Bird Magic: Wisdom of the Ancient Goddess for Pagans & Wiccans - Sandra Kynes 2016

Bird Guides and Messages
The Practices

Even if you have not felt an affinity with birds before, as you begin to work with their energy you may develop a special connection with a particular type of bird. A bird guide may stay with you forever or a new one may come into your life as you change and grow. In addition to a special bird guide, others may become important to us at different times. You may even find that these avian contacts change through the seasons as some birds migrate. Another level of relationship with birds are the messengers that make temporary contact to bring or help us interpret information or deal with a situation.

Finding Your Bird Guide

Visualization and meditation are useful methods for finding your bird guide. Sit quietly and close your eyes in a room where you will not be disturbed. Rest your hands in your lap with palms upward and open. Take three long, deep breaths, each one slower than the one before. Become aware of the energy in your heart center. Visualize your heart energy opening like a flower. Now, image that it is late afternoon and you are sitting in a beautiful field or outdoor place that you enjoy. Keep your senses open to the smells and sounds around you. Perhaps there is a gentle breeze. Stay present and keep your mind focused on this scene. Simply breathe and wait.

If a bird appears, just observe it. The bird may approach you or keep its distance. Because you have only just met, it needs to get to know you. Allow events to unfold. It may fly off to end its first meeting with you or simply fade away. Slowly return your attention to the room in which you are sitting and journal the details of any encounter that may have occurred. Over the next few days or weeks, you may notice images of the bird everywhere you go, or you may actually see the type of bird more frequently. This is confirmation that you met your bird guide. Alternatively, do this exercise outdoors and see if a flesh-and-blood bird approaches you. However, your bird guide may or may not be one that is local to you.

Once you know the type of bird that is your guide, find out all you can about it. Begin with the information in Part Two of this book, which provides basic details, historical information, and the bird’s associations and powers relevant to Pagans and Wiccans. Your bird guide may have connections with you that stem from events in your life, your family background, or various other aspects that have shaped who you are. Take time to examine these things as well as the bird itself. Study its physical and behavioral characteristics, which may reveal things about yourself as well as your path. Also, keep in mind that your bird guide may not be local to your area.

If a bird does not come to you, don’t try to force the visualization. Or, if you get fidgety or lose focus during the visualization, this may not be the best time for your bird guide to find you. Alternatively, your bird guide may choose to make itself known to you in a dream or by continually appearing. Appearances can include actual bird sightings, the same type of bird showing up in the media, or bird figurines and pictures in shops. Whether a bird came to you in the visualization or not, you will know when your bird guide chooses to make itself known. Don’t be in a rush; it will happen when the time is right.

An important point to keep in mind is that your bird guide may not be a fabulous eagle, owl, or peacock. Don’t be disappointed; even the smallest or humblest of birds holds a great deal of power and, of course, a connection with the Goddess.

When you find your bird guide, honor it. Keep an image or figurine of it on your altar or any other place in your house or on your property that serves as a meaningful touch point. Decorate a special egg and mark it with the common or species name of your guide bird. Glue a small image of your bird onto it, or paint it to resemble the coloring and markings of your bird guide’s eggs. Keep this on your altar or in a special place where you will see it often.

Messages and Guidance

As mentioned, sometimes certain birds come to us as messengers, and sometimes we may seek an outside force for guidance. The ancient Romans called this a “bird-telling.”⁴¹ If a particular type of bird keeps appearing and has not made itself known as your guide, then it may be bringing information for you. Alternatively, its appearance may help you understand something in your life or alert you to pay more attention to a certain situation. These appearances may also occur in dreams.

Ask the bird outright, vocally or in your mind, what the message is. You may receive a forthright response; however, the message is most often revealed by the action or location of the bird. For example, if the bird is always perched on a house, examine your home life and situation. If it is always flying, perhaps there is something you want to escape from, remove from your life, or change. If it is on a fence, there may be barriers that you need to remove in some aspect of your current situation. Because each of us and each bird is unique, there are no hard and fast guidelines. However, they are not difficult to figure out.

For example, a fence can be a barrier, a hurdle, or a challenge, but it can also symbolize something that unites and defines. It can mean that you need to make a decision about something. Interpretations depend on our personal circumstances and how we view them. If the messenger bird appears on different objects, it can indicate a connection or a progression. Keep track of the bird’s activities in a journal, and then take time to review them. Think it through and keep notes because, like dreams, our interpretations can come and then be gone like a gossamer mist.

If you are uncertain of your interpretation, take your time but don’t overanalyze it. Quite often the first or simplest interpretation is the correct one. It is also normal to question our conclusions and perhaps feel a bit skeptical. If this is the case, the messenger bird may provide confirmation for you. It may appear with food or a flower in its beak for you. The confirmation you receive will make sense to you.

Sometimes a message can be very simple and may come in the form of a feather. The first time I stepped out on the back porch of my house in Maine, I heard seagulls overhead. Having spent childhood summers by the shore, it was a sound I loved. When I returned my gaze to the porch, I found a white feather right beside me. I felt that I had been welcomed to my true home.

Another way to ask for guidance or to work with a bird is to randomly open this book to a page in the profiles section. This method can also be used to aid in interpreting dreams if they included an unidentifiable bird. Read the information about the bird. Do any of the characteristics relate to you in some capacity? Some of the ways that a bird can offer guidance may be included in the magical workings section of its profile. Take time with the information as you analyze the significance of the bird and how it relates to you or your situation.

The Bird Ogham

The Celtic ogham, also known as the tree alphabet, provides a unique way to connect with avian energy because birds are associated with the characters. The bird ogham was one of many types of ogham included in The Book of Ballymote. Like many of the old “books” of Ireland, The Book of Ballymote is a collection of manuscripts. There are several ways that we can use this ogham when working with bird energy. One is to use the ogham character in place of a bird’s name when inscribing it on candles or other objects used for rituals or spells. If you have a set of ogham staves or cards, randomly choose one and then use the profiles in this book for information on a potential message.

Table 1.1 lists the ogham names, letters, and their associated birds. Because a few of the birds are not included in this book, I have offered their cousins as alternatives. You may want to explore some of the birds from the original list if they pique your interest.

Since the number of birds represented by the ogham is so limited, another way to use it is by letter. For example, if you want to work with the energy of a falcon, you could use the ogham character Fearn, which represents the letter F. For letters not represented by the ogham, there are common substitutions that can be used. For example, when working with the energy of a kingfisher use the ogham Coll, which represents the letter C and is the substitute for K. The forfeda are five characters that were not part of the original ogham. While each character is not linked with an individual bird, the crane is associated with the forfeda as a group, so any of these ogham characters may be used for crane.

When working with birds, especially when randomly selecting one from the profiles section or choosing an ogham, information may not be understood immediately. In fact, it may take a few days, a week, or more. Be patient. Information often comes softly like the flutter of wings.

41. Diane Skafte, Listening to the Oracle: The Ancient Art of Finding Guidance in the Signs and Symbols All Around Us (San Francisco: HarperSanFrancisco, 1997), 11.