Saturday, 14 August 2021
Jinxing Context
The last time Mark, my husband, and I took a walk at JC Slaughter Falls, we had news of a lockdown when we got to the summit. To avoid jinxing the walk, this time we avoided going to the café. Thus, making the walk purely exercise.
Many things were going through my mind about which to write during the walk but, I put most of them to the side and hoped the topics would return when it came time to blog. The only thing to write about is jinxing things and how silly it is to have such a superstition, yet we all seem to have a superstition about something.
One of my many and varied comes when I’m watching my football team. For instance, when the game was on, I was doing housework. The cleaning was a productive use of supporter energy. And while I cleaned, my team kept winning.
When I finally decided to sit and watch the game, the other team scored a goal. I’d made three attempts to sit and watch the game, and three times the opposition scored with the momentum looking to shift their way. Coincidence? Or was I making a difference? I led myself to believe that my effort was contributing to the team’s momentum.
At the time, it seemed sitting was empowering to the wrong side. As long as I actively did the housework, I seemed to be jinxing the opponent. When I ran out of things to clean, I began on the windows surrounding the television. It was an exhausting game for me! But our place was spotless with clean windows to boot!
Unknowable Path
The reason superstitions and jinxes are so effective is because you’ll never know what might have happened if you had done things differently. There’s no evidence, except the evidence sought with a confirmational bias to prove the point.
It’s interesting to note, when the next time I tried cleaning, it didn’t work. That time, I needed to stay put and give my undivided attention to the game. At other times, my viewing is the reason they lost. Not watching the game so the team can win smacks of martyrdom, but I do it for my team 😉.
I think I simply feel invested if I feel I’m doing something to help them win; in my head, I believe this. 🙃 Of course, if the team loses, I hadn’t found the right way to assist or beat the jinx, or perhaps it’s just some days you need to experience losing.
And even though losing can be devastating, it’s still a weirdly “fun” part of the experience. It’s like picking at a scab or testing a bruise. You know it’s going to hurt if you touch it, but poke it, we do. Maybe that’s just me?
The point is, of course, we will never know if the jinx had changed if I persisted in sitting down whether the momentum shifts that happened would have happened regardless. Now and again, I have to remind myself that while my energy, like the energy of praying, might contribute a little, it’s unlikely to be the only “ALL” difference. Other factors need to happen to support the focus around the way the wind is blowing. Some events might just need to be jinx or no jinx. How’s that for a fatalistic approach?
Escaping a Jinx
How do you escape these insidious jinxes or superstitions to become a logical person? I’m not sure you can become utterly devoid of them. Any ritual or even habit can take on a resemblance of a superstition. The jinx is the ensuing bad luck derived from not following the routine.
Maybe it’s wise to confine superstition and jinxes to unknowable alternatives rather than say that I need to brush my teeth a certain way every morning. Doing your teeth a certain way might ensure you cover every part of your mouth. The trick comes from you not brushing for one day and feeling something evil will happen as a consequence. One time missed won’t hurt. Right?
Of course, bad luck might just be the way the cookie crumbles or the pieces land, but you’ll never know. If it’s not hurting anyone, it can become one of your “things” by which people will remember you as you pass through their life.
Today's Cards
The Cards - Analysis
Carryover Cards
Three cards carried over from yesterday; Morality moved from Outcome to Influence, Change moved from Recent Past to Distant Past, and Inner Voice moved from Influence to Outcome.
Cross
The Change in yesterday‘s Recent Past has moved to become the Distant Past today. Yesterday was all about the number thirteen and how it was superstition, and today was about jinxes and the preventative superstitions for team losses, another form of superstition.
Maybe both the superstitions come from the same source in the past; the “juju” might be something handed down from adult to child for generations. The only thing that changes is what superstition is influencing.
In the Context, under “Unknowable Alternate Path”, by Participation as a team supporter, the jinx exists in the Now in the first place. Of course, I have the overbearing presence of doing and saying the right things (Morality) regarding viewership and Participation.
The Change in the Distant Past continues its presence in Beyond Illusion, which is the card of the chrysalis shifting from the caterpillar to the butterfly.
Beyond Illusion is the fulfilment of the day’s Goal of The Dream. The Dream, by contrast, is full of illusion; the illusion, in this case, being my belief that what I do as a supporter matter. While I sometimes believe, on rare occasions, it does.
But I’m pleasantly deluding myself as an enjoyment like the wise Innocence of one making playful conversation with a grasshopper, although knowing full well the grasshopper is unlikely to understand. It’s what the Innocence card in Future Energy presents.
Base
While writing this post, I moved from knowing superstition was in the unknowable; I suddenly felt it; which is why Thunderbolt is in the Feelings position.
Others’ Views believe that Past Lives is affecting me and my superstitions or a jinx; who am I to gainsay otherwise? 😏
The Burden in Hopes & Fears appears natural when superstitions and jinxes are involved. Mentally you hope not to be manipulated by your fear of not doing or doing what your superstition tells you, but how do you get out of it? Yet, the fear of the alternate holds you to your ritual/s.
In the end, you just need to listen to your Inner Voice to ensure the Outcome you want to achieve and not be trapped by a jinx.
References
- Osho, Osho Zen Tarot – The Transcendental Game of Zen, St Martin’s Press, ISBN 0-312-11733-7
