The Fool - Leaps of faith in the tarot
The Fool is a card about confidence, freedom, and taking meaningful risks.
Hit play below to listen to an audio lesson, or scroll down to read the lesson in text form.
To give you a bit of context whilst you reflect on your own relationship to the card, here are a few key things to know about the Fool.
The Fool is the first card in the Tarot, and it’s numbered 0 in the Major Arcana. The Major Arcana itself is sometimes referred to as The Fool’s Journey by tarot experts, so you can think of the card, in a way, as the main character of the tarot - a kind of Alice and Wonderland figure who steps off a cliff and into the fantastical world of the tarot.
By name, the Fool suggests potentially questionable choices, but the optimism of the image elevates, rather than denigrates the Fool figure. Yes, there’s naivety here, but there’s also a powerful confidence and openness to the universe that many people lose as they grow up. And indeed, the tarot is a story of growing up - of traveling from the innocent optimism of the Fool to the transcendent wisdom of the World. To get from zero to twenty-two, we have to confront life’s big themes Love, Death, Vice, among many others. But we only get to go on the extraordinary journey the tarot has to offer if we’re willing to take that first blind step.
Faith may feel foolish, but it’s the only way anything ever moves forward.
In your tarot journal, you’re asked to reflect on what this card means to you, now, in this moment, and what actions and thoughts it inspires in you. As you journal, pay attention to what you’re personally picking up in the card, but also consider what the key themes in the card might be telling you. Where do you need to take a leap of faith right now? How have you grown as a result of “foolish” choices in the past?
This mini-tarot lesson was brought to you by me, Chelsey Pippin Mizzi, founder of Pip Cards Tarot. I hope you gained a little context to help you continue reflecting on the card in your own way, and I’ll see you tomorrow for another mini-lesson.