Most tarot decks consist of 78 cards. 22 cards make up the major arcana. These cards represent universal principles or archetypes that reflect tasks or developmental stages that we all need to complete through our spiritual development.
The other 56 cards make up the minor arcana. These cards have some similarities to regular playing cards. They consist of numbered cards from one to ten and face cards (court cards). Each card in the minor arcana belongs to an element – wands, swords, cups or pentagrams – and says something about where you are in a process of change or what kind of forces you are influenced by. The process can be about a minor or major change in one's interior or in one's life, or something that affects all of humanity or the universe.
Through their figurative and symbolic expression, the tarot cards hold a special opportunity for the intuition to open up. This was something that, for example, the psychiatrist Carl Gustav Jung drew attention to. He believed that the tarot symbols speak to our collective unconscious.
When you start with tarot, it can be a good help to familiarize yourself with traditional interpretations of tarot symbolism. But in the end, the cards are tools for your own intuition to be expressed.