The Fortune-Telling Book

THE
FORTUNE -
TELLING
BOOK

READING

CRYSTAL BALLS,

TEA LEAVES,

PLAYING CARDS,

AND EVERYDAY OMENS

OF LOVE AND

LUCK

Little, Brown and Company

Boston  New York  London

THE FORTUNE-TELLING BOOK. Copyright © 2000 by Gillian Kemp. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the publisher, except by a reviewer who may quote brief passages in a review.

For information address Warner Books, Hachette Book Group, 237 Park Avenue, New York, NY 10017.

A Time Warner Company

ISBN: 978-0-7595-2179-7

A hardcover edition of this book was published in 2000 by Little, Brown and Company.

First eBook edition: May 2001

Visit our Web site at www.HachetteBookGroup.com

Contents

Introduction

Tuning Your Mind

Crystal Ball Reading

Hydromancy

Apple Divinations

Playing Cards—Cartomancy

Candle Magic

Dice

Marriage Folklore

Tea Leaves—Tasseography

Bay Leaf Magic

In Closing

P eople have been telling fortunes since time began. You have the power within you to see your own future, or that of your friends, no matter what your age or circumstance.

The ancient art of divination is a vast subject, too large to be covered in its entirety here. This little book shows you simply how to develop your psychic and clairvoyant abilities, and to invoke them to tell fortunes using everyday household items such as tea leaves or coffee grounds, a pack of playing cards, a pair of dice, a bowl of water or ice, candles, or apples. Most likely you already have the ingredients at hand, and because each method is easy to use, you can begin anytime you like. Also included here are everyday omens and superstitions that have stood the test of time.

Once your mind is receptive to higher influences, you will find there is far more to life than just what meets the eye. You've probably already had the experience of knowing who is on the telephone before you pick up the receiver. Or perhaps you have thought of someone and then heard from that person or bumped into her, or had a hunch or a feeling that something would happen. Your intuition is the compass that will always point you in the right direction. The door is already open; dare you step through?

TUNING YOUR MIND

C lairvoyance is special sight (literally, it means "clear sight") that allows you to see the future in a crystal ball or a teacup. If you can think of a lemon, see its shape and color, cut it in half and smell its aroma in your mind, you have clairvoyant powers. If not, you can become clairvoyant by training your imagination to visualize an object or situation.

Psychics have the power to feel, such as divining by psychometry (below). You can encourage your psychic powers in a number of ways, often with the help of a friend. The more often you try these methods, the more accurate your predictions will be.

PSYCHIC POWERS

Try sensing a drawing. Begin by holding out your left palm, flat and face up. While you have your eyes closed, a friend should draw a shape in the air — either a heart shape, a square, a circle, a wavy line, or a cross — about an inch or two above your palm. Your challenge is to sense which shape they have drawn.

TELEPATHY

Telepathy is thought transference, or communication between minds using extrasensory means.

Take a deck of playing cards. Remove all the face cards so that you are left with numbers one to ten in each suit. Shuffle the remaining forty cards (twenty will be red and twenty black) and pass them to a friend.

The pair of you should then sit back to back. Ask your friend to remove the top card and telepathically convey to you the number on the card and the color of the card. The pair of you should continue until the pack has been exhausted. Again, the more often you try, the more accurate you will become.

PSYCHOMETRY

Psychometry is the divination of facts about a person via his or her possessions.

To intuit a friend's feelings or details from their past, present, or future, ask to hold an item of their jewelry, such as a watch or ring. Hold it with your eyes closed for a few moments. Because the item has absorbed your friend's aura — the distinctive energy emanating from their body — you should be able to make a prediction in only five minutes.

Another method is to hold to your forehead a letter or card someone has sent. You will detect their mood, character, and the surroundings in which the letter was written.

CRYSTAL BALL READING

R eading a crystal ball is easy — it requires only imagination and concentration. If you can see pictures in the clouds when you look at the sky, you have the power to see pictures in a crystal ball, or in an ice cube or a bowl of clean water instead.

The best time of day for scrying is sunset, or any time that does not need electric lighting. The best time of the month for scrying is when the moon is waxing (becoming full), because a quartz crystal is ruled by the moon, and because clairvoyant and psychic powers increase with the waxing moon. You should never read a crystal ball after midnight, because it will attract and reveal darker forces.

When you are reading a crystal ball for a friend, have them hold the ball in their left hand or place the globe on a table in a metal or wooden stand. If you like candlelight, keep a lit candle behind you. Place the ball on a plain black or dark blue velvet cloth or silk scarf, to help eliminate reflections from the room. You don't want to see reflections, but rather a complete blank, something empty waiting to be filled.

If the ball is on a table, the person may sit beside or opposite you, but they need to be close. If they are holding the ball in their left hand, they need to sit on your right, perhaps on a sofa or wherever you both will be comfortable for about ten or twenty minutes.

Place the crystal in your friend's left hand so that his fingers clutch without obscuring the ball. Place one of your hands under his left hand. The ball is heavy, so rest the cupped ball on his lap or on yours. Clear your mind and gaze into the center of the ball. Try not to force visions, but allow apparitions to appear to you. Within a couple of minutes, the ball will become cloudy or milky, which means a vision is about to appear.

Visions will float into the ball from any direction, rather like a cloud in the sky. Because the mist is in motion, you will need to give a running commentary on what you are seeing. You may visualize objects, people, animals, or events. A crystal ball cannot indicate time, so unless you note specific seasonal themes, what you see may either be the near or distant future.

Move your gaze from the center of the crystal, where details of the scene increase. The picture will build up until it fills the ball. When you have described all that you see, refocus your vision on the center of the ball. The former picture will have disappeared and a new vision will begin to emerge.