Do you remember heeding the cadence that calls for us pass on judging a book by its cover?  If we look beyond a cursory first glance, Turkey Vulture personifies this metaphor.  Have you ever got a rise while watching these birds effortlessly riding thermals by using Earth’s energy centers with minimal effort? Their message to us is that when we effectively integrate spirit into our Being, we can transcend matter.  Rather than focusing on our limitations, we levitate our consciousness toward perceiving infinite possibilities.  Instead of looking for forecasts that call for doom and gloom, we make a conscious choice to see the silver lining and make only positive interpretations.  On the spiritual path, we become the change we want to see in the world by doing the inner work necessary to actualize those changes we want to see.  We cannot co-create sustainable energetic changes in ourselves and our world, unless we choose to do the inner work.  Otherwise, the changes in climate are merely external and cosmetic.  Winter is a powerful time to stoke the embers within, as is meditation on Turkey Vulture waking us up to that.  Turkey Vulture helps guide spirit into our Being with its medicine of purification, death and rebirth and new vision.  Collectively, we need all the help we can get with that right now. 

On the surface, many storms are brewing and Climate Change is the new normal.  We are giving birth to a New Earth, but not without the accompanying labor pains. Some folks describe this transition as moving from a Pisces age to an Aquarian age.  It’s kind of like when your old self dies.  During the dying process, a new identity is emerging as a rebirth.  It takes time before the dust settles.  Rome wasn’t built, nor destroyed in a day.  Last week, we watched a US campaign to end the occupation by holding Israel accountable to US and International law.  Wal-Marts in Ohio and Texas continued breaking their company promise to keep assault rifles off its shelves.  Whether its BPA’s in foods or PED’s in humans, capitalist doctrine, based on primarily maximum economic profit tries to convince us that we should augment ourselves.  But there is a deep place of self-esteem that reminds us that we are OK just the way we are.  In sports news, linebacker Manti Te’o admitted to having a fantastic relationship that appears to have been a figment of his imagination.  Haven’t we all done that?  While fantasy and alternate realities are real on some level, we have to learn how to stay grounded in this reality.  Meditation is a healthy strategy for us to become the change we want to see in the world, but it can also become a skillful avoidance tactic.  At the end of the day, we all have to act.  Martin Luther Kind, Jr. didn’t just sit around and dream.  He took it to the edge and realized that his dream was bigger than his physical life.  MLK wasn’t just spinning dreams of who we might be.  He lived it.  Going to jail and risking his life to do the right thing was horribly uncomfortable, while staying on the pulpit and receiving liberal doses of applause was ego-gratifying for sure. 

We are living in hard times.  There is much pain and suffering on our Planet.  But what an opportunity for us to wake up.  If you find yourself having a sense of entitlement that you should have a better life, then take the action steps to change yourself on the inside first.  There is a sense of Armageddon here.  But you do not have to get stuck in that place, nor do you have to overindulge in it.  With Turkey Vulture as a spirited guide, we use whatever natural resources are available to us to nourish ourselves and continue onward’.  If only our friends in Congress, World leaders and everyone else on the Planet would make this internal shift.  It is going to take hard work to shift our consciousness and tip the scale.  Believe it is possible and take action.  Even if it is gut wrenching to watch a predator eat an innocent prey, take a closer look and examine why Great Spirit revealed this moment for you to notice.  What message(s) does the predator and prey have for you to apply to your life?  Pay attention to your feelings and dreams and take notes.  It requires taking inventory on yourself, rather than getting preoccupied with the distractions and giving away your power to those distractions.  This is not about being ego-centered.  This is about getting to know yourself on a deeper level and therefore enriching your understanding of others.

See you further on down the trails,

Ari