Magin Rose

The half-month of Uruz is here already, riding in as the mighty aurochs, the wild ox of ancient Europe.  I have a particular soft spot for Uruz, it is one of my birth runes and also resonates well with my taurean star sign.  Uruz is a rune of healing, strength and endurance; it is a wonderful ‘generic’ rune for healers and is sometimes equated with the strength of the musculature.  The thing about our muscles is that we have to take care from them if we want them to remain strong, one of the pitfalls of the Uruz rune is that its strength and endurance can seem endless – until we have exhausted ourselves.

While I was thinking about Uruz in preparation for this article, I was reminded of the project I am currently undertaking called the The Artist’s Way, a lovely course dedicated to recovering the creative self.  I am doing the project with a group and, like some of my fellow adventurers, I have found my own particular ‘block’ in the process, the mantra for the module I have been stuck on for over a month now: ‘Treating myself as precious makes me strong’.  Over and over again I kept failing to complete the module, getting distracted by other self-improvement projects, putting off really getting down to it.  It eventually became clear to me that I was doing everything possible to avoid the module’s lesson that caring for myself is the road to strength.  This is a trap healers often fall into, focusing on the healing of others and forgetting that their own energy and effectiveness as a healer will slowly deplete if they don’t take care of themselves.  Over the past few months I have been working on the other rune energies that are important to me at this time, balancing Uruz with Laguz, the rune of my birth month, and identifying my greatest needs through rune casting.  I have realised that the self-willed and determined Uruz rune can sometimes run away with itself, trampling over other needs and energies in its desire to reach some distant finish line.  My Uruz personality tells me that I can achieve anything with enough will-power and work; I forget that ‘achievement’ is not the be all and end all of life, perhaps a little perspective on what I want to achieve and how urgent it is to do everything right now is in order.  

My personal Uruz lesson for 2011 was neatly encapsulated by my business partner Kay Gillard, when she affirmed her own dedication to tackling one healing goal at a time.  I suddenly saw my chopping and changing from project to project for what it was: a lovely self sabotage mechanism that kept me charging forwards without ever actually making change.  I realised that I was stuck on the eternal wheel of ‘self improvement’, I had fallen into the trap of believing the impossible dream of a perfect home, perfect family, perfect job, perfect past times and perfect health was achievable through some quick fix solution.  I am now busy taking a step back, looking at what’s important.  Which healing goal is the most important to me at this time?  What do I really need?  I was reminded that one of the most insidious forms of stress induction is the attempt to make too much change in your life all in one go – this tends to be counter productive and lead to more stress rather than less.  My mantra ‘Treating myself as precious makes me stronger’ is now by my bed, this is the lesson I clearly need to learn before I start any more new projects!

This half-month is a great time to do a little bit of rune casting for yourself.  What do you really need?  Which runes represent this for you best?  I have selected a small number of runes which represent my needs at this time, I write them in my journal each day as a reminder to stay focused and not get diverted.  My aurochs is still running, may my mantra and runes steer him true.  

This half month also sees the broadcast of my first contribution to the free podcast service, The Shamanic Voice.  I am really excited to be creating a show dedicated to the northern tradition and its contributions to modern day shamanism.  The show is called Shaman of the North, reflecting the focus of the show on ancient and modern practitioners of the north whose work resonates with shamanic practices including journeying, ancestral work and working with the concept of the World Tree and Web.  My first contribution is called ‘Written in the bones’ and includes a channeling from a northern spirit worker, discussion the symbolism and power of bones and writing within the northern tradition and shamanism, and some of my own personal experiences.

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