What would lead, inspire, and challenge a graceful warrior from the army of Gaea into action?
I spend a lot of my time every day struggling to decide what I should post next, so much so that I have snippets of posts in different documents, some of which make sense and some of which…Well, let’s just call them “creative moments.”
This morning was no exception as I prepared to write the Sunday Duckisode.
Here I was going about some household chores in the hope that if I looked like I was really focused on washing those dishes, that one of the ducks would hazard an appearance. I even pooped out Lola the duck master with a long walk followed by a dog park WWF match (World Woofing Federation) to remove any perceived danger to the bearer of golden eggs.
Alas, all was quiet on the Gangnam front (see The Ducks Are Quacking).
Actually, all was TOO quiet. Had I found the Power of Now in some stinky pot? Tsk tsk. Not WITH some stinky pot! That would be the Power of Mañana.
It was shaping up to be a duckless Sunday, yet I could still hear the phantom of the Mama Duck (from Smells Like Duck) whispering inside my brain “Qua-quack!”
Can you tell me how I am supposed to “Re-lax!” when the ghost of duck dinners past is still haunting me?
I’ll need to schedule a quackercism if she persists. In any case, I’d rather be tottering on the edge of schizophrenia with an otherworldly guide than a poltergeist, so I thought that maybe if I listened (like I had promised myself), then the hovering duvet cover with black eye holes would fly back to the universe.
I lay on my back with my feet apart and the palms of my hands facing upward for a little guided Yoga Nidra. I played Karusia Wroblewski’s script on my smart phone, closed my eyes, took a few deep breaths, stayed perfectly still, and began the rotation of consciousness exercise by becoming aware of different body part sensations as I repeated them after Karusia in sequence in my mind.
“Right hand thumb, second finger, third finger, fourth finger, fifth finger, palm of the hand, back of the hand, wrist, lower arm, elbow, upper arm, shoulder, armpit, side, waist, hip, hamstrings, right thigh, knee cap, calf muscle, ankle, heel, sole, top of the right foot, right toes, the big toe, second toe, third, fourth, fifth.”
The plan worked. The little quack was gone, my breathing became softer, and I continued with the left side of the body.
“Left hand thumb, second finger, third—“
“—feather, fourth feather, fifth feather, inside wing, outside wing, wingtip, lower wing, scapular, wingpit, flank, rump, tail, shank, hind toe, web, toe, quack, quack, quack,…”
“That’s not right,” thought my consciousness as the script continued in the background, but I still repeated the bird parts as this new voice took over the recording.
Of course I KNEW that I wasn’t a duck, yet it was just easier to quack along rather than arbitrate an argument between my thinking and feeling minds.
I’m glad I did because reason does not accept the existence of golden eggs and the Hypnoduck was about to take me on a current life regression to September 2008 to discover one.
For the sake of clarity I will translate into English the relevant portion of the guided quacking. This is what she said:
“You are walking down a staircase. Each step you take you feel more and more relaxed. Every time you count one step you go deeper and deeper into your subconscious. You count down from step 10 and feel more relaxed. Step 9. Your eyelids are heavy. Step 8. Deeper. Step 7….Step 1. You are completely relaxed. You are in a very very deep state of relaxation.”
“On the quack of three, I will ask you to open your eyes, but you will be unable to do so. Your eyelids are very very heavy. They will remain shut when I ask you to open them on the quack of 3. Quack. Quack. Quack. Open your eyes, but you cannot. They are shut tight. Open you eyes. You cannot. Good…”
From that point on, the voice faded further into the background as my body sat in a Past Life Regression classroom while my mind walked out onto a balcony.
The air was dry and hot. The setting sun cast a burnt orange glow outlining three pyramids on a plateau. Cairo! The Great Pyramid of Giza stood before me in all its splendour and I was awestruck.
I had asked a question and the question had brought me to Ancient Egypt where people of all nationalities had journeyed great distances to hear me speak. The crowd below me radiated with hope and love. They knew that I had an important message to share, but the question that brought me there was still looping behind my teary eyes:
“Why am I here? I should be studying to be a Holistic Nutritionist.”
“Why am I procrastinating?”
Quack. Quack. Quack.
I came back to my living room, eyes open as subliminally instructed to do so during the Egyptian interlude. A golden egg dropped at my feet and cracked open. I sat up and reached inside it for an miniature papyrus scroll inscribed with hieroglyphs. Surprisingly, the translation quacked straight out of my mouth.
“Qua qua quacking qua quack quack.” (You are doing the wrong thing)
So I quit the Holistic Nutritionist studies and waddled into the unknown. The Hypnoduck apparently couldn’t resist a little post-hypnotic suggestion at my expense. I am happy to report that the effect wore off in a couple of hours.
On that day my heart opened to trusting myself. Now I go with my duck.
What about you? Is there something you think you should be doing but keep putting off?
Is your duck trying to lead you somewhere different? It doesn’t only happen When Ducks Fly South?
When your duck says “quack”, quack!
