I only listen to my tarot deck these days

A case for replacing the algorithm with an oracle

The Love Witch (2016)

Aren’t you tired of all the advice?

We have never been harassed by as much unsolicited advice as we are these days. It’s like your opinionated great-aunt and that condescending old boss (the one who peaked in high school?) have fused into one melting, cackling beast that was cloned a million times over and now lives tucked into every crevice of your home, waiting to scream useless information at the ceiling when you least expect it. It crawls out from under rocks and falls off trees and runs after you with a straight spine and impressive speed, howling “you should be more active on Linkedin!” while it stares deeply into your soul with the maniacally empty eyes of a ventriloquist doll.

No? Maybe that’s just me. Maybe I’m just done with the algorithm.

And I’m thankful for what the algorithm has done for me, really! Thank you, algorithm, for keeping my bubble so tightly curated it asphyxiates me, for validating whatever views I align with while fearlessly protecting me from differing opinions in case that leads me to spontaneous combustion, thank you so much, algorithm, for plaguing my screen with thousands of images of trinket charm handbags after I liked that one photo, until all I saw in my sleep were hundreds of rows of trinket bags, their trinkets clinking and shining happily in the sun, the Sonny Angels singing softly like a choir, blinding me with their pureness until I couldn’t see another trinket bag ever again.

Do I want a trinket charm bag? Not anymore but oh, the algorithm is like a mother who can’t keep up with her children’s preferences and it will hold me close and bottle feed me the tutorials I need to handcraft my charms in the comfort of my own home, and all of a sudden it’s too late! I don’t want charms anymore. You know, kids like carrots one day, then hate them the next. They’re mercurial, I’m mercurial. I suppose my algorithm is trying to predict what I’ll like next, or define it for me. It’s easier that way.

Luckily, I’m interested in many different things and there is a plethora of good advice and truly genius tutorials out there. So many podcasts and youtube videos and opinion pieces and tiktoks and courses and subscriptions and so. Much. Goodness. To have this at my fingertips, how powerful are we all? How wealthy?

I was raised to be a sponge, to listen to my superiors with deference because really, what could I possibly know, what could I have to say that is even of remote interest to anyone else? So upon discovering the internet (and I’m discovering it every day against my will), I did what most sponges would do and I started gobbling all this precious information down like a squirrel storing nuts for winter.

Want to start a business? Twenty podcasts and two online courses, please. Need to relax? There’s this great youtuber, her videos really help me be present, you’ll see, I’ll send you the link tonight so you can be present too.

Every single question that popped into my mind had to be answered by someone else. It didn’t really matter if I knew them or even had known of them before - ideally, I would get multiple diagnoses by multiple someone elses. It got to a point where I couldn’t trust myself to form an original thought about anything I deemed important; I simply had to consult an Internet Expert. There’s so much advice out there, you’d have to be really stupid not to use it.

But the math stopped mathing when the advice began to contradict itself. Podcast No. 1 said the best solution was A, Podcast No. 2 claimed the only way forward was B, and I was at a loss because both people were absolute Internet Experts and I had tried both things and failed and what now? What now, algorithm? But the algorithm’s generosity knows no bounds and mother was ready to feed me Podcasts No. 230, 518, 967, don’t worry, there is always more.

Weeks later, my head was starting to feel like it would melt at any point and I found myself talking to a fellow freelancer who was just as tired of all the advice as I was, except she seemed to have a better handle on her own free will and self worth. We met when I was on my way to yet another workshop I most definitely didn’t need to waste my time on, and as the master oversharer that I am, I promptly offered that I didn’t even know what I was doing there, since I was so exhausted from processing all this information all the time.

She told me she knew exactly how I felt, and said something along the lines of “hey, at the end of the day, I’m the one who knows what’s best for me. Yo soy yo” (I am me). The yo soy yo stuck with me because 1. it’s pretty catchy and 2., it made it clear that who she was and how she felt about things were valid enough reasons to move forward in the ways she knew best, rather than listening to someone else or, god forbid, asking ChatGPT for its opinion. It wasn’t that she had all the answers; it was more that this was her life and these were her decisions and everything was hers to own and learn from and see for herself, and that was that.

That day, I decided to make her my new mother (in a non-creepy way?) and only feed myself that very particular piece of advice, that yo soy yo and yo will use my own brain from now on, and I decided to stop listening to anyone else’s advice altogether. Really, people don’t know what they’re talking about most of the time anyway.

I don’t listen to podcasts anymore, I avoid impromptu educational tiktoks like the plague and I only watch youtube videos if I need a very specific piece of information. I go to Linkedin when I question my self worth, throw up a little on the inside and promptly leave. And I try (I try) to spend less time on Instagram. I usually fail, but however and whenever I can, I’m keeping the algorithm as quiet as possible.

I still read book reviews and watch the occasional makeup tutorial while I’m getting ready. I still enjoy my little corner of bookstagram and I am still undoubtedly being fed by the algorithm (I make food for it myself; the irony isn’t lost on me), but the effort pays off. My brain is a little quieter, and it gives me room to breathe.

Like most people, I need guidance sometimes, and I’m not on friendly terms with the popular concept of God. So I turned to the tarot deck I got for Christmas last year, and now every time I have a question, I ask it. The tarot deck is my new mother. I call her whenever I have a question, and she always answers.

Here’s why this works for me, and why it might work for you, too. You either:

Believe in the spiritual side of the practice, and you receive signs and messages from the universe/angels/something, someone above, which is great;

Or you don’t believe in any of it, and what you do get is a connection to that part of your brain you might have been trained to ignore. The tarot cards are a way for you to figure out what you want, or how you feel, often before you come to that realization yourself. If, like me, you’re used to being fed information and told what to do, a tarot card could be just what you need, because you’re handing that agency over to something else, but that something else is basically your brain speaking back to you.

When I’m feeling overwhelmed and need a sign that tells me what I should focus on, I’ll pull a card and it will say something along the lines of “focus your undivided attention on the project that gives you more energy”, and I’ll be like “oh yeah this is a clear sign for me to focus on xyz!”. It is never a clear sign; I just always know what the cards are saying, because I always know, full stop. Yo soy yo, after all.

These days, I’m much more interested in being in digital spaces that allow me to read people’s musings and silly diary entries; the previously unsubstantial has now become the substance I go online for. Please, I beg of you, show me your dog. Tell me something useless. Let me read a love letter you wrote to the loser you had a crush on at fifteen. Because as far as advice goes, unless you’re a tarot card, I’m no longer listening.

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