Gebo

The picture

A gift in the old world was never free.
That sounds cynical, and it is the warmest idea the old world had.
When a chief gave a ring or a sword or a share of the feast, he was making a bond, and the person who took it was agreeing to the bond.
A gift called for a gift in return, maybe tomorrow, maybe in twenty years, maybe to the giver's children.
The giving went back and forth across whole lifetimes and held the people together in a web that nobody could see and everybody could feel.
That is Gebo.
Two lines crossing.
Something goes one way, something comes back the other, and the crossing point is the relationship.

I think we have lost a bit of that.
We say a gift should come with no strings and then we feel odd when we cannot find a way to return it.
The old people would have told you the strings are the point.
The strings are the friendship.

So the picture is exchange of every kind.
The present on the birthday, yes, and also the time you gave up, the help with the move, the meal brought round when somebody was sick, the listening ear.
The business deal that works because both sides come out ahead.
The marriage, which is Gebo in its purest form, two people crossing their lives and agreeing to keep giving.
And the gift you did not ask for and do not know how to repay, which is the hardest kind to take and the one that teaches you most about yourself.

When it comes up

When Gebo comes up I read it as good news about connection.
Something is being offered, or should be.
A partnership is on the table, a kindness is on its way, a relationship is about to deepen because one of you is going to give something that costs you.
The rune says accept it.
Take the gift properly, with both hands, and say thank you like you mean it.
Half of generosity is knowing how to receive.

It also asks you to look at the balance.
In any relationship you are asking about, who is giving and who is taking, and has that been true for a long time?
Gebo is even by nature.
Two strokes the same length.
When a reading about a marriage or a friendship turns up Gebo, I ask whether the crossing is still in the middle or whether one line has got very long and the other very short.
The rune is kind about this.
It points at the shape and leaves the judging to you.

Stand in it by giving on purpose.
Give something this week that you do not have to.
Give it without working out what it earns you.
And when something comes to you, let it land.
The person who cannot take a compliment or a hand or a cup of tea is breaking the web as surely as the one who never offers.
If the question was about money, Gebo says the deal is fair, or should be made fair before you sign.
If it was about love, it says yes, and it says the yes has to go both ways.

Reversed

Gebo has no reversed position.
Turn an X upside down and you have an X, which has always seemed to me a neat way of saying that a gift is a gift from either side.
Its hard side shows in the runes around it.
Beside Thurisaz the gift may have a thorn in it, a bond you did not choose or a favour with a hook.
Beside Nauthiz or Isa the giving has stopped, or is one way, or is frozen while somebody waits for the other to go first.
Beside Fehu reversed it is the exchange gone sour over money.
Read the neighbours and you will find where the balance has tipped.

Across the traditions

I put Gebo beside The Lovers in the tarot, two figures facing each other with something passing between them that neither owns alone.
That is my own pairing and nothing stronger.
The Number 7 page in the Numerology section reads the same count in a quieter and more inward voice, and the Tarot Spreads page shows how a card in the position of another person can be read beside your own.

What have you been given lately that you have not yet properly received?

If you would like this read against your own chart, my readings are here.