The Tarot is divided into two parts, the Major Arcana (Secrets) and the Minor Arcana. The Major Arcana has 22 cards that are numbered from 0 to 21.
Zero, in the Major Arcana, is the Fool. It is the Fool that travels from the number one card, The Magician, to the last card, The World, often called The Fool’s Journey. Rachel Pollack, in her book, Tarot Wisdom, says that, as the Fool journeys through the Major Arcana, he moves from the Conscious to the Unconscious to the Superconscious, that level where he understands his connection to the cosmos and can celebrate his arrival with joy, fulfillment and success.
As a writer, artist, musician, or other creative, you are The Fool at the beginning of each new creative project. And, as you journey with your work from beginning to end, you travel through the phases of the Fool’s journey of conscious, unconscious, and superconscious.
In the first stage, the work is all about what you want to create and your goals for that creation, those goals frequently including completion, publication or production, and success (however you define that for yourself).
During the second stage, as you move into the work, if you have the courage (Strength) to let go of what you think the work should be about, the work and the Muse will take over. This is when characters in your novel start talking to you and refuse to act the way you think they should. This is where passion and love for your work wrest control from the mind’s dictum to shape the work.
In the final stage, if you can let go of everyone’s expectations for the work, including your own, the work develops into something unique and transformational.
But to get to that point, where the work takes on its own life and becomes something truly magical, you have to begin the journey, to leap into the unknown. You have to be willing to be the Fool, to appear foolish, to make mistakes, to fail, over and over again. Only then can you arrive at the place of joy, fulfillment and success as the Fool dancing with the Cosmos—the World.
Ciro, during his 10-year career creating four tarot decks and two oracle decks, embodied being the creative Fool.
When he started his first deck, the Gilded Tarot, he was new to tarot, and so, as he says on his site, the deck was not as “comprehensive in its symbolic content” as his later decks. Yet, even with the limitations expressed, his first digital art deck created such a resonance with tarot readers and collectors that, since 2004, he’s sold 300,000 decks worldwide, with translations in many languages including Czech, Russian, Greek, Chinese and others.
Following the Gilded Tarot, in 2006 Ciro released the Tarot of Dreams as a special edition that sold out by 2009. He then created a standard edition, daring to break the usual tarot format by adding four additional cards to the Minor Arcana, called Palaces. When that edition sold out, he created another from heavier card stock with metallic gold edges.
Finally, in 2009 after years of being part of the tarot community and learning more and more about the cards and their history, Ciro created the deck I fell in love with and use for my weekly Muse readings, The Legacy of the Divine Tarot. Originally, it, like Tarot of Dreams, was published as a special limited edition. Now, a standard deck is published by Llewellyn.
After finishing with Legacy, equipped with a deeper understanding of the tarot and newer developments in digital art, Ciro says that he returned to the Gilded and, “as a kind of celebration of my own personal artistic journey through this fascinating world of tarot, I decided to re-work the entire deck.” It is The Gilded Tarot Royale.
Not satisfied to rest on his creative tarot laurels, Ciro then produced his own oracle deck, called Oracle of Visions, and then the Gilded Reverie Lenormand, an oracle deck dating back to the Napoleonic era. Both of these decks showing in their design and detail, Ciro’s deep focus and creative investment in his work.
At the last night of Readers Studio, an annual conference for tarot readers, he received a box filled with individual thank you notes written by those whose work and lives had been touched by his art. But first, Ciro showed attendees a video, not of his art work, but of his imagined performance as a typical Las Vegas performer (AKA lounge lizard) singing a disco love song and dancing. His audience roared with laughter, dancing with him as he played the Fool. Moments later, they sat in silence, tears falling as they watched another video, this one a retrospective of his work, then erupted into laudatory applause and a standing ovation in recognition of his gifts to the community.
Ciro continues to travel the Fool’s journey as he ventures into new fields and areas of interest, always with a deep passion and love for creating magic with his art.
When you decide to make the Fool’s journey, to leap into your next creative project, remember to give yourself totally and completely to the passion and love of your work, to stay with it, regardless of failures and successes, to give yourself to it completely so that you—and your work—will transform lives.
Then you’ll reach that place of joy, fulfillment and success, The World, and dance the Cosmic dance of Life.
Like Ciro, the tarot community’s much-beloved Fool.
2 Responses
What a wonderful post. This was my first Readers Studio, and I recently became aware of Ciro’s art. The idea of being willing to be The Fool is an invitation to endless possibilities, and knowing that as one adventure is complete, another can begin. Each adventure brings forward with it all the experience, wisdom and joy. My take on The Fool is this: The Fool is not foolish. Indeed, he is wise. He takes the essentials with him to begin his journey, knowing that along the way he will acquire what he needs. And so Ciro has and will. It was wonderful to meet him in person, and to experience the depth and bredth of his contribution to the Tarot community and the world.
Michaela, I’m so glad you’ve become part of the Readers Studio community and of mine. Thank you for your thoughts on this post and on Ciro. I’ve loved his work since his first deck and love introducing people to his work.