Deck Interview: Playful Heart Tarot
Cuteness is a powerful vehicle for wonder and innocence, although it’s not one that I’d considered very much before buying the Playful Heart Tarot by Zaara of KittenChops Illustration. It’s no surprise that I pulled such “young” cards for such a youthful (seeming) deck: some 2s and 3s along with the Fool and the Magician. There’s an initiatory energy to this reading that fits with the open and free journeying that the deck encourages in me. It makes it possible for—or maybe it begs—me to re-examine the under-developed and forgotten playful parts of myself.
As always, I used my own custom deck interview spread for this reading, and you can read about what goes into in more depth in that other blog post.
Deck Interview with the Playful Heart Tarot
What major lesson are you here to help me learn? 5 of Pentacles
Through which divine energy can we best communicate? 2 of Pentacles
In what area can you aid me to help others? 3 of Swords
In what area could your guidance be easily misunderstood? 2 of Cups
What can I do to keep our communication clear? 3 of Wands
How can I use your guidance for the highest good? The Fool
How will I know when we’re ready for a new lesson? The Magician
For a deck that’s so cute and playful, I was shocked at the first and third cards that emerged until I spoke with the creator, Zaara of KittenChops Illustration, for an Instagram live interview. I mentioned the cards that I had pulled and explained my interpretation: it felt like an invitation to be in my emotions, even when they’re uncomfortable. She agreed and added her own take on the imagery of the 5 of Pentacles with Gretel (of Hansel and Gretel) just wailing. For her, children’s emotions are pure and intense, and that allows for rapid clearing and healing. Children are much more resilient in that way than adults (even beyond the elasticity and resilience of their bodies compared to their joint-clicking elders). While not all children can express their feelings so authentically for a variety of reasons, the idea of the uninhibited expression of pain (and joy) is definitely a lesson that I take with me from this deck. The 3 of Swords reinforces that message that this deck serves that beautiful healing purpose for everyone I work with, not just for me. It was such a surprise and so rich in its rearrangement of my assumptions.
And that surprising change in my expectations about this deck feels like a real spiritual wakeup call that goes hand in hand with the spiritual connection of the 2 of Pentacles. When working on my own Color Outside the Lines edition of the Life Line Tarot, I was focused on creating something that would work with the inner child without losing the maturity that I find so necessary for me to do the work well. My intention was that the design would evoke childhood without being childish. But the Playful Heart Tarot, which on first glance may seem like a deck with more traditional form of inner child playfulness, offers “serious” childish play. It welcomes you to feel the full intensity of emotional connection, hope, and wonder that are all important parts of inner child work that does more than simply rejuvenate and infantilize. The 2 of Pentacles, Jupiter in Capricorn, directs me to think about the full possibility of both/and with benevolent paternal Jupiter and serious (Saturnian) Capricorn melding. (There’s lots more to learn more about astrology and tarot in another blog post.)
The deck feels immensely personal and exploratory as a result of all this, and not interpersonal. That seems most powerfully reflected in the combination of the 2 of Cups as the potential source of miscommunication and the 3 of Wands as the clarifying focus. It’s as if using this deck to inquire into relationships takes you out of the playful personal space of the individual as uninhibited and unabashed. This is a deck that wants you to be unconcerned with what others think. It’s hard to let yourself go when you’re worried about who may be watching. But exploration and personal inner journeying requires you to be willing to branch out into new areas that might seem silly to those who aren’t on the same journey.
And the Fool is the perfect card to keep in mind while using this deck: it all comes back to that initial impulse to be free and set out on the journey, silly or crazy or naive or immature as it may seem to others. That’s where magic gets made, in that suspension of disbelief. And dreams and adventure are made possible when you stop fearing what will be. To me, that’s the greatest power in innocence and naïveté: you don’t know enough to be afraid, so you’re willing to be brave. This is a deck to help the Magus dare to do new things, and many of us desperately need that energy as we grow older. Like ancestors and past lives, the lessons of the inner child, carried within us across time, provide us with the opportunity for healing and empowerment. It’s why I sometimes offer inner child readings as a kind of “Story from Beyond” and include that work as one of the three focuses for my course on Reading the River of Time.
You can buy the Playful Heart Tarot through the KittenChops Illustration website. The version I bought, shown here, is a custom color-edge version. Zaara individually colored in all the edges. It’s simple but so fun.