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Underground > Temple >

Non traditional divination

18:01 / 11.10.04

So, I had a question that I wanted to use my subconscious to get a leg up on looked at my options. I was never any good at Tarot, I don't swing just the right way with pendulums and I didn't have the money or inclinaton to go buy a set of runes. I was thinking of heading down to the Mahayana Temple of the OMG Buddha, but that's in Chinatown and I'm in Brooklyn and was tired from a long day at work.

Then I realized I was also hungry. Once I got done with the pity party, I came up with a solution. I went down to the local chinese place(it was about 100 yards away), and made sure they added in my fortune cookie with my noodles, onions, and brocoli. Then I held the cookie after eating, concentrated on my question, and opened it up.

What's scary is that I actually got an answer that turned out to be very, very useful. Better than some tarot readings, actually.

So, now I ask you. What types of divination do you use when you have no desire/are too lazy to use traditional forms?

19:45 / 11.10.04

I grab a book, close my eyes, open the book, smack my finger down on the page and see what it's pointing at.

If I'm outdoors, I'll look at the clouds, patterns in the pavement, designs made by stuff laying around (eg, bits of string, paper, rocks). I use cards or runes most often.

Love the fortune cookie, though!

20:03 / 11.10.04

Get close to a mirror and stare at the veins in your eyes, Since you can't quite focus on it, they will blur and seem to move around a little, creating new shapes and patterns. Interpret them accordinglyWorks great when you wake up bloodshot as hell in the morning and wondering what the day holds for you.

21:26 / 11.10.04

I use the fortune cookie every time. It seems to vary from place to place how relevant they are - the "You are friendly and happy and everyone likes you" brands never help so much (even though it's nice to hear), but there is one place I go that is always spot on (they've even given me admonishing and warning fortunes, which I've never gotten anywhere else).

~L

14:43 / 12.10.04

>> I was thinking of heading down to the Mahayana Temple of the OMG Buddha,

What is this? I'm in NYC and I'm curious. (If you feel answering this in the thread would be too off-topic, you can feel free to PM me if you'd rather.)

trouser the trouserian

15:05 / 12.10.04

I usually blank my mind and gaze into the nearest reflective surface - can of coke, woman wearing highly polished leather boots opposite me on the tube, whatever's there - and 'take' whatever images, thoughts, impressions etc., pop into my head.

*

01:28 / 23.10.05

An experiment with iTunes divination:

Querent: "Will there be a major earthquake on the Hayward fault line while I'm living in Berkeley?"

Key— Runrig, Chi mi'n geamhreadh
Crossing— Eileen Ivers, On Horseback
Below— Faith & the Muse, Hollow Hills (Bauhaus cover)
Passing— New Order, Ceremony
Above— Frontline Assembly, Columbian Necktie
Coming—Claire Voyant, Iolite
Self— Eurythmics, Sweet Dreams
Environment— Clan of Xymox, Stranger
Hope— Decembrists, Shiny
Outcome— Chieftains, the Celtic Harp

The key— Chi mi'n geamhradh is about winter coming, and peaceful times of summer can't last forever.
Crossing— On Horseback is an instrumental, very lively with a lot of rhythmic tension. The drums are central.
Below— The Hollow Hills. Should speak for itself, really, although I point out that Yuletide is mentioned as a time when one should particularly not be anywhere near the hills lest one risk disaster.
Passing— Ceremony; cryptic. It seems to have the sense of building toward a point of change.
Above— Columbian Necktie. "Scattered on the roadsides, bloodcaked bodies..." not a good sign. The position of this card indicates it is either my (obvious) fears, or a possible outcome.
Coming— Iolite. "The worst stings in life have left me numb Please don’t leave this disaster"
Self— Sweet Dreams. Indicates travel, especially mentally; escapism.
Environment— Stranger. I'm not getting any help from my immediate surroundings. Walking vs. talking.
Hope— This could be my hopes, or it could be guidance for a good outcome. Either way, this song is about lies and seeming innocence and contains a minor injury but no death.
Outcome— A relatively upbeat instrumental. In other words, I'm not going to tell you, so quit worrying about it.

Any thoughts? I did one for my employment situation earlier which seemed clearer— so much so that I'm not going to share it here. If I'm really looking for guidance, I tend to turn to my ogham sticks, but I'd seen iTunes divinations elsewhere and thought this was an interesting experiment.

Charlie's Horse

01:56 / 23.10.05

That is a damn nifty use of iTunes, id. I can't say that I've tried it, but I think I'll have to pretty soon. I wonder if you could do this with one album, or one song.

Personally, I second trouser's approach. Normally, if I'm asking about someone else I know, I like to ask someplace that's seen the person. There's a diner and a number of trees near my apartment that have probably seen every single person who's come through this town, or at least everyone I've ever met, so I tend towards their advice. I let the ceiling tiles play connect the dots for a bit, spelling out pictographs of information. They certainly draw things differently than you or I. The night sky can also help out with this.

You could always just walk about, using your question like a mantra, letting the spirit of a place leak out from the cracks in the sidewalk, until the answer materializes in front of you.

I don't know about using these as 'lazy' methods, though. Typically I find this kind of work to be involving, if you want to gain anything useful.

11:01 / 23.10.05

id entity: If you're going to use that method then please God please never download any Merzbow.

Less searchable M0rd4nt

13:28 / 23.10.05

I went through about a year of using Google as my primary divination method. I would think of a question, reduce it down to a few search terms, plug it in and see what came up. I spent months refining the technique, working out the kind of phrasing that would help, varying the language used, employing the image search ect.

Eventually I got sick of the whole thing and went back to tarot. Google's okay for dream interpretation but for anything else it's just pants compared to the tarot.

Bard: One-Man Humaton Hoedown

17:11 / 23.10.05

I use the subway sometimes. I stare at passing trains as they come into the station, specifically in the windows. Reflections and half reflections, faces blending into one another. Gets a half decent sense of things sometimes.

I second blibliomancy. For me its normally pretty good.

I need to actually learn some proper tarot spreads. The crap I make up now tells me very little.

XXII:X:II = XXX

04:57 / 31.10.05

My form of divination is actually the strongest suit in my magickal practices:

THRIFT FU

[cue gong]

It works very simply: Whatever message the universe is trying to send me, it will put in my path at a price which I am willing to pay to acquire it. Usually, this is in the form of books, music, movies, etc., though it also correctly got me in on the ground floor of the retro gaming revival (at a goddamn steal) a year before it really exploded, and extends to other items as well. My favorite leather jacket actually waited two weeks and dropped from $20 to $12 by the time I went back to get it. Of course, the proper practice of this requires a certain amount of spending money and a propensity for frequenting thrift stores, garage sales, flea markets, etc., which I thankfully do. It has been known to even put items in my hands for absolutely nothing: my old favorite easy chair was strangely enough sitting in the stairwell of my previous apartment building, and a more comfortable piece of furniture you could not ask for. And of course, my new precious kitten (who right this moment is snoozing on my arm) found us, though in the end equation I'll probably have to spend entirely too much for his upkeep.

Oh, I sometimes try to read the signs as I wander, but so far thrift fu has been the most consistent.

Less searchable M0rd4nt

07:02 / 31.10.05

I'm curious--how do these purchases/finds translate into information? What message do you get from the Universe via a cheap leather jacket, other than "Hmmm, you look a bit cold"?

XXII:X:II = XXX

18:51 / 02.11.05

Perhaps not "you look cold," but "you've been wearing a black overcoat since high school; let's upgrade your appearance." For a particular testimonial regarding that jacket, look here.

20:14 / 02.11.05

Bathroom divination rules.

Watching the tracks of drops of water running down the fogged glass door of the shower always seems to do something to my half-asleep brain, conjuring up all sorts of ideas and inventions that I inevitably forget to follow up on.

Also, it seems that every time I sit down on the pot I see an entirely new and different image in the random coloration of my marble bathroom floor. It's always startling to me how vivid and clear the images are, and yet I can never figure out how to "see" the same thing again the next time I'm sitting there.

21:23 / 02.11.05

For a particular testimonial regarding that jacket, look here.

Had a look. Perhaps we could start a thread on divination tecniques that can get you "a lot of pussy!"

No, best not, i'll just get a nosebleed or a migraine or curl up and die or something.

21:30 / 02.11.05

Because any of those things would be better than having even the slightest chance of stumbling across your idiotic blog again.

XXII:X:II = XXX

06:51 / 03.11.05

Wow, thanks for judging me on the basis of what someone else said to me. You have a remarkably open mind and a well-developed sense of the humor of the ridiculous. Your opinion is valued and respected, and your iridescent wings can surely bear your aloft.

Less searchable M0rd4nt

07:52 / 03.11.05

thanks for judging me on the basis of what someone else said to me.

Well, on the basis of something someone else said about you, that you chose to report on your weblog and then present here as a testimonial as to how cool your jacket is. How the pussy-magnetness or otherwise of said jacket relates to divination is still not entirely clear, but perhaps we should move on in the hopes that we may grab the topic before it heads off into the long grass.

08:05 / 03.11.05

What MC said.

12:22 / 03.11.05

I'm not convinced by 'consumomancy'. I personally am a fan of lost divination arts like phyllorhodomancy, divining by rose petals.

12:53 / 03.11.05

I've had some good results with bus divinations. I'm sure that's been covered elsewhere already...

XXII:X:II = XXX

17:02 / 03.11.05

Just to be clear, I have never considered the jacket a "pussy-magnet"; it's the impression it had on a bunch of teenage kids that I found far more amusing. You'll note in my response to them I don't confirm their suspicions; I just say, "It's done its share." High horses gotten down from? OK, swell, let's proceed.

18:11 / 03.11.05

I was getting a run of really ominous fortune cookie fortunes, but I think it's been broken now. I was collecting them, but I'm not sure where I put them.

Things like, "People you don't know are talking about you." And "The criminal commits the crime, society prepares the crime." (Got that one twice.)

Unconditional Love

19:59 / 03.11.05

I keep seeing small devils and imps in the pavement and fully formed gremlins, and i just tried to write this post in my user name, cue gremlins.

ONLY NICE THINGS

22:04 / 03.11.05

I think the question here is what share exactly the jacket has done. Given how much ladysex Vladimir has had (only with disease-free non-Indian girls, obviously), what proportion of that has the jacket done? Has the jacket by now done a whole lady? Or just a leg? Inquiring minds want to know.

00:20 / 04.11.05

I think the jacket has only done one or two full pussies so far. The rest of the jumble sale has yet to trumpet its conquests. There was some talk of an old Edward Scissor-Hands VHS noncing up some Halloween type babysitter teenagers though but i generally i think that most pussy is safe for now.

Thank God.

Less searchable M0rd4nt

07:25 / 04.11.05

Still not quite sure what thrift shop gear, be it never so alluring to the ladies, has to do with divination. However, I was more interested in Mirror's post above, where ze referred to using a marble floor as a focus. This kind of reminds me of the oracle I mentioned here. "a slab of...hideous reconstituted marble stuff...which happens to have two large pink areas that look like two faces..." The two "people" conversing in the image never seem to express the same mood or be performing the same action twice, and try as I might I can't "see" them the same way they appeared on a previous occasion. It's a fairly reliable oracle, if a bit rough and ready.

15:34 / 04.11.05

Odd, I can't find any references to marble as something used by old oracles. No, like, funky name for divination-by-marble. You'd think there would be. (I mean, if there's kephalonomancy....)

ONLY NICE THINGS

15:52 / 04.11.05

As far as I know, that's because it didn't happen. It's possible that I'm wrong, though. If you're looking, head for the prefix "marmor".

23:56 / 16.11.05

i was assuming that the thrift divination mostly came through the other stuff the thrift store brought(the knowledge within the books and so on), the jacket being a kinda "oh, and it gets me cool stuff" add on. i do wonder why one pats their own mattress appraisingly, mind.
that i dont get.
surely you have already appraised it?
doing so when quizzed about it certainly suggests one might not have had cause to use it within recollectable memory.

on divination;
i use pretty much anything.
using techniques devised or decided upon on the spur of the moment appeals to me, and i use that kinda thing often.

i reckon most of what i do qualifies more as a scan of the subconscious rather than asking anyone external. i think internal understanding can more easily be wrought from more abstract techniques.
a toss of the coin often makes up my mind, whether i agree with the outcome or not. more accurately it makes me realise i already knew the answer, as i find is so often the case when divining.
i find other things work similarly. i have used the bus route technique mentioned above and several variations on that theme to good effect.
i also use the 'open a book' trick, the 'channel surf', the 'google(images preffered)' and the 'ask a stranger obliquely' technique.

i guess those are all fairly obvious.

a big partof the reason that i employ this haphazard yet pretty effective set of techniques is that i havent yet embraced a 'proper' divination method, such as tarot or i ching. i am thinking about it more than ever at the moment but skintness and a lack of knowledge conspire to stop me. i wanna leap, but i wont have the cash to make amends if i hate what i buy.

(
actually, if anyone has any strong feelings on either tarot or the i ching i would appreciate a PM. i know very little about either system in terms of using them.
i'm veering towards a tarot deck, but i liked the vibe i got from the iching. i only played it once, an online version thrown at me in an old thread, and i was pretty fucking high on acid, but its answers made perfect sense then and what remains of the message makes sense now.
torn, i tells ya.
)