Joie de Vivre Tarot

Joie de Vivre

By Jewel

The Joie de Vivre, French for Joy of Life, is a deck created by artist Paulina Cassidy and published by US Games in 2011.  The cards are 2 ¾ X 4 ¾ and of quality glossy card stock typical of US Games decks.  The cards are packaged in a flip top box along with a 61 page little white book (LWB).  The LWB includes an introduction, key words, the name and descriptions of the characters on the cards, divinatory meaning, reversed meaning, a small section about the author, and two pages to write notes.  The backs of the cards are golden to yellow with a vine design and are reversible.  The front and back of the cards are framed with a thin black line and have a ¼ inch white border. 

The images are watercolor paintings in pastel colors with vibrant tones.  The images follow the whimsical and unmistakable style I associate with Paulina Cassidy art, but are visually simpler than Ms. Cassidy’s previous deck the Paulina Tarot.  The simpler images allowed me to focus on the image and message of the cards.  In addition, the characters of the Joie de Vivre have names, making them more personable and their message/advice more personal.  Spiral designs are prevalent throughout the deck, especially in the backgrounds of the cards.  The characters ranged from people to faeries, to animals, to other creatures.  On a side note, Ms. Cassidy’s website includes full images of the deck.  When you click on the images you can see a large rendering of the card as well as the information about the card that is presented in the LWB.

The Joie de Vivre is 78 card Rider-Wait-Smith (RWS) based deck.  The Major Arcana follows the traditional RWS structure, including archetypes and numbering.  The Majors are numbered in Roman numerals, with the Strength card at VIII and Justice at XI.  The Minors are numbered 1 through 10 in Arabic numerals.  The Minor Arcana suits are Cups, Wands, Coins, and Swords.  The Court cards are King, Queen, Knight, and Page.  The Minors are fully illustrated, and RWS inspired but very original.  The number of suit symbols (Cups, Wands, Coins, Swords) corresponding to each Minor appear on the cards within the drawing.

As noted in the LWB introduction, in the words of the creator “… the Joie de Vivre is designed to access the childlike energy in each one of us to help stimulate, enhance, and inspire joy in our own lives. A truly fantastical people, the living beings in the Joie de Vivre realm are all sentient souls of love who want nothing but the best for those who take a journey through their world. An amplifier of intuition and a connection to the divine source, they hope the Joie de Vivre deck will help awaken a response from deep within your heart, mind, and spirit.” 

I am the first to admit that I purchased the deck for the art, and assumed that it was a “fluff” deck.  It is not.  My experiences with this deck have been transformative, healing, and helpful.  The deck has a gentle manner of delivering information, but addresses issues in a direct and honest way.  It does not sugarcoat the messages or advice.  What it does do is promote facing challenges, obstacles, and difficult issues with hope and in the spirit of resolution.  The Joie de Vivre is infused with empathy, for self and/or others, which is the true magic behind it.  This is one of the aspects of the deck that surprised me the most and the reason I quickly learned to love it.  I attribute this to Ms. Cassidy’s 10 years of study and experience in energy healing which she incorporates into her art.

Some of the traditionally harsher or scary cards such as the 9 of Swords, 10 of Swords truly capture the emotions as we experience them yet in a non-scary way, and XV the Devil presents the message/issue in a somewhat comical manner.  It is not just about the event or issue but how it is affecting us or others.  This is true of all cards in this deck not just the harsher images.  The images help us put situations and emotions all together completing the picture.  If you can see it and understand it then you can do something about it. 

In my personal opinion, this deck is really well suited for persons with interest in using tarot for psychological and emotional information, healing, and/or guidance, intuitive readers, empaths, and those who like decks that are honest and direct yet comforting.  It would also be good for use with querents that are a little squeamish about Tarot in general.  I would also recommend it to fans of whimsical art and those who like to use Tarot for writing.  The deck is best suited for persons with some tarot experience as the images do vary from the traditional RWS, however I would not discourage a beginner from getting this deck as the images are very evocative and great for sparking the imagination and intuition.