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How Angel Animals Teach
with Love
By Allen and Linda
Anderson
It took us awhile to notice. Humans can be
awfully dense sometimes. But our yellow cockatiel, Sunshine, continued to be
patient. After awhile, we began to understand how he was teaching Linda to sing
his birdsongs.
Every
morning, we uncover the birdcage and Sunshine greets the day with his
customary, “I love you, Sweet Baby.” While Linda makes breakfast, Sunshine
whistles. Since his mate Sparkle died a year ago, Linda has become careful to
return Sunshine’s whistles. The vet told us that we are Sunshine’s “flock” and
we take our responsibility seriously. Birds whistle and expect their flock to
whistle back.
Recently
we figured out Sunshine’s loving way of training his whistle partner. First, he
starts with a very simple whistle of only a few notes. Linda responds with
exactly the same whistle. Gradually he escalates and makes the whistles a bit
more complicated. Each time, Linda whistles back. She has to listen very
carefully to get the tune just right. Finally, Sunshine cuts loose with some
complex composition worthy of Mozart, trilling and riffing like a jazz singer.
By this time, Linda is completely outclassed.
Unlike
most humans, who would give up in disgust at the inferior ability of their
partner, Sunshine grows very quiet while he waits for Linda to return his
symphonic whistle. When she doesn’t, he goes back to basics. He starts all over
with a simple, two or three-note whistle and waits for her to respond. These
humans, they sure do need a lot of persistent coaching.
Sunshine
reminds us that animals, our angels in disguise, often show by their examples
how to treat others with kindness, respect, and yes, absolute patience.
The Man Who Lost His Fur
We
receive many letters from people who have learned other important lessons by
observing animals in their homes or in nature. Here are a couple stories that
might cause you to wonder who is teaching whom in human-animal relationships.
Lynn
Hewitt says that her cat Poog has the kind of expressive green eyes that convey
his intelligence and gentle heart. She writes about an experience when her
brother-in-law, Ron, Poog’s favorite houseguest.
“Ron has
a calm and determined manner. What Ron says and does, reflects his inner
feelings with a consistency and integrity that Poog obviously understands and
respects. Whenever Ron visits, Poog behaves as if a royal prince has entered
his realm.”
Ron customarily
wears a baseball cap. It covers his shaved, bald scalp. On one occasion, Ron
took off his cap when he came into the house. This was the first time Poog had
ever seen him without it. Since the cat always paid the most worshipful
attention to Ron, it was with great dismay that Poog observed the change in his
friend’s demeanor. The sight of hairless Ron caused Poog to begin moaning. He
circled Ron slowly and jumped up on the chair to look more closely at the
disaster that had been visited upon his hero. Poog’s sad eyes told the story of
his empathy for a fallen prince who had obviously endured a great disaster.
Lynn
writes, “Poog clearly communicated horror and sympathy for Ron’s ‘furless’
head. It brought tears to the eyes of several humans in the room as Poog slowly
crept respectfully up the arm of this honored guest and gently licked and
kissed his scalp in obvious sorrow and sympathy. There are greater tragedies in
a cat’s world, but the shaving away of fur was certainly a calamity Poog
recognized. His sincere and gently offered condolence remains a lesson in the
innate character and virtues of our animal friends, especially when their
unique gifts of individuality are consistently honored and nurtured with love
and respect.”
A Doggie Warning Dream
So often
humans think they are taking their dog companions for obedience training. Those
of us who have caught on to the folly of this way of thinking know that it’s
the other way around. The dog trains us, and we eventually figure out what
we’re supposed to be doing.
What you
may not have realized is that our angel animals continue to teach us even after
death. The following story from Noreen A. McClusky, a freelance writer and
animal communicator (www.butterflytree.com),
is a reminder that our animal friends never leave or forget us. We first
published Noreen’s story in the Angel Animals Day Brightener Newsletter.
“Kiera
was a lovely Harlequin Great Dane, an amazing head-turner. Many years ago,
Keira passed over. But a few weeks back, an image of her woke me out of a sound
sleep. Keira’s message to me in the dream was an important one. She urged me
that a certain loved one, my sister, whom she’d adored, needed to go have a
breast exam, especially the right breast.
“Since I
have learned to trust these kinds of spiritual experiences, I phoned my sister.
I relayed the important warning and left it at that.
“A couple
of days later, I received a return voicemail. ‘Yeah, I’d been putting it off,’
my sister said, ‘but I just went and had the right breast lump biopsied. Thank
God, it’s benign. I didn’t tell anybody about the biopsy beforehand because I
didn’t want people to panic. Tell Keira, thanks for the nudge!’
“Listen
to your dreams. So what if the still, small voice used to bark!”
Have
animals been teaching you important lessons of life in their gentle and silent
ways? Are you picking up the signals from furry angels who teach by example?
Are there animals in your life or visiting your dreams to help you learn to
sing their wise and complex songs?
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Angel Animals® Network
