Shall we discuss the use of this berkana rune?

Well, first you would either create or acquire a rune item to serve as a focus or reminder of your intentions regarding this rune, and while you are using this rune take note of creative thought and impulse in the world around you. Notice the creative process as it occurs in nature. The sprouting of new saplings, the calving of livestock, the birth of infants, as well as those moments of change that make us feel “born again.” This is just the perceptual focus though. A necessary start but not complete. While working with this rune you must take part in the creative process. Nurture hope, help people start projects, plant new things in your garden, or explore new ideas for their own sake.

By continuing to anchor your thoughts and activities in this rune, you “craft” your own spirit in such a way that you grow more and more to embody the rune, acquiring new skill and ability to influence the world in this way. That’s the essence of rune craft really. Yes, you include runes in things you make, but you are really making or remaking yourself. The idea of “the clothes making the person” taken in a natural and enlightening direction, but there is more to this than simple self-discipline. Working with the runes and patterning your intention and actions with them, you are not just connecting to the spirit it represents. You begin to form a relationship or alliance with it as well. Not only do you help it, but it begins to help you as well. New opportunities begin to self-select for what would best nurture you personally. Choices that lead to new programs or stages of a relationship begin to show more sympathy for your own state of being at the moment, the whole nurturing process. Just as you nurture, it also nurtures you.

Is that for all runes or just B? Berkana is the rune of beginnings, and other runes have other influences, but rune work all shares this structure in common, yes. You work with and for the spirit behind the rune, and it works more for you as well, and by spirit I don’t necessarily mean personality. The “spirit” of berkana is shared all throughout the natural world, forming a kinship between all things that nurture and foster new growth. So this rune would support teachers let’s say, but would complicate things for doctors who tend to end things instead of begin things.

So it wouldn’t be good for healers? No, but excellent for mothers and entrepreneurs, investors.

It nurtures and grows. Yes, even if you begin working with a rune, this will by no means obligate you to stick with that rune. It isn’t the same as an astrological influence. So you might start working with berkana and to your surprise discover yourself to not be very compatible with it. It would be perfectly all right to move on. Runes don’t organize themselves into any kind of hierarchical structure.

Is there use of the inverted symbol in rune magick? Actually, yes. Every rune you work with will show you both its faces. You can’t trigger its “positive” aspect of face without also awakening its “negative” face as well. So not only will you begin to develop new strength, wisdom and natural assets, but you will be facing new challenges as well. So the rune reversed gives you insight into what lays ahead on that path. Berkana reversed is strife. With everything you would nurture there is an attendant frustration. You won’t escape it, but with perseverance you will come to find the strength even in the adverse aspect of the rune and value that influence as well. Arguments when nurturing is kept in mind lead to further growth and understanding. It’s only when the positive element ceases to be the focus do arguments wind up barren or fruitless without positive outcome.

Your thoughts are welcome. Be well friends.

Travis Saunders
Dragon Intuitive
~science,mysticism,spirituality~