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How to Use Everyday Objects for Folk Fortunetelling, by Cory Thomas Hutcheson

(Article originally published in The Llewellyn Journal.)

When you imagine someone "fortunetelling," what images come to mind? For a lot of people, it's a crystal ball or a stack of tarot cards. There's absolutely nothing wrong with those methods when handled with care and thought, but as many witchy folk know, divination goes well beyond what so often gets portrayed by Hollywood. For those inclined towards folk magic, the tools of prognostication and metaphysical diagnosis are often both a bit strange and incredibly commonplace. That's because divination is so commonplace in North American folk magical practices, and therefore it makes use of commonplace objects. Diviners, however, often use those objects in uncanny and unusual ways, which renders them powerful tools for gaining insight into worldly (and Otherworldly) problems.

Below I offer an exploration of a variety of folk magical divinatory methods making use of common objects. What you find here is drawn from the pages and practices of American folklore (a subject about which I am deeply passionate, as evidenced by my rather massive book on the subject). No matter who or where you are within North America, chances are there are similar practices around you and within your own communities if you look for them.

• Sieve and Shears: A sieve—a straining device most often used for food—could be suspended on the end of a pair of shears or scissors to answer questions. These were often used in fortunetelling games (not dissimilar to games like MASH or those little paper fortune tellers that kids used when I was growing up). If the sieve began rotating clockwise when a question was asked, it indicated "yes." If it went counterclockwise or fell off balance, that was a "no." In a bygone era, a sieve would have been made from materials like willow withes, which have their own magical lore (as they are often used to bind a witch's broom, or "besom"). The sieve and shears method even appears in Aggripa's Three Books of Occult Philosophy, published in the sixteenth century, so the practice has a decent pedigree.
• Bible and Key: The use of a Bible or other book for divination is known as "bibliomancy," and it's a subject I've written about before on my own website in terms of folk practice. In most cases, book divination is done by turning randomly to specific passages and reading the first thing found by pointing at the page, a process known as "scanning." There are more prescriptive methods, too, such as predicting fortunes based on one's birthday by indexing them to particular Psalms based on gender and date. One method, however, that we find imported from Europe and fairly well-known in areas settled by English, Irish, or Scottish-speaking colonizers, is the use of a Bible and key. The key is inserted into a Bible (sometimes at a specific passage such as Psalm 49), then the book is bound up tightly so that the key can't slip out. The person making this charm suspends the key between their fingers, using the Bible as a sort of pendulum weight, and asks questions. The key will begin moving in response to queries, with the reader needing to establish which direction means "yes" and which "no" at the beginning of the divination session. This method is even mentioned in Reginald Scott's Discoverie of Witchcraft from 1584, so it's quite old!
• Coins and Cards: Plenty of people know about using tarot cards for divination, but in recent years a burgeoning vogue has appeared for learning to read fortunes using playing cards. Playing cards derive from the same sources as tarot cards (with most scholarship suggesting all such cards emerged from games involving tiles printed paper cards from places like India and China). So it makes sense that playing cards have just as much a place in fortunetelling as their better-known tarot cousins. There are a wide variety of methods for reading them, ranging from the very detailed and intricate Lenormand card system to the Spanish method involving removing all the Queens to variations found in places like Kentucky or other parts of the American South that were often codified in well-known rhymed verses. It seems most readers had their own particular methods based on years of practice and fine-tuning, so each person's approach might inspire someone else but be distinctly different as well (I am no stranger to this phenomenon, as I have even written a book about my own method for doing readings and then interpreting them by linking them to folk or fairy tales). Similarly, coins are incorporated into divination in a few ways. One divinatory ritual known as the "Calling Circle" involves surrounding a young baby with a variety of objects like coins, a knife, a Bible, and a whiskey bottle, and then seeing which the baby chooses. If they choose the coins, they will go into banking (or, depending on your interpretation, be stingy with money), while the other objects indicate a life of violence, holiness, or vice, respectively. The Chinese fortunetelling system known as the I Ching also makes use of coins in some cases, interpreting them through a process known as geomancy.
• The Egg and Glass: This method is simple enough that you can go to your kitchen and do it anytime (so long as you keep eggs on hand). There are several different variations on this practice. One of the best-known is the limpia found in Mexican and Mexican-American curanderismo. In that system, the egg is usually used to cleanse a person of spiritual maladies by rubbing them and praying. The egg is then cracked into a glass of water and interpreted based on the shapes that appear, such as bubbles or "curtains" of egg whites draping down like ghosts. Spots on the yolk or foul smells can indicate witchcraft or curses as well. This method was also connected to the Salem witch trials, as an account (published a good bit after the trials were done) indicates that some of the young women involved in the early hysteria had been playing a game called a "Venus glass," in which an egg was cracked into water and then read or interpreted to provide information about future husbands.
• Ring and Hair: The last method is one used in very particular circumstances, but one that might be adaptable to even broader work by a clever folk magician. In parts of the rural South and even into the Midwest, a woman can discover the sex of her baby by taking her wedding ring and suspending it by a piece of her hair over her tummy. If it moves back and forth, it indicates a girl, while movement in a circle usually indicates a boy (although some sources wind up reversing these, so it's a good idea to ask the ring to show you which is which first). While this is almost exclusively used in pregnancy situations in folklore, I can easily imagine someone seeing the links between things like marriage, birth, and more as indicative of other fortunetelling possibilities (such as asking the ring to help choose between various potential suitors).

These methods are simply a small handful of the incredible variety of everyday divinatory practices found in American folklore. Truly, almost anything, from dish rags to brooms to broken plates and dropped knives, could potentially tell a tuned-in reader about what they might expect to happen.

What makes these methods so valuable to us today isn't just the actual practices, but the sense of "ordinariness" that we see in them. While it's all well and good to collect tarot decks like they're going out of style (and I do the same with playing card decks, so I'm absolutely not judging!), understanding that everyday methods of divination are valuable and rich traditions of their own can help us figure out what works best for us. You may be the sort of person who can divine based on the way your soup boils on the stove, or the way smoke rises from a candle you've extinguished, or even which song comes up next on your Spotify playlist. All of those are the sort of folk magic our forebears would have turned to, and they can be sources of insight and inspiration to us today, as well.

Whatever method you turn to, I encourage you to look within your folk communities like family and neighbors (and family here can be chosen family just as readily as anything biological). You'll likely find plenty of divinatory possibilities if you just listen, pay attention, and ask the right questions. Which is really what divination is all about, right?

Article originally published in The Llewellyn Journal. Copyright Llewellyn Worldwide, 2021. All rights reserved.

My mom passed away about four months ago. It was very sudden. Since then, I have developed an obsessive fear of dying. Every day, I think I'm going to die. I'm only 22 years old but I think I'm going to have a heart attack or seizure. I fear that I'm going to suffocate and die a painful death or suddenly just stop breathing. Maybe my heart will suddenly stop beating. Sometimes I wonder if I am already dead and I have to shake myself to make sure I can still function. I have been put on anxiety and depression medication to help me cope. I'm writing to you in hopes that you can somehow help me. Thank you.

Yolie

Susyn:

When we experience the loss of a loved one, especially a parent, it touches us on every level of our existence. Because the passing of your mother was very sudden, you ran smack into the reality that we are powerless over when, where, and under what circumstance our time on earth will end. The type of shock you are in can defy all attempts at reason; even people who are young and healthy often suffer from an immobilizing fear of dying.

One thing to note is that as we grieve, we go through certain stages. Many of them can be tracked by time, which makes it easier to know what to expect next. For example, when a loved one dies or we lose someone in our life we cared deeply for through something like divorce or the breakup of a relationship, the cycles we move through typically last about three months each. It appears that you entered the second cycle of this transition about a month ago, which may be when your fear and feelings of depression began to grow.

The first three months of a loss are about managing. As we walk through the shock, trying to bring the deceased's affairs into order and awaken each day surprised to realize they are gone, we are in a state of animated suspension. About the time we arrive at the three-month mark, the reality of our loss sinks in, which can make it difficult to concentrate, keep up with daily obligations, and feel anything but sadness or despair.

At the six-month mark of a loss, the pain becomes more manageable. The loss does not diminish but we should be able to return to a sense of normalcy. Also note that between the three and six-month cycle, an urge to create typically arises. Because we have been reminded that our lives here on earth are short and could be over at any time, projects and ideas we've put on the back burner will start to demand expression.

As you near this stage of your grieving cycle, I encourage you to find a creative project you can immerse yourself in. If nothing comes to mind, you may want to start gathering pictures and memories of your mother and work to create a DVD or album that somehow honors her life. This is one of the most healing activities you can take up.

On a final note, your concerns about dying have nothing to do with reality. They are centered in the fact that the experience with your mother has naturally traumatized you on a deep level. If you still feel you need professional help, I recommend finding a therapist who specializes in EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing) therapy, which is ideal for clearing PTSD (Post Traumatic Stress Disorder), which is essentially what you are experiencing.

*****

Oceania:

I'm so sorry for the unexpected loss of your mom. Your obsession about dying a horrible death is your way of staying close to her and avoiding grief. Grieving can be intensely painful, but it's temporary. Time heals emotional wounds just as it heals physical wounds! There's no stopping the healing process, though we CAN manage to slow it down.

When we avoid grief, we sentence ourselves to chronic low-grade unhappiness. Anxiety and depression are two ways of NOT feeling. During depression, we shut down our emotions; with anxiety, we transform them into general nervousness. We worry about everything and anything, especially hypotheticals, to avoid experiencing emotions like anger or sadness over a specific event that has occurred.

Your fears about the future have a common theme: loss of control. I think your mother's death caught you unaware, and that this led you to dread unexpected change. Of course, we would all be wise to remember to expect the unexpected in life.

Once you allow yourself to wail and sob over the loss of your mom, you'll begin to heal. Allowing yourself to feel angry over your powerlessness will help you feel stronger. Survivors sometimes feel guilty about living life to the fullest when their loved one can't do the same, but you will honor your mother's memory by embracing your ongoing gift of life and making the most of it.

In my experience, the first three months of grieving are the hardest. Once you turn that corner, things should begin to lighten up. Waves of grief come less frequently and with less intensity then. The first year without a loved one is particularly poignant as you face each season and holiday without them. Since you're still in the thick of this, I recommend you find a grief support group, for it's helpful to be with people who understand how you are feeling.

In the documentary The Wild Parrots of Telegraph Hill, the following metaphor for life is presented: Picture a river becoming a waterfall, then continuing as a river when it hits bottom. As the river tumbles over the edge of the cliff, it separates into a spray of tiny droplets. These drops of water are like our individual egos, feeling separate as we pass through life. Death is ONLY the death of our ego as we rejoin the river and become something greater again.

You have lost your mother in the physical realm, but she's waiting just around the corner and remains alive and well in your heart and mind. One quality of grief is that it feels like it will never end, but I assure you it will. One day you'll feel good as new again - perhaps even better.

Astrea:

Many times in life we hear, "You will always have what you NEED, but not necessarily what you WANT." Your spirit must have needed to experience the feeling of leaving your human body, and the suggestion in the next chapter of Sylvia Brown's book was all it took to get you there.

Even though you hadn't read it yet, your SOUL recognized the title of that chapter as something it had been seeking, and your soul, knowing that you had that reference to read after your experience, got with it and out you went!

While I don't usually recommend her books, Sylvia Brown has a wide reaching and powerful effect on lots of people. A Gemini like you would be able to relate easily to her writing and put it to good use. Synchronicity - you gotta love it!

I like your description of "getting caught." That's exactly what it feels like, isn't it? One minute you're free and hovering above the room, and the next minute, ZAP! back down into your corporeal form you go!

As a little kid, I loved that "feeling of return." With practice, most of the time we can control that event, but sometimes, when our physical ears hear a distracting noise or something else occurs to knock us back into reality, back we go. With practice you will be able to control your return better.

I find it interesting that you were visiting your mother-in-law and not someone in your own genetic family. Evidently, you and your husband got married for reasons that are even deeper than love. His family's interest in "psychic stuff" will nurture your children in such matters and help them to grow into their own abilities.

You'll never have to be concerned that when your daughter visits them, she'll be discouraged from exploring her own psychic life and power. My parents encouraged me to develop my psychic senses in a time when it wasn't nice to even discuss such things in public. Heck, it's STILL not considered a great topic at the dinner table in some families!

Your kids will get to talk about it ALL and ask questions and read and study. This is going to give them such an edge in life! Talk with your husband about how you want to present this to your kiddos, so that you are united in your approach and ready to tell them their experiences are all natural and okay.

A word or two of warning: Geminis often have difficulty staying grounded in REAL LIFE. Don't get so strung out on your ASTRAL life that you neglect what you're doing here on Earth.

You are at the beginning of a long journey to learn where your power really lies. Try to be patient with this process and take your time.