My growing edge
I continue to learn and grow into this work every day. I am currently experimenting with applying animal communication in two new (to me) directions: bugs and babies.
“One doesn’t discover new lands without consenting to lose sight of the shore for a very long time.” ~Andre Gide
Communicating with insects. This is certainly possible, though in years passed I had shied away from this aspect of the work because I didn’t want to try being a telepathic “exterminator.” When most of us have ants invading our kitchen or mosquitoes sucking our blood or slugs eating our garden, we don’t want to strike up a conversation, we want them gone. Period. I never wanted to serve as a communicator in these cases because, frankly, I didn’t think it would work. Ordering insects to leave, however politely, seemed arrogant and futile, and expecting humans to “listen” respectfully to the multi-legged “pests” in their lives seemed hopelessly unrealistic.
“We spend a great deal of time telling God [or the animals!] what we think should be done, and not enough time waiting in the stillness for God [or the animals!] to tell us what to do.” ~Peace Pilgrim (ironic brackets by Calloway)
But the more I learn about gardening and the more time I spend with organic gardeners, the more interested I am in the whole insect “problem.” It seems to me there are many organic gardeners and ecologically-minded home owners in this world struggling to find a non-toxic and respectful way to co-exist with insect “pests.” And these are the folks I’m interested in helping. As the folks at Findhorn say, “Your garden is merely a reflection of yourself.” If that’s the case, then any imbalance or population explosion of insects might well indicate that a respectful conversation is in order!
If you have an insect “problem,” I’ll be happy to try to help. Sometimes plants in a garden will attract pets because they are weak or deficient in some nutrient. Sometimes mosquitoes will swarm us because we’re stressed out and boundaryless. Sometimes ants will happily leave a kitchen if an alternate, outdoor food source is provided. It is a fascinating, challenging, important and refreshingly slippery topic, and one I’d love more opportunity to explore.
“Stephanie Laland, the author of Peaceful Kingdom, didn’t know anything about cockroaches other than that she didn’t want them around. But they were in her house anyway. She tried the usual methods of getting rid of them, using boric acid and toxic Roach Motels with limited success... so out of desperation she decided to try J. Allen Boone’s method for communicating with another species. After all, he had had great success communicating with ants and with Freddie the fly.
“The first step Boone recommends is to find something admirable about the species that you are trying to contact. Laland watched the cockroaches in her kitchen uneasily and could not see anything about them that she liked. Finally she told them that if they would leave, she would find that admirable, and she promised she would then say good things about them whenever someone asked her. Unsure about whether that was good enough, she wrote them a letter with the same message and put it in the garbage for them, hidden away from any friends who might deem her crazy. The next day, to her wonder, the cockroaches were gone. She lived there for two more years, but they never returned, and she kept her word and praised them to other people.” ~The Voice of the Infinite in the Small, by Joanne Elizabeth Lauck.
Communicating with babies and non-verbal humans. I have had the opportunity to help the parents of ill or chronically crying babies understand what is the matter with them. I was surprised to find the process of communicating with non-verbal children was just like communicating with animals. And then, of course, I was surprised that this fact would surprise me! As a mother of 4 children I am very interested in exploring this aspect of telepathic communication further.
