An old native legend tells of a brave who found an eagle’s egg one day and, thinking to save it, put it in a prairie chicken’s nest. The eaglet hatched at the same time as his prairie chicken nest mates. And so, grew up with them.
As he grew, the young eagle did exactly what his prairie chickens brethren did. He pecked for insects and grubs. He clucked and cackled exactly like a prairie chicken. And when he flew, it was always in a cloud of feathers and only for a few yards at most, before falling back to the ground. After all, that’s how prairie chickens fly.
The years passed and the eagle grew old. One day he saw a magnificent bird gliding high in the cloudless sky. Gracefully the huge bird rode the air currents, hardly moving his great golden wings as he soared and wheeled through the sky.
“What a beautiful bird!” exclaimed the eagle to his prairie chicken friends. “What is it?”
“That’s an eagle…he’s the king of birds,” clucked his neighbour. “But you better forget about it. You’ll never be an eagle.”
And so the eagle forgot all about the magnificent bird, and soon died, still believing he was a prairie chicken.
Have you, like the eagle who thought he was a prairie chicken, ever thought you were less than you could be?
If so, think again…there’s an eagle in everyone of us…just waiting to soar.
