In addition to using the Chinese Almanac to formulate a person’s fortune, other devices like coins are used to aid in the Chinese fortune telling process.
What You Need for Coin Divination:
- Name (English and/or Chinese name)
- Birth year
- Age
What You Will Learn from Coin Divination:
Those who seek a basic fortune telling session can choose to have their entire life’s fortune told or a particular time period, such as the coming year or next two years, revealed in general terms.
The fortune teller will speak in general about key years in the past (like years when there were changes in your life) and important years ahead, your personal characteristics, and basic outlook. He or she will also provide advice about how to proceed to ensure the fortune comes true.
How Coin Divination Works and What You Can Expect:
The fortune teller and the client may sit at a table across from each other or next to each other. After writing down your name, birth year, and age, the fortune teller will hand you a round brass container with three bronze coins inside. The coins are replicas of ancient Chinese coins.
The client will then concentrate on his or her name, birth year, and age while vigorously shaking the metal container. Then, once the shaking has stopped, three coins will emerge from a slit in the container. The fortune teller will take note of how the coins fell (heads or tails and in what the order). Then, the client will proceed to continue shaking the container and releasing the coins. The client may shake the container as little as three times or as many as seven or more times.
After consulting the Chinese Almanac and making calculations, the fortune teller will then present the fortune. It is written down in general terms and presented in a hong bao. Sometimes the fortune teller will combine coin divination with Chinese fortune sticks or palm and face readings to ascertain a person’s fortune. The consultation takes 30 to 45 minutes. The cost varies and is sometimes negotiable but it typically begins at $15 to $20.
Now that you know how coin divination works, learn how to perform coin divination yourself at home.
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