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Mystical wanderers,,,,hello. I, Troy Parrott, Tarot Pro, am continuing our journey through and exploration of the Tarot. What else am I to do while recovering from an appendectomy?
We are nearly all the way through our our examination of the 22 major arcana cards, using a special North London themed deck of my own design. In this series we are looking at these special cards and how they may interpret your life in your tarot readings.
Today, we move on to Card XX: Judgement.
XXI: The World
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Upright
Completion, integration, fulfillment, travel
Inverted
Continuance, world-weariness, emptiness, incomplete
The World finishes the 22-card cycle of the major arcana, and this is a card that is about, appropriately enough, completion and travel. The world is round, a singular, perfect sphere — a journey begun will take you to far-flung places, but will eventually lead you back to where you started. Pictorially, there’s a strong thematic connection with the Wheel of Fortune — specifically the centralized images, the clouds, and the animals in the four corners of the card. This is not accidental — both the Wheel and the World deal with circles and journeys, though they take the augur on very different paths and lead to different conclusions.
You may recognize the item in the center of the card. Upright, the World can represent the culmination of a journey and the realization of a major accomplishment. It represents the point where many things come together to form a cohesive whole. It can bring great satisfaction to the one who draws it, along with the realization that we are all connected with all other living things. The World upright can be extremely cosmopolitan, and often represents that you have completed a major milestone in your life.
Celebrate this fact — it’s okay to enjoy it! The World is rarely perfect and there will always be things that you think can be improved, or that aren’t perfect. But this completion is important in that it is the realization of everything that has brought you to this point. Lift a glass — or a trophy — and toast yourself. You earned it.
The reversed World could suggest that you are trying to achieve this kind of closure to a major part of your life, but have not realized it yet. It could be from a personal setback — an injury that keeps you out of the squad perhaps — or maybe others have determined that you are simply not ready for this final step (Mick McCarthy, looking at you m8). It can lead to a sense of emptiness; you can either sink into the negative impact of these feelings or you can use them as inspiration to realize your dreams and push towards a worthy conclusion. The choice is up to you.
The World represents the culmination of all the threads that have made up the tapestry of your journey to this point. But the end of one journey can lead to the beginning of the next. Do not think of the World as the last card of the tarot — it is the conclusion of one thing, but the start of something so much bigger. Reflect on that, and draw a new spread.
My friends, we have come to the end of our journey. With this, we have progressed through all 22 cards of the major arcana, starting with the Fool (0) and continuing all the way to the World. I hope that I, Troy Parrott, your Tarot Pro, have helped you along this journey and that you have found yourself with a new understanding of how the tarot can impact your life. The tarot does not predict the future, per se — it can can glimpse a bit of what is to come, but more than that it can help you along your path to self-enlightenment. And there are more cards — the full minor arcana awaits for those who would wish to continue their mystical journey.
But alas, our journey ends here.
My Irish great-grandmother, who’s spirit continues to guide me along my own path, would say that it’s a tool, and like all tools it can be used for good and for ill. Use it correctly, and the Tottenham Hotspur Tarot deck can expand your horizons and lead you on to greater and better things. Audere est facere.
Thanks for reading, y’all. This series is by far the longest creative series I’ve ever attempted in my time at Carty Free. It’s been something that’s been percolating in my brain for months, and I’m glad that I got the opportunity to realize and complete it, just before football restarts. It’s been a very stretching experience, but has also taught me a lot about the tarot, something I knew little about before starting this project.
I’m still working out some details, but there may be the possibility of merchandise (t-shirts, prints, mugs, etc.) for some of the card graphics used in this series. My question to you — is there interest in such a thing, and which cards would you like to see made available? I’ll be glad to donate proceeds to another worthy cause if it goes forward.