If you’re anything like me, you’ve spent a lifetime searching for your power animal. You’ve spent hours staring into the eyes of cats, birds and spiders, inquisitively probing for evidence that this animal is your spiritual guide. You’ve watched the National Geographic Channel on slow motion with your TiVo, looking for obscure tropical animals that happen to speak to the core of your soul.

Perhaps, like me, you’ve even attended a “subconscious painting” telepathic channeling workshop in the basement of your psychic stepmother’s friend’s Ohio apartment, to see if your power animal would reveal itself in the corners of your badly painted masterpiece. (This actually happened...)

But regardless of your past experience with power animals, I believe that right now is the best time to start, or renew, your quest.

To give you a better idea of what a power animal is, I turn to www.rainbowcrystal.com, the end all to be all of power animal Web sites. This award-winning Web site has been mentioned on such Internet heavy hitters as poweranimals.com and shamanshack.com. Its author, Connie, is a self-proclaimed “double Sagittarian with Moon in Pisces,” who does “Bach Flower Remedy Counseling” in her free time.

Connie (who saw two white-tailed deer dash across the lawn to give their blessings as she wrote the Web page) defines a power animal as a being capable of delivering messages from the spiritual plane. It is an animal that gives energy and guidance, comfort and healing. When combined with power stones and energy crystals (both available at a low price through the Web site), the power animal takes you from danger and leads you to happiness.

The quest for the power animal can take a whole lifetime, though a single human being may have many power animals before he or she dies.

So where do you start? As Connie notes, the most popular power animal is the cat, followed closely by the dolphin and the wolf. But don’t limit yourself to these simple examples. Search for signs of your spiritual connection with various animals, and see which animals “speak” to you, either literally or metaphorically.

I should mention here that my interest in this concept was sparked several days ago by the completion of my personal power animal quest.

“KA-KAW! KA-KAW!” it mightily sang, perched atop the sunroof of my room, just beyond sight. It was 7:32 in the morning, and I was sound asleep. Yet I gaily awoke, entranced by its majestic song.

“Sing, my beloved! Sing!” I cooed. It just so happened that my alarm had broken that day, and luckily, its song was my saving grace. My power animal even had the intelligence to keep up its singing for the next 10 minutes, a sure sign that it wanted me to stay awake. And ever since, I have felt the effects of its trance.

That night, at Taekwondo practice, my teacher called upon the class to make up a kiep, or power yell, to blurt whenever we did an especially powerful kick. This noise was supposed to come from the depths of our subconscious. The other members of the class found their kieps in the form of a “hi-ya!” or a “raaahh.” But mine came out, simply, as “KA-KAW! KA-KAW!” And, emboldened by my power animal, I was able to make my malformed kicks slightly less malformed.

The next morning, I awoke again to my power animal (at exactly 7:32 a.m.), whom by this point I had chosen to call Zibradun. I called out to it once more: “I implore you, Zibradun! Show yourself!” And his power was once again with me. At breakfast, my Pop-Tart broke in a shape that was clearly avian. And, receiving a call from my grandmother in the middle of the day, I heard her “Birds of the World” clock in the background strike its three o’clock chime.

To further channel its energy, I have carved a Zibradun pendant out of gypsum, and as I write it sways gently on my neck.

I am confident that Zibradun has been guiding me these last few days, and will continue to do so for some time. No matter the fact that my computer crashed yesterday, and found out today that it has lost all of its memory. No matter the fact that I broke my watch, crashed my bike and lost my humbio notes in these past few days. When it comes down to it, Zibradun will pull through, soaring through the sky on wings made of hope and dreams. I can only hope that you, dear reader, can find your very own power animal in the near to immediate future. But until that time, Zibradun and I will watch over you, like a hawk watches over its children.