Mark Batcheler

For the last few years I have worked closely with a non-profit whose mission is to inspire and guide youth, adults, and families toward finding, expressing, and manifesting their inherent gifts through mentoring and creative nature experiences. When teaching these youth and subsequently their families, I often wondered what the force was that pulled people from the materialist society that most of us were raised in to a more subtle, deeply spiritual connection. Nature served as the model of education for the curriculum that we taught to the children. Always we would look to the metaphor of life that nature constantly provided us.

And nature has provided us with a blueprint and the stories to find ourselves back home. All you need is a pair of wings and an unbroken connection to your ancestral knowledge. The intrepid wheatear is a fine example. This sparrow-sized bird, whose family heirloom consists of more than a genetically imprinted map of where home is, possesses homing instincts complete with a readiness equal to that of a great athlete and explorer combined. As the eastern Canadian population of wheatears heads off on their migration, they follow their internal map towards open water for a trans-Atlantic crossing to England and then on to home to Northern Africa.