Introduction
The practice of palmistry is an art. The same line or sign on two different hands means two different things. More important, no one sign on the hand or line on a palm can be important enough to tell you about the person's character or future. Hands and palm prints have to be read in combination with each other. It also takes a lot of practice to actually evaluate each sign and see if a hard hand is actually hard or whether a thumb is longer than the average. Jumping to conclusions can give a wrong reading.
The frame is important
The most important thing is the shape of the hand and its texture, and consistency. Texture and consistency are two different things and only practice can make one recognize a soft hand from a flabby one. Then one has to know whether a hand is long or short, narrow or broad and also the size of the hand (as compared to the size of the person). The relative length and position of the fingers and thumb is also very important and all will give a different reading, even if the lines seem similar.
Evaluating the hand
As fingers look different from different angles and their position is also dependent on how the person is holding his hand (whether it is the natural position) one has to be very careful that one's conclusion is right. Besides, there is the question of the position of a finger (whether lowset or high set) and this can misguide the palmist as to the actual length of the finger.
Then there are important questions like: If a finger is lowset but long, do the qualities of the fingers apply? Well, for this one has to fall back on the overall shape of the hand and the position of the other fingers. And yes the lines and mounts can also help you make that decision.
At times different signs will throw up contradictory readings and one has to see how much of a particular quality a person has. For example if he is aggressive, how aggressive is he on a scale of 1 to 10? So it is a matter of judgment on the part of the palmist for which he takes into account all the signs.
Sounds complicated? It is! Unfortunately amateurs tend to come to conclusions by looking at one sign and not taking into account the type of hand. This has given palmistry a bad name.
Mounts need to be read in conjunction with the type of hand
The relative strength of the mounts has to be kept in mind all of the time, not just the strength of each individual mount. And this has to be read alongwith the strength of the fingers.
One has to examine very carefully which part of the mount is developed, the higher, the middle or the lower. Each gives a different reading. Locating the apex of the each mount is of great help in knowing the strength of each mount, and also for finding out if it is the lower or higher side which is developed. If an apex is tilting towards another finger it reduces the strength of the mount.
Once one has read the type of hand and the mounts, the decision has to be made as to which world the subject moves in. The higher or mental world, the middle or material world or the animal world. Few people will be pure specimens and thus one has to apply the qualities in a moderate and balanced fashion, by seeing which mounts have their higher side developed and which mounts have their lower side developed.
The reading of the lines can then begin.
Reading Lines
To read lines one has to apply the same principles. Relative strength is the first thing one looks at in a palm print. For example a thin, faint headline on flat, pale hand with other similar lines will have an entirely different meaning from a thin headline on a line with other lines deeply etched. Or a thin line on a fleshy hand with other thin lines. The readings will be completely different, not even close! Just as one highly developed mount on a flat hand has extraordinary meaning when compared to a highly developed mount on a hand with other highly developed mounts. You will be surprised to see the variations on different hands. Because no two people are the same.
While it is easy to distinguish the major lines, one has to be careful not to confuse the minor lines or chance lines with the major ones.
Reading the lines on the palm can give you a clue as to future trends, but remember that the lines tend to change the fastest, much faster than the hand itself. The reason is that a person's future changes according to the way he/she reacts to events, and also circumstances, which can keep changing. Yes, even the shape of the fingers and mounts changes, if a person is able to change a particular trait. This will immediately have an impact on the lines, for the better or for worse.
Wrong assumptions about palmistry
Recently I came across a question on yahoo answers in which a person had asked whether palmistry has any authenticity. The "best answer" chosen was an answer which said that palmistry has hardly any credibility because the length of life and length of life line have been shown not to have any relationship! But ofcourse, the length of life is not determined by the length of the Life Line! An error on the part of amateurs (who usually pick up this knowledge by reading some book half heartedly) is to assume that a long Life Line means a long life or that a short Life Line means a short life. Nothing could be further from the truth.
Conclusion
Beware of falling into the trap of believing that palmistry can tell the future with certainty. Your character is your destiny and authentic palmistry takes that into account. Another trap one can fall into is believing that one can master palmistry in a few months. This is impossible as one has to see hundreds of hands just to be able to distinguish what is what, leave alone start making an accurate analysis.
And like in all professions, in palmistry too half knowledge is the most dangerous of all. It is the half knowledge of many would-be palmists which has reduced the credibility of hand reading. This is a pity because hand reading can be used in the Human Resource departments of companies, and wherever screening people is important. And it can also be used for self-help. Self-knowledge is power. You then possess the power to change your life.