I’ve been building my own animal-themed tarot deck. Not because I have the artistic talent of a Renaissance master (my ravens look like angry commas), but because I’ve hit a wall with commercial decks. They’re beautiful, sure, but the symbolism feels handed down, not earned. When I flip a bought card, I’m reading someone else’s relationship to the symbols. When I draw the card myself, I’m literally mapping my own shadow work onto the page. Carl Jung wrote extensively about how symbols aren't just pictures—they're vessels for the unconscious. I think that’s exactly why DIY divination hits different.

I’ve been reading Daniel Kahneman’s work on cognitive biases and how our brains are hardwired for pattern-matching. Divination is basically a structured Rorschach test. You’re not predicting the future; you’re forcing your brain to confront its own confirmation bias and emotional blind spots. But when you’re the one who decided a three-legged crow represents isolation instead of pack loyalty, the reading stops being a parlor trick. It becomes actual psychology. The friction of making the deck is the practice.

I’ve been messing around with different inks, testing how the bleed on cheap hospital-ruled paper changes the mood of a card. Turns out, the smudges from a twelve-hour shift actually add a nice layer of grit to the Major Arcana. Anyway, if anyone else has abandoned the polished, mass-produced spreads for something a little more... duct-taped together, I’d love to hear what symbols you’ve forced your own brain to sit with. Or just tell me I’m overthinking it. I’m used to that.