The curlews keep screaming outside my window and I don’t know why. This week, I’ve heard them late at night, with their blood-curdling calls and their squabbling on the pebbled drive below. When I look out they are either standing stock still, calling, calling or silently and swiftly hurrying this way and that. It’s hard to discern any obvious purpose for their movements but I daresay it makes sense to them.
Whenever I hear them, I stop what I’m doing and move instinctively to the windows to chat. They are no doubt here for a reason, I just haven’t got the message yet. I’ve asked them repeatedly what they have to share with me but the meaning of their visits remains opaque.
In my life, birds that arrive so obviously and in such an attention-grabbing manner inevitably have a message or two for me. A frogmouth owl used to arrive at my old house late at night and sit calling on the fence until I ventured out into the night to talk. It spoke to me of the wisdom of words, my writing and my books. Obviously.
Then there were Mr and Mrs Plover who would casually loiter on the footpath in the daytime or sometimes scurry down the middle of my suburban street at midnight making a hell of a racket until I ventured out on the front steps. One was so determined that it stopped its progress up the street abruptly, directly opposite where I was standing, looked me straight in the eyes and chattered on for quite some time before dashing off to the nearby intersection and veering right. The plovers spoke to me of love and direction and using your voice to defend what you want. Strangely, I had forgotten those messages until this moment.
I only realised that birds were messengers a few short years ago. A shamanic friend was mentoring me at the time and helped me to understand that messages come via multiple messengers including animals, the plants, the sky, the wind and other formations chosen by spirit. The Universe sends us messages in so many ways yet we often miss them because we are too busy thinking and analysing. We don’t realise that all that analysing switches off our intuitive knowing.
Analysis blocks our ability to see the intuitive signposting going on right in front of us as the Universe tries to get messages through via any means at its disposal.
Someone asked me recently, how do I know if my intuition is working? My answer was you must trust the messages you receive and let go of the logic your mind determinedly seeks. Intuition is not about logic. It is about a feeling within you; an inner wisdom that circumvents reason and just is. It will usually come for a place that is still and quiet. It is rarely fraught with emotion and is usually a quiet but insistent voice rather than a screaming banshee.
As I write these words, I am beginning to suspect this is perhaps why the curlews came to call. It is so I will tell this story of talking to the birds that visit me at night and demand my attention through the windows.