Making a living predicting the future?

I’ve always been highly skeptical of people pretending to read into someone else’s future and yet, must admit that at some point in my life, I fell victim to one of these ultra-sharp tongues and that it cost me something that will always be hard to quantify in terms of happiness. 

This has led me to believe that these gifted individuals know how to weave their way into telling people things they want to hear or,conversely, things they abhor. For that they must use an array of techniques that are transparent to people seeking a reading into their future. 

Obviously, I see these tricks as pseudoscience devoid of scientific basis. 

One approach consists of making vague statements and generalizations that can apply to a wide range of people. The fortune-teller relies on the person's reactions and feedback to dig deeper on the way to making more specific predictions. 

Then there is this side in which the receivers are given high accuracy ratings to descriptions of their personality that supposedly are tailored specifically to them, yet which are in fact vague and general enough to apply to a wide range of people, it’s also know under the name of “Forer effect”.

Invariably, people tend to remember well and focus on predictions that come true while ignoring or forgetting those that do not. As fortune-tellers make along list of predictions, the individual's selective memory reinforces the perception of accuracy. 

Psychological manipulation is also used to influence a person's beliefs and emotions. This can include building trust, using persuasive language, and exploiting vulnerabilities to give more credibility to the predictions. 

Finally,it’s not uncommon for fortune tellers to gather information about individuals before a reading through various means, like social media, public records, or indirect conversations. This allows them to more accurately tailor their predictions based on all the information they have garnered in that manner. 

What’s your opinion ? Do you believe like me that this is a scam, or on the contrary that all of this is the result of mystical or quasi-religious qualities?