The Animal You Are~ a meditation on our creature-hood

Mother Earth, dark and fecund, hold me to my flesh.  Help my molecules to slow to an easy vibration.  Teach me to center into depth, root into confidence, remember my part in the dance.  Bless me and blessed be.

I struggle sometimes, this time of year, when the light is returning in force and the days get measurably longer.  It is as though my whole body contracts, like our eyes do, coming from darkness into the bright sun.  My flesh is filled with too much energy and it feels like anxiety and hyper-vigilance.  Uncomfortable.

This year, I have a place to put my anxiety.  Becoming responsible for these goat-children is raising all sorts of questions and concerns for me.  Are they eating too much?  Not enough?  Should they have more hay?  Less grass?  More grain?  How the hell can we keep them in the yard?!  If you have goats, you know what I mean.  If you don’t, you can trust the old saying:  if a fence will hold water, it will hold a goat.

Okay, that’s a little too glib, but it is kinda true.  We’re having better luck, rather than trying to keep them in, providing them with an abundance of what they want so they don’t want to leave.  It’s a balance, really.  At times, I need to muscle them around; they do not want me to mess with their hooves, but I will anyway because they need cleaned and trimmed.  But I will also feed them something delicious while I’m doing it, so they are more inclined to stay still. I want them to want the same things I want, so I try to see like them, think like them.  Allow myself to be tempted by the same things that tempt them:  delicious food, comfort, freedom.

In my practice, there is a focus on the relationship between our human mind, our animal body, and our divine spirit.  We strive for alignment between these parts of us, awareness and health throughout.  How I think about my animal-animals can inform how I think about myself as animal and vice versa.  I bet this will work for you too.

So let’s play a game:

(Probably, you want to do this when you’re not at work, but I suppose it depends on what you do for a living.)

If you have animals in your life, dogs, cats, birds, bring yourself into their presence.  If you don’t, watch some animal vids on YouTube.  Look for something that you find enchanting, funny, adorable.

Watch them move, breathe, eat.  See where their attention goes, what they are interested in.  Observe them sleeping.  Make this a practice and spend a little time each day becoming aware of the animals in your life.

Now allow your attention to drift into the center of your own form, the flesh and blood of you.  Feel yourself move, breathe, eat.  See what draws the attention of your body.  Tune into the position of your body when you are at rest.  Allow yourself to interact with your world as the creature you are.

Lie in a sunbeam like a dog.  Suddenly jump up and run into the other room like a cat.  Shiver yourself into adjustment like a bird.

Slip the fence and wander off like a goat.  See what unexpected treats you find.  Come back when you feel like it.

Know, too, that the human thinky brain of you is strong, and the god that is you is strong, and they will take care of you.  Not let you wander where you shouldn’t be.

(As long as you remember to listen to them…)

Goat image courtesy of the author

Dog image courtesy of shutterstock.com