Thoughts on Loki and Norse spirits
In what little time that I have been working with Loki there's a way I have come to understand them. Many call Loki a trickster or some other spirit of chaos. While Loki is certainly mischievous and their actions can create chaos, I feel that monicker alone is not enough.
Loki is also often associated with change, constant growing and shifting. Change can easily be mistaken for chaos by beings like us that desire stability and see stability as sameness. This does feel more appropriate
However, the way I have come to think of Loki is as a new kind of spirit of nature. The Jotun are, after all, essentially that. Loki seems to be a bridge, a duality between "society" and "nature" since he is born of a Jotun and Aesir adopted. The Aesir symbolize a lot of what humanity made for themselves: their own order and wisdom and rules—society.
I feel almost as though Loki represents the human spirit, both a part of society and from nature. Society, when it overreaches, seeks to bind the parts of us that it deems unruly. Yet it relies on our spirit all the same. We see this parallel often in the relationship that the Aesir have with Loki in the old stories. They come to Loki for help, to lift their spirits, to empower themselves, and when they see Loki step out of the role they decided—they punish them.
This allows each to have moments of being "in the right" or "in the wrong" without arbitrarily labeling one side as "good" or "bad" in our modern (post-christian) way of thinking. It is simply beings acting in ways that align with their nature.
I realize some of the stories may be partially or even wholly false since most (or all? I can't remember) were written down post-christianization of Iceland. However, they do still help as a basis to work from.
These roles also explains better, for me at least, the ability for each of the spirits/gods/entities involved to change. They shift with us and with the forces that they embody as time moves on. They are not stuck where the old tales left them, they have shifted too.
I mainly work with Loki and Sigyn in the Norse pantheon, so I'm sure there is something that can be added or adjusted in this view. But this is a way I've been thinking of things in a sense. Please add if you have something!
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