Man, let me tell you about this little project that’s been chewing up my free time but in a good way. You know how it is, sometimes you just get an idea stuck in your head, and you gotta see it through. For me, it was this whole oracle card thing. I love those decks, got a bunch of them scattered around my office, but sometimes I just felt like I was pulling the same few cards, or I just wanted something new, something totally unexpected. That’s when the thought hit me: why not make my own digital one? A generator, you know?
I started out super simple, just mulling it over in my head during my morning coffee. What even is an oracle card, really? It’s a message, right? A nudge, an insight. So, I figured, it needed words, phrases, concepts. Things that could spark an idea. The very first step, like with anything, was just to grab a pen and paper and jot down every single abstract noun, verb, or adjective that came to mind. Like “growth,” “challenge,” “release,” “reflect,” “listen.” Just a chaotic mess of words at first, honestly.
Then I moved to my computer. Opened up a simple spreadsheet, ’cause that’s where most of my wild ideas end up starting. I began categorizing these words. It wasn’t just a big pile anymore. I carved them up into different buckets. I had columns like:
- “Core Themes” – big concepts like Love, Fear, Abundance, Scarcity.
- “Actions” – verbs like Create, Release, Embrace, Observe, Act.
- “Qualities” – adjectives or states like Patient, Strong, Open, Resilient.
- “Guidance” – short sentences like “Trust your gut,” “Take a breath,” “Seek clarity.”
This part took forever, just going through old journals, flicking through my physical decks for inspiration, even just watching movies and snagging good lines. I really wanted a huge variety so that when the generator spit something out, it wouldn’t feel stale. It was a grind, I won’t lie, just hours of typing and thinking, typing and thinking.
Building the Brains of the Operation
Once I had a decent chunk of data, the real fun began: making it actually do something. I’m not some fancy coder, but I know my way around a little bit of scripting. So I just threw together a simple program on my desktop. The goal was straightforward: pick a random item from each category and mash them together.
My first attempts were a joke. It would spit out stuff like “Love Act Patient” – like, okay, but what does that mean? It was too blunt. So, I had to refine the logic. I realized it wasn’t just about random picks; it was about how they were presented. I started adding connective phrases within the program itself. Things like “Consider,” “Embrace the,” “Your challenge is to,” “Find strength in.”
I tweaked the script to pull maybe three or four elements at a time, depending on what felt right. Sometimes it would pick one “Core Theme,” one “Action,” and one “Guidance.” Other times, it might swap the “Guidance” for a “Quality.” I played around with the combinations, running it hundreds of times, just to see what kind of “cards” it would generate. It was like watching a little digital artist trying to paint, sometimes it was brilliant, sometimes it was just gibberish.
The Eureka Moment and Getting It Right
The biggest hurdle was making sure the output wasn’t just random words but felt like a message. It needed a little bit of structure. So, I added a “prompt” capability. Before hitting the generate button, I’d type in a question or what I was thinking about. Then, the program would try to subtly weave that idea into the output. It didn’t always hit, but when it did, oh man, it felt potent.
I also built in a simple way to “draw” multiple cards for a spread, like a three-card reading. Instead of just one message, it would give me three distinct combinations. I’d use them for past, present, future, or challenge, action, outcome. It really started feeling like a proper tool then, not just a toy.
The coolest part was when I finally showed it to a friend. She typed in a question about her work, and the generator popped out something like: “Embrace the challenge of innovation. Find strength in your resilience. Trust your gut regarding new paths.” She just sat there for a second, then looked up at me with wide eyes. “Whoa,” she said. “That… that actually really hits!”
That was it for me. That little flicker of insight she got, just from some random words I’d typed into a spreadsheet and a simple script. It really hammered home why I’d even bothered with all this. It’s not magic, not really, but it’s a way to shake up your perspective, to look at things a bit differently. Now, when I feel stuck or just want a fresh angle on something, I just fire up my little card generator. It’s a sweet, personal reminder that sometimes, the answers are just waiting for us to ask a different question, or hear a familiar idea in a new way.
