Shifting

Things are shifting.  All signs point in that direction. 

When this seems to be the case for me, I watch the animals around me.  These are the animals that eventually show up in my artwork.  What do they have to say to me?  What is their message?  Sometimes I am distracted and can't hear them.  So I research them -- find out their totem meanings.  Then I single out the one or few meanings that fit for me in that moment the animal and I shared.

Recently I experienced four (five) totem animals all in a row.  While I relate this story, I will admit that I am a bit trepidatious to reveal parts of my personal life.  How can a set of experiences so personal to me mean anything to someone else?  By example.  Hopefully, my story will show others how to examine the encounters they have in their own lives.

So I recently started seeing a man.  And while we were on his back porch, a large moth (we're talking near-bat, here) flew at my head kamikaze-style, and into his house.  It landed on his wall.  It was a mottled grey moth, but when it flew, the underside was a brilliant red, making it look almost like a monarch butterfly when in flight.  After studying the moth for a few moments, we did a trap-and-release maneuver for the moth, letting it back outside, to fly at someone else's head.

Now, I have created pieces with moths in them before, but it has been a little while, and if I am not currently working with a particular totem, I will tend to lose track of its entire meaning.  Moth, I was thinking, is transformation.  And while it does symbolize that, as far as totems go, transformation is more the meaning for a butterfly than a moth.  Turns out, moth is a messenger, and a symbol for relationships. Moth will reveal true feelings that are hidden, and trust you to know whether the person you are with is right for you.  Well, this moth nearly hit me in the head.

The next totem animal in this series is the black ant.  They are crawling, one by one, all throughout the man's house.  Black ant also has appeared in my artwork before.  Industriousness, discipline, patience, persistence.  To show us how we can be the architects of our own lives, and can build all of our dreams in time.

The next day, I sat under a tree.  Not to sound too much like Buddah here, I was on my lunch break, having a sort of crisis of fear.  A squirrel ran over, climbed the tree, sat on a limb, and stared me down.  Distracted by the workday and the fear, I could not hear what it was saying to me.  But squirrel (also having appeared in my artwork), while symbolizing gathering and preparedness, also seeks to show us when to unburden ourselves. When is the point where we have collected too much, and are storing burdens of thought that make us inactive?  I believe that squirrel was telling me to drop those fears and move forward.

As I was trying to listen to the squirrel, I had been noticing that my hand kept getting tickled by something.  Without looking, I tried to brush it away.  It came back.  After the squirrel stopped staring me down, I looked at my hand.  A little yellow bee was buzzing around it, as though my hand had a dusting of pollen on it.  Reminding the bee that I was not a flower, I moved from my spot.  The bee probably would not have stung me, though.  As all of these animals were, the bee too was a messenger.  It has been a few years since I created a piece with a bee in it, and that piece hangs on my wall.  Bee is a symbol of fertility and accomplishment, and the bee reminds me to strive for my dreams, to work with others as well as alone, and to work in such a way that I always have time for myself.

These four totem animals in such rapid succession suggest to me that I am on the right path, and will have what I seek in time, as long as I keep watching and listening, moving with steadfastness and patience, being true to myself.  And these totems will likely show up in a new piece of artwork within the coming few months.

While I am not going to bring this post back full-circle, and discuss how all of these encounters relate to a new relationship, I will say that any reader may feel free to analyze if they so choose.  I will also note that these four totems may show up in the new piece along with rabbit, who jumped out at me a few days later.  Rabbit, the keeper of fertility and new life, also reveals the need for planning, and often suggests that success and movement ahead will come in leaps and bounds.  Leaps and bounds.