When Worry about Feelings of Guilt and Shame Interfere with Receiving Communications
Dawn Hayman, Animal Communicator answers questions submitted by readers. Dawn has been a professional animal communicator and teacher for over 33 years. Learn how to submit a question at the bottom of this post.
Q: “At different times over the years, I chose to have my last 3 kitties put down. I haven’t had a pet in many years now because I was moving too much and it was hard to get places that allowed pets. Those kitties all had long, happy & healthy lives, but I still feel guilty about putting them down.
As a result of my shame & guilt, I feel like I will not be able to communicate with animals now. I feel like they gave me their trust and I betrayed them somehow. And as a result, I am punished and the animals won’t talk to me. I know this will hamper my ability to open up. I feel I need to seriously address this or I will remain blocked. Can you help me deal with and/or understand it?”
From Dawn:
This is such a powerful and important question and I thank the person who asked this for their bravery in asking. This is one of the most common questions I am asked by people wanting to take workshops but worried that they will not be able to succeed. Being aware of our blockages and obstacles that we throw into our own paths is an important step in our awareness. The human mind finds all sorts of things to worry on and mull over…. and over…. and over. While the heart, on the other hand, brings in clarity and is that breath of fresh air we all look for and welcome.
Animal communication is based on telepathy, literally translated as long-distance feeling. In other words, communicating to and from the heart. When we breathe and center ourselves through our hearts, we tap into the most natural and primal form of communication there is. It surpasses time and space and is a gentle knowing. But the human mind has a hard time with this and will throw in all sorts of doubt and warnings that we shouldn’t trust our own hearts. The first step is to be learning to recognize that we all do this to some extent or another. It is part of being human.
One of the constructs that our brains throws in our path is guilt. Guilt, or even the fear of guilt, casts a big shadow of doubt on our own abilities to trust our hearts. It is very common, in fact, to find ourselves questioning euthanasia decisions after they are made. And that may be the topic of a future blog post. But I want us to zoom out a little wider to encompass guilt in general. Because while I find the questioning of past euthanasia decisions to be a common obstacle, I also see this with past training decisions, or even guilt over how other people treated animals around us in our past. It is important to realize that these are our own blocks and in almost all cases are not coming from the animals themselves.
There are two parts to this question. One, is the fact of continual holding onto or beating ourselves up for things that we did not know in the past. All of us could look at things we did with animals in our past (or even our children as well) that we know today, knowing what we know now, that we wouldn’t do the same. That is a part of learning and growing. One of the first things I tell participants in my workshops is that we all need to let go of berating ourselves for things we did in the past when we just didn’t have the information we do today. If we do not let that go, it will be a block that prevents us from moving forward.
And the second part of this answer is that, in almost all cases, the animals do not hold grudges. Animals do not judge and condemn us for our mistakes. I have found this repeatedly in the tens of thousands of consultations that I have done over the past 30 years. But I have also seen and experienced this in our own animal sanctuary where I have worked with animals who have lived through some horrific things. Animals do not hold on to judgment. They move on and allow healing to take place. That is not to say that they don’t experience trauma, because they do, just like we humans do. But animals are also quicker to forgive and move on. They stay focused in the present moment.
When you go through a euthanasia decision and process with your animal friends, they understand and feel your love and intention. That intention and love is what surrounds them through the process. In most cases, even when it doesn’t look like it to you, they are making that decision with you and actually helping you along the way. They are participating with you. When euthanasia decisions are lovingly made with that intention of helping them, the animals completely understand and feel that. There is nothing to forgive and nothing to be forgiven for. But our minds start second guessing things during our grieving process. And sometimes our minds hold onto that for a long time.
The fear that you will open up telepathically to your animals and have them berate you for decisions you have made in the past is one that haunts a lot of people. But, in reality, it is just a fear of moving into listening with our hearts. Because in your heart, you actually know the love and acceptance your animals give to you. In your heart, you know that it is ok. Your animals love you unconditionally because they see and understand the real you. They never betray that trust.
When you experience communication through your heart, it is unconditional, non-judgmental, and timeless. The first step to moving forward is to recognize your fear of what you think you might hear, and be gentle with yourself and not judge yourself for having that fear. It is a gentle process of breathing and allowing the flow to happen. The more pressure you put on yourself, the harder it is to hear your heart. And the more open you can be to experience whatever is there for you to feel, the more freedom you will find in receiving communications. It is simply a matter of being still and listening. While humans as a species have lost sight of this, it is indeed possible to find it again. And, like a muscle, the more you use it, the stronger it will get. But the first step is to try.
If you’d like to submit a question to be considered by Dawn for this blog, please fill out the form below.