Neolithic Shamanism: Spirit Work in the Norse Tradition - Raven Kaldera 2012

North Wind
The White World: Air

Raven: The North Wind came to me when I was a teenager, and we commenced a brief but intense affair. I would lie out in the cold wind, and he would come to me. I didn’t know anything about him, but later as an adult I discovered who he was, and we met again decades after I first spoke to him. He taught me the art of moving ond with my singing, the way martial artists move chi with their hands. It was an art that I would use often in my daily practice, one of my mainstays, so I am grateful for his lesson. He was a good if impatient teacher when I was an argumentative and rather screwed-up youngster. Recently, oddly enough, my daughter gave me the Fables series of graphic novels, and I discovered that my old lover had a cameo in it . . . and they captured him perfectly, including his impatience with slow learners. Funny about that. I do believe that sometimes fiction writers tap in to something very real.

Galina: Kari, the North Wind, has been very good to me. Perhaps because I belong to a god of the wind (Odin), of the storm, of the power of words and spells and charms, I piqued Kari’s interest. I don’t know, and I don’t want to indulge in any speculation. All I know is that he has watched over me through some of the most frightening and grueling moments of my life. He even gifted me, telling another spirit worker to give me a reindeer hide (which the very confused spirit worker thrust into my hands after I finished a public lecture). He keeps an eye on me, and for that I’m immensely grateful.

There are many Wind spirits, but the Four Winds are the great chieftains of their tribes. They are more powerful, more intelligent, and far less ephemeral in their interest than the smaller Wind spirits. They may appear as male, female, or androgynous to any given person, but in this tradition of shamanism, the North and East Winds tend to appear as men, and the West and South Winds tend to appear as women. One thing that we have definitely learned is that the Four Winds have agreements between them: no one ever gets all four of them as allies. That, according to them, would be too much power for any one person, and their changeable natures don’t fancy the idea of that much control and obligation over them. So it’s quite likely that only one or two of them will talk to you; three if you’re very lucky. That doesn’t mean that you can’t practice the arts that they teach. It just means that you’re on your own with them, or you’ll need to learn them from other Gods or spirits.

The North Wind is the strongest of the winds in the North, as one might expect. He blasts arctic air down upon the lower countries, bringing the most terrifying blizzards. He is the most-depicted wind in all of European mythology—usually, in the North anyway, appearing as a fierce, white-bearded old man, but occasionally as a slender, pale youth. He comes into folktales so regularly and with such similarity of character that it’s not hard to believe that he must have a lot of contact with humanity. In Norse mythology, he was called Kari, and he was one of the chieftains of Niflheim, the world of the frost giants. Kari was said to have two sons (that we know of; as randy as he is, he may well have many children), one named Frosti (Frost) and one named Jokul (Icicle), who is in turn the father of a frost giant named Snaer (Snow) the Old, who is another of the chieftains of Niflheim. Snaer in turn has a son named Thorri (Frozen Snow) and three daughters named Fon (Snowfall), Drifa (Snowdrift), and Mjol (Powder). This last daughter is a powerful sorceress and seer of Niflheim who can fly through the air. (Frosti seems to have married into an elf family.)

In other areas of the North, the Arctic Wind is seen similarly. As in Scandinavian folktales, Russian folktales also show the North Wind (and his siblings) stealing food out of the bowls of peasants who walk through the wind from barn to house, but if they find his home and chide him for it, he gives them magical gifts. Like all the powers of Nature, he takes and gives equally; he loves to be fed and helps himself if no one makes the effort. Galina often sets out plates of food and drink for Kari and gives him liquor. If you live in an apartment, you can set out the food on a table or desk, open the window, and offer it to him. Leave for a bit and let him enjoy the food. You can also leave the offerings out on roofs or ledges. There are always ways to adapt to living in urban areas.

The North Wind’s gift is, as Raven discovered, the ability to move energy with the voice while singing. Shamans and spirit workers all over the world have harnessed the power of song to do their work. In some cases, they must memorize hundreds of songs, or songs that go on for many hours. When a spirit worker sings a sacred song, two things are important. One is the choice of words, which is the province of the East Wind, and we will get to him shortly. The other is the ond that the spirit worker sings out into the air to power the Intent, and this is the North Wind’s teaching. (Please note that you don’t have to have a great voice to do this. While it’s nice if you do, it’s not a prerequisite.)

In northern Europe, this singing of sacred songs is called galdr, and it is one of the most common shamanic techniques. A practitioner who knows how to galdr might sing things into happening, or with coaxing words sing spirits into appearing and helping, or sing healing into someone’s body, or sing power into an object, or sing protections around a person. There are different kinds of galdr; the most common is rune-galdr, which consists of singing the various names of a single rune with Intent. When using galdr, it is best if the words are simple and powerful and the tune has many long notes. Whether the singing should be tuneful, on key, rough, or screechy seems to depend on the practitioner. Galina has fine results with galdr that is quite rough and untuneful, and she points out that the term originally came from a root word meaning “to crow like a rooster.” Raven, on the other hand, finds that he has to keep it pitch-perfect or it doesn’t work well for him; he has speculated that this may be because he is a musician, and his brain objects if he doesn’t make the extra effort to stay on key.

Galdr is a powerful way of working wyrd and moving energy. A skilled practitioner can sing weal or woe directly into a person’s wyrd and bring about the requisite manifestation. The voice is merely the conduit for that power. When someone galdrs (which is how we write the modern Anglicized verb version: galdrs, galdring), a palpable wave of energy should sweep out with the sound. A client who had a shaman galdr into them reported that it was “like having your body rung like a bell.” This should be practiced outside at first, if only because the volume of sound and waves of energy can go through walls and reverberate in people who didn’t ask for that. Also, if you practice in a wild, lonely place, you will be less self-conscious about standing there singing loudly and repetitively for hours.

Exercise: Singing with the Wind

Before you do this exercise, you should know something about sing-ing—at the very least, how to breathe properly to create maximum volume. Prepare for your lesson with the spirits by taking lessons from humans. A few voice lessons should give you practice in breathing properly and help you explore your range. It’s also important to be properly grounded, as galdr can harness a great deal of power and energy that will all be channeled through you. It’s not just a vocal experience; it’s a full-body experience.

To call upon the North Wind, bring a bowl of warm soup and hot tea outside into cold weather, ideally when it is snowing and a good North Wind is blowing. Before you go out, tie white and silver ribbons to your arms and hands. Fling the soup and tea into the air in a big arc. Then wait a few minutes to see if he comes. Try to sense whether the Wind from the North blows on you, whether you can feel his presence, or (if you have the ability) whether you can even see him in the movement of the wind. If it is snowing, it may be even easier to see him. Ask him whether he will help you, and if you get a strong feeling of assent (or a very physical push from the wind that communicates something; remember that this element can definitely move on you at will), then turn around and face away from him, and open your mouth and sing. Anything—it doesn’t matter what—but you might want to start with single sounds held for a long time. Galdr may or may not involve actual words. The power is from the sound, from the flow of energy, and from the sacrifice of the practitioner.

You may feel the North Wind pushing against the back of your head. That’s a good thing—the energy is supposed to shoot from the back of your head out your mouth. Breathe deeply, open your mouth wide, and let the sound roll out of you. Your eyes may unfocus a little, and you may feel the energy vibrating on the way through you. Your whole body should be reverberating with the aftershocks of the enegy when you’re done. If you’re not a little bit wrung out, you probably haven’t done it right. Eventually, you’ll be able to pull in energy with your inhalation and multiply it tenfold on the way out.

Galdr is a hard thing to describe in words, and it’s nearly impossible for us to provide a foolproof way to help you here in this book . . . which is why you ask help from the spirits. If, after the North Wind has helped you awhile and you’ve practiced a good long time, you are not sure if you’re doing it right, go to a shaman or shamanic practitioner in this tradition for assessment.