For the week of 16 December 2018
Prepping for Winter Solstice
Jera is the half-month stave through 28 December. Sowilo (Sowilu) is the intuitive stave, and Ehwaz reversed indicates the Solstice message to us. Read right to left is Jera, Sowilo, then Ehwaz reversed.
I truly believe that #theweeklyrune includes the keys to making better choices based on keen insight into the present, to help each of us be more active in creating a better reality for us all. That realization process includes learning to tend what can’t just be fixed, and using every tool at our disposal to accomplish that. The runes are such a tool, and in the Old Norse tradition, this process is wyrdweaving at it deepest potential.
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What’s a half-month rune?
“Half-month” is an astronomical concept in which each month is divided into two parts: days 1-15, then 16-month’s end. In terms of the runic calendar, the half-month rune is based on the Elder Futhark, and governs for a tad over two weeks (14 and 1/4 days, or a fortnight).
Learn More
The Weekly Rune is a three-rune cast. Those runes are the half-month, the intuitive rune, and the overview. The half-month is a set rune, which for the most part follows the traditional ordering of the Elder Futhark. The intuitive stave (meaning, I draw it blind) indicates the life force most available to us, to the focus of the half-month rune into sharper focus. It suggests how we can best handle the half-month energies. The final rune (also drawn blind) provides a high overview of the current time, and speaks from different voices. These voices are usually Nature, Earth, Creation, though are sometimes others. I note who’s speaking each week, as it is revealed.
New to The Weekly Rune?
- Catch a couple of my IGTV videos, which explain the intention and process behind the runecast, and what makes it different from other ways of casting.
- Listen to my What in the Wyrd podcast, which is available across all popular podcast platforms, including Google Play and iTunes. The latest episode discusses the nuances of Raidho.
- A few people have asked the reason that I switch between different rune sets for TWR. The short answer is: because. The more nuanced answer is I ask which sets wants to speak each week. I don’t assume the same elements are in play according to the timing of the runes; I also don’t assume the same elements of my runes are appropriate to speak each week. I did a podcast on this subject, so there’s more info there. (See above)
- Also, for deep work on coming into relationship with the runes in season, check out my book, Runic Book of Days.
The Runecast
Shifting over the last couple of weeks with Isa has been a quietly intense time. It’s not the out-loud kind of drama, but the inner slowly simmering kind. The difference between regular old drama and the shifting Isa brings is that Isa doubles down on our need to do something about it, to develop skills around it, and to realize that pretty much everything in life depends on us doing just that.
Jera begins the process of how to move on with that information.
Learn more about this seasonal progression, and how to draw its insights into the personal spiritual path in Runic Book of Days.
What does it mean?
Jera is the rune of “Hearth Account,” in my words. It means “year” in the Old Norse culture, and it refers to this inventorying process of seeing how to close the current year and move fully prepared into the next. It doesn’t require that we begin that move, just that we start laying out how we’re going to execute it.
That’s a pretty special thing, if we pause on it: the space to just observe, to just witness. We don’t have to do anything, other than hold that space and use it to close and prep. In much the way that Isa encouraged us to do that as an internal process, Jera begins our externalization of the skills gained from Isa, or at least gives us a place to begin practicing them before we’re required to be productive in them. Where else in life do we get that kind of break or distinction?
Well, we don’t, and we should. Patriarchy, capitalism, colonization mentality don’t allow for that kind of whole-person development. The more complex answer to that question, the result of those oppressive systems is that we don’t have elders who hold space for us with knowledge and wisdom to feel free to do that kind of deep processing, do the work, and bring the benefits of it back to our personal lives and community. We have no caretakers of our ancient processes for holding space. We have no ancestral instruction for animistic support and use of such space. We have no systemic method for how to step down temporarily and be.
Sowilo brings spectacular light in doing just that. It expresses a brilliant experience of the space held, as well as what comes out of doing so. It’s very sweet to have the rune of the sun in this time of darkness, giving the assurance that the light is still there, however small, and the experience of it can still be felt if we remember to reach back to it. Sowilo is a closure rune in its own right, and it’s piece of the narrative supports the truth that the work we do is to benefit others as much as ourselves.
Get the Winter Solstice Runecast
Ehwaz reversed from the voice of Winter Solstice emphasizes the message of Jera and Sowilo perfectly. Meaning ‘horse’ and the soul travel inspired by the Old Norse relationship to the horse, reversed it suggests we just sit with things lightly. It’s not the time to deconstruct ourselves and delve deeper beneath the surface. It’s not the time to travel out into far realms for meaning and stitching it all together into profound narrative.
We are the narrative. The steps we take right now we cook up the plot and determine where we will go with it.
And right now, that’s enough. We’re enough.
For suggestions on how to do that gracefully, subscribe to my private runes community on Patreon.
