op 10 Tarot Decks for Major Arcana

Namaste. Welcome, beautiful souls. This video, I need to do a bit of a preamble because the title looks very similar to one I did a few days ago that had a top 15. And this one says top 10. This video is a follow-up to a year-long series called Top Tarot Trumps. And in Top Tarot Trumps, I featured 59 decks, 59 decks that were part of, and this is the top fives, so 59 decks made it to the top five of 22 Major Arcana. So there were many more decks that were part of the series, but of the cards that made it to the top five for each video, there were 59. And today, you are seeing the top 10 of those 59 decks. And I hope that makes sense. Because when I add the banners, the card in my hand here is Tarot of the Hidden Realm. It is one of five decks that had four cards in the top five of each video. And this is really, really close, these top 10 decks, because these top 10 decks had four, five, and one had six cards in the top 10. So really, all of these decks, and I'm sure that in chatting and sharing with you my reflections on these decks, there'll be more majors that probably should have been included. All of these decks feature amazing Major Arcana cards, and I'm going to speak to these today. Okay, so welcome. First deck, welcome to the Tarot of the Hidden Realm. If you don't know Tarot of the Hidden Realm, it is a Fae deck, and it is one that has close up imagery and a lot of emotion. There is a lot of wisdom in this deck. And I want to say wonder. The child cards are absolutely stunning. And this is a deck that also made it to the top in Top Tarot Miners as well. So what does that tell you? This is a deck I've gifted to several new readers, people that are connected to the Earth, people that care about the Earth, and our relationship with it. Amazing, horrific card. I have had this deck around for a long time, and I appreciate some of the differences in this deck. There are some name changes in the majors. The 10 card is called Fortune Fairy instead of Wheel of Fortune. The archetype of the Dandelion is really powerful. In all its stages, the Dandelion has a lot to teach us. And here we see a young Fae about to blow a Dandelion the seeds. The Blasted Beach is 16, and I'm going to show you another deck today that uses, I believe, the Blasted Birch for the Devil. We have Shadow Dance, a horned figure, a pan figure, a very common portrayal in Earth-centric decks to have the Devil in the foreground and a couple in the background enjoying life. I think it's really important to have this kind of a Devil card in your tarot library. And this Lover's card, oh my goodness, I mean, is this a man, is this a tree, is this the Green Man and the Green Woman, which, you know, it's a part of a lot of tarot decks where the Emperor and the Empress are featured in the Lover's card. And so, yeah, I mean, there's so many great connections in these cards. Look at this Chariot. That Fae really sees the way forward. The horn is pointing forward. And so we have different kinds of conversations with this deck than with a straight up Waitsmith-inspired deck. It is Waitsmith-inspired, but it does have its own bent on things. And I find it's the emotion is what really draws me into this deck. So I wanted to show you the World card, and I want to credit Amy, actually, for this realization. Oh, I'm not sure what it is, maybe it's the Empress, perhaps. Let's go find the Empress card. You know, I love teaching tarot because my students are so, they're always looking at different decks behind the scenes, if we're on Zoom, or we're on YouTube, and I learn a lot. And it was Amy, who does have her own YouTube channel, that pointed out, and I hope the Empress card is here. Yes, was it this one? Maybe. There was this really kind of profound connection that she made between the World and the Empress. The Empress being a 3, and 21, right, 21 also being a 3. And you know, every deck is, oh, this Temperance is just beautiful, unique. In its portrayal of these major archetypes, and some of them feel familiar, and others challenge in different ways, and I think this is a deck you would not be disappointed with if you gave it time. I know a lot of people in the close-up features find that challenging, but given it, give it time, and you will find your way. So, in this bottom group, like I said, it says here, there is a 5-way tie. And another deck that also was in the top for the Minor Arcana is Herbcrafters. And you know, this is a deck that, again, has taught me so much. I look at the energy of the rose, the rose, rose essential oil is highest frequency of essential oil. We have a lot that is going on here, and we have the fertility symbol of the bees and the honeycomb. And I want to really honor the wisdom of Joanna Powell Colbert and Letitia Guthrie for the creation of this deck, because there is a lot that one can learn here. There's a lot of mandala in the majors, right? So, circular, geometric, beautiful arrangements of flowers and herbs. And this is an important, I think, energy of the Major Arcana, these connections that we build. And so you can compare, so for example, the Wheel of Fortune mandala with, let's go to the World. So the card on the right is full of herbs, and the card on the left has flowers and fruit. So there is a fullness, a ripeness to the mandala on the left. Almost looks more like a cake, right? Something that man has put energy into. I mean, obviously, somebody has created this beautiful herb garden on the right. The directions are important in both cases. And in this deck, there are, this is one very favorite card, and a very important plant in yoga, the tulsi plant, the holy basil. And when I saw this card, I just melted. I felt so much connection. The tulsi mala is associated with Krishna, and very high frequency. And this whole card just feels so special. Some name changes, not too many. And here with the Strength card, garlic is the plant, beautiful garlic. Also, we have honey. And so it is a reminder of this idea of sweetness and rajas, right? So rajas, this just stimulant, energy, vibrancy, vibrancy and sweetness, among other things. I mean, these cards are so rich. This is definitely a favorite as well, too. And I think the Hierophant is a difficult card for a lot of people, because there is, there are painful associations with institution. And the Hierophant, in essence, is a transmitter of messages from the divine. And here we gather in ceremony, no matter how small or large, with the medicinal plant to heal and to meditate. I remember the first time I tasted cacao, and I was just shocked at how bitter it was. It was not sweetened at all. It's something that takes time to grow. Yeah. Much, much to learn. And this, I did a very long, slow, deep dive with this deck. And so worthwhile getting to know this deck. In this same group with four cards making their way to the finals, we have Lilywhite. This deck's been close at hand for a long time. This world card is amazing. The way that we see the roots and the reflection, the world, the canopy of the tree, all connected and reflecting. This is a watercolor deck by Celia Malesville, and it's been around for a while. Also was part of the Minor Arcana Series. And as most European decks, strength is 11. Beautiful Magician card. And some of these cards, I featured Lilyblack. So Lilyblack is a deck that's painted at night. It's very similar to this deck, but there are certain cards like this one that really shine in the black deck. And this one, oh my goodness, this card, this elk has shed its rack. And I feel like there's a forest fire in the background, and this is a tower. Vulnerability. Can you imagine having all this weight on your head and then dropping that rack? What that must feel like. Death. This is the lovers. And this hermit card is, for me, it's such a special card. This wheel is gorgeous too. But I see a womb, young woman in a womb, and it allows me to take the energy of the hermit to a whole other place. Transformation, 20th Arcanum. Gorgeous sign card. So that's the Lilywhite Tarot. I am surprised this deck is here. It is not a deck that I have worked with to any great extent. And part of my process in preparing for the Top Tarot Trump series was to go through every deck in my library. And I did that, and I made notes of favorites of 0 to 21, and then I started making minor favorites. And this deck, four of these cards got into the top five. And, you know, I need to think about why. Why is that? This is the curated art of John Bower. Los Caribeo deck. And there's just something, I mean, this painting, I'm sure I have read a children's book at some point with this painting in it. There's a heart to these cards and a universal understanding of what is going on. And I just, when I did my tally, I was so surprised. Here's the Hierophant, this rock troll, a young figure, a young boy communicating with a rock troll. Reminds me of the Disney movie Enchanted, Enchanted, no, no, no, Frozen, Frozen that has rock trolls. You know, after I saw Frozen, I really made some powerful connections with rock trolls in my forest walks. And I know a lot of people struggle with this deck. They've cut off the top and the bottom borders and turned it into an oracle. And I know others that have done deep dives into this deck and found amazing connection. And I don't use a lot of curated decks. I do have a few curated art decks. And so this was a big surprise to see that John Bower. I'm sure this fool card was one that was featured. And this is the Falarkos Tarot. This is the final of the first group. This deck I do know much better. I spent quite a bit of time with this doing a deep dive. I have interviewed the creator, Carmen Sorrenti, read many of her discourses and spent a lot of time thinking about this deck. This is the Hanged One. This is the Empress. And you know, I regret not including this card in the favorites of the top tarot trumps. It's an extraordinary Hanged One card. And I remember this Empress when I realized the cup shape of the flowers here on in the And this is a deck where you discover things the more that you work with it. And you learn things through. There's a little, there's a little white book. There's also an extended PDF. And I think this is just a deck that takes time. This is the Emperor card. And there's a large mirror. You can see bits of the mirror here behind the Emperor. And then a small mirror in the foreground. This is a card that really adds a whole new layer to the Emperor. Margaret Peterson is not part of this series. But this card reminds me of the journey of Margaret Peterson in that sometimes a deck creator will clear, you know, wipe a canvas and then begin again. And this is the Hermit card and the layers within layers can become so powerful. Fool and Star. It takes time to find. I mean, this is an obscure deck. The Furlarkos tarot is about connecting with your dreams. It's about healing through dreams. It's a historical perspective on the healing through dreams. And yet it has this alchemical connection, which allows me to find more contemporary associations. And Carmen Sorrenti, the creator's backstories are just brilliant. This is trimmed. I think it comes with a yellow border. Many of my my decks are trimmed. The next group of cards. Each of the decks had five cards that made it to the top five. And here is another surprise. I have the original deck called Tarot of Origins. This is Primordial Tarot. There is a guidebook by Barbara Moore. And yet in this deck, I find myself intuitively discovering all kinds of things. Wondering. I remember it. So this is nine. So this is the Hermit. And I was wondering about this woolly mammoth or this great beast, the skeleton of this great beast. And the Hermit here is the Hermit in the hip socket or the shoulder socket. And then it's funny, I think I was doing a live chat and other people were saying, well, no, this is a skull and these are eye sockets. Well, that's not what I see at all. And I think, you know, we need to just let whatever wants to evolve in a card evolve because hip socket, shoulder socket. These have different implications if you work with the chakras. And I spent a lot of time and I have had developed three courses and there's one that's still available on seeing the chakras and the lessons of the chakras in Tarot. This is such a great star card and the idea of pure potential. And for me, this card really connects to the Fool. In this deck, I'll see if I can find, there's the Fool. And not necessarily in this deck, but the star is like a rebirth. It's an opportunity to begin your journey again. There is, well, you'll have to watch the star video. I'm sure I shared this card. This is a great card with the large bottom and the energy going down into the earth as above, so below, as within, so without. And, you know, the primordial doesn't exactly match Golden Dawn correspondences or Waitsmith correspondences. And yet it's just so very, very clever. This is 16, the tower. You see this figure up here on the top of this large monolith. This is not High Priestess, this is Moon. So let's get High Priestess. Where are you? High Priestess and Moon. I have a couple of videos on this deck. Great double card. Really, really good double card. Ah, the mask. Oh, the powers of the mask. The mask can allow us to be who we don't have the courage to be when we are not comfortable. Sometimes the devil is a really important card for self growth. And this card, this deck is tough. I mean, it really gets you to face some difficult. It doesn't do things the soft way. Let's just say that. And here we see a hunter being pierced by the horn of an animal. And this deck does discuss, certainly, the hunter-hunted relationship. So this is a Primordial tarot. Of all the cards I'm showing you, so Primordial, John Bower, this deck, this is Tabula Mundi, Phalarcos. So four, only four. We're not also in the top 15 of top tarot miners. This is Mel Moline's Tabula Mundi, an extraordinary deck. Mel has a way of, I don't know, like making the Thoth tarot accessible. This is a Crowley Thoth inspired deck. And it does such a good job of helping to understand the connections of everything. And I think if you were to study the Crowley Thoth tarot, this is a must have deck for study. I believe so. Five cards. So probably the five cards are going to be the Empress for one. Adjustment. Love this Adjustment card. The Star. Absolutely beautiful Star card. And this Adjustment card taught me a lot about its Libra connection. And Libra, Rubella, Venus. And how Venus is so different in Taurus than in Libra. And I'm really grateful to Mel Moline for this deck. There's your Empress and Imperor. Art. So Art is Temperance. And this is a foundational, an important foundational understanding for the 14th Argonaut. To have the Archer here. To have this sign of Sagittarius here. And to understand the Tree of Life. And it's a really important card to study, even if Thoth isn't your thing. And I think this is a great deck to go through. Rather than Ashera. Ashera is a great deck, but this is a great, great study deck. All right. So also in this group, five cards in the top is Wildwood Tarot. This one also was in the top, Miners. And another deck that has been very formative in my tarot education. My 25 plus year tarot education. About building connections. Understanding the web, the mandala of tarot. It can come through because, you know, this deck has its own system. And the Crowley deck changes things from the Golden Dawn associations. And the more we study, the more we learn, the more open we are to expanding our vocabulary of what certain cards mean, the greater reader we will be. And this is, again, another very Earth-centric, bio-responsible deck. How are you all doing in the year of the Hooded Man, the year of the Hermit? This is being recorded in 2025, which is a nine-year, so a hermit year. The Ancestor stands at a gateway in the forest. About to beat the drum. Both as a protector of the Wildwood, but also calling you into your inner journey. And the symbol we see on a few cards in the tarot. It's a great deck for showing the same symbol among various cards. We see the Orphic Egg underneath the water in the Moon card. And here's the Fool in the Star card, beginning again. I have a meditation on my channel. So this deck has some extra guidebooks. One of them is called Wild Magic. And Wild Magic has a lot of meditations in it at the back. And I recorded the one for this card, which is a powerful ancestral healing. Wildwood tarot. The last one in this group is the Llewellyn. And I could have included every single card in this deck in a top five. The artwork by Anna Marie Ferguson is stunning. Absolutely stunning. I think I put these in order. This is the Magician. There is such great power in nature and the connection of the humans with nature. And the guidebook for this deck does a very good job of weaving together mythology and the tarot. There's your Empress and Emperor. If trimmed, it's a very small little deck, like a Lennarmen size. There is the Hierophant. And I want to show you something. Sometimes I wonder... Here is the Devil. So the Hierophant is 5, right? And the Devil is 15. And if you look at these two cards, it really makes me wonder about the connection between these two cards, especially if they were to show up together in a reading. I think there's something kind of amazing happening here. And when I look at this Devil card and the Horned one, and I think about how the horns can be transmitters of energy from spirit. And I mentioned in some other Earth-centric decks how the energy of the Devil can be so misinterpreted. And if you work with Golden Dawn correspondences, having a Chariot like in the Flarkos to that as well too, going through water can be really, really helpful. And they're both going through water. This is the Chariot on the right. This is Strength. I have this gorgeous Hermit card. And the Wheel. There was a tarot tag some time back that asked something like, if you took a deck off your shelf, could you bring a card to mind? What card would that be? And for me, this deck, there are just so many. This is one. The Justice, not so much. The Hanged one for sure. And this is a really cool Temperance card. It's like, so here's the Well. And then if you look up here, it almost looks like she's in the Well. Like this is water up here. I find this such a mysterious, mysterious card. And what a Tower card. This is a great Tower card. Star. And Blue. So this is what Llewelyn tarot is inspired by or named after. The Welsh mythology of Llew. And I've really come to these cauldrons or lakes that are, that have that whole deep healing powers. And I have a couple of decks. One is the Tarot Aux Rémords Étranges. And it reminds me of these walks into these sacred cauldrons and how transformation can happen. Okay, so that is the second to last deck. And the Marielle tarot had six cards that were in the top five. This card also featured in minors. And it's a deck that I've worked a lot with. Lots of videos on my channel. It is one that if you want to work with deep inner work, self-healing, past lives, it's definitely worth taking your time to get to know. Tarot of the, no, Landscapes of the Abyss, the Accompanying Guidebook, is a book you could read over and over and over and never quite absorb all the information. And I have been spending a lot of time connecting deeper and deeper with this deck. It's one you can never quite, there's always something to learn with this deck. This is the first edition. And the High Priestess is one of the cards that was changed in the second edition, though the guidebook remains the same. And it's funny, I have seen different versions of the Lovers and I don't know if it is from Marie White herself or from AI or counterfeit decks. This Magician is a magician that will change your tarot journey. The Sun and the Moon are a Diatek Iconic Emperor card. I just did a video on this card, the Devil and the Queen of Cups, if you're interested. The Judgment card is another one that was changed in the second edition. They're both excellent. And the Hierophant, so the Hierophant was also changed and looks a lot more like a familiar Hierophant. And yet it's so interesting that every single word in the guidebook for the first and second edition is the same, even though some of the cards changed. So there you have it. Just to recap, these 10 decks that I'm showing here today each had four or five or six cards in the top five. So in total, there was about 60 decks that made it to the top five of my Top Tarot Trump series. And that's all linked below. It is, I think, really important to study across a number of decks and to take time with that because many of these decks I'm showing you here today are ones that you really can't absorb in a month or even a year. You need to work with these decks and work with them across various kinds of questions. These are powerful, powerful archetypes. And I find it really interesting that of these 10 decks, six of them also were in the top 15 for the Top Tarot Miners. Four of them were not. And that's simply because there's something really extraordinary about the Major Arcana and not so much about the Minor Arcana. So how to choose a tarot deck? How to choose a tarot deck? Do you choose a deck that has strong Major Arcana that you can understand? Or do you choose a deck that has beautifully illustrated Miners? It's really personal. But I find it, I would say that I would have a good look at six of these 10 decks that also featured in Top Tarot Miners. Okay, so I'm going to tell you what those are. Of these 10 decks I'm showing you here today, five of them also featured in the Top 15 for Top Minor Arcana. So if you haven't had a good look at or given these decks a good chance, they are Tarot of the Hidden Realm, Herb Grafter Tarot, Lily White Tarot, Wildwood, and Mariel. And I would say these, none of these are really easy decks to work with. None of them are straight up, but they certainly all will expand your tarot vocabulary. So thank you. Thanks for watching. And let me know if you have further questions. Take good care. Namaste.