Those Goats have a Mind of their Own

You know it’s funny, there are a strain of black goats here called ‘Cilentana’ goats because they are native to the Cilento area of Southern Italy. They are said to be challenging for the goat herders to shepherd because they are quite wilful and have a mind of their own. There are other goats, brown and white ones that are as a result of cross breeding with Swiss goats, they are tame and docile and easier to manage.

These black wilful goats brought me back to something Don Americo, a Peruvian mystic that I trained with, taught me high up in the mountains of Peru. He spoke about the difference between the energy and characteristics of an eagle compared to a domesticated chicken and how as humans we mirrored these traits. Like all shrewd mystics he didn’t ask me which I thought I was, but the answer that was obvious to me, was that I was on the domesticated chicken side of the equation. I so wanted to be that eagle but when you are in the midst of a true mystic honesty is always close at hand. There was no getting away from how compliant, tame and docile I had become. I scanned my life, my work as an IT Consultant, my relationships, my hobbies (which were few), and they all pointed towards domesticated chicken. My dad was from the west of Ireland which is known for its wild men so I hoped that eagle energy still lived somewhere in my DNA.

Where had I lost my eagle-ness? Did I ever have it? These questions came to mind as I sat with Don Americo in silence…….well it wasn’t very silent in my mind!

I feel we all embody Eagle energy as tiny children and yet somehow life’s circumstances seem to conspire to quash this wilful energy ensuring that as we grow up that we are less inclined to have ‘a mind of our own’.

In our current modern western world it takes a lot of commitment to be an eagle. There aren’t very many role models. And yet our world more than ever needs us to be eagles, to be wilful Cilentana goats with a mind of our own so that we won’t be easily herded the way governments and corporations want us to be.

Ever since that time in the Peruvian mountains, I have committed to reclaiming my own inner eagle; through kickboxing and Tantra, participating in men’s groups and by continually connecting with nature which is in its essence is wild. And in doing so I slowly remembered those parts of me that were undomesticated and less inclined to ‘go along with the herd’. I am re-embodying my eagle and I give thanks to the black Cilentana goats for reminding me every time I see them on the mountain that I too have very much a mind of my own.

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