I mean, why not? Why wouldn't I try developing my own spreads? What's it matter?
I'm just having fun. Usually, when I want to reflect on what's going on around me, I'll do the basic three-rune spread, where you lay down the Present, set down the Past to the left of it, then place the third rune to the right of both, representing the Future. The reading is just as simple: the Present is where you are now, the Past is a particular moment that shapes this Present, and the Future is one likely outcome to work toward or avoid or just to think about. The runes aren't meant to divine the future, they're mostly for looking at where you are from outside of yourself. Reminding yourself of things you've forgotten, things that might be useful to bear in mind.
Really, they were just symbols to mark objects, saying "this is a government document" or "this implement belongs to so-and-so," and then they were carved into huge stones saying things like "King Such-and-Such was here, visiting from some place." But they looked so cool that they got blown up into a mystical phenomenon. That's just how people are, always gotta make things more than they are.
Tonight I have the apartment to myself. Last night I gathered all my notes and scrips and scraps, and I updated my rúnskrá with the prayers I say, some of my rituals, and as many instances of synchronicity as I could record. It's important to record your dreams to understand yourself and for creativity, and it's important to document moments of synchronicity when developing your spirituality. One sign you're on the right path is your personal entropy slips and decreases in small, innocuous ways. You have to keep your eyes and mind open. Or else this is just making a big thing out of nothing, once again.
I've got the place to myself, so tonight I thought I'd develop some rune spreads. This is probably naive of me, but again, it really doesn't matter. I want to buy some fabric for nice runecasting mats, but tonight I just used some long sheets of Japanese paper to mock up a proof-of-concept for this purpose. One model (pictured, above) is the Norns Spread. Not possessive, "Norns' Spread," because they don't own it, it didn't come from them. It's inspired by the Norns, named after them. The other model (below) is the Four-Layered Wyrd Spread.
The Norns Spread
The Norns Spread is easiest to explain: divide your mat into thirds. The first section is called Urðr and it represents your unchangeable fate. No matter what you do, this is something you're born into and you can't do anything about it except bear it in mind moving forward. The second section is Verðandi, and this section is the wyrd you're actively weaving in this life, this month, this hour. These are things you have some control over, to strengthen or abolish if you act wisely. The third section, of course, is Skuld and it describes what may be forming in the distance for you. If you look at your foundation and the choices you're making, this is one likely outcome for your actions, or perhaps it's something that's coming for you, something that will happen to you.
This runecasting is simplicity itself: Grab a handful of runes and sprinkle them over the three sections. Do the whole bag if you want, that's just more work for you.
Neatly arrange the runes in the sections in which they fell. Turn the face-down runes up. I never do reversed-position runes, but you can if you want to. Once you've got them all grouped and arranged, go ahead and start looking up their meanings as pertains to each section. There you go.
The Four-Layered Wyrd Spread
The second spread is more complex. The Four-Layered Wyrd Spread is used to discern your:
- Orlæg: your past and the fate you've inherited
- Hamingja: your personal power and luck
- Wyrd: the present weaving of your fate
- Skuld: the consequences of your actions and what is owed
Your orlæg reveals what you've been working with since your birth, like ancestral debts or karma from your past lives. Your orlæg is fixed, you can't change it. It's influenced by the deeds of your ancestors and the wyrd of the past.
Your hamingja shows your strength pertinent to this reading, gifts you've been given, and your vulnerabilities when it comes to influencing your fate. Your hamingja strengthens or weakens based on your actions, depending upon your honor and integrity.
Your wyrd spells out what's going on right now, what you're dealing with, the decisions you're making, and things that are influencing your fate. You can alter your wyrd through direct action and the choices you make.
Your skuld shows the likely trajectory for the future, given the past and present conditions (which can change), your karmic debt, and what you stand to learn in the future. Your future consequences are formed by the combination of your wyrd and your past debts, and it can only partially be altered if you commit to wise decisions.
And there's one last thing at the bottom that I refer to as the Coda. This is a little kiss from the Divine Feminine, a sacred insight from the Giantess, the Norns, or even your higher self. It may confirm the message of the reading or add a twist, a hidden truth to it all.
What I really need to do is build my close, personal relationship with each rune, get to know it and truly understand it, and recognize what it means on sight. That would really reduce a lot of the labor in interpreting the Wyrd Spread. Right now I'm wearing my reference sheet to shreds, going back and forth to identify each rune, riddle out the pertinent meaning based on what's going on around it, and then take a deep breath and try to comprehend how all the pieces fit together. I mean, the more runecasts I do, the better I learn the runes, so that's obviously a useful part of it. I suppose I could dedicate an entire month to learning a rune each day. I wonder if that would mess up my wyrd.