Soul Intent Arts -- embodied soul tending through Nature Learn more about her publications at www.kelleyharrell.com.
Kelley is an author, lifelong deathwalker and animist, and the founder of Soul Intent Arts in North Carolina. She teaches others to ethically build a thriving spiritual path as fit, embodied elders, who upon death become wise, capable Ancestors. Her work is Nature-based, and focuses soul tending through the Elder Futhark runes, animism, ancestral healing, and deathwork. Kelley is author of:
Runic Book of Days - 2019 Silver Nautilus Book Award winner
Life Betwixt - Essays on Animism in the Everyday and Shamanism Among
Teen Spirit Guide to Modern Shamanism
Real Wyrd - A Modern Shaman's Roots in the Middle World
Gift of the Dreamtime Reader's Companion
Gift of the Dreamtime - Awakening to the Divinity of Trauma
How you came into the world
is how you tend the world.
It sounds simple, but it isn't.
You came into this world before this life, probably many times.
But your origin story began when this world began.
Born for This sessions offer you an opportunity to learn why you came here t h e f i r s t t i m e, and to understand how the world arrived at this point.
How you arrived at this point.
And when you know those two things, you can make entirely different choices for how you go forward.
How the planet goes forward.
Your spirit guides are tired of performing.
They get worn out, just like anyone constantly being hit up to produce.
And connecting with animal allies is a start, but true animism isn't a consumer service. It’s an ecosystem.
Our Ancestors didn't just ask for medicine—they tended the land that grew it. Belonging is a verb. It's a full circle of interdepndence.
To move from seeker to steward, we must protect the physical home of the spirits we love. Preservation is a ritual. It's a love letter. It's a commitment.
If prayer is a practice that shapes consciousness,
safety is the architecture that allows prayer to land.
Prayer cannot take root where bodies are afraid.
Where children are not protected.
Where truth is punished instead of heard.
Safety is not separate from spiritual life.
It is the ground that makes spiritual life possible.
Before prayer can transform a community,
people must know their voices matter,
their bodies are protected,
and their stories will be believed.
Safety is not the opposite of spirituality.
It is the structure that lets the sacred arrive.
03/26/2026
Animism is generational wealth.
We stand on the shoulders of who came before us,
for better or worse. Like money or estate,
trauma can be our inheritance.
Earth shaped herself
in balance.
In relationality.
Relationality is our origin and destiny.
With it we generate wealth,
the kind not measured in money or property,
but the kind that teaches us how to belong to a living world.
Animism passes down relationship.
With land.
With Ancestors.
With the more-than-human lives that make our survival possible.
When a culture remembers that rivers are relatives and forests are communities, it begins making decisions that protect the future instead of extracting from it.
This is wealth that doesn’t disappear in a market crash.
It grows stronger the more it is practiced.
Animism is generational wealth
because it teaches each generation how to care for the next.
03/25/2026
We’re all connected.
Even in silence.
We have to be careful what our silence contains.
In the absence of speaking,
terrible fates are approved.
Horrific beliefs are confirmed.
Lies become gospel.
Likewise, the forest doesn’t stop communicating when it grows quiet.
Roots are still speaking beneath the soil.
Rivers are still shaping the land.
Wind is still carrying messages across the hills.
Connection doesn’t disappear when words do.
Much of the living world communicates through presence, attention, and relationship rather than noise.
Animism reminds us that silence is not emptiness.
It is the space where listening happens.
It is the space between intent and impact.
It is where we must envision ourSelves and our influence
even as we question whether
to speak.
03/24/2026
Animism protects women
because a living Earth
does not place dominion
above relationship.
03/24/2026
How you came here
is the medicine you carry.
Not just the beautiful parts.
The difficult parts too.
The questions you’ve wrestled with.
The places you’ve had to grow courage.
The ways your life refused to follow the expected path.
Those experiences shape a particular kind of knowing.
And the world needs people who know why their story unfolded the way it did.
From the first moment you arrived--and I do mean the very first time you came to this planet--your life has been preparing you.
Not because we are born broken.
But because we are born into stories that began before us.
The fears, silences, survival strategies, and unfinished grief of previous generations don’t disappear. They move forward through families, communities, cultures, and bodies until someone learns how to name them. And once we name them, we can choose to change how we're in relationship with them.
Healing begins when we understand the story we arrived inside.
Because within that story are also the skills, instincts, and medicine needed to change its direction.
Your origin story doesn’t just explain the past.
It reveals the work your life may be asking of you now.
If you’re ready to explore the deeper pattern in your story, schedule a Born for This session.
Deathwalking isn't only Winter work.
Spring Cleaning isn't only for houses.
It is our opportunity to shake out the final dregs of the Dark Time and create a space that best honors the present, to consciously go forward.
Spring is a good time to:
~Update witch jars
~Re-affirm boundaries
~Strengthen wards
~Plant dreams
~Release clutter (inside and out)
~Tend shadow parts
~Thank the darkness
~Celebrate warmth
How do you honor this equinox?
Wishing you all a glorious return to the lighter seasons!
03/22/2026
Animism protects children.
In an animist world, children are not possessions.
They are new members of the living community.
They belong to the land,
to the Ancestors,
to the rivers and the forests that will outlive us.
When a culture understands the world as alive, children are treated as sacred arrivals, not resources to be controlled.
Many eyes watch over them.
Human and more-than-human.
Animism reminds us that children are not here for our convenience.
They are the future elders of the Earth.
And the living world is paying attention to how we care for them.
03/21/2026
I was thinking, my entire fyp is cake decorating videos, animals being animals, raging women, and Other.
That's it.
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Send a message to Soul Intent Arts - North Carolina:
Soul Intent Arts - Embodied Soul Tending Through Nature
I’m Kelley Harrell, and I believe we can do better.
I believe we all share the calling to be fit, embodied elders, who upon death become wise, capable Ancestors. To fulfill that calling, we must respond at a soul level. Through actionable animism I teach others to find their unique spiritual paths in support of their quiet dead, healed ancestors, fellow humans, and peaceful coexistence with the spirits of the land they live on.
I’m an author, lifelong deathwalker and animist, and the founder of Soul Intent Arts on traditional Sissipahaw land in North Carolina. As an ordained interfaith minister, I teach others to ethically build a thriving spiritual path. My work is Nature-based, and focuses soul tending through the Elder Futhark runes, animism, ancestral healing, and deathwork.
Elder well, Die well, Ancestor well.
I offer classes, personal mentoring, longterm training through The Spirited Path, a one-year intensive study on the Elder Futhark--Reclaiming the Runes, and other classes. Contact me for mentoring sessions, or for information about The Spirited Path.
I am author of:
Runic Book of Days - A Guide to Living the Annual Cycle of Rune Magick
Life Betwixt - Essays on Animism in the Everyday and Shamanism Among
Teen Spirit Guide to Modern Shamanism
Real Wyrd - A Modern Shaman's Roots in the Middle World
Gift of the Dreamtime Reader's Companion
Gift of the Dreamtime - Awakening to the Divinity of Trauma
I’m a contributor to these anthologies:
Engaging the Spirit World
The Spirit of a Woman - Stories to Empower and Inspire
Nature's Gifts - Anthology of Prose and Poetry Celebrating Nature and Our Natural World
