On Tarot, Crystal Ball, Tea Leaves, Palm Reading and Divination

Although these forms of divination have all been around for centuries, they exist because people have a need to know what their future holds. Perhaps they think that the future - something that doesn’t exist yet - is already set and fixed, that if they know what it may be, that they will in some way be able to feel more comfortable with their present.

In truth, people don’t really want to know what their future truly holds but rather they want to know whether their future is a good one, a happy one, a place where things will make them content and satisfied. So to say that people are open to "hearing" about their future (if it could be heard), is not quite what they think they are searching for.

People don’t want to be told bad things or things that they most fear, the knowledge of which may already exist some place in their preconscious, or subconscious mind. They want to know that what they already fear will not happen. Many people search out those who are experts in Tarot, Tea Leaves, Crystal Ball and Palm Reading. They think that one of these occult forms of reading might give them more information that will validate not only their future as promising, but their present as well. When they hear the things they want to hear, they feel that the validity of this divination is verified, and they go back to their lives comforted that their future is assured as a fulfilling place that will hold promise for them. They provide hope, whether false or genuine.

If however they hear that things will not be good or that something they most fear might actually happen sometime in the future, that reinforces the growing fears they already have. They tend to attack the reading as if it’s a personal reproach on them, and their future. The truth is that the readings just told them things they didn’t want to hear. And when people hear things they are not open to or really aren’t ready to be told, for whatever reason , they tend to close up and raise doubts about the method this information came to them.

In general, this is how people handle fortune telling: They are drawn to them like magnets because of their need to know. But most people also have a simultaneous fear to hear what might be told. On the other hand, some people approach these forms of divination as opportunities to learn things they need to consider in helping them make better choices for the future. Those people have less fears of uncertainty and more confidence in using any information to help them plan their future.

This so far has answered why people go to fortune tellers, but it still doesn’t say anything about its accuracy, how it works, whether the future can actually be told at all? Or whether we should even be searching for answers to something that doesn’t exist yet.

The basic principle behind all methods of divination is the same. It’s a way for the reader (fortune teller) to tap into an energy source that is part of another sense beyond the five senses (hearing, tasting, seeing, feeling, touching), that some claim they have some mastery of. It's almost like a form of hypnosis or meditation for the reader (fortune teller) to pull this energy in and use it to pick up information on the seeker. What they actually pick up, and what they are tapping into, is yet another issue. But if you believe there are other senses than the five senses already described, then the reader perhaps is tapping into something.

Now we come to the question of whether it's possible to tell the future if the future doesn’t yet exist. If we take the position that the future is defined as a range of possibilities that can happen given the present circumstances, as in quantum physics, there are infinite possible effects for any given present action, then what the reader may be doing is simply describing one of those potential results that is part of the infinite set of possibilities that can occur. Are they then predicting the future itself, or just a possible future that can happen or may not happen? Since there are other possibilities that can occur, what would make the teller's prediction come true or not?

Again we come back to the issue of Free Will. Does the seeker have the ability to change the course of what might happen or perhaps the question should be: can the seeker in some way effect or make happen one or another of the infinite possibilities? I believe he can. Sometimes knowing the trends of one's life can get someone information that might impact which trend dominates in any given situation. If we know that our family history contains certain genetic diseases, we don’t have to go to the fortune teller to learn the likelihood of getting this disease in the future. We can be more alert of our health. We can seek out medical treatment more rigorously to catch something early or prevent what may already be in our path.

Although I have not described precisely how these four fortune telling techniques work, it's really more important to examine why people need to have their future foretold in the first place. If we feel we have control of our own destinies and if we feel we have power to effect the course of our lives, rather than have it chosen for us, then why would we need to go to fortune tellers in the first place?