Podcast E9: Finding Your Truth With Animals
Originally Published April 3, 2022
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Script
Welcome to True Kinship with Animals, where we believe we all do better when ALL creatures do better. I’m Janet Roper and each week I share stories and suggestions with you on how to deepen your relationship with animals, moving you from ownership to true kinship, one animal at a time.
This podcast is brand new and your help getting it off the ground is much appreciated! If you enjoy this podcast and find my work helpful, if you have been inspired or informed, or have discovered your world has opened to new possibilities because of the podcast, consider supporting my work by making a financial contribution. Your support helps this podcast grow and makes my work sustainable. Many thanks!
What’s true for you when it comes to the animals in your life?
The reason I ask this is because we are influenced by so many outside sources that it can be easy to unconsciously abandon your own truth and agency for someone else’s.
That surrender sneaks up slowly, it is often subtle and insidious. You think you’re living your truth and the next thing you know it has taken a back seat in a discussion you participated in online. How the heck did that happen???
In this day and age when social media is Queen it becomes almost second nature to compare yourself and your relationship with animals to the ‘picture-perfect’, socially accepted images, memes and posts that are constantly bombarding the social media sites you frequent.
Yet those online ‘picture-perfect’ appearances can be deceiving. The posts are often staged to present the best, the glitteriest, the shiniest impression at first glance. Anyone guilty of taking numerous photos of your animal pal before getting that ‘perfect’ one to post? *Raising both hands*
When that happens the “I’m not as good as’, the ‘if onlys’ or the ‘I should haves’ can start to surface as you compare yourself to how others present their relationship with animals online. How do you stay in your truth when you’re being inundated with so many renditions of everyone else’s truth?
Keep in mind posts represent the truth from the perspective of the person that’s doing the posting. That doesn’t mean it’s your truth and frankly, it does not need to be your truth. That’s OK because your truth is what you need and it’s your truth that animals recognize.
For example…… Over the years I’ve had scads of conversations with people who are actively grieving the death of one of their animal pals. They come to me at a loss because well-meaning folx are telling them how they should manage their grief or giving other unsolicited advice.
Well, it may be that person’s truth, but it doesn’t mean it’s your truth.
You are under no obligation to accept someone else’s truth as your own.
You are, however, responsible to know your own truth.
Finding and owning your own truth can be intimidating and scary. If it sounds like it’s a heroine’s journey, that’s because it is!
How do you find your own truth?
Before I dive into that question, let’s talk a little about some of the outside complications and influences that affect finding your truth.
Our relationship with animals is in the midst of momentous change. It’s no longer fair to define it solely by the roles we’ve assigned ourselves in the past, ie care-taker, pet parent, fur kid, etc
Because…
Animals are the owners of their own lives, and their experiences don’t need to be run through our human lenses in order to be valid. Recognizing that crucial yet often overlooked fact helps us recognize life from their perspective, pulling us away from our egocentric human lens to an ecocentric true kinship lens.
That sounds easy peasy, right? Like you ‘should’ be able to just decide to move into true kinship with animals at the drop of a hat!
If only!
There are circumstances that also factor in when it comes to moving towards true kinship with animals. Let’s talk about a few.
What Can Influence Us
For those of us who live in a colonized society our everyday experiences are built on capitalism and disposability, making elements of our lives beyond our control. Right now so many of us are influenced at different levels by the effects white supremacy, trauma, exhaustion, an on-going pandemic and war have on us.
This forces us into survival mode, doing what we need to do to keep our nose above water so to speak. Life can become a shallow, one dimensional way of living where we respond or react from social dictates, habit, convenience and our own proximity to harm and danger.
And for pity’s sake who can blame us for responding that way???
In a one dimensional reality, we’re often left with limited access to what brings us a fullness and zest for life. Those limitations may be brought on by a lack of money, time, support and energy, to name a few.
Our personal relationship with animals can become one of the casualties because we simply don’t have what it takes to tend and nurture it the way we want and dream of doing.
Remember the movie The Matrix? I’m a huge fan of that series and I often think about Morpheus presenting Neo with the choice of taking the red pill or the blue pill. Taking the red pill would result in a potentially unsettling or life-changing truth and taking the blue bill would result in living in confined comfort without want or fear within a simulated reality.
I’m not going to give away any spoilers in case you want to watch The Matrix but because you’ve stuck with me this long in the podcast I bet you would make the same choice Neo did.
Back to the heroine’s journey. I am purposely talking about this because the heroine brings balance to herself, then changes the world around her. It's more about the journey than the destination. It’s not a quest for an external objective, as is the hero's journey.
One of the things about the heroine’s journey is it acknowledges the binary, either/or facets of life while at the same time recognizing and inviting in other aspects of life - like timing, community, capacity, agency and connection. The heroine’s journey recognizes there is an element within us that wants to stretch beyond what conventional norms dictate relationships ‘should’ be.
In moving towards true kinship with animals - a possible starting point could be assessing your life situation. One way to do that is by getting to know yourself and the lenses you use to view life. Then when you show up for an animal, you can truthfully say: this is what I know at this moment in time, this is who I am —-> and how I am showing up in life at this moment in time, and I’m here to help you as I can and as you need me.
True kinship with animals is about embracing a transformation not made, one that is never totally finished and checked off the to do list. It is on the brink of bursting into life at any given moment. It's a space expansive enough for possibility and to hold the known & unknown. It’s a space where you are encouraged to discover what fullness of life means to both you and that one particular animal you are with. Then the next animal, the next one and the next…..
Conclusion
Many thanks for joining me today. If you liked what you have heard, you can support this podcast by making a financial contribution, leaving a comment, giving the show a like, a follow and/or a share.
Your support of this podcast with a financial contribution makes my work sustainable and encourages me to keep on going!
Thank you for listening and keep moving toward true kinship! Just for today remember: We All do better when all creatures do better. Until next week, take good care!
