The You Change

Coming Up With It

Divination systems these days are all controlled by experts. You can't look up at the sky and figure out if Mercury's gone retrograde, and most people don't carry I Ching pieces on them. Tarot cards are portable and publicly available, but require a lot of memorization to use.

I wanted a diviniation system for anyone, one not peppered with complexities that required books and arguments between professionals.

For a divination to be simple and sturdy and fast off the ground, it needed to lose some of the fat. I decided therefore to discard the aspects of divination that tell the seeker how they're doing right now, where they currently stand, that sort of thing.

I've always been a little uncomfortable with the categories many divination systems put people in, which I feel is an artifact from the time they were invented. Born on a certain day? Aries forever. Numerology says you're an 8. The systems came into being in ages when you really couldn't change who you were - once a serf, always a serf. But the world doesn't work that way - it never really did, though incredibly harsh social enforcement made appear so.

Individuality is its own pleasure, its own burden. It's our own responsibility to know how we're doing. And if how we're doing is that we have no idea how the hell we're doing, then that itself is an answer. It doesn't matter what you are, how many categories you can fit yourself into.

What matters is what you do.

So let's look at what matters.

What we need when we turn to divination, is direction. The world is a mass of confusion, of choices, situations coming at us faster than we can prepare for, slower than we want, or surging up suddenly from something we thought was settled. We don't know what we should focus on, how much of our energy we should be spending on a thing, where we should devote out resources. Should I focus more on work? Spend less time reading? More time with family or friends?

What we need to know, is what to change.

So appropriately enough, I turned to just that - change.

We all have it, unless we pay exclusively by credit card. Coins, once they're minted, stay around forever. They ride in our pockets day after day - pass from hand to hand, get put in jars, get swapped into banks to increase our bank accounts, get passed back out to businesses in rolls of change smashed open by retail workers during the rush. They surf through humanity like sticks in a river, and they sit close to our bodies - in pockets, in bags and purses. They soak us up for decades, are present for the decisions we make, for our catastrophic failures, our euphoric successes, our tragedies and miracles. I imagine they learn a lot about people.

I think we should ask them to share that knowledge.

So, take the change from your pocket, shake it around in your hand for a bit while thinking about your question ("Should I ask that girl out?" "Should I quit my job?" "What should I do about that pizza in my fridge?"). Maybe breathe on them a bit, too. Toss them out in front of you and watch how they land.

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Heads mean increase, approach, engage, risk
Tails means decrease, retreat, disinvest, secure

Pennies stand for earth - material goods and resources.
Nickels stand for fire - action
Dimes the lightest of coins, stand for air - intellect and knowledge
Quarters stand for water - emotion

If you don't have a coin of a particular type, then the universe isn't in any mood to tell you what you should be doing with your energies in that category.

That's really all you need, but here are a few minor things to keep an eye on as well:

Power: Sum the change and then add the digits of the resulting number together to reduce it to a single digit. On a scale from 1 to 9, 1=not that important to listen to, 9=very important to listen to. For example, two quarters (25) (25), three pennies (1) (1) (1), and a nickel (5) = 25+25+1+1+1+5=58 --> 5+8=13 --> 1+3=4.

The Wisdom of Age and Youth: If they disagree, the older coins are probably right, unless the situation you're in is something non-traditional or new, at which point the younger coins might have a better idea of the best course of action.

Placement: What matters is not their overall orientation, but where they land compared to the person tossing them. The coins on the left have more to do with the issues and situations connected to the question asked about (whether as causes, effects, or connections as yet unrealized), while those further on the right speak directly to the issue or situation asked about.

Practicing It On a Stranger

I picked a sunny day and went to a nearby park. I found a nice spot near a map and the end of a much more popular trail, and set up shop:

.

Note: When we ask questions about our future, we reveal what we care about - what concerns us, holds our hopes, terrifies us - our vulnerabilities. Therefore I am not pairing strangers' pictures with their divinations, and I didn't ask them what their questions were - if they chose to share some of that info with me, I'm mentioning it, but I left them their privacy if they wanted it.

I've done one on myself, however, so you can see how the coins work when you have a question in mind.

I also created some informational materials (complete docs are in the proof):



A thing I did not predict - stopping complete strangers, then getting them to agree to a divination, then asking them if they have change, is a tricky proposition. So I ended up letting most people use some of my change, first, to allay their fears that I was involving them in some kind of complex scam.

I was at it for a couple of hours, and the only folks who stopped were guys on foot - either singly or in pairs. Couples, women alone or in groups, and people on bicycles always gave me a polite 'no'. I stopped after I did six divinations - I'm reporting four of them here.

Everybody who stopped was happy to have their picture taken, though:

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First Divination:

He mentioned he that he was thinking about a relationship. He had four pennies (p), no nickels (n), a dime (d), and a quarter (q). The pennies (p) split evenly in terms of heads (h) and tails (t), the dime was the nickels was predominantly tails, and the quarter was heads:



p: hh tt = don't change a thing
n: 0 = dunno!
d: h tt = less thought
q: h = more emotional investment

He was devoting exactly the amount of resources to the issue as was proper, but he might need to think about things less and invest a little bit more emotionally.

Second Divination:

This person was very quiet about what his question might be about.



p: hhht = more resources devoted to the problem
n: t = less action
d: hh t = more thought
q: t = less emotional investment

So it looks like the way to go here was to devote more resources - whether material or monetary, and get some distance - try to calm his emtions, quit flying off the handle, and give a little more thought to the issue. Perhaps strategize a bit as to how those resources he's about to expend should be best used.

Third Divination:

This person also mentioned that his question was about a relationship.

(foregoing the picture here)

p: hhh ttt = evenly split on resources, so what you're committing to the issue is about right as it is
n: h tt = you need to take a little less direct action
d: h tt = you need to expend a little less intellect on this
q: h = but more emotional investment would be good

So the coins suggested this - he was devoting the right level of resources to the relationship, and should stay on an even keel in that department. However, he might be over-thinking things, and taking all sorts of actions as a result of that over-thinking. The coins suggest he think about it a little less, and instead try to invest in it emotionally.

Fourth Divination:

The guy mentioned something about a disagreement with someone. He had his own coins for this one, ten pennies, three nickels, and a quarter:

(again foregoing picture)

p: hhhhhh tttt = a little more resources devoted to the problem
n: h tt = a little less direct action
d: 0 = universe has no opinion
q: h = a little more emotional investment

So in this disagrement, he might want to devote a little more resources to the problem (perhaps he owes money?), and care about it a little more, but take less direct action.

I decided to do a divination on myself, so that you could see the full range of the process:

My Divination:

I asked about a project I have at work that's been going slower than it should be.



p: hh tt = even split on resources means don't change a thing
n: t = less direction action, too
d: h tt = maybe put a little less thought into things
q: h = more emotional investment would be good

This was interesting - apparently what I should do is quit overthinking things, keep devoting the same level of resources to the problem, quit thrashing around doing whatever comes to mind, and get emotionally invested in the thing. Which is pretty spot on, actually - part of the reason things have been lagging is because I got emotionally disengaged from it a while back. I also looked at the 'power' of the reading: 1+1+1+1+5+ 10+10+10+25=69 (hee!); 6+9=15; 1+5=6. So! I should listen to this about a smidge more than I'd listen to the average divination.

So that's that. Check your pockets, try it yourself.

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International Conversion

Not everyone lives in the United States! Am I missing your currency? Drop me a line.

Euro/Pounds:
€2/Two pounds (£2.00) - your own money or material resources
€1/One pound (£1.00) - the money or material resources of others
€0.50/Fifty pence (50p; £0.50) - positive emotion (love, happiness, effervescence, sympathy, etc.)
€0.20/Twenty pence (20p; £0.20)- negative emotion (anger, sadness, anxiety)
€0.10/Ten pence (10p; £0.10) - analytical thought - analysis, strategy, logic
€0.05/Five pence (5p; £0.05) - creative thought - intuition, inventiveness, innovation
€0.02/Two pence (2p; £0.02) - creative action - action that begins new things, helps things progress
€0.01/One penny (1p; £0.01)- destructive action - action that stops things from happening, or weeds out bad things

Canadian Dollar:
1¢ (penny) - direct action
5¢ (nickel) - positive emotion (love, happiness, effervescence, sympathy, etc.)
10¢ (dime) - negative emotion (anger, sadness, anxiety)
25¢ (quarter) - analytical thought - analysis, strategy, logic
50¢ (50 cent piece) - rarer coins function as wildcards - use your own best judgement.
$1 (loonie) - creative thought - intuition, inventiveness, innovation
$2 (toonie) - material resources or money