Fortune Telling in Second Life

By Bixyl Shuftan

Xymbers Slade has a rather unusual occupation in Second Life: fortune teller. Customers can get tarot readings from him at his SL home & office. I recently had a chance to talk with him about his unusual occupation. Arriving at Wyvernhome, the bottom floor was like a dragon’s lair, with it’s pile of gold and other treasures. The office had a feel of the arcane, with it’s pentagrams, crystal, mystical looking candles and other props. Xymbers greeted me in a sorceress avatar, and we both took seats for the interview.

Bixyl Shuftan: Are you also a fortune teller in real life?

Xymbers Slade: Yeah, it's what I do to make ends meet. Do what you can in this economy. I have an Associates in Liberal Arts, which is totally useless. Fortunately I have a pretty decent family that helps with bills. I pay what I can.

Bixyl Shuftan: And how did you get the idea to do fortune telling in Second Life?

Xymbers Slade: It's what I know. I have no talent for building or scripting. So I brought what I did have a talent for :)

Bixyl Shuftan: Was it difficult to make the transition? Anything that required a bit of effort to do here?

Xymbers Slade: Nah. I've been reading since 1996. Not difficult at all. Maybe the initial expenditure for a classified ad. Sort of get the party started. First step's always the hardest.

Bixyl Shuftan: How many people stop by to get their fortunes told?

Xymbers Slade: I usually get about 20 hits a week on the classified, maybe a quarter of those stop in for readings. It's a niche market, but I do it well enough that people willingly pay about 5000-7000 $L a reading sometimes. So I can make the 8000 $L rent on this place every month.

Bixyl Shuftan: Sounds good. Have you had some especially interesting readings?

Xymbers Slade: Two where I foresaw death, both turned out eerily accurate. Another where I thought I saw someone attempting a kidnapping... with my insight we were able to get the guy to show his hand before he acted.

Bixyl Shuftan: Now that sounds interesting. You helped foil a criminal?

Xymbers Slade: ... It was yet another one of those domestic situations you always hear about in the news and the people were using the children as pawns. I wouldn't call it a criminal foiling. The potential to foil, yes. The guy knew he'd been goaded into acting foolishly and backed off. At least, that was last I knew. That's all I'll say.

Bixyl Shuftan: What can you tell the readers of how a session of fortune telling generally goes?

Xymbers Slade: Mostly all I need is where you're from (so I know where to focus; just state is fine, or country outside the US), and hair and eye color so I have a basic idea of what you might be suggested by in the cards. Then it's whether you want a 5, 10, or 19 card reading, I shuffle for about a minute in real-life, and display the cards above me here.

Bixyl Shuftan: Yes I see. I notice some are upside down.

Xymbers Slade: Yeah, I read "reversed" cards ... some people don't. Cards have different meanings if they're upside down. The real trick is finding someone you're comfortable with. Ask the same question of 20 readers, you'll usually get 20 answers.

Xymbers Slade: Everyone has their own decks and their own interpretations. What the upside down Devil there in that sample spread means to me in that position will be different than what someone else sees it as.

Bixyl Shuftan: Are some people difficult to get a reading off of?

Xymbers Slade: Yeah. I can't read drunk people, or people impaired under drugs or anything. You have to be clean and sober for me to read you, and I WILL sense if you're not, which makes the reading even harder than normal (and if I draw the Wheel of Fortune in the reading, God help us both :P ) I have done this for so long I've really developed my empathy almost to a truly amazing degree. It helps with connecting to people for readings here through the Internet. Sometimes I'll get colored lines or images in my head of a particular person.

Bixyl Shuftan: For those readers who know little about tarot cards, could you give a few examples of the meanings of the cards?

Xymbers Slade: The scripted deck I use on the wall behind me has a random "fate" option, so I'll do a sample 5 card draw using that and say what those cards mean, whatever shows up. Fate often turns 'em upside down, I'll just give both meanings rather than the reversed ones.

Xymbers then shuffled the cards, and five reappeared on the board.

Xymbers Slade: First card that appeared ... the Chariot ... my card of speed ... usually to me showing people going fast from point A to Z without paying attention to points B-Y... if you don't pay attention, you're going to hit a rock and that chariot is going to flip. So in other words, slow down.

Second card that showed up ... 5 of Cups, my "Mountains out of Dust Particles" card ... people are focusing too much on a "woe is me" aspect ... if they don't pull their heads out of their a**es, bypass 'em and move on.

8 of Wands as the third card, my "River" card --- if you jump into a situation feet first, you're going to be swept downstream with little to no control."

Justice, which I HATE drawing in a reading, it's my card of "destiny", saying "This is what's going to happen, sit back, take it, and f**k you while you're at it." Drawn with cards representing stagnation, or a lot of chaos and chance, leads to frustrating situations people don't deserve.

Final card that popped up, 6 of Swords, my card of moving forward (or backsliding, if it's upside down)... slow and steady progress despite obstacles. Any progress is good progress.

I often focus on the negative in a reading. If it ain't broke, don't fix it. When I do see something positive, I worry a little. Tarot's supposed to be about exposing problems and situations that need to be changed and fixed. If it's positive, you don't need to change it.

So I can be pretty pessimistic in my readings. But on the other hand I don't sugar coat and if I say "dude, you're fucked, take it a day at a time"... yeah, I'll say it.

Er, if I have to say that, I will. I have in the past.

Bixyl Shuftan: How do people generally react to their readings?

Xymbers Slade: Mostly awed that what I say rings true to them. Tarot is generalizing, they take what the cards poke at and put it into a context in their head about things. But for the most part they're either awed that I was pointing in directions they needed to hear about or didn't think about, or we don't hit it off so well and the person walks off. Love hate relationship. I'm used to it. You have to take the bad with the good, some people I simply can't read, and others I've read once and I'd rather not read them again, either because they didn't listen the first time or some other silly reason that makes me reluctant to deal with them again. I can't read myself, for example. I have two or three readers I go to on here for my own readings.

Bixyl Shuftan: To your knowledge, how many fortune tellers are there in Second Life?

Xymbers Slade: I know of three that I go to, and I'm sure there are dozens more, both professional and personal. It's a hobby for a lot of people, it just turned into something I can do for money. Anything I make here goes right back into Second Life. The exchange rate is just not good enough to make me cash out unless I suddenly get an influx of people paying me five-figure $L costs. My best ever was 12500 --- they wanted to pay me in real life dollars and I said "Give me a price, I'll convert it to $L."

Xymbers then offered me a tarot reading, to which I agreed. The teller had a couple questions, “Where are you from so I know where to focus? Just state is all I need. ... And what do you look like so I know what you're represented by in my cards? Hair and eye color is all I need unless you want to reveal more.” After I answered them, Xymbers began shuffling a deck, “... one minute ... Want 5, 10 or 19 cards?” I answered, “Five sounds about right.”

The five cards displayed on the board behind Xymbers earlier went away, and five more appeared in their place, face down. The fortune teller drew them one at a time, “First card up ... Earth ... current situations ... “ the card was then flipped, “Queen of Cups, which I am not seeing as an actual person ... more of a mindset. This is suggesting to me that people's minds are far more open than they seem (even to them) --- so the power of words and suggestions will work far better than actions in the short run.”

Xymbers moved to the second card, “Card 2 ... Air ... next major influence ... “ and this was flipped, “10 of Swords, my card of grief and pain ... the picture on the card is self explaining, really... a major plot or plan or idea goes belly up, or a lot of little minor things beat the odds and all come together to form a major clusterf**k. A definite "What ELSE can go wrong" sort of thing.” Xymbers paused, “But I am seeing it as short-lived. It happens, it needs to be dealt with, it is, and people move on.”

And then the teller turned to, “Card 3 ... Fire ... next major obstacle ... “ and with the card overturning, “Temperance, my card of patience and of waiting for the right moment. This is suggesting waiting for something is not the way to go. You need to jump on your plans now before they fall flat on their face. If you have major things going on, kick up the time table by a month or two. Patience may be a virtue, but action will get results directly here rather than waiting for the opportunities to come back to you.”

Next was, “Card 4 ... Water... my ‘truth behind the scenes card’ ... “ and it two was overturned, “2 of Pentacles, my ‘juggling of situations’ card ... it's also my ‘happy on outside, not on inside’ card; I am seeing this as more a ‘You know there's better stuff out there but you feel blocked or frustrated that you can't get it all.’ You have your own stuff to juggle as is. You don't need to add any more. Else all those things at once turn into those 10 Swords.”

Xymbers then turned to the last tarot, “Final card ... Spirit ... final results if things don't change ... and I have absolutely NO clue who this is.” It was overturned to reveal, “The Empress, a strong woman in a strong position of power. It looks like she's just sitting here though, resting. She's not taking any action for or against. If you go to her for help you might get help, you might get beheaded. It's a crapshoot with her. But she's not evil, so that's a good thing. As an Empress she'd be much older than you, probably a good 15+ years. Definitely has the age and wisdom thing going for her. I was almost tempted to say it was Rita. But I don't get the sense that it is.” Xymbers meant Rita Mariner, the frisky Sunweaver group leader.

The teller continued, “Whomever she is, she holds more cards than she knows, but I don't see this Empress using them. She's got 'em, but doesn't know she's got 'em, and won't lose anything by losing 'em. I don't think anyone would dare oppose her, though. She's in a position of power, and everyone knows it.”

Xymbers concluded, “So, other than that, that's what I'm seeing here ... that 10 of Swords stands out to me as the strongest card here ... that it's got more to share. But I don't know what that could be.”

It was then Xymbers Slade had to take leave, and ported away to some other business in Second Life. How accurate was the reading? Time will tell.

Xymbers Slade also conducts work from a website: http://www.liveperson.com/the-silent-strider.

“We fortune tellers make pennies on the dollar. I make about $1000 in real life every ... 2, maybe 3 months. But it's my only way to make money and support what I can of myself, so I do what I can to avoid homelessness and the like.”

Bixyl Shuftan