Magin Rose

Following some very helpful feedback I have started updating my resource pages for each of the Elder Futhark starting with Jera.  You will find links to other bloggers’ work as well as You Tube videos which all bring different perspectives to rune work.  I am also adding in further commentaries for the gods and spirits associated with the runes as well as the commonest elemental correspondences.

For me the most important thing that any rune worker can do is to work directly with the individual runes, raising their energy, meditating and journeying with them to find their own personal connections.  Research is, of course, important as a way in to the mysteries of the runes and I think that every student should study the rune poems closely.  The opinions of others, however, are only opinions and the best way forward is to learn as much as you can, but to ultimately trust your own instincts and intuitions.

With this in mind I would like to share my own personal meditations on Jera which have led me to include Summar (Summer) and Vetr (Winter) amongst the spirit correspondences for Jera.  The Old Norse recognised two seasons: Summar and Vetr.  Summar was the son of the God Svasud ‘Mild-One’, and Vetr was the son of Vindaul ‘Wind-Cool’ and grandson of Vasud, the freezing ice wind.  Summar and Vetr were considered to be enemies, and we can see them circling about each other within the shape of the Jera rune.  The Prose Edda gives a number of kennings for Summar and Vetr: both are kennings for ‘time’; Summar is known as ‘Growth of Men’ and ‘Comfort of Serpents’; and Vetr as ‘Destruction of Serpents’ and ‘Tempest-Season’ (Teutonic Magic: A Guide to Germanic Divination, Lore and Magic).

Much of the lore relating to Jera speaks of the Summer half of the year and the harvest time when the land is lush and giving.  The cycle represented by Summar and Vetr reminds us that, however unpleasant, the winter months are also important to the harvest.  Winter is a time of rest and sleep, energy is gathered in and conservered, that which is weak and diseased dies away ready for strong new growth in the spring.  Another common interpretation of Jera is as a rune that brings success; in this respect its cycle can be seen as the cycles of planning, work, tending, harvest, celebration, reflection and rest needed for any successful endevour.

The idea of work and rest is also reflected in ‘The Song of Grotti’ in The Poetic Edda.  In this tale two giant women are captured by the King Frodi and are set to work at a magic mill to grind out unsurpassed wealth for him.  Frodi is a hard task master and refuses to allow the women to rest; eventually they turn upon him and grind with all their might, grinding out his doom through defeat in battle.  They grind so hard that the magic mill-stone cracks in two.  It is not clear whether their efforts actually create the army that defeats him, or whether they are grinding out magic or Wyrd that brings the battle to pass – but whatever the case this story shows that what was originally good fortune can turn to bad if you do not allow the proper balance of work and rest.

The tale also links Jera in with Gebo, the rune of gift giving and fair exchange.  If you look at the two runes you can see that they are the same revolving shape, Gebo embodies the rules that must be followed if success is to be attained – Jera embodies the manifestation of that success.  Summar and Vetr are not the only figures in Norse myth charged with maintaining a natural cycle; Sunna (Sun) and Manni (Moon), Nott (night) and Daeg (day) are also charged with sacred tasks that keep the balance of light and dark, warmth and cold as they need to be for the harvests of the worlds to be successful.

Jera reminds us that you get out what you put in; even good luck can dissipate if we demand too much without giving in return.  If Frodi had shown simple kindness and consideration to the mill-workers perhaps he would still be reaping the plentiful rewards of the mill today.

In 2011 I was given the opportunity to contribute a show to the free podcast service The Shamanic Voice.  I knew straight away that I wanted to use the space for northern tradition shamanic work which remains relatively unsung within the broader shamanic community.  There are plenty of resources about the runes, plenty of books about shamanism, and a smaller number of books about Seidr (the most commonly recognised ‘shamanic’ form in the northern tradition); however, there are very few which bring these forms together.  I have worked with the runes since I was a teenager and trained in many forms of magic, seership and shamanic work; it has been a slow process bringing these together into a relatively unified personal practice – but I take comfort in the fact that the old texts indicate that the peoples of Northern Europe embraced the many and varied techniques available to them and were adept at weaving these in to their practice and spirituality.

Anyone who knows me will tell you that I’m a sucker for a well-referenced text and a thorough, academic approach.  As is often the case when we embrace a spirit-led path, I have been challenged over and over again to step out of my comfort zone and walk within the dream world where the known and the unknown are much more difficult to pin down.  When I undertook my first shamanic journey to see what spirit wanted from my ‘northern tradition’ show, I was greeted not by Odin or a similarly ‘Germanic’ patron, but by a shadowy group of decidedly human-looking ancestors who informed me that my request for nothern tradition teaching had been heard and they would be bringing their stories via direct channeling.

I have now been doing the show for over six months.  I have channeled a woman whose bones contained magic; a teller of sacred tales who had betrayed his calling; one of the last of the old druids; a priestess of the shadow world; a hearth mistress; and the World Tree (I know, the tree snuck in claiming to be the oldest ancestor of all…).  I have also done an episode dedicated to ancestral work and am sure there will be similarly themed episodes in the future.  I have found the work strange, fascinating and terrifying, those of you who do channelings and oracle work yourselves will know who weird it is to hear a recording of your channeling – let alone broadcasting it for everyone and anyone to hear!  

The more I do this work the more I am convinced that these ancestors and spirit beings have something really important to say.  Some of them were highly respected in their own lifetimes, some were loved, some feared, some derided; but all have a story to tell.  The simple act of making bread becomes sacred when we know how to honour its spirit; soul wounding is recognised by those who know the depths of heartbreak; the simple passing on of blessing from one generation to the next carries deep power and magic.

The show comes out on 19th month and I do hope you enjoy listening to them as much as I enjoy making them.  There are some wonderful presenters on The Shamanic Voice covering a broad range of practices so do check out the site!  You can find old shows in the archive and the newest shows on the podcasts  page.  This is a free service and, currently, we are looking for the resourcing to expand our archive space – if you find a show missing please do get in touch and we can send it directly to you.  

My full list of my shows so far is as follows:

Episode 1 – Written in the Bones (July 2011)
Episode 2 – Flight of the Ravens (August 2011)
Episode 3 – Druid’s Walk (September 2011)
Episode 4 – Honouring the Ancestors (October 2011)
Episode 5 – Shadow Sister (November 2011)
Episode 6 – The Hearth Mistress (December 2011)
Episode 7 – Yggdrasil’s Song (January 2012)

Over the last few days the universe has been providing me with little reminders about the ways in which we can train our brains, or perhaps a better word is ‘consciousness’ to help us find wholeness, self understanding and empowerment.

The idea of ‘brain training’ has become popularised through the latest generation of techno-gadgets which, helpfully, remind us that buying more computer games is actually educational and therefore good for you… I have to admit that jumping about with the Wii and playing Trivial Pursuit with the family on New Year’s Eve was actually quite fun – but in moderation!  Brain training works on the assumption that the brain is like any other organ in the body: it can be damaged through abuse and strengthened through a good work out. All of us who are seeking to develop and transform our lives and our environments for the better know that physical addictions damage the brain and moderation is key to a balanced and healthy mind and body. On the ‘mental’ level the theory goes that the more we challenge our brains to use different types of thought process, the stronger and smarter our brains become.

When I was at university I was a member of the ‘Thinking Society’ and we used to do tests looking at our individual strengths and weaknesses in lateral thinking, analytical thinking, creative thinking etc. There were about five of us and the tests we were doing were largely photocopied out of old Psychology manuals. Today ‘brain training’ is big business with any number of self-help guides, on-line tests, brain training gurus and games; there is huge competition in the technology industry for the brain training pound.

The way we think about the brain has changed massively over the last ten to fifteen years and today it is recognised that physical, emotional and spiritual activity are just as important to brain training as performing great intellectual and analytical feats. A quick search on brain training brought me to My super-charged life which identifies meditation, sex, nutrition, singing from memory, and walking around blind-folded as just some of the ’20 ways to train your brain’.  In our super adult, super charged, super fast world we are being reminded that play is the single most effective method of keeping ourselves smart, effective and happy.  Apart from the sex of course, the adventures of the Secret Seven, Famous Five and the Swallows and Amazons are perhaps the nearest I could get to ‘brain training camp’.  Get some good tuck, run about a lot, play games, use your keen observational skills, do a bit of problem solving, help each other out of scrapes, have a good old group bonding session and then home for a well earned rest.  The problem is that, to most of us, the activities of the Secret Seven would leave us knackered for days: we simply don’t have the resources to solve crime before supper.  The Western world seems designed specifically to drain us of our mental and physical resources; we no longer recognise our overall being as a self sustaining organism that is meant to be in balance.  For me ‘brain training’ does not go far enough, we need to recognise that we are more than a brain, indeed, we are more than just a body. 

As adults we tend to see play as something which is usurped by responsibility.  Anything that is worthwhile will require seriousness, effort, self-discipline, hard work, time, and probably money (all the stuff that drains our physical and mental resources).  Play is relegated to the luxury of ‘leisure time’ which, at most, gets a couple of hours a week lip-service if we’re lucky.  Of course, our brains and bodies still crave play, which is why alcohol, television, watching other people playing sport, and web-surfing all eat away at our lives: they are sanctioned, sterile and largely inactive past times which con our brains into thinking they are training when really they are being filled with crap.

From a shamanic perspective the brain is simply one part of our consciousness, indeed, the entire body is really one part of our overall ‘self’.  For me there is really no limit to the self.  We are not self contained little beings wandering round with a body and perhaps some form of spirit or energy body attached to it like a balloon.  We are part of a web of being which includes the physical world that manifests us, the mental world that stimulates us to growth, and the spiritual/ imaginative/ dream world that is us.  All of these different bits of us consume and produce ’energy’ which I’ll describe for now as ‘movement that effects change’.  Energy changes form all the time:  food turns into fuel that turns into physical movement or mental process.  Anyone who works with energy healing or magic will also tell you that, after a session they are famished; after all, they’ve been working hard channelling energy.  A person who has received an energy healing may feel full of energy, or perhaps lighter if stagnant energy has been shifted to allow new energy to flow once more.

Shamanic practice is about working with energy.  All shamanic practitioners work on themselves and some will also work on others.  The most commonly recognised shamanic practice is called ‘journeying’ where the consciousness of the practitioner is either said to leave their body and travel elsewhere or to expand outwards so that they are able to access other realms; in any case, the purpose of journeying is to seek wisdom and to retrieve power, soul essence, or energy that has been lost.  In a world that drains us this is obviously a key skill to learn and develop and, luckily, the majority of us now seem to be born with an innate ability to journey once we are shown how.  Perhaps this gift comes from the universe seeking to restore balance, or perhaps the sheer power we now have to change our world is opening our eyes and minds to the consequences.

Some people are just naturally able to journey, but most of us need some guidance to get us started.  However, just because you can journey doesn’t mean you have the clarity to see truth when it’s in front of you, or the wisdom to act on that truth.  I doubt that any shamanic practitioner out there can say with hand on heart that they have always immediately understood messages from spirit and acted upon them.  This is where brain training comes in: learn to still your mind and find clarity; learn to support your process through self care; learn to differentiate between ‘I should’ and ‘I am’; learn that obstacles are largely illusions; learn that play is work and work is play.

Sadly, a spiritual experience, even the most intense, is seldom enough to do more than give us the initial impotus for change.  Our ability to then bring change into our lives is determined by the overall state of our consciousness.  How much energy is available to you?  What perspective do you have on your ability to make change?  What support networks have you created for yourself?  Does the thought of changing your life make you feel knackered already or are you bursting to grab some tuck, track down the baddies, save the day and be home in time for supper?  If the answer is ‘knackered’ then perhaps some brain training is in order before you start to tackle any serious life change and so deplete your already exhausted resources.

You can book a mentoring session with me in-person or via Skype to develop a personalised programme using techniques that promote clarity, boost your energy levels, identify blockages and get you on track.  Mindfullness, meditation, stress management techniques and journeying form some of the methods we can work on together and your journey can also be supported by in-person or distance energy and shamanic healing.

It is appropriate that the half month of Isa fell during my time off and this article for the rune of inertia and resistance is therefore coming to you at the end of Isa’s time for 2011.  Isa remains, however, an important rune to work with throughout the year and  I couldn’t resist doing a little something for you on this beautiful but treacherous rune. 

After all the struggles and stresses of Hagalaz and Nauthiz, the half-month of Isa can feel like a blessed release.  Isa brings stillness, silence and rest; it is the rune that beckons us to hibernation, but it is also the bringer of death for those who have not prepared their winter nests well.  I certainly found myself falling into the traps of Isa this half month as I struggled to keep going with the resolutions I had made for change in the coming year.  Isa is the rune of the ego which always resists change and tries to fall back on the easy, destructive ways when the going gets tough.  Isa whispers to us that it is simply too hard to make change and it is better just to lie down and give up.  All of those good resolutions we made and  all of those tough life lessons we passed through can seem far away and quite irrelevant as the cold sets in and we long to snuggle up where it is warm and safe.

Working with inertia and resistance

To all of you who have struggled on through the difficulty I raise my hat, but to those who (like me) have found the last few weeks as tough as old boots, Isa is not all doom and gloom.  The rune of ice is also the rune that helps us know ourselves the best.  Yes, I found myself staying in bed too long, eating things that were bad for me and watching trashy tv instead of going for the nice refreshing walk that I promised myself.  However, this provided me with the cold hard slap in the face I needed, affirming that I have indeed identified my ego’s patterns of resistance effectively.  Isa is the rune of reflection and at this time we find moments that truly reflect the person we have become during the previous year.  My half-month included some moments of real clarity, healing and break-through, but there were also moments of sheer self-pity when the last thing on my mind was transformation and growth.  It is often when we are on the very edge of change that our old ways come back to bite us the hardest; don’t forget that you are a strong person, so your old habits and behaviours will be strong too.

On the StarFire Alchemy Introduction to RuneCraft (launching as a correspondence course in 2012 for those of you who can’t get to London) we work with the stadgaldr for Isa.  This rune posture includes voice work and the expansion of the self out to contact the full energy spectrum within Midgard.  Although the Isa pose is the simplest stadgaldr, it is hugely important for further work with the rune postures as it works with the very basic concept ‘I am’.  Isa is often referred to as the ‘ego’ rune; it ensures that we are stable and strong within ourselves so that we don’t become one big mess of competing desires and aspirations.

When we hit a point in our lives where we just don’t seem to be able to break through our bad habits, feelings of hopelessness, and lack of motivation, then we know that we have hit against the hard ice of Isa.  Often we try to tackle these feelings by getting angry, effectively taking a sledge-hammer to the ice in an attempt to break through it.  Problem is, that ice is you, so every time you yell at yourself or cry miserably into your pillow you are simply attacking your own being.  The ice is either going to crack (leaving you in a worse state than you were before), or simply defend itself by becoming thicker and stronger. 

Remember all those tales about winter?  No one ever beats winter by getting mad, it is always acts of love, kindness and warmth that soften the Ice Queen’s cold heart and loosen her grip.  The ego is like the Ice Queen, it wants to be in charge and to feel safe – much like a small child.  When the ego feels threatened it responds with fear, resistance and stubborn tenacity.  If we want to work effectively with our egos then attack is not going to work.

This month’s meditation focuses not on the concept ‘I am’ (for this is best used once we have made peace with our egos), but rather on ‘I accept myself’.  This is the first step towards change.  Let your ego feel safe and loved, then it will accept the gentle warmth of your desire for transformation ‘I accept myself and I am not afraid to become more than I am right now’.

Don’t forget that you can also take my longer journey with Isa or book a healing with me working with rune energies, personalised journeys and rituals.

We are now at the very heart of the half month of Nauthiz, the rune of necessity which is both the dark hollow of longing and the bright flame of the self-kindled fire. I find that Nauthiz comes up with surprising frequency for those seeking a spiritual path of self development and healing.  At some point the rune of necessity starts to pull at you, exposing the tangled knots in our personal web and demanding that we begin the work of freeing ourselves.
This week Kay and I worked with a wonderful group of healers exploring shamanic techniques for cord cutting.  Our course has developed under the guidance of Spider and the Nornir and we have been led to work very much along the principle that in order to cut cords, we must understand how they come into being in the first place.  A cord is an established flow of energy between you and another person, situation, object, place or illness (in fact anything through which we define ourselves) - your entire self is made up of cords which wind together to create the person that is you.  Many of our cords are positive, but some of them will be negative or may have started out positive and become negative along the way.  Imagine a spider weaving its web, or a weaver sitting over the loom.  As you look at their work you can see that an established pattern is forming and that the spider or weaver skillfully pulls different threads taut at different points to maintain that pattern and ensure that their work holds strong and steady.  Our lives are like that, we have established threads within them that set the pattern of our future, and we cannot simply remove a thread without understanding that the overall tapestry will then change.

There are lots of different reasons why we might choose to cut cords.  A common reason is when a relationship has come to an end but the energetic connection between the two people is still there; sometimes we want to let go but we simply can’t – in which case it is likely that the energetic cord between you hasn’t yet been cut.  At other times a relationship might be stuck within old patterns that need to be released before it can move on: we see this a lot in relationships with our parents or sibblings who continue to treat us like they always have, even if we have changed.  Marking rites of passage such as birth, maturation, marriage and death represent one way in which society has traditionally marked the end of one phase of life and the beginning of the new; the lack of these rites will often mean that cords that would otherwise naturally have been released still need to be cut years later. 

Nauthiz is the rune that embodies the necessity of the pattern; but it also tells you when something has gone wrong with the pattern.  People often associate the ‘dark night of the soul’ or a period of depression with Nauthiz; the rune brings trying times that can either be the making of us, or our destruction.  On a wider scale, Nauthiz lingers within a disatisfied society: strikes, rebellion and rioting represent the many faces of Nauthiz that tell us the fabric is not holding and change is being demanded.  Our job as rune and energy workers is to work with the underlying energy in our own lives, and that of our society, to skillfully cut what needs to be cut, remove what needs to be removed, and mend what needs to be mended.

For this half-month I want to look at Nauthiz as the rune which tells us when change is required.  Nauthiz is, in many ways, a double edged blade.  On the one hand it represents that which must be because of what has come before (it is the pattern we have fixed for ourselves), but on the other hand it also holds out the possibility of releasing that pattern.  This possibility for release comes about through the work of the goddess Skuld, patron of Nauthiz, and goddess of that which must be.  For me, work with Skuld is all about attitude.  There are those who walk blindly in the world and believe that the pattern they have laid for themselves is simply an external force at work bringing them good fortune or ill at whim; there are others who choose to look the Goddess of necessity in the face and to seek her guidance on what work they must do to change their destiny.  Skuld never promises it will be easy, but she certainly takes an interest in those who dedicate themselves to changing the web.   

In our own lives we might already know what should change but not yet be able, or want to, change it.  Our negative cords represent the negaive side of Nauthiz: addiction and compulsion.  Often, a particular behaviour or the consumption of a particular thing represents our attempt to fill a need for something else which we haven’t yet identified or which may seem impossible to fulfill.  A person who has low self esteem may not believe they are able to fulfill their dreams, but the need is still there and it demands to be filled.  Our society is adept at providing us within things that we are told will make the need-ache go away: alcohol, cigarettes, sweets, clothes, cars, television, computer games etc.  These things represent items which we might rationally tells ourselves we can do without, but there is a big difference between what we know we should do, and what our need tells us to do.  Nauthiz is not the rune of should, it is the rune of must, ‘I must fill this emptiness inside me’.  The need is real even if we haven’t yet found the best way to meet it.  Committing to work with Nauthiz and Skuld represents a commitment to find out what you truly need.

My You Tube video for Nauthiz represents a very simple meditation you can do at home to open yourselves up to ‘true need’.  We can do this work on behalf of ourselves and we can also do it on behalf of society. 

Changing the self

For ourselves we can ask Nauthiz to begin the process of revealing the negative and empty cords which we are holding on to, preparing us to release them and so create the space in our lives for our true needs to manifest.  I am currently working with this meditation to help ready myself for a cord cutting I want to undertake but which I know I am not yet ready for.  This cord runs particularly deep for me as it was formed in my teenage years and there is a lot of raw, unprocessed, emotion tied in to it.  As I started on this work I found that I dreamt more and more often about the particular person this cord is attached to, even though I haven’t seen them for years and years.  As my work continued the dreams became more focused as I explored what need in me is being met by this strange attachment to someone from so long ago.  As I write today I have been shown where on my body the negative cord between us is, so I know that soon I will be ready for the cord cutting itself.

You can use the meditation simply to say ‘I am ready to meet my true needs’.  Over time you may start to receive information during the meditation itself about negative addictions, relationships and situations you are ready to release, as well as what your true needs are.  You might also find that your relationship with the world around you is changing, perhaps you get itchy feet when you sit watching television too long or maybe you are less eager for an hour’s gossip with a friend who always leaves you feeling drained and inadequate.  These little hints are signs from Nauthiz regarding where action is needed.  

Changing society

There  is so much in our society which seems empty, barren and destructive at present.  It is easy to become overwhelmed by a feeling of hopelessness which is all too common a response to the harsh truth of Nauthiz.  We don’t even know how to begin to make a change or how one individual might remedy such a widespread problem.  We can wonder why we bother with our little efforts when nothing seems to make a difference.  Of course our individual efforts do make a difference, even when we don’t feel it; but we can also use our skills as runesters to bring about change in the underlying fabric of our society.

You can use the meditation simply to say ‘We are ready to meet our true needs’.  Know that your focus and concentration are working upon the very fabric of reality to help loosen the knots that bind us to unhealthy, damaging behaviours.  The bright flame of Nauthiz exposes the empty, negative threads for what they are and, collectively, we are able to unpick these threads and release them to the flames.

In shamanic healing we talk about concepts of power loss and soul loss; from a shamanic perspective the process of healing is considered to be one of recovery where the soul is restored to a state of wholeness.  In this state of wholeness we are more able to express ourselves, less susceptible to illness and wounding, and are able to achieve fulfillment in our lives.  Some might also characterise a state of wholeness as being a state in which we are able to achieve our ‘soul purpose’ (more on that later). 

The concept of ‘wholeness’ is particularl important within the Northern tradition because the modern English word for ‘whole’ shares a common root with both ‘holy’ and ‘hale’ (as in ‘hale and hearty’ or ‘healthy and hearty’).  As part of this series I am going to be looking at Teutonic concepts of the soul (Teutonic referring to the common origins of languages including English, German, Icelandic etc), but for now I want to look specifically at the idea of ‘wholeness’. 

So let’s assume for a moment that if something is not whole it is characterised by weakness and is in some way ‘unholy’.  A structure which isn’t whole is unstable and dangerous.  A place that isn’t whole is isolated, barren and polluted.  A group that isn’t whole is characterised by division, conflict, miscommunication and inequality. A person that isn’t whole is powerless, needy, vulnerable, lonely and wounded.  To the Teutonic mind ‘unholy’ does not mean evil; instead we might recognise it as the chill down the spine felt in forgotten and neglected places, that sense of emptiness that fills us with fear and a desire to be somewhere else.  Unholiness comes about when we forget to treat ourselves, each other, and our environments as sacred.  In the modern world many of us are all too sensitive to the lack of wholeness which is present all around, and within, ourselves.

One of the modern world’s biggest demons is the demon of consumerism.  From a shamanic perspective over-consumption and addiction are symptoms of a lack of wholeness; we sense that we are empty and desperately try to fill the hole inside us with the items we have been convinced will make us feel better.  I’ll be talking more about this when I write about this coming half-month of Nauthiz – the rune of necessity and desire.   

So what has wholeness got to do with past life healing?  My answer would simply be ’everything’.  We are the sum of our past and, from a shamanic perspective, that past isn’t just the tiny bit of your existence which makes up your conscious memory of your current lifetime.  Your past includes your dreamtime, your pre-conscious memories, the stories you have woven to make sense of your own reality, the memory stored within your body in both sickness and health, the memory stored within your DNA, our shared human history, and the vast record of memory that is the collective past.  Quite a lot, you might say – perhaps too much to even begin worrying about!

To many of us, the past is that which is gone or forgotten.  This has become so true that it is common in Western society for death to be so frightening that we just don’t talk about it at all: we don’t want to be reminded that we will one day become part of that past.  But it doesn’t have to be that way.  In Teutonic Magic Gundarsson tells us that:

The Germanic time-sense is not threefold [i.e. past, present, future], but twofold: time is divided into “that-which-is”, a concept emcompassing everything that has ever happened – not a linear progression, but as a unity of interwoven layers – and “that which is becoming,” the active changing of the present as it grows from the patterns set in that which is.  Teutonic Magic: A Guide to Germanic Divination, Lore and Magic

Imagine for a minute that you are a tree.  Your present self, your conscious self, exists as the bark of the tree – the very surface of your being which is your own particular ‘that which is becoming’.  Beneath the bark are the rings of the tree, each representing a year of your life; these rings represent ’that which is’, they are the past which defines how you will develop and grow in the future, what your tree looks like, how big and strong it is, how hardy and ’hale’ it is.  To the Teutonic mind the past is not that which is forgotten, it is in fact part of the present: the past is embraced as part of our entirety, or ‘wholeness’.  In this sense, the modern world’s championing of the future and our discomfort with death and forgetting is a manifestation of our lack of wholeness: we have become disconnected from our past and are therefore not whole, the tree is still there but we are blinded to it.

Past life healing is the process of getting to know our own tree, of discovering our strengths and weaknesses and of creating healing that works on both the past and present.

Know thyself

I work regularly with a group of seidr practitioners and one of the pieces of advice which we have been given is that the questions which are important for us to ask in our work are ‘why’ questions.  It is very easy to get stuck in ‘what’, ‘which, ‘when’, ‘where’, ‘who’ and ‘how’ questions: we like to know facts about what we should be doing, which option is best to take, where we will find happiness and with whom.  However, these questions do not give us wisdom or self-knowledge, they simply seek guidance from an external source on the best course of action.  In a sense, we work on the assumption that some guiding force exterior to ourselves knows best what we need and desire.  It is the why questions which tell us about our pasts and so allow us to find wholeness through self-knowledge – only then will we find the inner knowing that help us access all the other answers for ourselves.

Past life healing is a process of remembering, integrating and, in many cases, forgiving.  When I work with people through  past life regression we seek to find parts of the self which we have lost conscious access to that can help us understand ourselves and so begin to change our lives.  One common problem is repeated behaviours which we can’t seem to change – it is almost as if the past is constantly trying to make itself known within the present because, until we recognise what we are in the present, we cannot become something different.           

 This month I am working with the energy of ‘shadow sister’ in preparation for my show on the Shamanic Voice.  She is coming through as the part of self and society which we seek to push further and further away – she informs me that the harder we push the more she must force her way back.  Many people I know are experiencing the recurrence of old illnesses, the resurrection of old hopes, and the rekindling of old passions; this is a time when healing really is possible for us – shadow sister is calling out to us to recognise and embrace her.  When the past rears its head it is tempting to run and hide, but this is a wonderful opportunity for us to actually tackle our skeletons in the closet and lay old wounds to rest. 

Fulfilling soul purpose

Earlier I talked about the fact that a person who isn’t whole will try and fill the lack they sense inside them with something else.  Our society is all too ready to tell us what we can consume to make us feel whole again.  The problem is that, even if we resist the urge to blindly follow the consumerist trend, we still don’t know what we need because so much of our soul tree is hidden to us.  This is where self-help books come in, as well as a whole plethora of people who are able to tell you what has worked for them and, indeed, what has worked for the majority of people.  The difficulty is that these approaches can’t help each individual to find their unique soul purpose.  This is why knowing yourself is so important and why past life healing can help you to find the path that is right for you.  You are one vast well of experience about what works for you and what doesn’t, embedded deep inside the tree rings of your own past are thousands of moments of perfect clarity where you confronted, understood, accepted and embraced your true self. 

 Remembrance 

This time of year is an important one for remembrance. In my November 2011 podcast Honouring the Ancestors on The Shamanic Voice I talked about the difference between places of the dead which are ‘living’ and those which are neglected.  To me places of communion between the living and the dead exemplify the difference between a ‘holy’ place and an ‘unholy’ place.  Burial grounds, ancestral altars and other places of memorial are important places of power; we become extremely upset when a place of special remembrance is defiled or defaced.  Some places of remembrance are special because they act as places of communion between the living and their immediate relatives, but other places are considered important even if we don’t know exactly who is buried there – think of the unnamed graves of warriors, prisoners of war and victims of massacre.  We may not have such clear ideas on why we wish to remember as our Teutonic ancestors, but many of us instinctivly feel that remembrance is part of what it means to be human.  Undertaking some simple acts of remembrance for thos who have gone before us is, in itself, a form of deep soul healing.

Personal healing work

From a shamanic perpsective, even events which are seemingly random have roots within the past – even if we are unaware of these roots. You may already know the source of the behaviour or belief but, in many cases, the source is unrecognised.  Sometimes it is important to go back and find the source of the belief or behaviour (more on that in later articles) but, often, your healer will be able to perform work for you that doesn’t require that you consciously dredge up the past. While all healing work ultimately aims to restore wholeness, these are some of the most common methods used in past life healing:

• Past life regression to help your conscious mind re-connect to your own roots and personal heritage
• Power retrieval and soul retrieval to bring about restoration of parts of the self we have lost access to
• Work with the ancestors and spirits of the land to heal isolation, separation and loneliness
• Cord cutting or extraction work to release beliefs and energy which we have inadvertantly taken on in place of our own essence
• Work to connect with the different aspects of our soul including our physical body, power animals and guides
• Ceremonies that honour our own achievements, deeds and souls

In the ancient runes, wholeness and fulfillment are represented by the rune Wunjo.  The Teutonic peoples saw union with family and the gods as the source of their greatest happiness and this rune is traditionally associated with kinship and dicine ecstasy. THe experience of Wunjo might be brief and fleeting but it acts as a compass that guides you steadily through life, always drawing you on to greater moments of wonder and happiness.  Every step you take towards wholeness in yourself makes that inner compass stronger.  Blessing of Wunjo upon you.

On Radio 4 this week Material World includes an interview with Vasudevan Lakshminarayanan who is publishing the latest findings concerning the Viking sunstone.  In legend we are told that the Vikings used a ‘sunstone’ to navigate their ships and many since have tried to ascertain what stone this might be.  In recent years Iceland Spar (a particular form of calcite) has been the most popular candidate and now Lakshminarayan confirms that his research has found that Iceland Spar can be used to determine the position of the sun on a ‘sunless’ day.

The sunstone is traditionally linked with Sowilo, the rune of the sun which is also known as the ‘joy of seafarers’. Although the link between Sowilo and Iceland Spar has been around for some time, it is very exciting to get another piece of evidence which seems to confirm this link and also provides us with a clear and practical demonstartion of the existence of the mythical ‘sunstone’ – a navigation methods which pre-dated even the compass.

The half-month of Hagalaz began on 29th October and reaches its peak on 5th November.  The Hagalaz rune is traditionally linked with the great ruler of the underworld,  Hel, the primal being Ymir, and the ‘watchers’ Heimdal and Modgud.  Hagalaz is the rune of ‘primal pattern’, it is sometimes thought of as the DNA of the World Tree which was made from the body of Ymir after he was slain.  Hagalaz is often considered to be a rune of violent destruction, but perhaps this is down to this very first act on the part of Odin.  We don’t know whether Odin and his brothers chose to set the pattern of creation with this first sacrifice, or whether Ymir’s death was always a necessary part of the birth of the universe.  Whatever the case, Hagalaz (also known as the mother rune), contains within it the crystalline pattern of creation, and the implacabale requirement for destruction.

If you are pagan you will already be comfortable with the idea that death and rebirth walk hand in hand and cannot be prized apart from each other – to do so would only bring stillness and inertia.  For me, the appearance of Hagalaz within the rune row signifies that the time of ‘weaving’ is at an end and a time of testing is now at hand.  The creative production within the first Aett culminated in Wunjo, the rune of wholeness and ecstasy; now the universe passes a critical eye over what has been created – where has the pattern gone astray?  Where have the threads become snagged or loose?  We are all weavers, we all partake in the act of creation and so, instead of looking upon the coming of Hagalaz with fear and foreboding, we can choose to don our ‘critical eyes’ and seek to learn from what has been done well and release what has been done badly back into the waters.

In the northern tradition souls that have acted well and acquired strength during their lifetimes will move on into new forms of being upon death; the rest of us will drift into the currents of the Well of Wyrd and be swept into Hel’s realm – ready to rise up into the waters again and give it another bash.  This is where Modgud and Heimdal come in, they guard the gateways of Hel and Asgard and only let those meant to have passage to the upper or lower worlds pass through.   For my own part, I work with the model of the ‘woven soul’ which unites many elements within a single being; I believe that the process of death will be more complex than a simple rise upwards or a sinking downwards – different bits of me may stay together, others may be released for cleansing, and others may go on to do different work.  I also believe that this process takes place at all times – death is simply a particularly intensive period of release.  This is where my shamanic work comes in as I am able to work with my spirit guides to help myself and others release parts of the self which are damaging to them, and strengthen the bits of them that are precious and integral to the Web.

Looking with your Hagalaz eye

This time of year is characterised by releasing (which traditionally takes place through the autumn, right up to the present time), and work with the ancestors.  In some pagan traditions this is also the time of New Year and it marks a point of appraisal where we can take stock of the year that has passed.  I invite you to look at the year with your Hagalaz eye – the critical eye which sees both the strength and wisdom within your past actions, and the errors of judgement and deed which inevitably befall us all.  The idea of seeing with a special eye features in the northern tradition as well as within shamanism: Odin sacrifices his eye to gain spiritual insight and wisdom, and in shamanism we speak of seeing with the ‘strong eye’ – the eye that sees beyond the physical.  For me the ‘Hagalaz eye’ is the critical gaze of the Norns who look over the tapestry of being; they are the law makers who determine what will be released back into the Well and what will remain embedded within the trunk of Yggdrasil as the embodiment of the eternally manifesting present.

Take a moment now to sit and write out two lists.  One list should be a record of the new strengths and skills you have accumulated in the past year, the other should be a list of things that have not gone so well and actions where you have disappointed yourself.  If this seems like a daunting task with a potentially never-ending list, then choose nine items for the first list and nine for the second (nine being the number of both Hagalaz and the World Tree). 

Reinforcing strengths

Your strengths list represents the qualities you would like to bring forward and build on in the next year.  There are many ways in which you can ‘reinforce’ this list and ensure that your strengths bring you luck and further growth (rather than being lost).  This year I will be keeping my list by my bed where I can see it.  Another aspect of the ‘strengthening’ work I am doing at the moment is to honour my ancestors each evening (both blood line and spirit) by speaking their names and thanking them for their protection and guidance in my life.  The act of speaking their names strengthens our bond and I feel their presence strongly around my before I go to sleep (which is lovely).  As I look at my list of strengths before I go to sleep, I know it is also being witnessed by my ancestors and is therefore resonating outwards through them.  This form of sharing with the ancestors echoes the power of symbel rite I discussed last half-month for Wunjo.  Words, and the exchange of words, are hugely important magical acts in the northern tradition. 

Releasing weaknesses

The first thing to do with your ‘releasing’ list is to think ‘what have I learned from this’?  Our experiences should not be wasted and sometimes the most negative times in our lives provide us with the greatest strength.  You may already notice that some of the items in your ‘strengths’ list stem directly from the way you responded to mistakes or painful experiences – if you haven’t extracted the seeds of strength from your ‘releasing’ list, do that now and add them to your strengths list.  Now look at your releasing list again and pinpoint for each one, the aspect of your own actions that you don’t want to bring forward into your future.  There are, of course, many things we would like to change about the way other people and events manifest around us, but our locus of control is within ourselves and it is here that we must begin the cycle of change.  

Hagalaz is the rune of events which are outside our control, but it is also the rune that helps us find the strength to cope with them and so transform our futures.  Let’s say you have been experiencing bullying.  Your strengths list may include a very large number of positive qualities that you have brought to bear on the situation to cope with, or resolve it, while, in your weaknesses list you may simply wish to write ‘I felt like a victim’.  The act of releasing this feeling ensures that you don’t carry the identity of ‘victim’ with you into the next year and so inadvertantly attract further negativity towards yourself.

Write your ‘releasing’ list on biodegradable material such as paper or a slip of wood.  Then take it to a place where there is running water.  Read out each of the items you wish to release and either whisper ‘Hagalaz’ after each one or say ‘Mother Hel please accept these offerings, may they return to the waters and be cleansed from the present’.  Drop the list into the water and know that these parts of your past have been released.

This little ritual should be performed before the begining of the half-month of Isa on 28th November.  At this point the solidifying force of this rune will set the course of the coming year – ready for birthing at the Winter Solstice when the rune Jera is at its peak.

Preparing for the future

You may also like to do a rune reading at this time to identify your own personal strengths and points of weakness/ personal challenges within the coming year.  The reading may affirm the strengths you have already pinpointed or it may reveal other strengths you weren’t even aware you had.  The reading uses the ‘mother’ form of the Hagalaz rune which comes from the Younger Futhark and Armanen rune systems. Because I like to have it all I work with the Elder Futhark as a repository of power for all the later rune systems (I know some of you may not like that but it works for me).  The mother rune form of Hagalaz looks like an x with an additonal horizontal line through the centre which forms a six pointed star.  Incidentally, the six-pointed star shape is reminiscent of the roots and branches of a tree shooting up and down – this links the mother rune in with Yggdrasil and Ymir who, as an hermaphrodite, was both the mother and father of creation.

Take a rune cloth (the one you see here is available for order in the casting cloths section of my shop).  Using your preferred casting method (see my rune casting page for a simple method) lay out six runes.  The three runes at the top of the spread represent your core strengths in the coming year, while those at the bottom represent personal weaknesses that may get you in trouble if you’re not careful.

For this reading I like to ask Hel to bless the reading and lend her wisdom for the personal weaknesses/ challenges which I see as rising up through the layers of Wyrd to make themselves manifest within the future.  I then ask Heimdal to assist me in selecting and interpreting the ‘strength’ runes above.

In the example reading the core weaknesses/ challenges are Berkano, Othala and Kenaz.  While Berkano is well aspected, Othala and Kenaz are ill-aspected; I take this to mean that Berkano may relate to a new project or birth which is likely to be challenging but not necessarily negative if countered by the personal strengths above.  The ill-aspected Othala and Kenaz, however, might represent the querent’s own stubbourness in dealing with family and manifesting their creative ideas.  When I did this spread both the Othala rune and Kenaz rune seemed to be being ‘dragged’ reluctantly upwards, as if they are weights the querent really should be trying to shed but has trouble letting go of.  The Nauthiz rune on its side suggested to me that the person has strong ties, a keen desire, and a steady support network that will help them tackle the challenges being presented by the Berkano rune.  This was further enforced by the Gebo rune that suggested the person has made well-judged bonds with others that will also assist with the family issue looming.  The Raidho rune suggested to me that perseverance and steady work would stop the frustation and lack of progress suggested by the inverted Kenaz rune.  As you can see from the picture, I went on to draw further runes to elucidate on each of the six primary runes; you might also choose to do a specific reading about each rune to explore the issues more thoroughly.

Wunjo!  Here we are already at the height of Wunjo’s power.  Wunjo is a lovely rune, its meaning is seemingly so simple and benevolent that it is easy to overlook it as we face the ‘winter runes’ with trepidation – but they aren’t here yet…

Wunjo literally means ‘joy’ and its appearance in a reading will signify happiness, fulfillment and the success of wishes.  Although the rune poem states that Wunjo enriches everything around you, the rune is often thought to refer especially to the happiness that comes through family, friendship and kinship.  While we know that our northern ancestors would have been celebrating the harvest, giving thanks to the ancestors and, for the Norse, celebrating the New Year at the end of this month, today this time has come to represent the ending of harvest and communion with the ancestors for a much broader section of the ‘pagan’ community. 

For me this is a time to affirm bonds with both the living and the dead.  My work is founded on the belief that each of us is bound up in the great web of being which connects all things; we gather great strength, joy and fulfillment through honouring each other and those who have come before us.  On my podcast for Shaman of the North on The Shamanic Voice this month I have shared some of the ways in which I work with and honour the ancestors so, on this blog entry I want to share a very simple rite that I like to do with my family when we meet.  It is based on the principles of the symbel rite practiced by modern Heathens, Asatru and other Germanic religious groups.  If you are interested in reading about the history of the rite and modern reconstructions I would recommend Wednesbury Shire’s article    or Arlea Hunt-Anschutz’s article.  My own rite follows on from a workshop I did with Ian Read of the Rune-Gild which I found very powerful and moving.

Symbel is essentially a ceremony where toasts are made which honour those present, their gods and ancestors.  The power behind it lies in the words spoken by each participant, and in the act of drinking from a blessed vessel which is passed from one person to the next by an individual who is responsible for ensuring the Wyrd is woven correctly as the vessel makes its journey.  In a sense, the passage of the vessel is the motion of the threads of Wyrd; as the vessel passes from person to person their words and intentions are woven into Wyrd and (if spoken with truth and honour) will serve to reinforce the bonds of the clan and the luck of each individual. 

My own family are of mixed faiths, and some are no faith at all, so it would be disrespectful to all concerned to try and reconstruct a religious rite such as Symbel.  However, the act of speaking words of power and intention, and of passing the cup from person to person to weave stronger bonds and increase personal luck is a beautiful one.  From a shamanic perspective, the honouring of ourselves, our loved ones, and our dead is also very healing and empowering; it allows us to speak words from the heart and to engage in a little bit of taboo breaking (as you will see).  My family have no problem honouring a tradition which is part of their own heritage (being rooted in the Anglo-Saxon land and language) and we all enjoy the sense of occasion and sacredness - even if the sacred is something different to us all.

For your family rite (you can also do this amongst groups of close friends), you will need a large drinking cup or horn, and something nice to put in it – mead is traditional but my family have a particular fondness of red wine so we tend to use that.  It is nice to perform the rite after dark, perhaps after a family meal.  Bring down the lights and perhaps put out a few candles to mark the occasion.  Take your time thinking about who you would like to toast to.  The subjects are a family member (or close family friend) who has passed away, a living family member, and yourself.  If you are in a large group then you might choose someone to take the drinking cup around, they will need to use their intuition as to who should go first and how the drinking cup will then make its rounds of the group.  Otherwise, you can pass the cup around the circle, or each person can take it at the time that seems right to them.  When it is your turn (or when you feel that it is your turn), take the cup and speak your words in honour of the person you have chosen, then drink to seal them and pass the cup around so that all may toast to the person.

Now, you will find that it is easy and heart warming to drink in honour of somebody else, but, it is also really important to drink in honour of yourself.  This is where the taboo breaking comes in as the rite demands that you aren’t self deprecating or modest, you need to speak about something you have achieved or to describe personal characteristics or actions that you are proud of.  It is no good demeaning yourself in front of your family and then drinking to seal a diminished and weakened version of yourself – you have to believe that your family are going to accept and embrace your words.  On their part, each person in the group is expected to accept your words graciously – if you really believe a person has lied then you might get all Viking and challenge them, but I’ve never experienced that in the groups I’ve worked with so I can’t comment on how that gets resolved!  Honour, integrity and acceptance are the important qualities for you all to hold in your hearts during the rite.

If you are feeling really brave, then the rite can also be used for oath-making.  This is where a member of the family makes a vow over the sacred drink that they will fulfill a particular task they have set themselves.  Their resolve is strengthened by weaving it into the rite, however, the whole rite will be weakened if they don’t fulfill their promise – so don’t promise anything you don’t intend to go through with.  In the Symbel rite, these vows were witnessed by the gods, as well as the family and ancestors, so they were taken very, very seriously.

At the end of the rite the remainder of the drink is ceremoniously poured out onto the earth.  You could offer it (as is right for you) to your ancestors, to the spirits of the earth, to your family’s protective spirits, and to the Gods. 

Wunjo is not traditionally associated with drinking rites but, for me it is the perfect rune to call on to bless a drinking ceremony.  What more could you want than a happy, harmonious family and the blessings of the rune of wish-making upon your vows for future deeds?

You are the sum of your past:   you learn through experience; the world judges you on our previous actions and inactions; and you interpret your experiences by comparing them with what has come before.  Your future welfare, success, health, prosperity and happiness hinge on what you have done and who you have become.  All healing is essentially an interaction with the past, it is done by working with the manifestation of that past: you.  

This article is the first in a series looking at how we can work with our pasts to bring about healing and strengthening of the self in the present.  I will be looking at why past life healing is so important to our welfare, Nothern tradition perspectives on the progress of the soul through lives, and how to enage in long term work with your own past life.

Releasing and restoring

Imagine that you are an iceberg.  Bobbing about above the water is the part of yourself that you know well. The surface area of that visible bit of ice is the bit of you that other people can see while, underneath, there’s a whole lot more that is either forgotten, or is made up of the ‘unconscious’ bits of yourself – your body, sleeping awareness, and links to the past beyond your conscious lifetime.  Now imagine that the ice is not made up of water, but rather of intricate webs of thoughts, actions, beliefs and behaviours that go to make up you.  Some of them play out upon the surface of the ice – but most intertwine around each other, sometimes appearing on the surface, then stretching down into the lower layers of the ice.

Many therapies work by helping us to remove or  ’unlearn’ behaviours or beliefs which have become ingrained within us.  It is only when we are able to perceive the threads within the ice that we are able to work with them.  You may feel that you are trapped within a particular pattern of behaviour or that, every time you try and move forward in your life, you are blocked by an external force, or by feelings that drag you back.   

Some people choose to see a ‘talking’ therapist, someone who helps you to trace the threads of the conscious self and recognise the patterns rising up from the unconscious, hidden, parts of your soul.  Others choose to see a healer who will work directly with the threads at all levels on their behalf: transforming negative energy into positive; extracting beliefs and behaviours that have been ‘imposed’ from outside (i.e. a thread that is actually someone elses); restoring lost threads that are rightfully yours; and removing blockages so that you are able to access more of your ‘whole self’. Many people choose to do both and, in practice, you will often find that a healer is often qualified in forms of therapy, and vice versa.

Energy healing such as reiki, crystal healing, rune healing and sound healing represent some of the methods that a healer might use to gently release negativity (harmful beliefs and behaviours, blockages and intrusions) and restore positive energies.  These are really important healing forms and shamanic healing ceremonies (which we will be looking at later) should always incorporate energy healing to support deeper, more intensive work.  These types of ‘releasing and restoring’ healings are carried out regularly by healers and those serious about their own personal healing journey – they represent the on-going maintenance necessary to undertake more challenging work both in healing and everyday life.  These types of therapies focus on the person you are now, recognising that the past has had a negative impact and that healing must occur within the present.     

Dealing with trauma

Talking therapies help you to trace the threads of the web as they manifest upon the surface of the ice, slowly coming to terms with them and helping you to transform the negative beliefs and behaviours into positive ones.  These types of therapies are particularly important for people who are literally trapped by traumatic events to the extent that their present is wholly defined by them.  For people whose previous experiences are painful but bearable, talking therapies can occasionally reinforce the pattern of  ‘victim’ as the past is replayed over and over again.  However, for people who have suffered severe trauma, this is already the case, which is why seeing a therapist who specialises in that area is so important.  Imagine that the surface of the ice is extremely fragile, meaning that work needs to progress slowly and carefully.  Only once the ice is fairly stable can work be done beneath the surface, allowing the energetic source of suffering to be interacted with directly. 

Over time, these sorts of healing will bring you into a state of wellness, inner peace, and balance.  From a shamanic perspective, however, they might not have the ‘clout’ necessary to get right down into the depths of the iceberg and find the deep, tightly bound threads that tell us who we are and what we should become – the root may still be buried within the ice meaning the old ways are liable to come back in time.  A shamanic healer doesn’t simply recognise that the past has impacted on the present – they seek to journey into that past so that healing may be undertaken at source. 

Incidentally, and for those of you of a runic disposition, the rune of ice, Isa, relates to ego and identity.  It is a rune of ‘self’ but also represents the desire for stability which can manifest as resistance to change and an unwillingness to let go of the past – even when we know it is bad for us.  Isa is often considered to be a dangerous rune, and perhaps a large part of that is based on the fact that its stabilising influence is always focused on the present.  One of the goals of many spiritual systems is to be fully ‘present’, not worrying about what has gone before or what is to come; this is the positive aspect of Isa – its negative aspect is a rigid fear of change which holds us, unrelentingly in the present, even when we feel in our hearts that our situation could be better. 

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 I offer gentle energy healings as well as shamanic healing and ceremonies.  If you would like to work with me on your own healing journey please see my healer page. I am a shamanic practitioner, meaning that I work with any of the range of healing methods I have trained in as directed by spirit.