How to Talk to the Fool and Other Tarot Cards

“I am the beauty that attracts you, but I have thorns. After all, close relationships can hurt, and you know it well, says a beautiful flower to a young man. “There is always such a risk, so make sure that the spikes do not bite into your hands.” The man listens very carefully, and understanding appears on his face: he begins to guess where the strange confusion that he experiences in the company of his new acquaintance comes from. This is not a magical practice, but work at the Living Tarot Cards training.¹

How everything happens

I work with psychodrama. Grossly simplifying, it can be described as follows: clients explore and resolve their difficulties by playing different roles. In the training, participants first listen to themselves and think about what worries them or what they would like to improve. Then they formulate their request. “Why do we quarrel with mom all the time?”, “I want to find mutual understanding with the boss”, “Something is wrong in my relationship with women” …

I lay out the Tarot cards face down in advance and invite the participants to choose one at a time. Then each one carefully examines his card: first, thinking about his problem, and then thinking about how he can solve it. The drawing of each card consists of many details. And, as a rule, our attention selects different elements depending on what we are thinking about, or sees them differently. It’s not logic that works here, but imagination: 48-year-old Olga, thinking about her insecurity, saw the Hermit’s cloak as black, and when she thought about how she could feel more secure, she suddenly noticed that the cloak was “actually” white.² The skills acquired at the training can be used for independent work at home in the future.

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Then comes the time for the protagonist to work in the group. The protagonist in psychodrama is the one whose request becomes the basis of the scene that we play out. He names those symbols on his card that he considers the most significant, and chooses other members of the group for these roles. Let’s take the Jester card as an example. He threw a pole on his shoulder, to which a bundle is tied, a dog jumps at his feet, mountains in the background, a bright sun shines from above. Someone will pay attention to the Jester’s bright clothes, someone will notice that an abyss opens before the Jester … Each of these elements can become a role. This is an important difference from the theater we are used to: there, a door or trees are usually a silent background, a decoration. And in psychodrama, any detail can become an important symbol and find its own voice.

The roles have spoken

But how do you know what the Mountains or the Sun will say? After all, they say something different to everyone. That is why, after the scene is built and all the participants in the play are put in their places, the protagonist takes the place of each of them in turn and, plunging into the role of this or that symbol, tries to feel it from the inside and find the words that correspond to it. If this does not happen immediately, I help with questions: “What will you, the Sun, say to the Mountains?” or “How do you feel about the Jester?”. There is a kind of interview going on. Then the protagonist leaves the role (literally: moves to another place), and the participant chosen for it repeats the cue given by him. The protagonist listens to her from the outside, delving into the meaning of the message.

Thus, the elements of the card begin to show their character, express their attitude to other symbols and communicate important information that we will decipher with the protagonist after the dramatization. Each element has its own message for the protagonist in the context of his request. Arranging communication between symbols, we see how the action unfolds. Bringing the map to life in this way is an exciting process in itself, and everyone plays their part enthusiastically.

What is happening on the stage reflects the dynamics of the internal conflict, and the protagonist has the opportunity to look at how this mechanism looks from the outside, and realize something important for himself. He can see what exactly in animated symbols is an obstacle, and what is a way out of a difficult situation.

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Wisdom of symbols

Often the solution to the problem is contained in those symbols that most of us associate with some kind of resource: important messages are pronounced from the role of Heaven, Earth, River, Mountain, Sun … Such roles are called transcendental, that is, beyond the limits of direct human experience. It may seem strange, but the protagonist from the role of the Mountain or the Moon sees the dynamics of internal processes in a completely different way and finds a way out of the current situation much faster. The experience that we experience when playing the symbols of the Tarot cards expands our understanding of our inner world. We see our problem from a new perspective and often discover ways to solve it that were previously hidden from us.

One card, many meanings

Messages are usually based on the natural properties of the elements of the map: the earth symbolizes support and support, the sky indicates lightness, the mountains — constancy. And yet, the meaning of the messages is always unique, and when we play a card, I, as the host, never know in advance what exactly the protagonist will say from the role of the symbol, for me, as well as for the participants, this moment always remains a mystery. But, perhaps, it is even more surprising that the protagonist himself cannot guess what the message of the symbol will be until he takes his place, does not take the pose in which he sees him.

Here are two examples for comparison, where the participants chose the “Jester” card to show what the same elements of the card mean to different people. The examples are real, the names of the protagonists have been changed for privacy reasons.

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Michael’s case: relationship with a girl

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Catherine’s case: relationship with a younger sister

Case Analysis

As we can see, the same card and its symbols have different meanings for the participants. For Mikhail, the bag is a valuable and reworked experience, while for Ekaterina it is a type of behavior that manifests itself in relations with her sister as overprotectiveness, causing protest and undermining trust. The sun tells Mikhail that the main thing is not to rush, building relationships at your own pace, and the sun encourages Ekaterina to develop and communicate more with new people.

The interpretation of the Jester card as a whole has its own meaning for everyone. Mikhail understands that he needs to keep a distance that is convenient for him, to get accustomed to the girl he likes and, despite mutual sympathy, not to strive to possess her, as he did in previous relationships. For Catherine, the general meaning is different. She communicated with her younger sister sharply, condescendingly, not taking into account her desires and interests. She either put pressure on her, or allowed her to kind of “break away” a little. But the essence of the problem is that she spent a lot of time and effort on teaching, performing a parental function. The decision that her unconscious from the role of the Sun tells her is to take care of herself, her life and development, and not waste time teaching her sister.

Practice shows that when we begin to understand the universal laws of mental processes, then independent work on ourselves becomes more accessible. And Tarot cards can become our companion on this winding, sometimes difficult, but always interesting road of self-knowledge.

¹ The site of the training «Living Tarot Cards» plan-b.msk.ru

² The training described here uses the Rider-Waite deck.