How do we read signs and omens in everyday life
This article is part one about about experimenting with the inherent power of the human being, which was to blend with nature, live by nature and learn and understand through the signs and omens of nature, which have been lost in course of time, due to ignorance and/or disuse.
This is about Omens or Portents as they call it.
Portent, a definition
How do you define portent? It is a signal from outside or inside about a future occurrence, which may happen in the next few minutes, hours or later.
Have you ever had a feeling that this is not going to be right? And did you experience later that it was not right?
This happens to us all of us sometimes. Some of us may experience it more than others. Some may not have experienced it at all. That is your sixth sense or intuition. Some of us have a highly developed intuition, while others do not.
But, on the other hand, everyone of us can take advantage of the external signs of something happening in the near future. This may refer to an incident or something that happens when we are about to travel such as, visit a friend, go to the supermarket, starting for office and so on.
You may slip when starting, encounter an obstruction or see a particular sight within a few meters of beginning your journey.
As I said, we are involved with two different kinds of experience here; the first one is popularly called intuition; the other one is called an omen.
What is intuition?
Intuition is a sign within yourself, where your sub-conscious tells you that something is wrong/right, or make you feel that you should be doing this or that.
It is believed that the base of your nose, where the eye-brows meet, is the point where the solution to improve your intuition lies. That point is called the "Ajna". It is one of the seven major points in the body; this relates to the sub-conscious.
It is believed that when one meditates on the "Ajna chakra", which is the point where our eyebrows meet, ones power of intuition is improved.
How do we explain Omen in a sentence?
Omen or portent (according to wikipedia) in a sentence, is that it is a phenomenon that is believed to foretell the future, often signifying the advent of change. It may be a sign of success, failure or just to tell us that the time has not come.
As we simply put it, an omen is a sign in our everyday life that nature gives you as an indication on the outcome of an activity.
Consider the following situations.
You are planning to visit a friend. You have already informed him that you will be visiting. You visit his home. He is not there. Your visit is unfruitful.
You are planning to visit a friend. You have already informed him that you will be visiting. You start from home. You get stuck in traffic, which is held up due to an accident. You reach your friend late. Your friend is not there. Your visit is unfruitful.
You are planning to visit a friend. You have already informed him that you will be visiting. Your vehicle stops with a flat tyre. You notice that the spare tyre is also flat. You do not reach your friend in time. Your journey is unfruitful.
In all the above 3 instances, it is known that the visitor and the friend will not meet, due to a sequence of events.
And the events that trigger the outcome are already on roll.
Naturally, the events trigger another action that informs the visitor that the outcome will be successful or not, which is an omen.
Let us consider another example of omen in daily life. Aruna gets ready to go to her friend's place. Aruna's mother tells her to have food before leaving. Aruna is in a hurry. disobeys mother's words and leaves. In the next 15 minutes, Aruna's bike is involved in an accident.
On hind sight, we know that if Aruna had heeded to her mother's words and had food before leaving, the accident could have been avoided.
The accident did not happen because Aruna's mother asked her to eat before leaving. The thought of asking her daughter to eat and leave was placed in Aruna's mothers mind, because nature knew that if Aruna started at that moment, she would be involved in an accident.
We should understand that the Cosmos is an alive and intelligent being, always sending us messages or omens. It is a pity that most of us are not receptive to it. And thus, we are not able to interpret the omens.
I have personally experienced these omens and have tried experimenting with them. In the process, I have found out certain things symbolically represent success/failure when I go out.
We have to see everything that happens to us as Nature influencing us. We have to believe that Nature wants to help us. And it is our duty to do our best to not harm nature and keep the balance.
Omens are one of the ways in which nature helps us do the right thing. Interpreting omens is rather easy, when we open our minds and keep a track of our daily activities.
We can learn a lot when we keep our ears, eyes open and keep an open mind. Introspection helps.
Examples of travel omens
From my experience, seeing the following means Success; positive or safe outcome:
A female dog
Someone with a vessel or vessels full of waterSomeone with milk
A married woman
A mentally challenged person
Hearing good news upon starting (such as a money order comes in, or the postman delivers your google pay check for the month) portends success.
The following coming towards you means Failure or negative outcome:
A male dog
Someone with an empty vessel
Someone with a garbage can
Garbage van
A solitary Brahman
It also means failure or obstruction, when someone asks you "where are you going?", or when you hear a baby/child or anyone cry upon starting.
These are based upon my personal experiences, which I have noted during the past. I do not know if different omens mean different things to different people. What is successful for one, may not be the same for another.
Learning to interpret Omens
Every one of us has this power to interpret omens. As with any skill, It takes time to understand, practice and master this knowledge. We may start by keeping a record of interesting things that happen during our day.
When we go through it at the end of the week or month, we may see a pattern, which will help us get into conclusions; and improve our learning on the interpretation of omens in daily life.
Using omens in everyday life
Omens are not just about travel. It is also about important decisions or actions that we take in our everyday life. Let us say, for example, we are planning a meeting with a prospective business partner. Or, we are visiting a house which we plan to purchase. Or, we are about to sign an important document. In this context, we need to know that timing is everything. And, since we are not experts, we seek the assistance of the cosmos to help us, assist us in our everyday life. And we are shown a positive or negative sign, which is our omen left to our interpretation.
Essentially, in conclusion, try to notice or observe things that happen everyday around you. Compare the outcome with the observations. Draw up your own conclusions!
Update: Part 2 of Omens and their interpretation
