Stage One
As young children, we have no ego; we love ourselves and each other unconditionally, we don’t think before we speak, we don’t hold grudges, we don’t make judgments on ourselves, on another, or on our life.
We don’t live in the past, we don’t worry about future, the thought hasn’t even occurred to us. We don’t know how to do anything other than live in the now, play and run wild with our imagination!
This is the first stage of The Fool’s Journey — the one where a fool does not know that they are a fool.
Stage Two
As we grow the ego develops, we begin to care about how others see us, we start making judgments and change ourselves accordingly. Inner restriction, attachment, untruth and disconnection grow as the ego develops. No longer magically free with our imagination, ego takes over and turns it into a fear-mongering machine.
At adolescence, the ego kicks right in and we come right out of the heart into the head. Judging others, our lives and ourselves is our new play time. It doesn’t feel anywhere as good as when our imagination was free, but we have found ourselves trapped in the ego and we can’t do anything other than feel the fear, causing the polarity of attachment and separation.
We are becoming conscious, but unconsciously. This is the second stage of The Fool.
Stage Three
The task at hand is to develop the third stage of The Fool. We flow through the first in the child stage, when the child is open and unconditionally loving and isn’t conscious of it.
But we tend to get stuck at the second stage, and it can take a lifetime’s work to feel free enough in ourselves.
We may not stay adolescents forever, but in adulthood all we tend to have learnt with the journey of ego and enlightenment is how to restrict ourselves even more.
Everyone on the Earth is on his or her own Fool’s Journey. To be at our best we must consciously work with the energy of The Fool, embrace the journey wholeheartedly, live it, breathe it, and be it.
How amazing would life be if you didn’t care about looking like a fool?
What would you say and to whom?
What would you do?
How free would you feel?
How would this change your life?
My guess is MASSIVELY in EVERY way possible!
And not just yours, but everyone you come into contact with.
By being liberated in yourself, you automatically give permission for others to be liberated within themselves.
How can spirit work through us if we are so in fear about what others will think?
How can they help anyone get to a place of freedom and love within, if the conduit is restricted, constricted, or in fear?
The most important thing in life is to learn how to flow with our being.
The universe helps those that help themselves.
There is an actual spiritual practice of walking the path of The Fool, and that, (believe it or not) is the Tarot. Most people, when they see the word Tarot, think “psychic reading” just like when you think yoga, you think “position” or reiki, “healing.”
But there is a whole spiritual practice underneath the one external facet that you see.
There is a story of soul evolution contained within the Tarot and it is actually called The Fool’s Journey. It contains 22 pages (cards) that start with The Fool and end with The World. Each page/card along the way represents a stage in life that all of us must go through to get to enlightenment (The World).
Perhaps you don’t see the practice of Tarot as helping someone to get to a place of love and freedom within, or perhaps you do, but Tarot has been long associated with prediction that I wouldn’t blame you if you didn’t.
People don’t say “I am going to go to a Tarot session to find inner love and freedom.” No! They say — I’m going to a reader to find out if I am going to get that job/man that I want, etc.
People tend to come for a reading because they want the opposite of inner love and freedom (unconsciously).
They want to identify with the mind, make judgments, get predictions, gain control of the uncontrollable and basically attach.
Having a prediction causes an attachment, a desire for the prediction to come true, or a fear that it will or won’t. Either way it brings in the small egotistical self of fear and control.
The person having the reading doesn’t realize this causes the opposite of freedom and self-love of course, because they are in the second stage of The Fool (Ego).
But if we are in the third stage of The Fool, then our way of being in life (or Tarot practice) changes and we can begin to help people out of the need for control.
Gently fostering more trust, love and freedom until incredible alignment becomes possible. People start fostering trust in themselves, and the universe that all is as it should be. Restrictions fall away as they become comfortable with the truth, not moving to try and hide or fix it.
And from that the biggest blessing happens;
They find themselves. And the ripple effect is created, enhancing all those they come in contact with, helping the whole of humanity to move in the third stage of The Fool – This is the third stage of The Fool.
How Do You Know If You Are At The Third Stage?
You feel it.
Your walk and talk is free.
I’m not saying that you are a constantly conscious enlightened being, but you know when you are out of alignment.
You will understand through your feelings that you have become restricted, attached, in fear or in control, and you will be able to look at what is holding you to ransom and un-attach yourself.
In this way, The Fool mirrors the process of The Hanged Man (found half way through The Fool’s Journey), that deep inner reflection for ultimate freedom — the archetype of the enlightened master.
So, The Fool is the most powerful archetype there is, and not just because it’s the only card in the Major Arcana of Tarot that found it’s way into the playing cards as the joker, the wild card, able to go anywhere, do anything and be anything.
And not only because it is the only archetype in history that is free enough to take the mickey out of royalty and not get beheaded, but actually paid for it (and lives on today as Russell Brand).
But because it is truly free inside, which is why it can be so free on the outside. And by holding that, The Fool can journey through life, causing ripples of freedom for others.
Powerful.
The Fool may be at the beginning of the cyclical journey of life called The Fool’s Journey, but as it is cyclical he is also found at the end — as the enlightened master. The Fool can do what the powerful cannot, because The Fool has no ego — and when there is no ego, the channel for spirit flows freely.
We may not be able to become completely free of our ego, but Eckhart Tolle says if we become 90% free of ego we can achieve the currently unachievable.
Just like how Frodo, the simpleton in Lord of the Rings, was the only one who could complete the journey to Mordor.
“And still, after all this time, the Sun has never said to the Earth,”You owe me.”Look what happens with love like that. It lights up the sky.– Rumi
