A sparrow finds his way into the café, yet has trouble finding his way out. It’s not entirely that he’s a dummy exactly. The layout of the entrance is confusing. The door is in a corner, but there is a glass wall enclosing the exit. When the bird flies in a straight line along the front window of the café, instead of flying out the door as he would expect t0, he flies straight into the glass wall that works as a buffer between the cold currents blowing on Massachsuetts Avenue and the patrons of the café. Despite various action-oriented efforts of patrons and attendant work-study yoga student, the bird continues to flutter around in its glass prison, occasionally attempting to fly through the glass window at the front of the store.
Patrons try walking behind it, hoping to direct it to the passageway to freedom. A tea drinker tries distributing crumbs in a path between the bird and the doorway, but the bird is much too frightened to eat. Another patron suggests that perhaps his cap will make a container for the bird, and tries to catch it to show it the door. By now the bird has become so frightened that it merely crashes into the wall in a panic, intent on avoiding this human.
The dharma student who is serving the tea thinks maybe a wicker crate will do the trick, but she too is unlucky at convincing the bird that her efforts are in his best interest.
As if waking from a stupor, it suddenly occurs to me to suggest that we stop taking action and instead between the five of us just hold the intention that the poor sparrow finds his way to freedom. This is not to brag about my great prowess, tempting though that is. But merely that, as a student of Abraham-Hicks it has finally dawns on me that this is a great opportunity to put what they teach into practice. Abraham, channeled by Esther Hicks, emphasizes the power of taking the emotional journey first, rather than leading with action. Wayne Dyer named one of his books The Power of Intention. Abraham consistently extols the importance of lining up one's vibration (i.e., emotional set point) to match the desired outcome before embarking on a course of action.
The sparrow has created an opportunity for us to experiment with the concept. Compared with more personal issues, in this case it’s easy to be neutral about the outcome. I mean, I’m invested in this poor creature finding freedom and safety, but the outcome doesn’t weigh as heavily upon me as having the money to pay off my car loan, for example.
As soon as give words to the suggestion for us together to hold the intention for the bird’s successful flight away from captivity, the little fellow spreads his wings and soars up from his hiding place under one of the chairs in a corner of the café and out the door to freedom.
By this time we human witnesses bonded in our mutual desire to help him. There was far more interaction among us than one normally encounters in a café, even in Cambridge. I am sure that each one of us will have many occasions to remember and share this incident, recounting the tale of our participation in an ad hoc experiment demonstrating the power of intention.
