This workshop explores a wisdom path by discovering the archetypal images of our personal myths. Joseph Campbell discovered in myths and fairy tales, common elements of a here's quest. In his book, "The Hero With A Thousand Faces," he portrays the quest as being universal with myriad varieties. The hero's journey could be our own, in which we must overcome a series of crises, sometimes with the aid of a helper, eventually finding a boon, an object of great value (in our case, wisdom), after which we re-cross the threshold of our familiar home where we use the boon to live a life that is fuller and more whole.
It is partially based on a World Mythology college course I taught.
YOU RECEIVE:
1. The Book containing history and information on Tarot cards; using them for insight on our life journeys. 4. CD or download with 22 guided visualizations.
2. Parchment bag containing 22 Major Arcana Cards to color 5. One package of handmade paper trim
3. Twenty two ivory laid finish Blank cards to collage 6. Colored Pencils
EXERPTS: Table of Contents:
Introduction
1. The cards - history
2. Play, Creativity, Time and the "Real World" - Welcome to the "playing field"
3. The Mystery of "I" - Inside/Outside - Conscious and the Unconscious - Personal and Collective Unconscious
4. Life Journey
5. The Individual Cards Of The Major Arcana in the Life Journey
6. The Individual Cards Of The Major Arcana in My Own Life Journey INTRODUCTION
TAROT CARDS, those mysterious predecessors to our playing cards, have fascinated people for hundreds of years. The colorful images contain mythic archetypal symbols we can recognize in our own life journeys. If we ignore with the medieval-sounding names on some of the cards, we find many of the figures are familiar. We have all known - or even been - carefree innocent Fools, ready to step off a precipice - remember falling in love in your youth? We can remember the Magical, Mystical experience of early childhood (Magician and Priestess). We've all been subject to the authority of parents (Emperor, Empress and Pope), and have even been authority figures ourselves - when exactly do we become the grown-ups? We've all played the Charioteer who is setting out in the world on his own for the first time - remember getting your first car and the feeling of freedom you had driving with the music playing full blast? And we have all been in love, learning the beauty of relating to another or others (The Lovers). Later in our lives, we have all had the urge to search for deeper meaning - remember the first time you or someone you love became seriously ill? We can recognize the Hermit's need to go within, and the Hanged Man looking at his world-turned-upside-down. How strange that he looks perfectly calm after leaping into the unfamiliar. He's been around long enough to have experienced the ups and downs of the Wheel of Fortune. We have come to realize that the Devil is a trickster who has lured us into attachment to the glittery illusion of worldly achievements. People in their fifties and sixties don't drive fast cars with loud music unless they're going through a "mid-life crisis." What are perfectly appropriate outlook and normal behavior for a child or adolescent is unacceptable for a mature adult. A bolt comes out of the blue to destroy the Tower (an "ivory tower" or strong, beautiful, youthful body), and transformation occurs whether we like it or not. Death will come. The idea is to come to terms with the meaning of our lives. To gain some inner illumination, warmth and refreshment so that we judge ourselves to have lived a good life, a unique and fulfilling life (The Star, The Moon, The Sun and Judgement). Along the path we have gained insight into some of the virtues it is wise to cultivate (Strength, Temperance). And, ideally, we have finally come to understand the meaning of our life as something that has a quality beyond appearances (The World).
We are all in a kind of play or drama. Our own life story stars us as the main character. We are on a journey, a Hero(ine)'s Quest, and what we are searching for is our best selves. As part of a deck of playing cards, the Major Arcana can be a useful to help us understand and direct the unfolding of our lives.
4. LIFE JOURNEY
Everyone has a life journey. It has phases and stages, ups and downs, twists in the road and detours. It is a path or a river only traveled by one - ourselves. Sometimes the sailing is smooth; sometimes the road is bumpy. Sometimes there are signs, and sometimes we get lost. Sometimes we are alone and sometimes in the company of others. But travel we do. Our life is our adventure, our story. Sometimes we feel that we are creating it, and sometimes it feels like it is happening to us. We all start the journey young, and (if we're lucky) we end it old.
It raises questions, this journey. Where are we going? Why are we traveling to begin with? How did we get here? Why do we find ourselves here and not there, now and not then? Who are the infant we began as, and the old person we will become - who is this I that is traveling?
There is nothing more fascinating than this journey and these questions. The word "question" is related to the word "quest." As I often tell my students, "your life is a play, and you are the central character. You are both the actor and the writer - the director too." Socrates said, "the unexamined life is not worth living." So let's examine the play by playing.
