Bobcat’s Thoughts

Bobcat has been part of the wildlife makeup in Calgary for the past fifteen years or so.  In our area, we see Bobcat and friends fairly often or several times a month.  The fact that our hood sees it so often makes me wonder about the messages that it brings.  Here are some thoughts.

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Bobcat has lived on the fringes of urban areas for years.  It knows how to adapt to desert, mountains, swamp, and plain.  It has learned much over the 1.8 million years it has been on the planet.  Even though man has tried to kill it off, it still walks the earth, proudly wearing its gorgeous fur.

Bobcat has come forward to share some thoughts with us:

• Regardless of your appearance, you can easily blend in and camouflage yourself when the need arises.  Many of you will need to learn how to blend with the natural surroundings; and you will need to learn how to be quiet.  Four legged and winged ones are shy, and to meet them, you will need quiet and patience.
• Try limiting your diet to those things that are close at hand, fresh from the land, and made with your own hands.  Your muscles will accept this food better than artificial food.  
• Find a place where you can go and rest – not your current house – someplace on the land.  If you are scared of natural places, now is a good time to overcome that fear.
• Learn to understand or to read, the signals of the wildlife around you.  When many birds fly up suddenly, that means something that birds are scared of has come into their presence.  When animals scatter, then a predator (a big one, or a hunting man) is coming into the area. 

Blessings,

Judy

Know Where You Come From And Where You Go

On top of recovering from medical emergency, I have been sharing my life with a cold for the last four days, and a bit, and, sometimes, it seems that the cold has a better life than I do. It grows strong, barks loudly, and emits heat.  Then, that passes, and it seems like I have the best life. 

Then I read this quote by  Soko Morinaga Roshi, a Buddhist teacher, and I realized that I was experiencing the continuous process of life and death in my experience of the cold. 

 

Our lives appear to be unbroken blocks of seventy or eighty continuous years, but, actually,...when you maintain the straightforward frankness of your own mind as it comes to life each instant, even without effort, even without training, you are beautifully born each instant. You die with each instant, and go on to be born again, instant by instant.
~Soko Morinaga Roshi~

I am now believing that Cold is my friend, who is working to keep me from doing too much – taking on too many tasks.  I do what I need to and I spend a lot of time sitting and reading and watching movies because if I get too active, I begin to cough, and to congest.  When I sit quietly, then the light can move through my body and do the work that the light needs to do to work on changing me.

Blessings,

Judy

Grizzly Bear’s Message

When an animal speaks to me continuously through dreams, waves at me from pictures in a magazine, or even comes up in regular conversation, I know that I need to pay attention to what message is coming through.

Adult Grizzly

Picture from www.weforanimals.com

 

 

 

Sometimes, however, getting a message is like picking up a lot of static on your favourite radio station.  And, I was getting lots of static.  I could see Grizzly, and could not hear her.  I was getting frustrated!

Grizzly cub from  

www.weforanimals.com

 

 

 

Then, I was walking out in the provincial park.  Even though it is only the end of January, I began to think about bears.   As soon as I had this thought, the next thought flowed – Grizzly Bears are having their cubs about this time.  Where did that thought come from? I was startled!

                  

Mother Grizzly with her cub – picture from Wikipedia from Wikimedia Commons 

To get in touch with the feeling around the thought, I began to do a deep meditative breathing.  My dog looked at me, wondering what was amiss.  And gradually, a message came. Grizzly Bear said:

This is the time of hibernation.  During this time, many changes take place in bears.  The female give birth to their young, usually from two to four cubs. It is a time of introspection. For bears, the long sleep lets us walk with The Mother Of Us All without the constraints of the physical.  We learn from her, and apply the lessons when we wake up.  Bears have been shy.  We are now moving back to that place where we see humans as equals, and we will walk in the same places that they do. 

There are many humans who are undergoing the same change that we are experiencing.  However, these humans do not sleep the required time to germinate something new.  They do not empty out their systems to give the body rest.  I say this to you – this is a time of giving birth to new ideas, projects, and new ways of living.  Listen to that inner voice. Sleep when you need to, and disregard the chatter of the masses.

Bears are solitary by choice so that we can move as we need to. We also can think, play, eat, and sleep when we need to.  We are not governed by what others want to do or by any control.  Will you let your self be so free as to walk away from those things in life that control you?

Many blessings,

Judy