For the week of 21 November 2021
The Embodiment of Collapse

Nauthiz is the half-month rune through 28 November. Kenaz is the intuitive rune, Wunjo reversed indicates Moment’s message to us, and the key occupies summer. Read right to left is Nauthiz, Kenaz, then Wunjo reversed.
The Weekly Rune Free Version - Nauthiz for the Week of 21 November 2021
The Elder Futhark runic calendar provides to humanity keys for how we live in season with All Things. Through #theweeklyrune I share the Futhark’s insight on how to live better as animists, to make better choices based on keen insight into the present, and to help each of us be more active in creating a better life for us all. That realization includes living with All Things as family, learning to tend what can’t just be fixed, and using every tool at our disposal to do so. The runes are such a tool, and in the Old Norse tradition, this process is wyrdweaving at it deepest potential. The runes provide one way that we can create ourselves as fit elders, so that upon our good death, we can be well Ancestors.
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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, each half-month rune is one of the 24 runes of 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 have been 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.
- 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
The prevailing theme of Nauthiz has been getting it done without the resources. That space of being bone tired if not weak, yet with no choice but to keep going is the epitome of this rune. The way it’s been expressed thus far in season has been through our inner work–reaching the point that embodiment is uncomfortable, not because it’s undesired or not immediately beneficial, but because the more we become who we are, the more uncomfortable we become with what stands in the way of it. This unrest means sitting with raw parts of Self, relationships, and dynamics in the best way we can to keep reconciling them against who we really are. It means facing systems and legacies that don’t want us to be who we are. In this way the season of Nauthiz deepens the work, we tire, and we persist.
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?
Sometimes the things we say we want look very different when we get them. This is as true of embodiment as anything. Embodiment is the new trendy thing in spiritual work, and I don’t want the power of it to be lost in bypass-speak. Indeed, the more we become who we are, the more we have sovereignty over Self as we move among, the better we move. Within that movement are all the relationships we have to everything in our lives–literally to every being that is. Some of the things we’re in relationship with don’t want us to be embodied. It fully rejects what growth could come from that embodiment. When we first begin embodiment work it may be triggering and also wonderful. As with all things, the deeper we move into living who we are and the awe of that, the more we unearth aspects of us that we don’t want to deal with–shadow, child, trauma, memories, bias. This is the bit that doesn’t get talked about in the wider spiritual arena.
Nauthiz is a rune of ritual that holds us to the fire of that inter-relationship truth–good, bad, indifferent. Everything from the realization of need, to the expulsion of all other fire to rub into being the nodfyr, to beseeching the elements to help meet the need, is all about being present in the relationships–particularly with Self–even if we don’t feel like doing so. Especially when we don’t feel like doing it. We impact everything and everyone in our lives, and despite how wonderful and wanted embodiment is, once we have it we only become more and more responsible to our time here. Half-month rune Nauthiz and its framing runes this week give that truth perspective, and a bit of direction. Read more…
For more insight into the runes, tending your unquiet dead and Ancestors, and cultivating a strong spiritual path
join my community Runes for Change.
For suggestions on how to weather the season gracefully, subscribe to my private runes community on Patreon.
#beyourcommunity

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.