The Chicken Story

For the last seven years, I presented professional development to secondary teachers. I liked to end my trainings with a story. One of my favorites came from a book I purchased at a Ruby Payne Conference called Think Rather of Zero. The story began with a man who brought home a  baby eaglet and put him in the pen with his chickens. The eagle grew into a strong, young bird right along with the chickens. Soon all of his actions were "chicken" actions. He strutted around in the pen just like a chicken. Many chickens came and went in that pen because the owner took them away to eat, but he kept the eagle because it was a topic of conversation with his friends. They would point at him and laugh, but the eagle never understood what that was about.

One day the grown eagle looked up and saw a beautiful bird soaring high in the clear sky, and  he asked one of the chickens in the pen, "What is that?" The chicken answered,"That's an eagle. He's the king of the sky, but we are just chickens. We cannot fly high." With that, the eagle went back to scratching in the dirt with the chickens and strutting around the yard with the chickens, and acting just like a chicken because that's what he thought he was.

Now we see things imperfectly as in a cloudy mirror, but then we will see everything with perfect clarity.1 Corinthians 13:12

Peace.

Love, Linda