Before the first lockdown in March, Maria Mellor’s relationship to spirituality was never more than a quick laugh at a relatable meme on her social media feed. But during a job search that spanned half of 2020, there was a time where she unpacked her deck of tarot cards every single day.
“I felt hopeless in my job search. I just thought: why not get into this as well?” says Maria, now a sub-editor. Inspired by her housemate, she ordered a tarot deck that ‘spoke to her’ and developed a method: a single card pull before a job application, a triple card pull in preparation for an interview, another card to determine whether to send that follow-up email.
2020 has not exactly been the best year for job seeking. Graduate prospects have suffered the biggest decline since 2008, unemployment is expected to continue rising beyond this year, and redundancies have climbed at the fastest rate in over a decade.
On the other hand, the so-called “mystical services market” is still booming. Including astrology and tarot card reading, its value has been estimated at $2.2bn (£1.6bn). Personalised astrology app Co—Star had over 5 million registered accounts before even launching for Android this year, there are over 53,000 results for the term ‘tarot cards’ on Etsy alone, and the healing crystal market is said to be outshining the diamond one during the pandemic.
With uncertainty characterising 2020, it’s no surprise we’re looking for hope, guidance and comfort. For Maria, tarot cards provided just that. “It gave me a lot of hope during a long 6-month job search,” she says. The cards were also a good mental exercise. “It’s a bit like flipping a coin and seeing what you really feel about something,” she says. “Sometimes I wouldn’t apply for a job after doing that because I realised it wasn’t something I really wanted.”
Maria isn’t the only woman turning to the stars and spirituality for their job search. “You feel lost and you feel like everything’s out of control,” says illustrator Beatrice Simpkiss, talking about job searching and pursuing freelance opportunities since graduating this summer. She religiously checks her Co-Star app, scans astrology books to better understand her emotions and follows Instagram accounts to stay updated on the positions of the planets.
“I suffer from anxiety and it helps the emotional side of the job search. The world we live is all very ‘go, go, go’ and trying to get to the next stage… for me, trying to trust to process, trust the universe, helps me to slow down but also stay focused.”
The trend of using astrology, tarot and other spiritual methods to help in the job search has been noticed by those in the industry, too. Anita Chakraburtty – an astrologer, naturopath and shamanic healer based in London – says the interest in the astrology part of her business has experienced great popularity since the pandemic began. “I thought the naturopathy that would pick up [due to health implications of the coronavirus], but it was the astrology that has significantly picked up since March and April,” she told Cosmopolitan.
Before the pandemic, her client’s concerns would centre often on love and romance, or on general life uncertainty leading to a curiosity about astrology. Now, fears about impending redundancies, questions about career changes, and job seekers looking for reassurance about the future dominate Anita’s diary. “It’s probably been about 70% - 80% of my clients coming to me for stuff all about careers, jobs and uncertainty about that. Before, it was a very mixed bag. […] And predominantly, they’re people who have never seen an astrologer before.”
So why are people turning to astrology, tarot and other methods for the first time this year? According to Professor Chris French, a psychologist at the University of Goldsmiths: “it’s always good news for divines when things are uncertain.”
“I have never known a period, in my life, where things have felt so out of control,” he says. “If people are getting more and more anxious about the way things are going for them, it’s a case of ‘anything’s worth a try.’”
Maria’s recently landed a sub-editor role and has her tarot cards packed away while she moves to a new house. “I think I’d have the job I have now without it,” she says. “But I think I would have been a lot more stressed in the process.”
While Beatrice is still unsure about her future, she’s hopeful about it. With one internship offer and a recent interview for a dream job, her voice lights up as she says: “It’s Sagittarius season! Which over the last week, has completely changed my energy.”
Turning to tarot may have helped Maria make decisions during her job search, but it seems that the stars don’t just offer practical help and concrete guidelines – there are countless CV-checking services and career advice columns at our fingertips for that. Instead, using the stars and spirituality has a comforting quality, whether we believe wholeheartedly in the divine or not. In a time of so much uncertainty, it’s not surprising we’re looking where we can for answers.
“It’s a lot to balance in your mind. You can be completely logical about it and you still won’t get a job, especially in a pandemic,” says Maria. “You might as well try whatever you can to try and keep yourself sane.”
