"I do not think we need to revive old beliefs literally in order to learn something from the worldview behind them. Nor do we need to reinterpret folklore through the language of modern wellbeing. A charm was not a mindfulness exercise, nor was kekri a wellness retreat. Our ancestors were not practising “nervous system regulation” without knowing the modern terminology"
Natalia Kiuru is the co-founder of Väki Wellness™, Skýra Retreat’s official wellbeing partner. A certified holistic coach, yoga teacher, mindfulness instructor and nature connection guide, she draws on the rhythms of nature, traditional Chinese medicine’s five-element theory and her studies of Finnish folklore and Northern natural remedies. In this article, Natalia explores ancient Finnish beliefs surrounding life, death and the changing seasons, and what they reveal about our relationship with nature and wellbeing today.
By late autumn in the North, change is impossible to ignore. The light disappears quickly, the ground freezes and the forest grows quiet. Plants withdraw, leaves fall and the water begins to cool. What only a few months earlier was growing, flowering and reaching towards the light begins to turn inward.
In the past, the cycle of the year shaped everyday life far more directly than it does today. Nature was observed closely, its changes were read, and the rhythm of work adapted to what the land, the weather and the season allowed. Each part of the year had its own work, celebrations, customs and beliefs.
Today, we have become remarkably good at resisting the dark. We light our homes, extend our days and try to maintain almost the same rhythm throughout the year. We talk about sustaining our energy, productivity and motivation. Even wellbeing can become another form of optimisation, with the pursuit of better sleep, more energy, greater resilience and better performance. I often find myself wondering whether we have turned wellbeing into something in which we are always expected to achieve more.
The northern landscape tells a very different story. Nothing in nature grows continuously, and perhaps we are not meant to either.
A Turning Point in the Year
In earlier times, the changing seasons had a much more immediate effect on everyday life. In Finnish agrarian tradition, kekri marked the end of the agricultural year, when the harvest had been gathered and one season of work had come to an end. Food was prepared, people came together, and the transition from the old year towards the new was acknowledged in many different ways. Alongside celebration, kekri included customs and beliefs connected both with the year that had ended and the one that was still to come.
Kekri was not only about harvest and celebration. Finnish folklore also preserves traditions connected with the dead. During kekri, deceased members of the family and household were remembered and treated as guests. Food was laid out for them, and the sauna was heated for them. In some accounts, the dead were thought to bathe first, after which they moved into the house to eat while the living members of the household took their turn in the sauna.
The dead were therefore not entirely absent from the world of the living. They still had a place within the family and household. This may feel unfamiliar to us today, when death is often separated from everyday existence. In contemporary Western life, it happens behind particular doors, and we often speak about it only when circumstances force us to stop and face it. In the older Finnish worldview, there was a clear boundary between the living and the dead, yet death did not necessarily mean complete absence.
Kalman väki
One concept found in Finnish and Karelian folklore is kalman väki. The word väki is difficult to translate with a single English word. In modern Finnish, it can simply mean people. In older traditions, however, it could also refer to a force or potency connected with a particular place, element or phenomenon. There was the väki of the forest, water, fire and death.
Kalma was associated with death, the dead and the forces connected with death, which is why kalman väki cannot simply be translated as “ghosts”. The surviving tradition is far more complex than that.
In charms preserved in Suomen Kansan Vanhat Runot – The Ancient Poems of the Finnish People – the dead could be approached, addressed and even asked for help. In other situations, their power was feared, and disturbing the realm of the dead could have consequences. Forces associated with death were approached with caution and respect.
One charm used in the appeasement of kalma begins:
Terve, kalma!
Terve, kalman isäntä,
Terve, kalman emäntä...
Greetings, Kalma!
Greetings, master of Kalma,
Greetings, mistress of Kalma...
— SKVR VII4:1983
Later in the charm, kalman väki is asked for peace, health and forgiveness. The address begins respectfully, recognising and naming Kalma, its master and its mistress.
What stays with me especially is that kalma is greeted, and the word used to greet it: terve. Today, terve is familiar to Finns above all as an everyday greeting and as a word connected with health. Its older meanings have also included whole, intact and sound. It is interesting, then, that this particular word opens the address to kalma, carrying layers of meaning much older than the everyday greeting we hear today. Maybe that's part of what makes these few words feel so powerful. Death is adressed instead of merely named or feared.
The same idea can be seen in older Finnish relationships with nature and the surrounding world. Places, elements and the forces associated with them did not simply exist for human use. There were boundaries, reciprocity, respect and reverence, and often fear as well.
Modern wellbeing language can easily soften nature. We speak of calming forests, grounding, healing landscapes and reconnecting with nature. But the forest of older Finnish tradition was not simply peaceful. It could feed you, shelter you and provide almost everything needed for life, but it could also disorient you, frighten you and take your life. Water sustained life and could drown. Fire warmed the home and could destroy it. Nature was neither good nor bad, but powerful and unpredictable.
I think this is something we have partly forgotten. We have become too accustomed to looking at nature increasingly through the lens of our own needs, as something to be used, controlled and shaped.
The Counterbalance to Growth
I do not think we need to revive old beliefs literally in order to learn something from the worldview behind them. Nor do we need to reinterpret folklore through the language of modern wellbeing. A charm was not a mindfulness exercise, nor was kekri a wellness retreat. Our ancestors were not practising “nervous system regulation” without knowing the modern terminology.
And yet, it is interesting how many things we now associate with wellbeing are themselves very old: sitting quietly, warmth, rest, spending time in nature, observing the cycle of the year and taking part in shared rituals. The experiences themselves are not always new. What changes are the words and meanings through which we explain them.
Old traditions can also make us look at our own time differently. Modern wellbeing culture often focuses on what we should have more of: more energy, more vitality, more growth and better performance. The cycle of the year, however, reminds us that alongside growth there is withdrawal, alongside light there is darkness, and alongside birth and beginnings there are death and endings.
This is, of course, not a uniquely northern idea. Duality and cyclical understandings of life appear in cultures around the world. But in the North, these shifts are difficult to overlook. The almost endless light of summer gives way to a long dark season. Growth stops, and nature withdraws for winter. A tree sheds its leaves and does not cease to be alive, just as the ground freezes while life continues beneath the surface. Not everything grows all the time, nor is it meant to.
It seems we find it easier today to celebrate what begins, grows and becomes visible than to make space for what diminishes, withdraws or comes to an end. This may be one of the things the old seasonal cycle and the traditions surrounding it can still remind us of: an ending is not always a failure, and withdrawal is not the same as standing still. Both belong to the same cycle as growth and beginning again.
Wellbeing Without Optimization
Much of my own work is centred around wellbeing, yet I find myself increasingly drawn to the moments when we stop trying to improve ourselves. Walking without measuring the distance or having a destination, simply wandering. Sitting in a sauna without asking what physiological benefit we are gaining from it, or being quietly in the forest without turning it into yet another tool for improving our own wellbeing.
There is an important difference between using nature and being in relationship with it. Older Finnish traditions remind us of this. The forest was not just scenery, nor was the sauna simply a place for warmth and washing. The seasons shaped the rhytmn of human life.
The most valuable thing these traditions can offer contemporary wellbeing is not another ritual for us to copy, but the reminder that everything around us does not need to exist for our benefit. We do not always need to gain something from an experience. Sometimes it may be enough simply to be there.
Kekri once made space for acknowledging that one cycle had come to an end. Traditions surrounding the remembrance of the dead also held the idea that absence did not necessarily mean complete disappearance. Every autumn, the northern landscape reminds us that not everything is meant to remain the same. Perhaps the dark season does not always need to be conquered. Perhaps, sometimes, we can surrender to it.
Letters from the North is a content series written by the Skýra collective and shaped by contributions from our team members.