Fear.

I have been thinking about fear. The way it inhabits the body, changes the way you think and behave. Fear is an illusion so convincing, when in the middle of it it is hard to tell it apart from the truth.

This weeks insight into my own patterns and fears was once again a gift from sitting with the quail. 🐤

We had a hard week in the coop, something happened the quail were frightened by an unknown one became incredibly aggressive injuring several others. Fear had entered the aviary. The birds were feeling unsafe and scared. I sat with them and watched for a few hours, their behavior was different, aggressive and worried.

The big aviary that I thought was a wonderful freedom for them was vast and daunting. So many generations of living in tight quarters had built the preference into their DNA. In the wild they live in little holes in the brush ans are always squeezed together in little flocks.

I decided to place the two fighting sides into their own cage. The most aggressive ones had the most fear, never let me near them. I don't know if this is related to it, but all the aggressive birds are from the same breeder. And all of the mellow sweet ones from another. Seeking to reassure the mean, fearful ones I put them in a huge dog kennel. It was large enough to set up a super protected feeling cage for them. I put places to hide, different levels, tons of straw to burrow in and covered it up except for the front while they are settling down. The rest I placed in the original cage, with two levels.

🌦 It is going to rain today. 🌧 It has started as I am writing this, the storm has arrived. 🌩 They are super cozy in their new homes, all protected and watching the drops scatter outside. I am thinking about how we react to fear. Do we lash out when scared, hide, run away? What can I learn from watching the behavior of animals, the reactions that the have when confronted with primail emotion. They have similar instincts, to the ones that control our subconscious reactions.

The Native Americans believed that when you have an animal that show up in your life and behaves in a strange way, you are to observe its behaviors and apply them to your own life. That animals can show us the way through our own emotional blocks by reveling them to us. They believe animals are aware of this connection and will reach out by trying to get your attention. To always be aware of that gift, and to take the time to observe their lesson they have for you. Much of their meditation technique and concepts of moving through your own subconscious, to be more grounded intentional human beings, was taught through storytelling. The teachers in the tales being animals. From a young age they learned to see themselves in the behaviors of the wild things.

“The world is emblematic. Parts of speech are metaphors, because the whole of nature is a metaphor of the human mind.”

Ralph Waldo Emerson, Nature

We have disconnected ourselves from the natural world. We have forgotten to see ourselves in the wild, and in others. Without this connection it is hard to be able to see our own subconscious selves. We are collectively stuck in a false reality where our created egos run the show.

Maybe it is time to walk among the trees, and watch the way the birds behave. To sit with ourselves and dig deep into our fears. So that our actions are the product of an intentional thought and movement. One focused on something bigger than ourselves.

And Maybe, just maybe we can even learn about it from a tiny quail.

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Big Love.

Ren