Are you an Eagle or a Chicken?

A story:

An ornithologist was visiting a farmer. He noticed an eagle amidst the chickens, so he asked the farmer, “Why is there an eagle with your chicken?”

The farmer answered, “Well, I found this eaglet and did not know what to do with it, so I started to feed him chicken feed, raised him with the chickens. He seemed to like the feed, so he stayed.”

The scientist asked the farmer if he could try an experiment with the eagle. He took him in his arms, told him “You are an eagle; you belong to the open skies,” but the eagle flew back to the chickens. He took the eagle to the top of the barn, and told him again, “You are an eagle; you belong to the open skies,” but the eagle escaped again and went back to the chickens. The scientist took the eagle again, but this time he went to a high mountain. He told the eagle, “You are an eagle; you belong to the open skies, to the great spaces. Glide.” This time, he threw the eagle into the open air.

The eagle protested a little at first, but then he quickly spread his majestic wings, screeched, and soared with great majesty to the heavens. He started to do what he was made to do: reign over the open skies, glide with majesty, and be the most beautiful creature one could ever behold.

Are you the eagle, living with, and thinking you are, a chicken? Or are you meant to spread your wings and fly in a different way?

Take Wrong Turns...Talk To Strangers

I have always been a fan of turning left when you would normally turn right.
Intuition guides many of the choices I have made in life.  Synchronicity appears when I have made these choices and life becomes amazing beyond a sheer coincidence.  Only in hindsight do I realize how everything is truly connected and that you need to "keep on keeping on".  Don't let situations in your life paralyze you - believe me, I know how difficult it is to try to keep positive in the midst of darkeness.
And be sure to discover your passions in life.  Follow Your Bliss!

Here are some amazing words of inspiration from Randall Munroe and Rev. Michael Piazza:
Take wrong turns. Talk to strangers. Open unmarked doors. And if you see a group of people in a field, go find out what they are doing. Do things without always knowing how they'll turn out. - There are so many adventures that you miss because you're waiting to think of a plan. To find them, look for tiny interesting choices. And remember that you are always making up the future as you go.
~ Randall Munroe

While we seek to discern God's vision for our lives, it is easy to get caught in inertia, to be frozen in place by the sense that we can't move until we know exactly where to go. This is tempting: to take a break from the journey until we have checked all the maps, the GPS, the Internet for directions, and are absolutely certain of our direction and next steps. However, many of us have stories where we did all of those things and ended up at a dead end or, in my personal experience, in the middle of a field.
Even when we feel certain of the future, the future is never set in stone. God does not need us to have it all figured out to call us toward a particular vision. We don't have to stay still to know God. God calls us to live, to love, and to learn as much as we can in the process.
Visioning can take time, if we do it right. In the meantime, we must worship joyfully. We must pray without ceasing. We must build community by laughing and weeping together for days, months, years on end. We must continue our adventures in living and loving that brought us here and will carry us into our future. It is in worship, in prayer, in community, and in life and love that we will most clearly hear God's call, see what God's next steps for us might be, and find sustenance for our journey toward God's vision. This is the way it always has been for God's people, and this is the way it will be for us.

God of action and reflection, keep us unfrozen as we seek your vision for our lives. Dare us to move, challenge us to adventure, urge us to journey on. Be with us on all of our adventures of life, showing us your way whenever we are able to see you in our midst. Amen
~ Rev. Michael Piazza