Whenever I present the observation that by all accounts occultist Aleister Crowley was “not a very nice man,” I pause and wonder whether I should look in the mirror. Going back over five years of almost daily posts in this blog, I realize that the “curmudgeon content” in my writing is fairly high, which can be attributed in part to being infected by Crowley’s uncompromising attitude toward humanity in general at an early point in my metaphysical development; at the time (1971) I was a natal astrologer and disaffected “New Age survivor” casting around for a fresh inspiration. (The rest is due to a constitutional aversion to the self-serving bullshit that is amply demonstrated by so many people.) But in my own case I take my cue from the Wizard of Oz’s objection to Dorothy: “Oh, no, my dear, I’m a very good man, I’m just a very bad “apologist for fuzzy thinking” in all matters of esoteric import. As food for thought, my aim is always constructive even when not particularly charitable in its delivery.

The popular opinion that the practice of divination is best approached as an entirely mystical, psychic and intuitive pursuit has been my main whipping-boy since the beginning. I certainly won’t condemn anyone for thinking that way, but for me much of the charming myth that surrounds the tarot simply won’t pass the “giggle test” of sober intellectual scrutiny. I like to believe that the objective Universe is all-knowing, and that our subjective self-awareness can tap into that fount of supernal wisdom at the subconscious level by opening the proper channels to receive it. But the unfortunate experiences of naive dabblers in Ouija board divination back in the ’60s and ’70s (and going back further, those of the psychological casualties of Norman Vincent Peale’s “Power of Positive Thinking”) offer a cautionary tale for anyone who would accept uncritically any insights received from a patently unverifiable source. We may think that if our intentions are pure we can’t get into any trouble, but I’ve had enough exposure to the dubious testimony of the astral realm to think otherwise, and passing our unsupported intimations on to trusting clients only compounds the problem by unintentionally precipitating a “blind leading the blind” debacle.

I recognize, of course, that many seekers don’t want “chapter-and-verse” of their impending life’s story when they sit for a reading, just an answer to a specific question. But I can’t in good conscience give them the redacted “Cliffs Notes” version when larger implications are staring me in the face. I’ve had clients who specifically wanted an “esoteric” perspective on their situation rather than a purely pragmatic one, and that’s “music to my ears” since it is typically what I do even if I don’t present it in such recondite terms. It is always a matter of translating my loftier impressions into utilitarian language, and that’s where the storyteller’s art becomes the “midwife” for bringing predominantly abstract concepts to life in a real-world sense. Even when contemplating the “big picture,” through the judicious conflation of transcendent and mundane principles into “just the right” terminology it’s possible to be both comprehensive and compassionate in putting the best – as in most useful – face on its significance.