Bibliomancy
A Few Notes Before We Begin…
For the next six weeks I will provide:
An optional weekly exercise that can be used as guide for selecting the text(s) that you will work with;
An excerpt of text (one excerpt per week) pulled from a selection of works which I have chosen to use for my personal Bibliomancy practice;
Overarching writing prompts which can be used to help guide your daily and/or weekly journaling practice.
Please remember, this practice should feel easeful and replenishing. The objective with any practice is flow, not force. If any aspect of this practice begins to feel forced, stress inducing, or misaligned, please pause and, if you can, identify why, and adjust the practice to fit your need(s).
Personal selection of texts
The following is a list of the texts I will be using over the next six (6) weeks. Please do not feel you must run out and buy these. The optional weekly exercises can be used to help you select texts that you either already have at home, have access to through personal connection (ie. friend, partner, family member, elder), or can check out from your local library or peruse at your favorite bookshop.
You are welcome to select and work, exclusively, with one text over the six (6) weeks, or switch it up each week and select a different text to practice with.
Week 1: Women Who Run With The Wolves, Clarissa Pinkola Estés, Ph.D.
Week 2: The Alchemist, Paulo Coelho
Week 3: The How, Yrsa Daley-Ward
Week 4: This Here Flesh, Cole Arthur Riley
Week 5: The Source of Self-Regard, Toni Morrison
Week 6: Pause Rest Be, Octavia F. Raheem
Historical Note
Bibliomancy (from “biblio” meaning “books” and “mancy” meaning, “divination by means of”) has a long spiritual tradition. Traditionally Bibliomancy is practiced by setting a religious text (ie. Bible, Quran etc) on its spine and allowing it to fall open. Then, with eyes closed, and using a finger to trace along the pages of the text, and letting one’s finger land, a passage is selected.
Personal Practice
I began practicing Bibliomancy in 2020 when I started reading Women Who Run With The Wolves. This book had been sitting on my bookshelf for years but I’d never felt ready to read it. Then, one day I felt called to pick it up and begin engaging with the book’s wisdoms. I learned about Bibliomancy through my friend, Agnes who told me to, before opening the book, set an intention, this could be in the form of a question, a prayer, or just speaking a contemplative thought out loud. Once the question, prayer, or contemplation had been spoken, I would open the text and either begin with reading a passage within the pages that I open the text to, and/or skim those pages and flip back to the beginning of the chapter or section within which I landed.