Mannaz. Humaning. This is the quintessential rune of the human experience in form. All the frills and chills. It is a coming out rune of sorts, in that it carries an implication of seeking out social engagement with other humans when doing so is fraught.
When is it not fraught?
I drew this rune with a more refined intention than the previous ones: this rune is what my body needs to say to me. Humaning. Star-crossed socializing. I could take that literally, that Body needs me to seek and have more external support specifically in the form of social gaiety. Part of my unformed intention for this draw was to get out of the way of the message more than prior, and when I came back to that in my felt sense something very different came up.
First I think of how I am an ecosystem of mutualistic relationships, microorganisms and flora, bacteria and germs. I am a walking community that I don’t give enough voice to. I don’t listen to us enough, and this is a fact, yet that’s not what comes up from the bowels of Mannaz in me.
Soul loss. But not the usual ‘part of my inner cosmology fragmented for my immediate safety’ kind, or the ‘something was so challenging I couldn’t hold it at the time’ kind. No. My gut spoke, and instead of hearing what it said, I felt what it thought: it does not recognize me. It doesn’t have a schema for me being so involved with Body’s dialogue. It has thought I was gone all this time, a lost soul part.
I am a lost soul part to my gut.
My second brain has been on autopilot without my intentional support, and I realize that in all my effort to be body-wise all these years, I don’t speak its language. It has its unique relationship to Source. I also realize that how I have moved among as a gut has been Body-wrenching.
In the Mannaz way, I begin with introduction, as I advise every student venturing into ecosystem relationship. I ask what can be done in this relationship now, and I wait for the response, as long as it takes.
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S. Kelley Harrell, M. Div.
I’m an animist, author, deathwalker and death doula. For the last 25+ years, through Soul Intent Arts I’ve helped others to ethically build thriving spiritual paths as fit, embodied elders, who upon death become wise, capable Ancestors. My work is Nature-based, and focuses soul tending through the Elder Futhark runes, animism, ancestral healing, and deathwork. I’m author of Runic Book of Days, and I host the podcast, What in the Wyrd. I also write The Weekly Rune as a celebration of the Elder Futhark in season. Full bio.
#beyourcommunity ~ #youareecosystem
elder well, die well, ancestor well
Elder Well
To bear your unique gift to the world.
Die Well
To leave the planet better than you found it.
Ancestor Well
So that your descendants never elder alone.
