“Future Uncertain, But Certainly Slight”

“Here come the world with the look in its eye
Future uncertain, but certainly slight”
(from Devil Inside by INXS)

AUTHOR’S NOTE: Three years ago, when I passed the five-decade mark in the study and practice of divination, I had a major epiphany. I realized that predictive techniques poke their collective nose into the future and bring back only slender threads of probability; the farther they probe into the mists of forward time, the more tenuous the likelihood of accuracy becomes. This fact drives many people away from the forecasting of events and circumstances; they expect precision and all they get are educated guesses about transient conditions, at best portrayed as semi-reliable tendencies, trends and possibilities regarding what may come to pass.

This is clearly not a “bettor’s game” since the odds are stacked the wrong way. There is absolutely no certainty in any of it, only glimmers of testimony that must be squeezed for all they’re worth. As I often admit, I refuse to “put too fine a point” on my predictions because there are many variables that can derail the train of events. About the most I will acknowledge is that an occurrence may be more rather than less likely to transpire as conveyed by the reading than pure chance would suggest. This is often good enough for seekers who are clutching at straws, but it would never withstand the rigors of the scientific method, or even the “pseudo-scientific” proofs of astrology since there is no millennia-long trail of evidence to support it.

Does this mean I’m ready to give it up? Not a chance; I love the metaphysical (and mystical) tenets behind what I frequently describe as “getting under the skin of objective reality to see what makes the Universe tick.” The fact that it is more impressionistic than clinical makes it that much more enticing as a story-telling art. I don’t need to prove myself 100% right as long as I routinely land in the ballpark and can give good reasons for why it turned out that way. Even after all this time, I still learn something with almost every attempt, if not about new methods of divination then about unique twists on the old ones, or at least about the nature of the client-tarot interface.

It seems irrefutable that these insights arrive via the subconscious awareness of the person shuffling the deck, thereby being imparted by a form of induction to the cards pulled for the spread. I don’t subscribe to the notion that the full gamut of cosmic wisdom is available “in the aethyr” at any moment in time to anyone who asks for it, and that the extracted truths will automatically apply — without reservation — to the situation that prompted the request. It’s simply too pat to be credible. My position is that there must be a subjective filter to personalize the input entering through the subliminal channel, and this is not something a diviner on the far side of the world can do for us without our active involvement in the process.

Universal psychic energy notwithstanding, I just don’t believe it works that way. The psychology of tarot-reading is more local than distributed; I’m reminded of the principles of classical geomancy, in which the medium of expression (earth, stones, etc) ideally comes from the surrounding environment, or those of horary astrology where the alignment of horoscopic features at the astrologer’s location and local time of casting governs the outcome. Unlike remote tarot-reading, there is an underlying structure or telltale signature to the methodology (Joseph Maxwell alluded to it as excavating a buried “presentiment”) that anchors it in the substantive reality of the matter. Anything more intuitively conjectural invites being swallowed by unforgiving “anecdotal quicksand;” all the reader has to stand on are biased personal opinions and assumptions that are ostensibly articulated through free-association from the imagery but are more often than not just pure “what-if” speculation.

I’m quick to acknowledge that every sitter for one of my readings understands far more at the subconscious level about the forthcoming state of their private affairs than I ever could, they just don’t know it yet; the purpose of their interaction with the cards is to point them toward it. I fancy the idea that they become “consulting architects” in framing their own future with a little coaching from the Grand Masters (the impartial “gods of tarot,” not me; I’m just the humble translator). This is the tarot spin on “We make our own reality.” and it’s pointless trying to have someone else define it for us. When we engage directly with the interplay between the cards, we unquestionably own the results.

Originally published at http://parsifalswheeldivination.org on February 9, 2025.