There was a season in my life when I was dive-bombing a mountain lion every chance I got.
That cat killed my friend Squiggy, a tiny squirrel with huge eyes whose chattering voice brought the trees to life. I was blinded by a dry ache for my friend, and I thought my claws might somehow fill the hollow Squiggy left in my heart.
Dangerous? Of course.
But more importantly, it was foolish.
I learned the hard way that my anger didn’t bring my friend back, nor did it change who the mountain lion was.
Lessons were all around me. I just needed to slow down long enough to see them. As I stilled my wings, the forest began teaching me that this place is not a copy-and-paste trick where everything fits together perfectly. It’s a jagged, beautiful mosaic of pieces pressing against one another.
Every piece of this puzzle is uniquely different, and every piece has its own purpose. The broad leaf catches the sun to feed the roots below. The beetle curls his treasure in the way only he knows.
You’re no exception. You’re not an extra feather fastened to someone else’s wing. When you step into the sunlight, the forest reflects light in a way it cannot without you.
Once you begin to recognize the beauty in your shape and the shapes around you, you’ll need to confront the Talon-Truth.
Respect is not the same as comfort.
To show true respect to another creature is to allow them to spread their wings freely, without clipping them to fit your ideas. It’s allowing the thorn to be prickly and the owl to hunt at night.
Respect says,
You may be who you are.
True respect requires the difficult choice to accept another creature’s place in the forest, even if that means accepting their presence as a source of pain for you.
The forest doesn’t simply tolerate the thorn, it relies on it. The thorn shields the rose from the hungry. The mountain lion ensures the herd stays swift and strong. Even the storm has a job, scouring away the debris that a gentle rain could never budge.
Not every tragedy carries a hidden gift. But in the wild, even the harshest edges have a place.
Squiggy’s death felt like it broke the forest. But the forest survives by holding both the soft and the sharp.
I stopped diving at the lion not because the grief had vanished, but because I realized my rage wasn’t bringing Squiggy back. It was only keeping me from becoming who I still needed to be.
I understood then that a forest of only oak trees is just a woodlot.
It’s the prickly, the loud, the quiet, and yes, even the dangerous, that make this wild place a home.
