Frequently Asked Questions

I believe - or rather I hope - that there is indeed something after this life. There are many things that are still inexplicable. Yet I believe that paranormal events cannot be controlled. That things happen to us without our control. I don't believe we can summon spirits. If ghosts exist at all, they decide for themselves if and when they come and how they make themselves known.

Therefore, I do not believe there are mediums who can have entire conversations with deceased people and pass on specific information from them to us. If everything is energy, a spirit can never literally speak names or tell other personal things.

No. However, it is possible to estimate the future based on your own (logical) understanding. 1+1= 2, as it were. However, by using tarot, astrology or other oracles, you can be inspired and trigger your own (subconscious) intuition with it. Subconsciously, we often know more than consciously. Images in particular trigger recognition in the brain and therefore offer a lot of insight, also regarding the course of certain situations.

'Spiri' is the Latin word for 'spirit'. So being spiritual is really just 'being spiritual'.

I see being spiritually engaged mainly as constantly wanting to improve yourself, looking for new insights, and above all wanting to do what is important to you, what makes you happy or calms you down.

That could be anything. Where some people unwind from sport, others unwind from walking in nature or watching series. Some find it important to have many friends, while others find it important to create a lot of 'me-time'.
So being spiritual is above all: seeking happiness within yourself and finding the right balance between body and mind,

Paranormal is something completely different. This mainly concerns belief in things that happen outside yourself such as supernatural things that cannot be explained scientifically.

Believing in angels, surviving souls, ghosts, telepathy, telekinesis, extrasensory perception, etc. all fall under the paranormal.

Spiritainment is a mix of spirituality and entertainment whether in media or not. Actually, I see it myself mainly as 'spiritual entertainment'.

Most people enjoy being treated to all kinds of predictions about celebrities or things like sports, the weather, politics, the royal family, media, etc. If only to compare with their own findings or 'see if it comes true'.

Of course, this is pure entertainment: nobody gains any insight from it. Indeed, in fact, no one actually gains anything from it; it is mainly for fun.

With horoscopes, the situation is slightly different. It is downright striking that horoscope pages on major websites are the best visited sections, despite the fact that by far the majority of readers exclaim not to believe in astrology.

People just like to read something about themselves or laugh if certain information sounds familiar to them in view of friends or family. Or conversely, to ridicule the whole thing if it is, in their eyes, complete nonsense.

Either way, it is light and airy, nice to start the day with or cosy to browse through during the coffee break - with or without your colleagues.

So spiritainment is really nothing more than entertaining people in the hope that they won't take it too seriously but might get an 'a-ha' moment from it, whether in relation to their own situation or not.

After all, everything we read, see and hear we relate to ourselves. Lyrics of songs or insta-quotes; in some cases, even other people's Facebook statuses can give us sleepless nights on the spot: 'Is this about me?!' Often it is a matter of 'he who fits the shoe, puts it on'.

After all, when someone turns out to be able to do something with the horoscope texts that appear as entertainment in the media, it just turns spiritual again. As far as I am concerned, that is the ultimate mix of entertainment and spirituality: spiritainment.

Definitely yes! Whereas spiritainment is mainly about being entertained, a spiritual personal consultation is mainly about - in a serious way - gaining more (self) insight.

Predictions made in spiritainment are usually about general matters such as sports, the weather, politics, the royal family, media and other current affairs. Things that nobody has any direct influence on, or in most cases anything at all. It is mostly 'fun' (see previous question).

This is of course different in a spiritual consultation. There, things are discussed that you do have a say in and that - if all goes well - are of real use to you.

Actually, you can compare a spiritual consultation with a good conversation with a psychologist. Only in the case of a spiritual therapist, things are made more visual by tarot cards or an astrological radix, for example, which makes certain information come in better, easier - or even louder, if necessary.

Soft-hearted masters make stinking wounds. Sometimes, someone just really needs a kick in the butt to realise that they are just not being very helpful at the moment.

Note: a spiritual consultation is different from a psychic consultation! In a spiritual consultation, the client is put to work himself, while in a psychic consultation, assertions are mainly made.

I come from a family that has dealt with spiritualism for years. My grandfather was president of a paranormal society. So I grew up, as it were, with ghosts, out of body experiences, clairvoyant sightings, prophetic dreams and whatnot; instilled in me from the very beginning.

I also learnt how to read tarot cards from my grandmother at the age of 15, took an 'intuitive development' course and did my own studies in astrology, gemology and dream psychology.
For years, I even thought I was psychic myself. I was nota bene working as a psychic!

Only later in life - I was already 40 - did I start thinking differently about spiritualism and delve more into psychology and the deeper meaning of spirituality. In this, I found many explanations regarding 'paranormal things' and my own way of doing things.

Meanwhile, I have stepped away from my belief in the paranormal and use tarot and astrology mainly in a psychological, spiritual way. And in media, therefore, more in a playful way.

Officially, no. In ancient times, on the other hand, astrology was considered the queen of sciences. Meanwhile, on the contrary, many consider it quackery. So many people, so many opinions.

Let me tell you how I feel about it myself. This is because I believe that when something works for someone, it does not matter at all whether it can be scientifically proven or not.
It's mainly about what feeling you get from something, what it does to you on a psychological level and what gets 'triggered' inside that makes you think (differently) about certain things.

In my opinion, when someone is happy with their horoscope and actually benefits from it because it makes certain pieces of the puzzle fall into place for them, this is the most important thing that matters.
So what does it matter whether this is caused by the psychological Forer effect (Barnum effect) or because there are actually planets that bring all this about for that person? Einstein said it very aptly:

"I know very well that many scientists consider dowsing as they do astrology, as a type of ancient superstition. According to my conviction this is, unjustified. The dowsing rod is a simple instrument which shows the uncanny reaction of the human nervous system to certain factors which are unknown to us at this time."

The way I make the horoscopes that appear in the media cannot be compared to the way I calculate a personal horoscope.

With a personal horoscope, I really only use that person's birth data, from which I then extract whatever I can find.

In the more general horoscopes for the media (which should, after all, be recognisable to as many people as possible), I mainly take into account current planetary conditions.

Thus, I not only look at the current position of the moon and at the planets that are currently in certain 'Houses' (each zodiac sign has a money house, a health house, a social house, a love house, career house, etc.) but also bring in the current aspects (the angles at which the sun, moon and planets are in relation to each other) and look at the characteristics of each star sign (constellation) separately to estimate how they might react to the current astrological situation.

Actually an impossible task because no two Aries. Taurus, Gemini etc. is the same. Take Aries. One Aries has a different ascendant, another Aries has a different lunar sign, not to mention in which Houses these signs are located in the personal birth or yearly horoscope. These are all ancillary factors that play an important role in astrology.

Horoscopes you read in magazines therefore definitely fall under the heading of entertainment. For the simple reason that they are just too impersonal. Of course, certain texts can give you food for thought and in some cases give you that extra bit of support... and that's when it becomes a bit spiritual again!

Yes indeed. You are welcome at VIP Tarot and VIP Astro (see both sections in the menu).