Yesterday I listened to an amazing interview with scientist and author, Jackie Higgins, on her new book Sentient: How Animals Illuminate the Wonder of our Human Senses. Her latest book explores the extrasensory powers of many different species on this planet, and I can’t wait to read it! CLICK HERE for a short video with just a few of her insights about the amazing powers of animals 🙂 Have you read it yet? I’d love to hear your thoughts!
Jackie comes at this from a scientific perspective, and as I see it, our Animal Reiki practice comes at it from a spiritual one!
As a Let Animals Lead® practitioner, I am constantly fascinated and inspired by animals’ ability to heal themselves through perceiving, understanding and using the power of the compassionate, healing energy that humans create through the practice of Reiki.
We can learn so much from animals and their deeper gifts of perception and presence. One of our most important teachings in the Let Animals Lead® method, and that is that animals are teachers and healers in their own right. People often don’t value animals, but the Let Animals Lead® method invites us to consider that animals are extraordinary and here on this earth for their own purpose and journey. If we are lucky enough, they may grace our lives and teach us some important spiritual lessons along the way. Animals teach us effortlessly about how to be a more connected, more compassionate human being, simply by living and being themselves, and by expressing their unique talents and instincts. However we must learn how to open our hearts to these lessons if we hope to learn them. CLICK HERE for a short video about how animals are healers and teachers, which is the 6th pillar of the Let Animals Lead® method.
In Animal Reiki practice, one of the big ways we as practitioners miss the lessons animals teach us is through ego. CLICK HERE for a short video about how we can easily miss the gifts animals offer us. Although it is with the very best intentions that we may offer our Animal Reiki sessions, often we begin to see the process as very one-sided, where we as the practitioners are the ones who are playing the active role in offering a healing space. We imagine that since we have “learned” the system of Reiki, we must somehow have a superior connection to healing energy. In this way we actually forget the most important (and healing) dimension in an Animal Reiki connection, and that is what the animals bring to us when they trust us and open their hearts to connect. When they do so, they truly elevate the healing space and teach us so much about what the word “healing” actually means. They remind us that we are a part of something much bigger than ourselves, and that our place on this earth is truly interconnected and interdependent at the deepest levels.
In the Let Animals Lead® method, we learn to let go of the “doing” of Animal Reiki, which can cause us to forget what animals are teaching us. We learn to hold space with animals with curiosity and a beginner’s mind, so that we are in the right space to listen and observe animals with an open heart. In this way, we more easily develop trust and comfort in the ones we wish to serve, and we cultivate humble hearts as human beings, acknowledging animals’ wisdom and allowing them to guide us to a deeper space of being.
Want to know more? Both of my videos that I’ve shared above come from the Level 1 Online Animal Reiki class. This class gives you a strong foundation in the Let Animals Lead® method, while also certifying you as a Let Animals Lead® method practitioner. This class is suitable for beginning students as well as seasoned human Reiki practitioners.
My next sessions start in May, but in the meantime, be sure to check out current classes with my amazing licensed teachers HERE.
Stay safe, be well and may the animals light your way,
