Use your favourite books as an oracle

Plus bibliomancy with Irish mystic John O'Donaghue

find the magic in books again like when you were a child

Happy almost new moon

September has a quieter atmosphere despite the return to work and school so my offering to you today is a little different with a touch of the magical because I can already feel change in the air.

Bibliomancy

Using books for divination is called bibliomancy as you may know.

Divination is the art of understanding the world through signs and symbols and one of the places we can turn to for signs is in the pages of our books.

How to do bibliomancy

This is a very simple

• Choose a book from your bookshelf. It can be any book you like although I suggest something intriguing/mysterious/philosophical/witchy/arty

• Sit quietly for a moment. Maybe near a window and look out at the sky to settle yourself into spaciousness. Do whatever ignites your gypsy soul. Drink tea, light candles, listen to birds or play music.

• Place your book in your lap and thumb through the pages at random until your intuition asks you to stop. You could ask your book a specific question or just go free form

• Open the book at the double page you have landed on

• From here you can choose;

  📚Either read one or both pages and allow yourself the freedom of finding a sentence or two you enjoy

  -📚Or close your eyes and let your index finger fall on a sentence. (I find this method less satisfactory)

• The message you find becomes the sign for your day. Read it aloud, write it down in your notebook and see what relevance and understanding it holds for you.

• You can use the message in several ways. As a prompt for your journaling, a spark for your writing, a theme to notice or simply a way to connect with your inner mystic.

Bibliomancy with John O’Donaghue

Here are three quotes from my own bibliomancy ritual taken from a beautiful book called Eternal Echoes, by Irish mystic John O’Donaghue.

I also created three tarot questions inspired by the quotes to ask my tarot deck.

This is about using divination to return to your wildest soul rather than seeking concrete answers. My favourite kind of magic.

Here are the three messages I landed on.

In the Celtic tradition there was a strong sense that each of us has an invisible companion who walks the road of life with us.

John O'Donaghue

Question for your tarot/oracle/journal/drawing/meditation

Who or what is your invisible companion today?

You were sent to earth to become a receiver of the unknown. From ancient times these gifts were prepared for you. Now they come to you across eternal distances. Their destination is the alter of your heart.

John O’Donaghue

Questions for your tarot/oracle/journal/drawing/meditation/

How can I connect more with the alter of the heart? What gifts were prepared for me?

When you read a great poem, it reaches deep into regions of your life and memory and reverberates back to your forgotten or invisible regions of your experience.

John O’Donaghue

Question for your tarot/oracle/journal/drawing/meditation

What is lying today in the invisible regions of my experience?What does it mean to reach into the deepest regions of your life?

An invitation to you to tell us the message you received

I’d love it if we could start a thread of messages from our books here. Give yourself a few moments out of your day and type below the message you receive from your book.

If you know an author on Substack you’d like me to include in future bibliomancy threads please do let me know.

Sending good wishes for your week

Claire/Amritavani