Horoscopes and Astrology: cont.

First, thanks for all the responses! It's just interesting to hear everyone's thoughts and see what kinds of influence concepts like divination have (and it's handy for some currently secret purposes) and I really appreciate the thought some of you went into. So for fairness in sharing thoughts, and to say a little more about the project I'm working on:

I think that forms of divination are, as far as belief structures and efficacy goes, bunk, but I don't think they're valueless. I think that divination is less relevant on any kind of metaphysical/mystical/prophetic level, but super useful in regards to just...dealing with shit. It's a nuanced coping tool that helps people make decisions and look at things differently. It's frustrating because while I'm very INTERESTED in mysticism and divination and would LOVE to have something like that be a part of my life, accepting any form of these beliefs feels like a strange mix of both laughable and just straight skin-crawly gross. Additionally for me, the cultures around these ideas are also often...not great. It's generally not anything I relate to or identify with or even find appealing, and there's a distressing amount of manipulation happening within communities that use them (emboldened and supported by point 2 below), which pushes me that much further away.

Divination is such an utterly human thing though, which is so lovely as a point of intrigue and insight to how people work and why they do the things they do. There are a lot of things to talk about in regards to what divination speaks of in people, but that's a massive separate conversation that's I'm only going to touch on; there are also a lot of aspects to talk about for any form of divination in regards to it's claims and functionality, but I don't think the majority of them are honestly worth talking about. I find the most valuable points of interest are what each has in it's function as a tool:

1) it revolves around story creation. Humans are all about storytelling. Looking into any amount of divination just inundates you with all kinds of fictional and nonfictional stories of people's experiences or the nature of things.

2) Tries to explain things that we otherwise don't have the capability of knowing - how people work, what and why things happen, our place in the universe, literally any kind of meaning or sense in anything. Point 1 is heavily involved in this point.

3) Sets up a situation where we can either better understand places or decisions we need to make in life by altering our perspective or simply takes away the stress of making certain decisions ourselves. Akin to flipping a coin, although significantly more complex, where you either are given an answer so you either don't have to think about the problem or you're given a new perspective through force where you discover what option you REALLY wanted.

The first function is pretty neutral. Stories are just how we work. It's the most fun aspect. Storytelling is great.

The second function can be relieving in some ways, but very easily become problematic depending on the claims made and to what degree of force they are applied. In my opinion, this point is a cake made of fear and confusion which may be eaten in non-toxic quantities, but is readily able to be served as a primary factor in manipulation, suppression and oppression.

The third function can be beneficial, and is the primary focus of my intrigue. I think it's a fantastic coping and decision-making tool, it just tends to be fed and feed into point 2. I want to compare it to writing/drawing prompts: it's be far easier and simpler to work from a foundation than to move forward with nothing to go on. Point 2 does this as well, but in more problematic ways. Point 3 can be used for manipulative purposes, but I think it's personal self-revealing nature makes it significantly less threatening than 2, which tends to prescribe more specific and non-personal ways to think and feel about things.

The project I'm working on now, called 13th House, is more or less an exploration and criticism of divination and mysticism, but also an alternative space to utilize aspects of divination that may be beneficial/enjoyable without the same background culture and weight of things like astrology. I've actually attempted something similar before in the form of a fake cult, but it didn't pan out the way I was hoping and I never published anything of it; a lot of that is being rolled into this project. I wanna have fun with mysticism, make up stories, and find things to relate and identify with, like stars and animals and monsters, and see what things they make me think about and what things they reveal in me. I wanna have other people enjoy and relate to and explore them with me without taking it to weird super serious or super dubious places. Hopefully, 13th House will be a nice place for anyone to play with these kinds of things and maybe even find something to help them out in their lives.

Just for the sake of noting: nothing I've said is a judgment of anyone who believes in any kind of any thing. I'm not gonna tell you what you're supposed to think and I'm not gonna disparage you for thinking whatever you like for whatever reasons you may have. That's a pretty dang frivolous fight. Criticisms I make are of belief structures and their aspects in and of themselves as well as their potential for harm, irrelevant of what beneficial properties they may have.