light: The Sun, Arcana XIX. It is his sun within, his divine flame, his Spiritual Being. Here, the Fool rejoices, for he has connected with eternity; he has transcended all of the veils that obscured the Being of Light he always was and always will be. Now the Fool says, "I am the Divine."
In The Aeon, or The Judgement in many decks, the Fool experiences the reintegration of his recently recovered parts. Instincts, intellect, emotions, and Spirit fuse into a new being. This alchemical process entails a large qualitative leap in consciousness, analogous to a rebirth.
Here, the New Man, or New Woman, emerges, complete and perfect, free of all fetters, divine, willing to live a new moment in a New Age.
In the Universe, Arcana XXII, the Fool completes his task, fulfills his potentials, reaching the final creations, manifestations, and consequences. This implies transcendence. The Fool reaches a new cycle in the spiral of evolution. Now, all that remains is to celebrate, free and happy, the blissful dance of life.
