Rainbow Bee-eater

Featured here, and perching pensively, is the wildly colourful Rainbow Bee-eater.

But they never perch for long, before taking flight in the most erratic and discombobulating way. Darting here, twisting there, diving, soaring, looping and swooping. All in the space of a few mere and manic seconds. The untrained eye might wonder what on earth they are doing.

But as their name suggests, these birds are bee-eaters, and they feed solely on flying insects. Yes, these vivacious birds “hunt on the wing”. As such, and hence, their frantic flight pattern is justified, as they use nothing but pure instinct, intuition, and innate ability to seek out their nourishment.

Evidently so, in this game of millimetres and microseconds, of quick decision and arrow-like precision, there is no time for thought or ponderance. In fact, it’s not until they are fed and fulfilled that they might have any time for reflection or retrospect.

So, as pictured, what happens when they do finally peter out to a perch? What does its pensive look portend?

Might they look at the flight of other birds, and wonder why theirs is so different? Watching the the Eagle soar, The Pelican coast, or the Magpie swoop. Or perhaps it’s so that Mother Nature is there, to remind our little Bee-eaters never to compare their flight path, or their flight pattern, to any other bird.

So instead they take a breath, before taking to the sky once more, in their own unique way, painting the sky with rainbows like no other bird can.

Do you compare yourself to others? Could honouring your own intuition, your own unique gifts, allow you to be more colourfully you?