As a diviner, I have no objection to making predictions about what is likely to happen. I see the current taboo about the future as a mix of delusion and ignorance. Our current culture comes at the tail-end of the myth of the self-made man that has animated much of our recent (and even not-so-recent) past. This myth has strongly influenced the Zeitgeist of the current occult wave, which started at the end of the XVIII century and continues, though declining–putrefying, even–to this day.

The occult developments have in turn trickled down into pop spirituality and have fostered the belief, now extremely popular, that all it takes to change one’s reality is to tune into the wavelength where one’s delusion corresponds to objective facts, and that nothing about one’s identity is more than a socially-conditioned self-identification that can be simply deconstructed and cast off like a cloak in favor of something else as the whim of the day dictates.

This implies the idea that the future is a completely blank slate and that therefore divination can only be used as a tool for self-reflection on the present to facilitate this process of self-making and self-remaking. Unfortunately, the self-reflection in question regularly resolves itself into simply telling the querent what they already think or would like to think of themselves, but packaged in empowering language within a context in which they assume they are communing with divinity. “Wow, the Gods think exactly the same as I do! How wise!”

Anyone who lives in actual reality and has spent five minutes reflecting on it know that this view of existence is demonstrably false (although, like many false things, it contains faint traces of truth). Each of us has a path in life that is unique, containing specific challenges and opportunities, possibilities and impossibilities. Divination is good at detecting these patterns and their likely outcome in the near future.

Still, I find that there is value in employing traditional divination in exploring the present. The language of traditional divination is frank, crisp and concrete, as it comes from a deep understanding of the fact that, if what is above is as what is below and what is within is as what is without, then what is above or within cannot be a metaphysical soup of saccarine inanities, but must correspond to the complex interplay of pleasure and sorrow of the below and without.

In other words, if a tiktok psychic might tell you that you always end up with the wrong guy because you have a soul contract that stipulates that you need to come into contact with your inner queen, traditional divination is more than happy to let you know that it’s because you are a basic harlot who chooses basic idiots.

This is not to say that there is a god or a spirit judging the querent through us or through the oracle: it is merely a dispassionate look at your life from a dispassionate observer on a simple example of causality. It also does not imply that we, as diviners, shouldn’t learn to speak with tact and diplomacy. However, the employment of actual divination techniques allows us to shed light on the querent’s present in terms that might actually be helpful to them.

We never leave a divination session unaltered. The knowledge we gain changes us necessarily: me knowing about X is not the same as me not knowing about it. If X is in my hands, then knowing about it can give me some power over it. If it isn’t in my hands, then knowing about it gives me awareness of the limits that define my unique path through life. That’s growth, too.

MQS