For the week of 14 February 2021
Giving to go deeper

Sowilo is the half-month rune through 27 January. Kenaz is the intuitive rune, and Ehwaz indicates Vagrancy’s message to us. Read right to left is Sowilo, Kenaz, then Ehwaz, with the mink rib in autumn.
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.
This is the free version of The Weekly Rune. Get the full benefit of the ad-free, detailed version every Sunday, by joining my private runes community at Patreon.
The paid runecast includes:
- more detail
- ad-free
- the current runes’ impact on human life force
- insights on how to best manage the curves and twists therein
- introspective prompts to nuance and tend self-work
- galdr of the runecast, with sound files and instruction on how to use each sound
- live video sessions
- runic insights, book excerpts, release news, free classes
- optional services with me
- discounts on soul tending services
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
Over the last couple of weeks we’ve had very descriptive insight into managing layers of our inner cosmology for best action right now. This week’s runes continue that anchoring, moving us into more emotional territory. Over the next two weeks we make closure of our time with the second aett. This closure marks a point that we know more about how we express our calling alongside others doing the same. What’s specific to this annual return of Sowilo is that we understand more of what’s at stake personally and collectively when we don’t move embodied among others doing the same.
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?
Sowilo is the rune of paying it forward with divinity. It encompasses the dynamic of feeling so brightly supported by the sun that we shine on others. The ability to understand we are part of that process, to see our own divinity, and by doing so see the divinity of all things is an incredibly animistic state of being. Often when folx explore this rune it’s from a place of ideals or easily actionable pursuits: “Yes, everyone deserves support.” “I will pay for the coffee of the person in line behind me.” Those are good things, though they are the bare minimum of what’s being demanded by this week’s runecast. This week we are being asked to make the association that we are responsible for All Things, and that how we move through life with that awareness is directly connected to our own vitality. And where we don’t step in to provide that support for our communities, other un-embodied systems will step in and exploit the lack. 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.