Destiny Cards: fifty two playing cards laid over the year, one card for every birthday.
The system maps the ordinary deck onto the calendar. Fifty two cards for fifty two weeks, thirteen ranks for the thirteen weeks of a quarter, four suits for the seasons, and 365 as the sum of the card values plus the joker. Every date in the year therefore has a birth card, and the rank and suit of that card carry the reading: hearts for feeling and relationship, clubs for mind and word, diamonds for value and worth, spades for work, health and the will.
It reached its modern form through Olney Richmond in the nineteenth century and Florence Campbell in the twentieth, and it is popular precisely because the vocabulary is already in your hands. You have held these fifty two objects your whole life.
The thirteen ranks
Thirteen ranks for the thirteen weeks of a season.
Ace
The Ace: the beginning and the wanting. You are the seed of your suit, alone and pointed; you start what others finish.
2
The Two: the pair. You are made for another; alone you are half a thought. Your work is choosing well.
3
The Three: expression and variety, the creative restlessness. You make, and you scatter; your work is to finish one thing.
4
The Four: the square, the foundation. You build stable things and you are steady to lean on; your work is to let the walls have a door.
5
The Five: change, travel, the refusal to be held. You move; your work is to move toward something.
6
The Six: balance and responsibility, the law of return. What you give comes back; your work is to give what you want returned.
7
The Seven: the spiritual number, the trial. Things do not come easily to a Seven and are worth more when they come; your work is faith.
8
The Eight: power and its right use. You can move people and money; your work is to use it for something beyond yourself.
9
The Nine: completion and giving back. You are here to finish cycles and let go; your work is to grieve well.
10
The Ten: attainment, the Ace fulfilled. You achieve; your work is to enjoy it.
Jack
The Jack: the youth, the creative one, the trickster. You are clever and unfinished on purpose; your work is to grow up without growing dull.
Queen
The Queen: the mother of the suit, service and mastery. You hold a house together; your work is to be served sometimes.
King
The King: the master of the suit, authority. You are meant to lead; your work is to lead without needing to.
Joker
The Joker: the card outside the deck, born on the last day of the year. You may be any card at will; your work is to choose one long enough to be known.
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The four suits
Four suits: feeling, mind, worth, work.
Hearts
Hearts: love, family, the affections; the spring of a life. A Heart lives through relationships and learns everything there.
Clubs
Clubs: the mind, words, learning; the summer. A Club lives through ideas and talk and is restless without them.
Diamonds
Diamonds: value, money, what is worth having; the autumn. A Diamond lives through worth, and must learn its own.
Spades
Spades: work, the body, wisdom won by labour; the winter. A Spade lives through doing, and its wisdom is earned.
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