Korea
Saju — Korean Four Pillars of Destiny
Korea's classical destiny reading: the year, month, day and hour of your birth become four pillars of cosmic energy.
Saju Palja (사주팔자, "four pillars, eight characters") maps the exact moment of your birth onto the traditional East Asian calendar. Each pillar — year, month, day, hour — carries one of ten heavenly stems and twelve earthly branches, and together the eight characters describe the balance of five elements you were born with.
A reader looks at your day stem, the "day master," as the core of your character, then weighs how wood, fire, earth, metal and water support or clash with it. For centuries Koreans have consulted saju before marriages, career moves and new years — and it remains a living, everyday practice today.