X - Gebo, Gyfu
by Fuensanta Arismendi and Galina Krasskova
Andvari luck is perhaps best described as Gebo in action.
It seems to be a rare and uncompromising type of luck, based on knowing what
belongs to you by right and what belongs to you by accident and respecting
both. Those with Andvari luck develop a very special relationship with money,
responsibility and resources. Luck in the cosmology of the Northern Tradition
is based upon causality and consequence, responsibility and balanced give and
take. It flows directly from the state of one’s wyrd, the actions of one’s
ancestors, and one’s own character.
This is all the more true with Andvari luck. With this type of luck, one cannot take actions designed solely to increase one’s luck. The actions must be done because they are the right actions to take, because the contrary is a screaming injustice or wrong. It is also the knowledge that money and resources, like luck, are in constant flow. It is based and flows out of right action, right relationship, right respect, and mindfulness.
We think of money as finite: you have $10 and that’s it. But that $10 can become a gift for someone, a meal for someone else. It can grow and change and evolve. If it doesn’t grow and flow, the flip side of this luck is that of Fafnir: grasping, greedy, obsessive stagnation. Fafnir’s treasure does not evolve into anything and therefore it rots. Andvari luck is based on loving money and resources, but not in coveting or wanting to have more to keep up with your neighbor. It’s loving money as you love a friend and giving it the freedom to grow and evolve.
This type of luck acknowledges that you don’t have control over wealth, any more than you have over a friend. It involves acknowledgement that part of this money is yours and part you are only holding for others, and you must facilitate it going where it needs to be. Whether you have a little or a lot, part of it is not yours to keep, even if you have so little money you can barely exist. The smile of courteousness you give to someone may be that which you owe out of your limited resources to someone else. This is part and parcel of the flow.
This is knowing what is yours by accident and what is yours by right. It involves appropriate utilization of resources—putting spare pennies into a jar rather than leaving them strewn about (out of respect for the pennies, not to hoard them), or turning off the lights when you leave a room, out of both respect for the electrical bill and also for the limited resources of nature that are not yours to waste. It involves a degree of mindfulness with every action, every day.
One gains this type of luck either by ancestry, or by approaching Andvari with an honest plea for learning and assistance. This will come with a geas or taboo of obligation. As mentioned above, it will forever entail mindful responsibility of every single resource and its utilization. In the tale of Loki going to visit Andvari with money stolen from the Aesir to commission a pretty bracelet for his wedding to Sigyn, Andvari wouldn’t accept the money. This is because it was not Loki’s to give by right. It had no value to Andvari. What he demanded (and got) was Loki’s service for the time it took to craft the bracelet. This was Loki’s to give by right and it was far more valuable to Andvari and Loki than stolen coins.
Finally, and this is most important, one cannot court both the easy and fickle Gods of luck like Fortuna, and Andvari at the same time, ever. You may lose one and not gain the other. The two may respect each other, but they do not mix. It’s like oil and water. For those who are blessed by Fortuna’s luck, or Trickster luck, that is a good thing that should be honored. For those blessed by or seeking out Andvari luck, one of the primary taboos is that one may not have any dealings with that particular type of luck. This taboo is so strong that we are not permitted to even touch a shrine sacred to Fortuna or other such deities. This is not out of disrespect for Fortuna, but out of a mindfulness of where our own obligations lie. These are two currents that simply cannot mix.