Guides to Saju and the zodiac, tarot and numerology, palmistry, face reading and dream interpretation — no input needed, just read.
Fortune-telling lands far deeper when you understand the principles behind a reading rather than simply receiving a result. In this corner we've laid out the fundamentals of Saju and the Five Elements, of zodiac signs and tarot and numerology, and of palmistry, face reading, feng shui, dream interpretation and the personality types as well, so you can read them calmly, with no input required. At the end of each article you can jump straight to the related fortune reading.
The principles behind Saju, which frames your birth year, month, day, and hour as eight characters, plus a beginner's first steps in reading your own chart.
About 8 min read
The ten relationships the remaining characters form with your day master, grouped into five pairs, and how to read wealth, career, bonds, and learning through them.
About 3 min read
The cyclical principle by which Wood, Fire, Earth, Metal, and Water generate and restrain one another — one lens that runs through Saju, feng shui, and traditional medicine alike.
About 6 min read
The origins of the New Year fortune method named after Tojeong Yi Ji-ham, and the principle of drawing one of 144 hexagrams from your lunar birthday to read the year.
About 3 min read
The origin of how the twelve zodiac animals, from rat to pig, were fixed, the temperament of each animal, and the basics of zodiac compatibility read through three harmonies, six unions, and clashes.
About 3 min read
From which hand to read, to the three major lines — life, head, and heart — and on to the fate line and sun line: the basics for anyone reading palms for the first time.
About 3 min read
A clear guide to the Kua number and the East/West Four Houses derived from your birth year and gender, and to the principles of Eight Mansions Feng Shui that pinpoint your four auspicious directions.
About 3 min read
A one-glance guide to the many ways of reading the bond between two people — the principles and differences of Saju, Chinese-zodiac, star-sign, name, blood-type, and MBTI compatibility.
About 3 min read
Yongsin, the essence of Saju reading, examined through its four approaches — eokbu, johu, tonggwan, and byeongyak — to lay out the principle of finding the element that benefits you.
About 3 min read
The fundamentals of physiognomy, which divides the face into three zones, and the principles of traditional face reading that interpret the balance of the features and the five peaks.
About 3 min read
From yin-yang to the eight trigrams, and from the eight trigrams stacked into 64 hexagrams — a look at the structure of the I Ching and how it reads change through hexagrams and lines.
About 3 min read
The principles of daeun, the major luck cycles that turn every ten years, and seun, the yearly luck that arrives each year — plus how to meet the flow of fortune with balance.
About 3 min read
The twelve double-hours that divide the day, and the Hour Pillar — the last of the Four Pillars (Saju) — which reveals the inner self and the later years behind one's outward face.
About 4 min read
How the yut game once played at Lunar New Year became yut divination for foretelling the year ahead, and the meanings held in Do, Gae, Geol, Yut, and Mo.
About 3 min read
From Birth to Nurture, the Twelve Fortune Stages read how much strength the Day Master of a Four Pillars chart gains or loses in each Earthly Branch, mapped onto a single human lifetime.
About 3 min read
The Traveling Horse of movement, the Peach Blossom of allure, the Heavenly Noble whose help arrives from above. A guide to the sinsal, the spirit stars that mark special currents of energy in a chart.
About 3 min read
From Ipchun to the Great Cold, the sun's path is split into twenty-four. Here is why those solar terms mark the boundary of a month — and the start of a new year — in Saju.
About 3 min read
From the Heavenly Stem combination and the triple and six harmonies that draw together, to the clashes that collide head-on. How a chart's eight characters bind to one another.
About 3 min read
The Six Relations translate the Ten Gods of your chart into relationships like siblings, parents, spouse, and children. Here we lay out the pattern of human ties woven into your eight characters.
About 3 min read
Wealth in the nose, siblings in the brows, children beneath the eyes — face reading divides the face into twelve areas of life. Here are the basics of the Twelve Palaces.
About 4 min read
Once in every twelve years, each animal sign is said to enter samjae. Here is what the entering, settled, and departing years of samjae mean, and how to face them without needless fear.
About 3 min read
The origin of the twelve signs from Aries to Pisces, and how to read personality through the four elements — Fire, Earth, Air, Water — and the three qualities: cardinal, fixed, mutable.
About 6 min read
From The Fool to The World, the journey of growth drawn by the 22 Major Arcana and the fundamentals of reading upright and reversed cards, laid out at a beginner's eye level.
About 6 min read
The origins of divination with the ancient Northern European rune letters, and the basics of drawing an Elder Futhark rune and reading it upright and reversed.
About 3 min read
How the Celtic tree calendar that assigns birthdays to thirteen trees was actually put together in the twentieth century, together with each tree’s symbolism.
About 3 min read
The basics of the Minor Arcana — the four suits of Wands, Cups, Swords, and Pentacles, the numbered cards, and the sixteen court cards — which read the fine details of everyday life.
About 3 min read
The origins of the birthstones assigned to each month, the symbolism held in each gem from January's garnet to December's turquoise, and how to enjoy them alongside birth flowers.
About 3 min read
The four ranks — Page, Knight, Queen, King — and the four suits together make sixteen court cards. Here is how to read them as people and as situations alike.
About 3 min read
Placing side by side the Eastern Five Elements, which saw the energies composing the world as five, and the Western four elements, which saw them as four — a look at their likenesses and differences.
About 3 min read
The kinds of tarot spreads whose answers shift in grain depending on how you lay out the cards, and guidance on which to choose for which situation.
About 3 min read
From the Sun, Moon, and Mercury to Pluto, what each planet symbolizes and how the ruling planets relate to the twelve zodiac signs they govern.
About 3 min read
From the self to the unconscious, the houses divide a birth chart into twelve rooms and show in which area of life the energy of the stars unfolds.
About 3 min read
Does a card turned upside down mean the meaning turns bad? A guide to the tones a reversed card speaks — delay, turning inward, excess — and how to read them.
About 3 min read
From the conjunction to the opposition, here are the basics of aspects — why the angle two planets form reads as harmonious or as tense.
About 3 min read
From the new moon to the full moon, here is how the moon's waxing and waning phases mirror emotion and rhythm in astrology — and how to read the moon on the day of your birth.
About 3 min read
Grouping the twelve zodiac signs into fire, earth, air, and water reveals the broad grain of personality. Here are the temperaments and affinities each element carries.
About 3 min read
When you need an answer now, yes-or-no tarot asks with a single card. Here is how to draw and how to read it.
About 3 min read
Why does Mercury retrograde warn us to mind our communication and contracts? Here is what a planet's apparent retrograde motion is and how astrology reads it.
About 3 min read
How to calculate the Life Path number obtained by reducing your birth date to a single digit, and the meaning of numbers 1 through 9 and the Master Numbers.
About 6 min read
What the four indicators E/I, S/N, T/F, and J/P measure, and how to understand the 16 types by grouping them into four temperament clusters.
About 3 min read
The origins of the blood type personality theory beloved in East Asia, the signature temperaments of the four blood types, and the right attitude for enjoying it in fun.
About 3 min read
Why people have interpreted dreams, the views of traditional interpretation and modern psychology, and the ideas of auspicious dreams, ominous dreams, and reverse reading.
About 6 min read
The three biological cycles — physical, emotional, and intellectual — that flow from the day you were born, and how to read high days, low days, and critical days to gauge your condition.
About 2 min read
The characteristics of the four constitutions Lee Je-ma's Sasang medicine defined — Taeyang, Taeeum, Soyang, and Soeum — and the basics of their health and food guidance.
About 3 min read
Beyond the Life Path, the three numbers drawn from your name — the calculation and meaning of the Expression, Soul Urge, and Personality Numbers.
About 3 min read
The principle of the emotions people feel from color, and the dispositions revealed by warm colors, calm colors, and achromatic colors, laid out from the perspective of color psychology.
About 2 min read
The symbolism carried in numbers, and the numbers of luck and misfortune that differ by culture — the East's 3, 8, and 9 and its 4, the West's 7 and 13.
About 2 min read
Why personality tests like MBTI, blood type, the Sasang constitutions, and color psychology are so fun — and how to enjoy them wisely.
About 3 min read
How is a good name made? A look at the flow of the phonetic Five Elements held in a Korean name, the balance of yin-yang, and why it is held to matter.
About 3 min read
What do the common dreams everyone has at least once — of pigs, water, fire, or losing teeth — really mean? We set out a broad frame for reading recurring dream symbols.
About 3 min read
Why does the same four-letter type feel different from person to person? A step deeper into MBTI, into the eight cognitive functions and how their ordering shapes a personality.
About 3 min read
Numerology carries a Personal Year number that turns through a cycle of nine years. From the 1 of beginnings to the 9 of endings, a guide to reading the tone of your year.
About 3 min read
The Master Numbers 11, 22, and 33, left whole rather than reduced to a single digit. Here we look at the meaning of these numbers, which carry great potential and a heavy task alike.
About 3 min read
Where did the saying that you buy a lottery ticket after dreaming of a pig come from? Here we look at the grain of an old amusement — reading a dream's symbols into lucky numbers.
About 3 min read
A is careful, B is free, O is warm-hearted, AB is rational. Here we lay out the playful fun of reading people's grain and affinity by blood type.
About 3 min read
Like the old rhyme where Monday's child is fair of face and Saturday's child works hard, we look at the grain of personality held in the day of the week you were born.
About 3 min read
A pig dream means wealth, a snake dream means wisdom and wealth — or so they say. Here is how the animals that often appear in dreams are read in traditional dream interpretation.
About 3 min read
Unlike the Life Path, which adds up the whole date of birth, the Birthday number reads from the day of birth alone. Here we explore the grain of the innate talent it holds.
About 3 min read