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Egg Divinations
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The
World is Your Oracle
by Nancy Vedder-Shults
Nancy's forthcoming book, The World
is Your Oracle, compiles hundreds of divination methods, from
ancient oracles to modern-day techniques. The excerpts published
here will describe a few of the ways to access the deeper layers
of our minds and broaden our sense of perception.
A good oracle puts us in touch with
ourselves. It lets us discover our motivations, feelings and thoughts
about the question we're exploring. And it connects us with the
atmosphere or environment surrounding that question —
making us aware of the water we swim in, but usually don't notice.
To receive inner guidance, all we
need is to open ourselves to what our body/mind tells us, what our
emotions display, and what our unconscious knows. In this way, we
can begin to hear with our inner ears and see with our inner eyes.
Using these mystical senses — what we might call the sense
organs of the unconscious — we perceive holistically,
noticing relationships and patterns rather than isolating, classifying
and judging what we observe. Once we have gathered this wisdom,
we can then use the rational mind to interpret what we have learned.
We live in an interconnected world,
a web of life. Each segment of that web reflects the whole just
like fractal designs or holography. That's why the patterns we discover
through divination give us information. They mimic the relationships
of the whole at a particular moment in time.
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by Nancy Vedder-Shults,
Ph.D.
Eggs were sacred to Ostara, the pre-Christian goddess of spring who gave
her name to Easter. As we celebrate this season of new, burgeoning life,
it seems appropriate to offer several egg divinations in Her honor.
Eggs serve as wonderful oracular tools. Not only can you perform divinations
with them, but when you've finished, you can eat them as well, feeding
on the wisdom you have uncovered. As symbols of beginnings, eggs may also
point you in unexplored directions or at least give you new information
that you may have overlooked before asking your divinatory question.
When a friend of mine introduced me to egg divinations, I assumed someone
had devised this oracular form recently. I have since discovered that
the ancients used eggs as well, calling such oracles oomantia or
ooscopy. Eggs also provided oracular information to people in the
Celtic British Isles, Lithuania, other parts of Eastern Europe, Morocco,
and Mexico, as well as to the Murias of India and the curanderas
of Puerto Rico.
Divination Methods
Accessing the present moment is as fundamental for egg oracles as for
any other divination. So ground and center using whichever meditation,
visualization, or spiritual exercise you prefer. Then acknowledge the
egg you have chosen as your oracle. Once you've finished interpreting
your oracle, remember to thank the universal energies as well as your
egg for guiding you to your deepest knowledge.
Egg Rolling
Of the three divination methods offered here, this remains my favorite.
Not only can you gain oracular information from your egg, you also get
to decorate and eat it! I also favor this form of oracle because coloring
the egg always reminds me of the times I painted and embellished Easter
eggs when my daughter was young. Let's begin at the beginning:
- Formulate an oracular question.
- Hard-boil your chosen egg.
- Devise a symbol for each possible outcome
to your divinatory query. For example, the photo shows some of the
images I used to deal with a noisy, next-door neighbor who thought
that raucous parties at 3:00 a.m. were his right.
- Paint or draw these images on your
egg, while concentrating on your query. Actually, it's hard not to
think about your issue when drawing symbols on your egg, since you're
portraying solutions to your problem.
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Symbols for Dealing with My Noisy Neighbor
Eye image. A crossed-out eye indicates I should ignore
the neighbor.
Two open mouths facing each other. Two open mouths stand
for talking to the neighbor myself.
Police whistle. A police whistle represents calling the
cops.
Male symbol. A male symbol signifies that my male partner
should talk with him.
Female symbol. A female symbol means that a female friend
might help out.
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- Ground and center.
- Now you're set to roll, literally,
since your next step is to propel your egg down a nearby hill.
- When the egg stops moving, the symbol
that comes to rest face up will indicate the answer to your question.
- Once you have thanked your egg for
its insight, eat it to take the wisdom you have gained into your body.
This may be the final step in coming to understand your issue, your
first action toward the change you want, or an internal commitment
to do something about the situation. However you understand ingesting
your oracular egg, be aware that, like any other form of "communion,"
it will affect you. So watch for subtle cues to this transformation.
In the days ahead, you may have greater confidence in confronting
your issue or you may even find that it has dissolved away.
Egg Toss
When my daughter was in grade school, one of her assignments involved
preparing a chicken egg to protect it from cracking when she threw it
from a second story window. Unlike my daughter's elementary school experiment,
this divination technique is meant to break your oracular egg. To perform
this divination:
- Settle on a divinatory question.
- Find a hard surface (sidewalk, driveway,
a piece of flat wood in the yard) at least three feet on each side.
Cover the square with a large, clean piece of paper.
- Ground and center.
- Wait for an impulse to throw your egg.
Then toss it onto the paper.
- Identify the images created by the
broken egg.
- Interpret your oracle.
Interpretation
- Interpreting the patterns created by
the broken yolk, egg white and shell is similar to taking a Rorschach
Test. Don't rush to judgment, but let your eyes take in all the globs,
splats and squiggles produced by your egg until they begin to look
like identifiable objects, people or other images. Notice where on
your canvas each of these symbols has come to rest: above, below,
in the middle, left or right. What does their placement tell you about
the relative significance of each of these factors to your query?
Such observations will eventually unlock your oracle.
- If you ever spent childhood hours staring
at the knots and grain in a piece of pine — discovering bug-eyed
monsters and strange-looking people — you'll have no trouble
with this process. Remember not to push away any information that
comes to you through other perceptual channels (auditory, visual or
kinesthetic) while performing and interpreting your divination. If
a saying or jingle enters your mind, integrate it into your interpretation.
If you notice a particular feeling, pay attention to it as well. If
something or someone interrupts your oracle, this, too, may add to
your understanding, either through the words or sounds you hear as
you set aside your divination or through the person or thing that
breaks your concentration. Play with your egg "drawing"
in your mind or even with your fingers (remembering to wash off the
uncooked egg), and soon you will be rewarded with some practical wisdom
for your life.
- For help in interpreting the Egg Toss
or Curandear Egg Oracle, you can freely associate with each image
you've identified, and notice how it relates to the others in your
divinatory picture. For more information on how to do this, see my
earlier column, Free
Association.
Curandera Egg Oracle
A friend of mine taught me this oracular method, which she learned at
a workshop about traditional Puerto Rican mystical and medicinal practices.
Curanderas (healers) in this Caribbean tradition use eggs as a
means of healing as well as divination, so you may receive a secondary
benefit when you perform this type of oracle.
- Develop a query concerning your issue.
- Ground and center.
- While concentrating on your question,
sweep your chosen egg over your body or along the contours of your
aura. In either case, the egg will heal and cleanse your physical,
emotional and spiritual body, according to Puerto Rican understanding.
Once you've freed yourself of the negative influences you've internalized,
you are ready to begin your divination.
- Acknowledge the egg as your oracle.
- Crack it into a clear glass of water.
- Study the shape(s) of the egg white
and yolk. This is similar to a RoHrschach diagram, but in three dimensions.
Turn the glass to study the forms in it from all angles, even from
below. Spend some time allowing the appearance of the cracked egg
to wash over you.
- Interpret the images you see. Notice
what these shapes remind you of and how they affect you. Note their
relationships. Keep your senses open to further intuitions in the
form of comments or sounds, visions or feelings. Anything that happens
during your divination may be significant. Ultimately, your interpretation
of the shapes and forms the egg white and yolk have assumed will give
you some guidance about your question.
Graphics Credits
- egg rolling, egg image courtesy
of jeltovski (divination symbols digitally drawn by Sage Starwalker)
- suspended egg, courtesy of jamsheed.
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