Spirit Lodge - Totem Animals - Page 70

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Bear Medicine	Birth Totems	Coyote Medicine	Dragon Ranks	Dragonfly Medicine	Eagle Medicine	Four Animal Helpers	Grey Wolf Medicine	Hawk
Heron Medicine	Horse	Magpie	Raccoon	Salmon Medicine	Spider Medicine	Swan Medicine	Thunder Being Medicine	Totem Loss Disc

GRACKLE
By CinnamonMoon

Ted Andrews/Animal-Speak:
Keynote: Overcoming Excess and Emotional Life Congestion
Cycle of power: Early spring

Although the grackle is often considered part of the blackbird family, along with crows and
starlings, it actually is not. It is part of the meadowlark and oriole family of birds. It is a large
black bird with an extra-long tail. About its head and shoulders are iridescent feathers that
change from blue to green to purple or bronze, depending on the light.

This coloring often reflects a need for those to whom the grackle comes to look at what is going
on in their life differently. It says that situations are not what they appear to be and you may not
be looking at them correctly--particularly anything dealing with the emotions.

Keep in mind that black is the color of the inner and the feminine. The purple and bronze
coloring about the head especially usually indicates that emotions are coloring our thinking
process. The grackle can help us to correct this.

During courting season, the male grackle will fold its tail, creating a diamond-like trough. This
diamond shape is often reflective of activation. It hints at a need to become active in regards to
emotional situations. Have we been too passive in our emotions? Are we simply rehashing and
talking about them without doing anything to correct the emotional situations in our life? The
grackle is a noisy, chattering bird and may be a reminder to quit talking and *do* something.

Grackles are very sociable birds as well. It is not unusual to find people that are in the midst of
unbalanced emotional states constantly narrating and rehashing the conditions in every social
situation. It can be therapeutic to speak of problems, but many social occasions do nothing but
aggravate the conditions and feelings surrounding them. Again it can reflect we may be talking
about things too much and not doing something about them.

Grackles have inside their mouths on the hard palate a keel which helps them cut open acorns
and eat them. We have often heard the expression, "It's a tough nut to crack." Well, this reflects
the role a grackle can serve as a totem. Dealing constructively with our emotions and those
people and things in our life which aggravate them can be a tough nut to crack. The grackle can
show us how best to do this.

Grackles love to live in pine trees. Pine trees are very therapeutic to emotional states. In a form
of homeopathic medicine known as flower essences, the essence of pine can be used to help
alleviate strong emotional states, particularly feelings of guilt. Again this reflects the grackle
showing up as a sign to help you clear the emotions.

Emotions that are not dealt with can congest our life, aggravating or even creating congestion in
the body at some level. The grackle can serve as a warning to be careful of this possibility, but it
can also help show us how to prevent it from occurring. The droppings of grackles can serve to
culture fungi which, if the wind blows, can cause a pneumonia-like infection.

Most illness is symbolic. Congestion, especially pneumonia-like in appearance can tell us that
we are holding in our emotions. It can reflect a suppressed crying or a refusal to deal with certain
long-standing problems and issues. (Have we neglected situations, giving them time to be
cultured?) It can reflect a refusal to take in new life and new approaches to life, and so we
become congested with old emotions.

The grackle shows us how to handle this. It can teach the proper expression of emotions. They
can show us where excesses are dissipating our life force and facilitating a congestion of growth
and movement. They can teach how to get back to creative and beneficial experiences and
expressions of emotion.