What if Tarot cards ARE the message, not just a messenger? What if each card has a grander lesson about not just our individual angst and opportunities, but is a mirror for our evolution as a larger beingness?
Most people assume that Tarot cards are only useful for reading about individual lives or reflecting on relationships between people, places and/or things. Certainly, there are reading techniques that focus on events or other topics of exploration, either selected randomly from a shuffled deck, or picked intentionally as an image examplar for that aspect of the reading. This is not what I am referring to here.
Tarot cards, specifically the major arcana cards, numbered 0-XXI (21), have their own relationship with and among themselves. In the Tarot world, this sequence of cards can tell a story, such as “The Hero’s Journey” drawn from the work of Joseph Campbell, and often referred to as “The Fool’s Journey” in Tarot writings. In my own work, I make reference to “The Sacred Journey of the Soul”, as taught in my online recorded class by the same name on Global Spiritual Studies. This unique study has fascinated me for over 40 years and influenced my broad and multidimensional understanding of the Tarot cards’ meanings. For more information about this journey, see the link below.
So…what if the sequence of the cards also tell the story of our development, not only as humans, but also as a species? And then, if that story reflects back to us our more expansive, vibrational existence (think Quantum Physics), where our human evolution transcends this mortal coil, when we truly merge with the awareness that we are “Spirits having a human experience.”—something I have been teaching my beginning Tarot students for over 25 years—then where are we in this collective story right now?
In my 2009 article on this weblog, “The Tower Card in These Times“, I examined the connection between world events—specifically the 9/11/01 “wake up” call the world received, a symbol of the unfolding of these times—and the Sacred Journey we all travel as reflected in the story of the major arcana’s sequence.
Here it is, ten years after my Tower article and around 18 years past the flashing beacon of our XVI Tower event…where are we now? I believe I can say, unequivocally, that the mass consciousness that was triggered by the 9/11/01 event has been cooking in its alchemical pot, stewing on the meaning of life, the nature of existence, examining the essence of hate, fear, love, well-being, and peace, while pondering our connection with a higher intelligence or source of life (God, Goddess, Great Spirit, Creator, the Quantum Field, etc.). Such a profound world event (World Trade Towers) was a wake up call that many have been trying to answer…to pick up the proverbial phone/receiver to get the message.
This is where the Tarot’s “Sacred Journey” shows us our next phase in the major arcana sequence…the XVI Tower is followed by XVII Star. In the context of my thesis, as we emerge from the ashes (the phoenix‘ fiery purification and emergence from its cremains) we rise beyond the known world, that which preceded and was the cause of distress due to illusions and attachments (XV Devil), and are catapulted into the Divine realm, much like a near-death experience (NDE) where we peek past the “veil”, supported by the non-dualistic awareness of the II High Priestess, to see beyond. The challenge for the XVII Star, hanging out in this blissful space (much like some altered-states of consciousness), is how to bring this cosmic awareness back to Earth, grounded, while living this new awareness of higher consciousness in everyday existence.
When in or near death and on the other side of this veil, many report seeing something expanded and more inclusive than ordinary life. You’ve heard or read about some of these stories. There is a growing collection of writers and teachers attempting to describe to us on this side of the veil what is really beyond our established sense of the known. Here are a few that stand out for me:
- Anita Moorjani – Dying to Be Me: My Journey from Cancer, to Near Death, to True Healing (2014)
- Eber Alexander – Proof of Heaven (2012)
- Raymond Mood – Life After Life (2015)
- Jill Nolte Taylor – My Stroke of Insight (2009)
- Gregg Braden – Human by Design (2017)
- Dr. Sue Morter – The Energy Codes (2019) (my copy of this new book was just delivered to my door as I was writing this…talk about cosmic timing!!)
MY SACRED JOURNEY . . . 