When I was at UNC, I was hypnotized and we went through something called guided-imagery, where the leader "took" us to an area of our choosing where we would be happy. I found myself in a clearing in the wilderness with a tepee and a small fire. The leader then said we were joined by someone who would make us happy. In my hypnosis came a beautiful red-tail hawk. We just sat in silence.

I looked up some Native American lore and found that the unusual appearance of hawks and other birds of prey are considered good luck. A visit from such a bird serves as a sign from above that we are preparing to move to another, higher level in our life.

I have had three such visits by the red-tail hawk in my life, each one of them preceding a great change in my life.

Appearance #1

My first year at UNC was not a very easy one. I knew no one going in and I found no close friends within the first few months I was there. People I did come to view as friends were not doing well for me. I am not saying they were into drugs or anything; I just was not as close to them as I wished. I also had fallen for this girl who had not felt the same way, and I was creating my own little drama in my head. It was a little obsessive and was consuming my energy and working against me. My hypnosis came during this time.

A few days after my hypnosis, I was walking to my dorm room and I heard a crashing in the woods. I looked over and saw a bird. I was not sure what it I was but I went to go see it. It was a red-tail hawk. I sat down just about 20 feet from it, and we just sat for about 5 minutes before it flew away. This was so much like my vision in the hypnosis.

After that, I began to change the way I saw my social relationships at school. I met new people and relied less on the ones I had come to rely on before. I began to hang out more with my suite mates. I left the first year feeling much better about my UNC experience than I had just a couple of months earlier.