on horoscopes
reading horoscopes are one of my guilty pleasures in life. although, i feel the need to say that i do not particularly believe in them. well... the daily ones at least. i am not sure why, but the whole zodiac idea based upon the twelve months of the year appeals to me. unfortunately, i only remember the signs and descriptions of november through june, so everyone with birthdays in july, august, september, and october are out of luck.
in particular, i really enjoy reading the in depth ones based on the hour and day of someone's birth, indicating where the planets are and all that mumbo jumbo. when meeting someone for the first few times, i like to find out when their birthday is so i can mentally map out a picture of them. because in a lot of ways, horoscopes are a good way to frame the world, because they give you a general idea to work from. regardless of whether you believe them or not, it gives a starting point or a focus that inquiries or observations can be made. for instance, if you ask someone to read their horoscope, indicating their supposed likes and dislikes, from their response, you can learn information that normally does not come up in regular conversation. instead of asking weird questions like, are you punctual, a horoscope gives you a list of traits that people agree or disagree to in response.
in the same way, daily horoscopes are interesting because they play mind tricks on the reader. if your daily horoscope says that, "you will meet a mysterious stranger today," more likely than not, you will pay more attention to people you normally would not. even if the horoscope does not come true, it still got you to change how you look at your surroundings, or at least pay more attention to it. all in all, horoscopes do not strike me as such a horrible thing. i mean, i guess eating fortune cookies every morning for a cryptic message would also work to spice up your life, but then you have to worry about exact duplicates and bad grammar/spelling. since horoscopes are usually in syndicated newspapers and usually written by people who want you to read them more often, there is usually pretty high quality assurance in terms of literary standards as well as useful (more so than some of the nonsense in fortune cookies), if vague descriptions of what to expect each day.
instead of an end all, be all, try to think of things as a starting point. you never know what is around the corner, but you sure will not see it if you do not look.
in particular, i really enjoy reading the in depth ones based on the hour and day of someone's birth, indicating where the planets are and all that mumbo jumbo. when meeting someone for the first few times, i like to find out when their birthday is so i can mentally map out a picture of them. because in a lot of ways, horoscopes are a good way to frame the world, because they give you a general idea to work from. regardless of whether you believe them or not, it gives a starting point or a focus that inquiries or observations can be made. for instance, if you ask someone to read their horoscope, indicating their supposed likes and dislikes, from their response, you can learn information that normally does not come up in regular conversation. instead of asking weird questions like, are you punctual, a horoscope gives you a list of traits that people agree or disagree to in response.
in the same way, daily horoscopes are interesting because they play mind tricks on the reader. if your daily horoscope says that, "you will meet a mysterious stranger today," more likely than not, you will pay more attention to people you normally would not. even if the horoscope does not come true, it still got you to change how you look at your surroundings, or at least pay more attention to it. all in all, horoscopes do not strike me as such a horrible thing. i mean, i guess eating fortune cookies every morning for a cryptic message would also work to spice up your life, but then you have to worry about exact duplicates and bad grammar/spelling. since horoscopes are usually in syndicated newspapers and usually written by people who want you to read them more often, there is usually pretty high quality assurance in terms of literary standards as well as useful (more so than some of the nonsense in fortune cookies), if vague descriptions of what to expect each day.
instead of an end all, be all, try to think of things as a starting point. you never know what is around the corner, but you sure will not see it if you do not look.
posted by Anonymous at 2:14 AM
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