Skadi - the Goddess of Winter

Presenting a friend for cold winter days – Skadi the Nordic goddess of winter.

Skadi is the goddess who helps us find our independence and become self-reliant. Together with Skadi, we can continue further down the road into our selves, with wolfs at our heels, hiking boots on our feet, and the hunting bow over our shoulder. She is the giant daughter of the oldest race, who has never been civilized into patriarchal society.

Skadi and the Stars
I’m outside a small cabin with heaps of snow as far as I can see. Stars are glistening in the dark sky, and the moon is full. I know that Skadi is close by. I can feel her in the beauty, the cold and the silence – the kind of silence that is only born from cold winter nights. She breaths down my neck, and I understand that freedom is a state that includes both gains and risks. Freedom permeate me, but just one moment of inattention, and I could die of the cold. No one can live on freedom only. I look up at the stars and my mind is expanded further.
Suddenly, I understand that freedom, and its companion, independence, makes our soul grow, as well as causing our ego to shrink – and not the other way around, as we often have been misled to think. Under the stars I can taste eternity, and I am more deeply connected to my ancestors. Something awakens in me, that has been there all along, waiting. I can almost feel how quiver and bow are hung on my back. Skadi wants a companion for the hunt. I let my mind soar.



Excerpted and translated from Nordiska gudinnor: Vardags magi för dagens kvinnor, (Translated title: Nordic Goddesses: Every Day Magic for Women of Today) by Sofia Karin Axelsson.

First published in the mid-monthly newsletter Writing, Magic and Marketing by Sofia Karin Axelsson and Michael Peter Langevin. Sign up at www.theechoworld.com