dharma
The Wisdom Of The Cuckoo
Over the past year, I have become fascinated with birds, particularly thrushes. They are small to medium-sized ground birds that feed mostly on insects and fruit. My interest began with the American robin, but soon branched out to other thrushes worldwide, such as the fieldfare, the Eurasian blackbird, and olive thrush of Southern Africa.
One peculiar species I accidentally stumbled upon is the well-known, and also notorious cuckoo. Apart from being famous as the key feature in ornate wooden clocks from Germany, the cuckoo is also infamous for being a ‘parasitic’ bird that lays its eggs in other birds’ nests.
Yes, the cuckoo does not raise its own young. Instead, it takes advantage of other bird parents by laying in their nests. Once the egg hatches, the cuckoo chick attempts to push the other bird species’ eggs out of their nest, thus monopolizing the surrogate parents’ energy. The cuckoo chick typically also grows much bigger than the natural offspring of its adopted parents.
Watching some videos of cuckoos online, I became aware of many negative comments on YouTube about these amazing birds. Many folks apparently choose to regard the cuckoo as a devious villain of the natural world. However, I don’t see it that way at all.
Being a co-parent myself, who had to depend on my ex-husband to provide much of the care for my two children when they were younger, due to my personal health challenges after a near-death experience (NDE), I feel empathy for the cuckoo’s eccentricity and the unusual value it brings to the animal kingdom.
Forgive, But Never Forget!
I’ve been reflecting on the notion of ‘forgive and forget’ in this season of thanksgiving, joy, generosity, and gratitude. Is it indeed necessary for us to both forgive and forget when others wrong us? Does that not make is doormats or losers? Consulting spirit on this matter, I found that the concept of ‘forgetting’ actually implies something quite different to our typical understanding of it.
True forgiveness is to ‘turn the other cheek’ when we are wronged. It is an essential aspect of our spiritual growth and soul evolution. When we practice forgiveness, we increase dharma, which is essentially ‘cosmic law and order’ and therefore ‘good karma.’ If we have good dharma, we begin to receive more gifts and blessings from the Universe, and spontaneous kindness and generosity from others. We also become more approachable because our ‘gratitude glass’ is always more than half full with spiritual champagne!
Spiritual practice and energetic self-care are the optimal ways to practice and strengthen our forgiveness. Through daily prayer, meditation, candle work, or journaling, supplemented by anointing ourselves with healing essential oils, for example, or taking an Epsom salt bath, we can release all resentment, anger and bitterness that block our energy flow and holds us back.
The other person does not need to know that we’ve forgiven them. It is of course even better if we tell them, but their participation or approval is not necessary. Forgiveness is a private matter and a gift we give to ourselves.
Forgetting harms and hurts is however an entirely different matter. If we forget too easily, we also tend to stop reflecting gratefully on our joys and blessings. Bad things happening to good people increases our appreciation and gratitude for the good things in our lives.
Karma, Dharma Or Lesson?
Karma is defined as the sum of our actions which will determine our fate or destiny. I choose to see karma as a reprimand from the Universe. We can see how people who are uncaring or cruel in their words or actions will suffer a fate similar to the those they have been unfeeling towards.
A good example of this is Scrooge. Mr. Scrooge was a slave driver, never had a good word for anyone, saw the worst in every situation whether it benefited him or not. The ghosts who came to visit him in the night showed him what his fate would be because of his thoughts and actions.
Dharma is defined as the principles that regulate the cosmic order or purifying the souls of human beings. I choose to see dharma as the other side of karma. That’s not to say that karma is negative, but that dharma is more positive, and the more we strive for the positive, the more we live in the light, the more we align with the Universe, the more dharma we incur. The easiest way to incur dharma is to live your life in a “’ it forward’ sort of way. Do for others just for the sake of doing, not for whatever you think will come to you because of your good works.
Then we have lessons. I believe that when we choose to be born, we contract with deity, spirit guides and certain people to learn certain lessons while we are here in this life. A lot of times, the relationship is karmic in nature, a situation in a past life that you need to do over, and most of the people involved now were involved then.
I’ve discovered in my years of reading people that we learn the best about ourselves, our limits, our feelings, our capacity to love, while in relationships with others. Whether sibling, child, parent, co-worker or mate, the lesson learned in the relationship will shape the way we deal with others for the rest of this life, and possibly into the next life.
