Early this morning I walked down to the beach. I wasn’t looking for feathers, just walking. But the feathers were there and I couldn’t ignore them, could I? I kept picking them up, wet and washed up along the shore line, pelican feathers, gull feathers, even a heron feather or two.
Pretty soon I had a fistful of feathers -- enough for a healing bundle, then enough to fill a large vase. I wasn’t sure what to do with this plethora of feathers, nor did I know if they were truly meant as a message from the universe; they seemed like “ordinary” washed-up feathers. Still, I had never found this many before. The acquisitive side of me kept forcing feathers into my fist.
I walked further, and met a woman walking in the opposite direction who was picking up shells. She dragged a huge bag behind her, stuffing it with shells as she slowly shuffled forward, bending intently to the sand. I showed her my feathers; she showed me her shells. Then we parted, engrossed in adding to our respective collections.
One of yesterday’s sandcastles had survived the night tides and sprawled before me. I had the urge to stick my feathers right on top of it. After all, a sandcastle is a sacred thing, too, something a child’s mind (even in an adult’s body!) builds out of nothing, knowing it won’t last, knowing the sand ultimately belongs to the sea and not to the hands that shape it into towers and moats.
I thought of the birds who had shed these feathers. It was spring molting season. Perhaps they left these feathers behind so that newer, stronger ones could go grow in. The birds seemed comfortable, too, with the idea of change and impermanence, with letting go of whatever was in the way of flying free and unencumbered.
One by one, I let my feathers drop from my hand. The morning tide would take care of them, as it would the sandcastles. They would soon return wholly to the earth and become soil again, as all things eventually do. Their sister feathers would ultimately join them, even the new ones just grown in.
Meanwhile, I felt lighter without the feathers I so fiercely clutched a few moments ago. I decided to take my feathers one at a time, and leave fistfuls to someone else.
What would lighten your load and help you fly free? Imagine yourself preparing for a long journey to the stars. What would you take that would help you fly faster and farther? What would you leave behind that would weigh you down?
Close your eyes, get quiet, let your fingers lie loose and open, and pose these questions
1) to your physical self;
2) to your emotional self;
3) to your mental self; and
4) to your spiritual self.
Allow plenty of time for each of them to answer in their own ways.
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