Lessons from a little Crested Pigeon

Come on in my friend, it’s lovely to have you here! As I write this it’s a sunny autumn day here on the east coast of Australia. So, I thought we would enjoy our time of tea & reflection in warm sunshine.

I have prepared our mugs & gf delicious double choc brownies with fresh strawberries. Would you prefer coffee or tea?

Now we’re settled in the warm sunshine in my autumn garden, listening & watching the beautiful little birds that come & visit, let’s begin…

Talking about birds, the other day I was out walking on a trail that I enjoy traversing. It’s beside the waters of our bay. When I noticed a little Crested Pigeon on the pathway up ahead. He also noticed me coming towards him…

A curious thing happened

He must have perceived me as a threat, as birds of the wild do. I expected him to take flight so I continued walking. But you know what he did?

He decided to turn & run as fast as his little bird legs could carry him! I was gobsmacked! Here was a little bird that had the gift of flight & yet instead of using that wonderful gift he literally high tailed it & ran!

As I kept my leisurely pace up behind him, he ran for quite a ways then suddenly remembered he could fly & took perfect flight out of the perceived danger, soaring heavenward!

This gave me much food for thought for our reflection!

How often do we perceive a threat & instead of using our God given gifts, we turn & high tail it out of there as fast as we can?

Awkwardly running along a path that wasn’t meant for us, rather then soaring heavenward!

Traumatic experiences can impact us in ways we don’t realize…

I don’t know about you but past experience has taught me that certain situations can turn into traumatic events for our mental, emotional & spiritual health.

While these experiences can give us wise insight into life, they also set up trauma memory markers on our subconscious.

This sets up an involuntary emotional reaction, at the subconscious level, when a situation hints at being similar to the past traumatic one we experienced.

Triggering, a turn & high tailing it out of there, running as fast as we can within our emotions scenario. And we keep emotionally running until we either realize what’s happening or we become emotionally exhausted!

I have been doing this with the following situation…

As you may know, if you join me here often, I have experienced quite a few traumas in my life, one of which was the death of my late husband Ed.

He died of Brain Cancer, I cared for him during his terminal illness until he lost his marathon battle for life & stepped into glory. This was an extremely traumatic time.

However, the full impact of this trauma didn’t actually hit me until after my beloved husband passed away, as I was so distracted & busy in caring for him during his decline. So when the full impact of this trauma hit me, it hit hard!

Recently, I have been asked to help out with a loved one who has a degenerative Neurological disease. Other members of the family have been giving their amazing support to this much loved member of our family who desires to stay as independent as possible (with family support).

But the main supporter now needs my support to continue their support. This had me in a quandary, for as you may know, I also have chronic health conditions & am very limited in any support I’m able to give.

But stepping out in faith I set a time to travel the distance (a ten hour return road trip) to give my support for the days needed.

Then I noticed my emotions were high tailing & running!

I realized my emotions were running overtime. Although, at first I put it down to all the preparation I need to do to travel & stay there. And thought it was this that had me a bit stressed & anxious.

For I have to prepare all the meals to take because one of the autoimmune conditions I have is Celiac disease & I need to use my gluten free kitchen to assure no gluten contamination occurs in our meals.

However, as each meal was prepared & stored in the freezer for easier transportation. I wasn’t feeling any relief in ticking these off my ‘To Do’ list, I thought this rather odd for I love accomplishing things off my list!

But yesterday it finally occurred to me what was happening, after putting on my professional cap…

This situation has triggered my trauma memory marker causing a subconscious emotional reaction of high tailing & running as fast as my emotions could run! For this situation is very similar in caring for my late husband.

Traumatic events set indelible memory markers upon our subconscious!

Once I realized this & remembered my spiritual wings of prayer, I took flight into my heavenly Father’s arms for His comfort & strength.

The following poem came to mind as I was writing this today, it was given to me when I lost my son Benjamin,

On the Wings of Prayer

Just close your eyes & open your heart

And feel your worries & cares depart,

Just yield yourself to the Father above

And let Him hold you secure in His love –

For Life on earth grows more involved

With endless problems that can’t be solved –

But God only asks us to do our best, 

Then He will “take over” & finish the rest –

So when you’re tired, discouraged & blue,

There’s always one door that is open to you –

And that is the door to “The House of Prayer”

And you’ll find God waiting to meet you there…

On “The Wings of Prayer”. 

– Helen Steiner Rice

Are you high tailing & running over in your emotions but unsure as to why my friend? Have you thought it may be a memory marker of a past trauma being triggered?

Remember, you have wings of prayer to soar above the situation into our heavenly Father’s arms of comfort & care!

More on how trauma sets memory markers upon our subconscious Here

Until next time,

Jennifer

You’re most welcome to join me in The Reading Nook

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© 2021 Jennifer M. Ross, teawithjennifer.blog All Rights Reserved. Photo of the Crested Pigeon by JJ Harrison (license to share here)

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