When I was young, my friends and I would playfully explore our futures with the simple MASH game. We would draw a square on a piece of paper with the word MASH on the top – MASH standing for Mansion, apartment, shack & house. On the other sides we’d usually choose 4 people we could marry (a combo of crushes and cringey boys around us), how many children we would have, and what kind of car we would own. We’d then pick a number and go through the items and check them off until there was one item left in each category. Excitement or teasing would then ensue. It was all in fun, but even as I got older the love of gathering intel about the future never subsided.
Palm Reading
Recently I decided to get my palm read by a woman, Tina Woo – she’s the owner of a local business Palmistry & Potions. I loved that she was also a health-care professional and this is something she does on the side.
The fun thing about having someone else do a reading on me is that it invites a perspective beyond my own. Someone else is often better able to see our blind spots too.
Tina explained palm-reading within a holographic lens – the hand is an extension of everything inside us. She was spot on about a number of things and I enjoyed learning more about this avenue of connecting to parts of myself beyond my thinking brain.

Pendulum Reading
Over the years I’ve been introduced to pendulum work from a variety of people. We used pendulums with the Barbara to learn how to read chakras and how they were spinning until we didn’t need them anymore. Now I can place my hand over someone’s chakra and I can sense many things about them without a pendulum.
What Kind of Pendulum is Best?
Choosing a pendulum is a personal thing. If you are especially sensitive to crystals and different types of wood, it’s probably best to buy one in person from someone and see what it feels like to you. I’ve met people who found wood pendulums to be less intense than a crystal pendulum. For others, it’ll make no difference.
I have always used wood pendulums, I purchased one made out of beech and then lost it a few months later. Now I just make my own. I’ve included mine below. You could use an acorn nut or cap – really anything with some balance & symmetry.
How to Use a Pendulum
Another woman I met taught me how to create a grid to aid with decisions related to use of the pendulum.
1. You get a ruler, and a piece of paper and then draw a line across the sheet of paper.
2. Place a dot in the midpoint.
3. You then place your pendulum at that midpoint and create your personalized grid by asking your guides/intuition/spirit/higher Self (whichever resonates with you). You ask to be shown which direction is for the numbers 1 through 10. Close your eyes or look forward and allow the pendulum to swing in the direction it wants to go. After you feel it moving, look and see which direction it’s going. Use a ruler and put a line in that place.
4. You then use the same process to indicate where yes and no should be placed.
Here’s an image of my pendulum grid below. It was very cool to see how the semi-circle was fairly evenly divided into 10.

What questions are best for a pendulum?
The general wisdom is to not use it for any major decisions in your life (or at least not solely). Should I have a baby, get married, divorce, move to Brazil – don’t base these decisions on pendulum use.
Better questions are: “On a scale of 1-10, with 1 being low and 10 being for my highest good, where would moving to Brazil go on that scale?” or “On a scale of 1-10 with 1 being low and 10 being for my highest good, where does a relationship with _________ fall on that scale?
Also try it out with simple questions first, “On a scale of 1 – 10, how good would _______ product be for me? Or use it to narrow a selection of options that you’re trying to choose from. It’s good to try it out on smaller things first and get some confidence in the output it offers before trying it with larger things.
I’ve used it to help me decide which educational workshops to take when I’m stuck between a few options.
Most of the time with pendulum use I’ve gotten an answer that my body resonates with and inwardly shouts – yes, I knew that was it. Every once in a while I’ll get a surprising answer, but these are rare.
Other options
Some people are really into muscle-testing (google this if you’re not familiar). Muscle-testing has similar intentions as pendulum use, but the pendulum grid makes it a little broader than muscle testing for me. That being said, I’m sure people have come up with methods to fine-tune muscle-testing.
Tarot Cards
Another popular option for connecting to your intuition/higher Self and/or spirit guides is the use of tarot cards. Over the past year I’ve played with the classic tarot cards and enjoyed them – see the bottom of my summer-time post for a great book for learning the tarot. There are so MANY different decks available now. I’ve got quite a few of them and I use different decks for different things. I find that the Animal Medicine deck is most accurate for me. I also like Doreen Virtue’s angel card decks for use for inspiration.
What kind of card decks are your favourites?
If you’ve been following along with me on the connection to your intuition series, I hope you’ve felt inspired with a variety of methods to connect to your intuition, higher Self or Spirit Guides. I often find that I dabble in them all. Sometimes I find the process of writing to be helpful in clearing out the noise, sometimes nature is my best medicine and sometimes I enjoy playing with the pendulum or tarot cards.
Let me know your favourite way to connect to your intuition!