What kind of relationship do you have with the child within yourself? If you’re not sure, ask yourself: How much enthusiasm do I feel each day? How often do I play? How open am I to learning and experiencing new things? Do I still feel awe and wonder, at least once in a while?
If we don’t cultivate a relationship to the child inside, life will be dull and heavy. Yes, life can be stressful, and we have our responsibilities to attend to. But if we stay connected to that little kid we possess deep inside life can be fun again. We can embrace the little pleasures that we took so much for granted when we were actual children.
Tarot to the rescue! Your tarot deck is an excellent way to re-discover and stay connected to the child within you.
The tarot’s Fool card is number 0 and represents the divine child within us all. It symbolizes approaching life with fresh eyes, pure spirit, and a sense of adventure. Like children, the Fool can be quite “foolish”, but also fun-loving, courageous, and FREE. The Fool is the most idealized version of the child found in the deck. But it’s not the only card that invites us to embrace the kid inside.
Let’s look at the tarot’s Court Cards. These are the Kings, Queens, Knights, and Pages of the deck. Who are these royal figures? And more importantly, what do they have to do with you and your life?
The easiest way I’ve found to work with this set of cards is to see them as symbols of personality types. We see them all around us, throughout our lives. And – far more important – we see these 16 personality types as distinct parts of ourselves. Many of us just assume we have one personality. We may assume it’s crazy to have more. But there’s much more to the story!
Think about the different versions of yourself that emerge under different circumstances. Are you the same “you” at work as you are when playing with your kids? Are you the same version of yourself when you are on a romantic date as when you’re taking a class or out with your friends? Clearly we have different sides to our personality. The Court Cards allow us to discover these different sides and cultivate a mindful relationship with each.
Of those 16 Court Cards, the Pages represent the child within us. They are differentiated from one another by their suit. Each Page represents how that child is expressing itself, in terms of the element of the suit.
In a nutshell, they are:
Page of Wands – youthful Fire (spirit) – optimism, enthusiasm, joie de vivre
Page of Cups – youthful Water (emotion) – playfulness, wonder, gentleness
Page of Swords – youthful Air (mental) – curiosity, study, thirst for knowledge
Page of Pentacles – youthful Earth (physical) – novice, trainee, learn by doing
Many of us grown-ups falsely believe we have to be serious and responsible nearly all the time. We debase the childlike side of our nature because we don’t believe it has any value. We may believe the child within is a weak aspect of our nature, if we’re even willing to acknowledge it exists at all. This is such a shame! We don’t realize how important it is to cultivate the relationship we have with our inner child. Sometimes we need to feel wonder, shed our cynicism, and PLAY. There is a power found within our inner child that remains completely dormant for many of us our whole adult lives!
I love when I get a Page in my daily readings because it invites me to reconnect with my inner child. I then give myself permission to stop being so darn serious and just be silly, open, and joyful again. I’m reminded that I have a child within that I can always access and even embody. Then, like magic, I feel that youthful spirit again. I BECOME that youthful spirit again.
Throughout our adult lives we never lose the child within; it remains deep down inside, within the essence of our being. Throughout our lives it provides us with wonder, enthusiasm, playfulness, and openness to new experience. If these attributes are lacking in your life, it may be time to rediscover the kid inside you again. And your tarot deck can be a very helpful way for doing so.
(images from the Hanson Roberts Tarot)
