Tag Archives: psychic

A User-friendly Guide. Volume 1. Number 1. Page 1.

A Page of Swords type called me on the phone the other day, seeking information. The conversation went a bit like this:

 

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I’m thinking of booking a consultation with you but I want to ask some questions first. Okay?

Sure … go ahead.

Can Tarot foretell the future?

It can, in the sense that with yes or no questions it has a precisely 50% chance of being correct.

Can Astrology foretell the future?

It can, in the sense that anyone who can read an ephemeris can predict with pinpoint accuracy where any planet will be anytime over the next many several years.

So, if neither of these methods can give me the winning numbers, what use are they?

Good question.

Are you saying that Tarot and Astrology do not tell fortunes?

I admit nothing.

Well what do they do?

They raise awareness.

Oh. Like mind-altering substances?

Not exactly.

Well what then?

Okay, since you ask, both methods are sophisticated psycho-intuitive lenses that can penetrate below the surfaces of life. One can gain information about personal process, personal struggle and personal opportunity. This can greatly assist in the understanding of one’s strengths and vulnerabilities, and what creative responses are possible to the life-challenges that all of us face at times.

Isn’t that just New-Age psycho-babble?

Maybe … Maybe it’s better than that.

So, let me get this clear, you’re not a fortune teller?

No, you’d need a licensed professional for that … All this, in accordance with the law, is for entertainment purposes only.

Then why should I come and see you?

We’ll have fun.

Is that enough of a reason?

You tell me.

Oh, and by the way, is the Psychic Fayre still happening next week?

No. It was cancelled due to unforeseen circumstances.

 

How I Got Involved

Why should a United_Statesmiddle-aged, British/Australian character-actor living in the USA, be involved with this kind of hocus-pocus?

I’ve had a couple of significant experiences with divinatory systems. Aged 15 I was at North Sydney Boys High School in Australia, and the maths teacher offered to do a palm reading for each of us in exchange for being allowed to keep a print of our hands. I accepted.

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I’d been at the school for about 3 weeks and had never spoken with this man. He began the reading by saying, “The first thing that struck me about this was — an actor.” It hit me between the eyes. How did he know?

About 7 years later in London I went to a psychic. When I sat down he said, “There’s a big Australian flag above your head.” Later he told me, “Your life is Greek myths in the suburbs.” And so it has proved to be.

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Again later, I became friendly with an elderly Scottish sculptress who used to read tea-leaves. To sit with her in positive, energized, creative presence was a lovely experience, and she was the sort of person who seemed to know “the mystery of things”.

From an early age, I knew that there were “more things in heaven and earth …”

I’m no more than ordinarily psychic, by which I mean that I believe we all are, to greater or lesser degree. But I reckon intuition to be an equal function with intellect. And I take the view that daily life is full of information that could be useful to us. If we knew how to read the clouds, the stars or the wind, we might be able to expand our ability to influence the path of our own lives.

Tarot and Astrology are compatible lenses through which we can view circumstance, and look for meaning.

At one point in my youth I had a job in a bookshop. One of my co-workers gave me a deck of tarot cards, saying, “Here, I think you might be interested in this.” This was a puzzling event. I left the bookshop soon after, and lost touch with the giver of the cards. I would pore over the deck (The Marseille Deck) wondering what any of it meant. I didn’t know it then, but in gifting the cards he was following a tradition.

There were other experiences which were also like pointers. Just before my first Saturn return I read Liz Greene’s book: Saturn, a New Look at an Old Devil. I admired the book as having a depth of scholarship, and some academic weight. I had similar feelings of relish and pleasure at finding a piece of code that explained a facet of mystery, as when previously reading Ouspensky.

And so on …

It was a while though before I began to study seriously. Presently, I have opposing but not contradictory experiences: on the one hand, the more I know and understand I’m aware of how endlessly much more there is to know and understand. On the other, every piece of understanding gained is like a signpost on a return journey.

What about you? Do the cards or the stars call to you too?