The Fools Journey

Written By Halley Sherwood

Listen to the audio version of the piece below.

If you’ve been with me since the Fools Gold days, you know how attached I am to the Fool card. 

It was one of the very first cards I learned about when I was getting into tarot, and I continued to feel oddly connected to it in spite of the various interpretations that labeled the Fool as careless, naive, or of poor judgement.

Then one day, I stumbled into an interpretation of the Fool by Jessica Dore (@thejessicadore). I don’t have her original reading, but I’ll paraphrase for you the way I took it to mean.

Our instinct is to look at the Fool and see him about to walk himself right off a cliff, despite the dog’s valiant efforts to warn him. But what if there wasn’t any danger at the bottom of the cliff? What if it wasn’t a cliff at all? What if, only a short jump below, was a heavenly meadow filled with tall grass and fruit trees, just out of our view? 

When it comes to uncertainty, to the unknown, we usually jump to the worst-case scenario. Our ‘what ifs’ are always full of dreadful, anxiety-producing thoughts. We’re scared of what we don’t know, because we can’t control or prepare for what we don’t know.

The Fool is the perfect image of surrendering to uncertainty, to what is and to what will be. It knows that adventure is the unexpected medicine-bringer, that questions bring you closer to healing. That sometimes the journey you set out on leads to a place you no longer want to be, and that getting lost is an opportunity to find something you didn’t even know you were looking for.

The rest of the world (the dog) may try to warn you that the pursuit of your dreams is impractical and could end in massive failure, but who are they to talk, that have never stepped off the cliff?

The Fool whispers, “remember to forget.” Forget the rules that have been followed for too long without question. Forget the list of things you ‘should’ and ‘should not’ do, the places in life you ‘should’ be. Forget what you think you know so that you might learn something new. There is room for humility and reinvention at every step.

I just finished reading The Alchemist, and I don’t think I’ll ever be able to look at this card again without hearing the voice of the King say, “When you really want something, all the universe conspires to help you achieve it.” I now see the Fool as Santiago, the shepherd boy who left Spain on a boat to Morocco in pursuit of his treasure. The boy who stepped off the cliff.

Santiago’s journey— and the Fool’s journey— is towards a dream. He may not know exactly how he’s going to get there, and he may not even know if there will be any payoff once he does, but life happens along the way and— by following the omens— he ends up with not one, but TWO kinds of treasure. (I won’t spoil it for those of you that haven’t read it yet)

So if you’re reading this, and you feel as if your heart is standing next to you, tugging your sleeve like an impatient child, whispering that it’s time to go after your dream, listen to it. I’ll leave you with a short excerpt from The Alchemist: 

Most days, the boy’s heart wanted him to find the treasure, to realize his dream. But sometimes his heart began to speak of fear. It told him stories it had heard about men who sought to find their treasure and never succeeded. Sometimes it frightened the boy with the thought that he might not find his treasure, or that he might die there in the dessert. It told him that he had already found his treasure, found a woman to love, and that he was already content.

“My heart is a traitor, it doesn’t want me to go on.” the boy said.

“Well that makes sense. Naturally, your heart is afraid that in pursuing your dream, you might lose everything you’ve already won,” the Alchemist responds. 

“So why should I listen to it?” 

“Because you will never again be able to keep it quiet. Even if you pretend not to have heard what it told you.”