What Exactly Is Divination, Anyway?

[pt_tangles]

The replies (both here and on Wordpress) to my previous post have brought another question to mind. What exactly is divination? When practised, are we connecting to the gods? Spirits? Our subconscious?

I, personally, tend to lean toward the 'if it works, that's cool' school of thought (and thus why I didn't care much for physics in high school). A lot of the time, I'm not really interested in the why. Obviously, I do appreciate that learning more about something will help to make me better at it, but I am not really a person who is endlessly asking 'why' or 'how' about everything.

Point being, that for me, divination is a means of gaining clarity. How it works doesn't often cross my mind.

Also, I think that this is one of those belief-based things. Who knows if we will ever discover exactly how it works, but I am curious to hear about everyone else's beliefs.

How do you think divination works? Does the message come from without or within? Or both?

--Phae

Comments

[gessatrude.livejournal.com]

Both?

Seriously though. I think that for some things, the answers come from within us... for others from either gods or spirits or what have you.

Most of my divination through things like tarot cards or runes, probably comes from within. The answers are things I already know, I just need a way to access the information.

there are other times that I've done it, where it becomes a means for having concrete conversations with the gods.

So for me, definatly both.

[estaratshirai.livejournal.com]

I think it depends on the tool. Originally we were talking about "spirit boards," of which the original intent was that they provided a platform for communication with spirits. I don't necessarily think that's the same way that all divination tools, or all diviners, normally work.

I know people who always feel their information is coming from Someone Else, and others who are pulling on their own intuition. What I do, now, is to read the "threads" of probability around them, for lack of a better brief explanation. So, it depends.

[pt_tangles]

So, do you think that spirit/talking/etc boards can be used to access unconscious information that you already know? Or do you think that they are only for connecting with spirits/gods/the divine/whathaveyou?

I wonder if it is like other tools, where their traditional usage has an influence, but the will of the user does as well. Like casting a circle with an apple corer?

--Phae