“To bring something into your life, imagine it is already there,” wrote Richard Bach in his book Illusions. I needed to prove that I was the creator of my life, so I left my home in the city and set out to find a blue pen. I gave myself 48 hours. That weekend I should have walked through all the parks, all the natural conservatories, all the reserves, all the rural roads within a fifty mile radius of my house. Eventually, I even looked in my own little yard, but not a blue feather.

It was Sunday night. My 48 hours almost ran out. Finally, I gave up, gave up, and decided to go to bed. As I reached for the light switch, I heard a voice inside my head. “Turn around. Turn around.” The voice was subtle and yet it had a force that forced me to obey.

The moment I turned around, my cat, Sesame, knocked over his basket of toys. Between the spilled catnip balls and mice was a blue feather. Once attached to a ball wrapped in string along with canary yellow and cardinal red feathers, the peacock blue feather had detached itself and lay alone as if to say, “Here I am. Can you see me now?” The pen was there the whole time. All he had to do was open his eyes and mind to see it.

I have told this story many times in workshops over the years when a workshop participant outdid me. In that workshop, a year-long mystery school, El Camino Sagrado, we met once a month. Participants were tasked with manifesting a blue pen to show that they could create what they dreamed of for their lives. They had a month to do it.

When we met again, everyone had found their blue feathers. Everyone enthusiastically told their stories as we waited for one of the women who was late. Finally, he walked in, out of breath with excitement and a handful of feathers. “Will the white feathers count?” he asked, and then told his story.

He was driving north on a two-land highway toward our El Camino Sagrado meeting. She was a little late and frustrated because she was trapped behind a slow moving truck and couldn’t get through due to traffic. Finally, she gave up, gave up, telling herself that she could also relax and enjoy the scenery. At that point, the truck hit a pothole and the feathers flew straight at her and straight into her hand that was outside the car window.

She was following a truck loaded with chickens. Everyone in our workshop laughed with our friend and our delight was growing even more. He has another story to tell. “All these white feathers prove to me that if I make my intention clear, act towards what I want and indulge in the process, I can manifest what I want. Still, these are white feathers and I wanted a blue feather, but I decided that the amount of These white feathers would take the place of a blue feather. I was already here and I had this bunch of white feathers. Then when I got out of the car, I looked down and there, right in front of my feet where I almost stepped on it was this. ” He raised his other hand and there it was, a perfect blue feather, a gift from a blue jay.

Diana Rankin © 2013