In today’s episode of Healing From Within, your host Sheryl Glick, author of her newly released book, The Living Spirit: Answers for Healing and Infinite Love, welcomes guest Noelle Meade-Izzi, author of The Hummingbird that Answered my Heart’s Calling , a book that shares the extraordinary within the ordinary in order to realize the power of nature and its ability to teach heal and reconnect us to our true human nature. Noelle Meade-Izzi is an entrepreneur, philanthropist, author, speaker, award winning graphic designer and Natu-journalist capturing visual reality with her camera and combining wildlife anecdotes and facts to encourage every person’s potential to connect to and preserve nature. Her study of the wisdom of the animal world, animal symbolism and animal totems enriches our lives.
Noelle will share her experience with Artemis, the hummingbird who took up residence in a tree branch overlooking her bedroom and how her interaction with this mother hummingbird brought her solace and hope after being caught in the economic downturn and market crash of 2008. But Noelle’s personal story and encounter with Artemis is only part of her mission as she offers methods for protecting and supporting what she calls the Power Pollinators- who are essential to our food chain and must be supported to avoid a global natural crisis.
As Noelle watched in awe, captivated by this stately looking creature, (the hummingbird) she says she felt a sense of humility…it was as if this bird had selected her home, her tree so she might observe the magical process of hummingbird life emerge..a mother and her nestling. Noelle chose to call the hummingbird Artemis, named after the goddess Artemis- guardian of Nature…Of all the Greek Goddesses, Artemis was born to serve as a nurturer and protector.
Noelle mentions that each time she took her place on the balcony, Artemis would shift and face her directly and her soulful eyes like little black pearls seemed to perceive something beyond mortal vision. Noelle mentions G.K. Chesterton an English poet who once wrote, “There is a road from the eye to the heart that does not go through the intellect..” Sheryl Says that sounds like Unconditional love: the love of truth without restriction or judgment and of the soul and its highest connection to Universal Source which is compassion and pure love.
What inspired Noelle to write The Hummingbird that Answered My Heart’s Calling was a moment of self discovery. As Noelle watched the incubated egg in the tiny nest and developed a spiritual bond to Artemis as she watched she saw the bird was totally unaffected by the gardeners below and the winds that blew. You might say it was as if she intrinsically knew she was safe supported and protected by something larger than herself. Artemis seemed to simply trust the journey and Noelle began to ponder the symbolic and literal aspects of the hummingbird. Artemis shared a part of her world offering insight into her own life and as a creature that symbolizes tireless joy and who literally seeks the sweetness (nectar) and beauty (flower) of life, Noelle began to realize she must do the same…simply open her eyes to the beauty and goodness in all things and in her life experiences to experience abundant joy. And so it began— Seek the goodness in Life! We can all do that once we stop focusing on everyone else and their opinions and beliefs.
Noelle tells us the importance of the Pollinators (Bees, Birds, Butterflies, and Bats) their contribution and the possibility and consequences of their potential extinction…bees in particular. As Artemis extracts nectar from flowers the pollen that falls on her beck is then re-distributed to other plants and flowers contributing to the proliferation of new growth. This simple expression of giving and receiving was revealed.
Noelle shares her story of panic attacks that began just before Artemis came into her life. It almost seems like Divine Intervention for Artemis to have nested in Noelle’s tree branch for she shared her simple trust in living according to intuition and her inner connection to the bigger plan of life. Sheryl tells Noelle that she has spoken on other shows on the extent of the use of anti-anxiety and depression medications that almost 60 percent of women are prescribed when they visit their doctors…that may be an initial way to deal with an emotional or physical condition but we would like to look past the quick fix approach to find ways for lasting and meaningful changes in life style thoughts and actions that may be causing the physical symptoms. As we are evolving spiritually at this time at a faster rate than before many people are more sensitive to energy, shifts in thoughts and peoples actions and events in the world. Creative people are feeling these changes greatly at the present time. In learning to protect one’s personal energy system, meditate and begin to know our true nature as energetic beings having a physical life we are better equipped to deal with these physical symptoms created within from the forces of the outside world around us.
Sheryl relates to Noelle by saying, “Years ago when I first was developing my Reiki healing practice and becoming aware of downloading information from a Universal Source with messages for my clients…I came across a book entitled Animal Magick by DJ Conway that has been invaluable to me in giving my clients further insights into the messages when I envision an animal or something from nature in the reading. I myself one day became aware of a squirrel that stopped on the platform above the steps leading to my office who looked me squarely in the eye and wouldn’t budge…at that time I wasn’t aware of the value or importance of animal totems for sharing wisdom and helping us on our spiritual journey. So that night I went to a workshop where I was practicing deep meditation and beginning to respond to the messages and feelings from Spirit…a woman there told me she saw a squirrel as one of my totems and I was really less than impressed but the next day when I check my book I found out that the attributes and ways a squirrel prepares for the future by storing up time, resources and energy..resting during unproductive times while moving to a higher level of consciousness to avoid harassment was quite true for my own handling of my day to day experiences.”
Noelle tells us three important facts in her book.
- Within each of us is the capacity to connect to the Universe a bigger view of Ourselves and existence and with nature and to discover the profound goodness that pervades all that exists and co-exists .
- The Universe is always listening and responding to our feelings and thoughts (our heart’s calling) Be open to the way God the Universe, The Supreme Being (however we choose to label it) Become aware of the teachers who support our journey and development towards becoming a more evolved and self-aware human race.
- Everything is connected. Everything affects everything else and we must respect and cherish and preserve all life forms.
Noelle and Sheryl have looked at a way that the smallest of creatures entered Noelle’s life and made a major impact on her sense of love of self, life and moved her past the obstacles of that time to grow and enlarge her concept of a bigger reality: our seen and unseen world, our unconscious soul essence or inner realm that truly emerges when we awaken, pay attention, and appreciate the source of wisdom that guides us from Universal Energy. In observing Artemis care for and nurture her nestling she fulfilled what every living thing yearns for- to love and be loved.
Noelle wrote…. “I found it fascinating how God, The Universe, the Supreme Intelligence…however we choose to label it equips all beings with an intuition that’s unyielding. This awareness is not exclusive to the thinking humans but rather woven and spun through all life forms. Interestingly enough, it is we humans that abandon our intuition more often than not, consequently repeating the proverbial, “I Knew I should have followed my gut feeling on that….over and over in our heads.” And so it goes, Artemis inspired me to not only pay close attention to that small still voice called intuition but to also trust it. Maybe then I will more cognately harmonize with my nest—my world.
What Noelle wrote reminds Sheryl to remember as always to make change when called for and to see our way forward to manifest the best in our lives no matter what the circumstances are: also to allow ourselves to perceive a new more conscious possibility, act on it and create a new reality. Then we can realize this sense of intuition connects us to all of life. This thought allows you to move past limitations, fears, patterns of the past that have not yielded the results you want and to find a way to serve others in a loving and positive fashion as the Universal Source would hope we can.
As Sheryl has written in her new book The Living Spirit, the responsibility for happiness and spiritual growth begins with an awareness or knowingness that the key to all our successes and joys resides within us. The outside world may offer us challenges that lead us to discover our personal power and our ability to wisely become our best most creative inquisitive engaged spirit in search of truth trust and love.
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