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Syd got me a deck of tarot cards back when we were dating.
She was interested in those sorts of things like astrology and tarot, it didn't command her life like with some people, but nevertheless she enjoyed it. She always said it was more of a mindfulness exercise for her. I hadn't ever really been exposed to that sort of stuff, sure I knew my zodiac sign, but not much besides that. Syd showed me her deck of cards and did a few readings every now and then, especially when she or I were stressed. I didn't put much credence into it for a while, not until I had a big falling out with my best friend and I borrowed Syd's deck to do some readings for myself. When I centered around the question of my future with this friend, one of the cards I pulled was The Lovers, but inverted; the other cards all passing along a similar message of not having a friendship with this person into the future. It's been a few years now and despite a few attempts to reach out to this friend, I haven't really spoken to them since. It kinda spooked me by how accurate the cards and the meanings behind them directly followed what the question at hand.
We didn't use them for a while after that, until she got me my own deck. We did our first little reading with them and she thought it would be fun to ask how our future together looked. At the time I was heavily considering breaking up with her, but hadn't said anything to her about it. I don't remember the specific card, but one of them that was pulled came with the description of feeling trapped or dissatisfied with a relationship. It just summed up how I was feeling so well and actually opened the door for me to talk about how I was feeling with her. Of course I didn't say I was thinking about breaking up, but it allowed me to finally open up a bit.
I've used them a handful of other times when there's something eating me up inside. Each time the cards I've pulled have given me some insight or pointed towards how things have played out. When I asked if we were going to be evicted, when the landlord found out it wasn't my parents but instead Roomie and I living in the house, the cards told me that I had gotten too worked up and that I was secure. Sure enough we're still living in the house today.
The thing is, I fundamentally know these are just little pieces of card stock with drawings printed on them, hell the copyright on them is "US GAMES SYSTEMS INC", they're mass produced. Yet in all my use, despite my initial, and somewhat lingering, skepticism, I have been given great advice by them and they have accurately predicted the outcome of an event. I know they shouldn't, yet nevertheless they provide me great insight. They touch that part of me that I have always known was present, but always doubted, my intuition. I just get these horribly strong gut feelings from time to time that almost always end up being important. When I act against my gut feeling, it always ends up causing me trouble.
For many years I considered myself to be an atheist, yet even then I believed in my gut feelings. Now that I've opted to shed that label, I struggle to create a framework of what all I do believe. I used to lump in tarot in with all that new-agey hippie crap that only exists to take people's money and I think a lot of modern "spiritual" stuff is just that, malarkey. However I can't deny my own experiences. When I was taking my Intro to Asian Philosophy course, we covered Taoism and even though we only covered a very surface-level explanation of its teachings, the idea of a natural order to the universe just seems to fit my understanding of how things seem to play out. Not a pre-ordained path, but more like a compass. I'm still learning what I do believe and I'm going to continue to approach almost everything with a scientific skepticism, but I'm happy to play with ideas that go beyond a strict materialist understanding of the world.
I can't rule out that everything in the universe has turned out this way by chance, but I have a feeling something's got a thumb on the scale.