Dolly, left, and Maggie after a Let Animals Lead® session.
You may hear me talking more about meditation than Reiki these days. That’s because the animal Reiki method I practice, Let Animals Lead®, works through meditation. It’s different from what you may know as Reiki.
Let Animals Lead® was developed by Kathleen Prasad, founder of Animal Reiki Source and co-founder of the nonprofit Shelter Animal Reiki Association, to which I belong. Let Animals Lead® is a specialized form of Reiki, a Japanese stress relief modality: “Rei” stands for spirit or higher power, and “ki” (sometimes seen as “chi”) is the energy that animates every living thing.
Reiki was developed a century ago by Mikao Usui. It was essentially meditation; subsequent teachers added hand positions. These hand positions are used with a human client seated in a chair or lying on a massage table. That was how Kathleen and tons of other practitioners, including me, learned Reiki. Today, Reiki promotes relaxation and healing in spas, private clinics, hospitals and other settings.
As time went on, Kathleen found that “people Reiki” wasn’t always effective with animals … despite the best intentions of the practitioner. Because animals are much more sensitive to energy, touch generally isn’t needed. Animals who have experienced abuse, trauma or illness may even shy away from touch.
Kathleen saw this most acutely when her beloved dog Dakota was sick. He wouldn’t sit still for traditional Reiki, but when she sat quietly in meditation, he settled beside her.
Creating a peaceful space where animals are free to share on their own terms turned out to be a game changer. Thus Let Animals Lead® was born.
I had taken one or two of Kathleen’s earlier classes and practiced animal Reiki, but training with her as a Let Animals Lead® practitioner and teacher allowed me to offer animals and their people something better. It is my honor to see creatures from mice to rescued draft horses join with me and take the lead in their own healing — whatever that means for them.
Is it still Reiki? Yes. Is it more accurately and recognizably described as meditation? Also yes.
In a world where so much seems murky, talking about a discipline that makes animals’ lives better can be clear.
Are you listening? Working with an animal communicator lets your animal friend know that you are. (Image by Päivi Nietosvaara from Pixabay)
You want to solve a puzzling behavioral problem with your dog. You want to help your cat through your upcoming move or divorce. You want to know what your horse needs from you as the end of his life approaches. Any of these situations, and countless others, may have you wondering if an animal communicator could help you sort it out.
Maybe you have doubts about animal communication. That’s OK. Maybe you’re not sure where to start — also OK. For now, consider three ways working with an animal communicator could help you and your animal friend find peace of mind.
1. Animals love that you’re listening.
In most if not all of the animal communication sessions I do, the animal appreciates being heard. This is especially true of rescued animals who have had little or no say in what happens to them. If they’ve experienced trauma, the notion that they have a choice about anything (including whether to communicate with me) may be new. Animal communication can therefore open new avenues of trust and partnership.
Working with an animal communicator can also help your animal hear you. Anyone who has ever had a human child, or been one, knows that what you hear from someone besides your primary caregiver sometimes sinks in more readily.
Of course you have been trying to listen to and help your animal. You’re probably doing better than you think. But there are so many of us humans on this planet, and we all have different skills and perspectives. We’ll all do better if we help each other out.
2. You get another set of eyes.
Years ago, I tied myself in knots trying to help my cat Idgie with a variety of health problems and changes. Even though I’d begun studying and working in animal communication myself, I knew I needed another perspective.
So I booked a session with my animal communication teacher, who helped me see aspects of the situation I had not. She also suggested action steps to help both Idgie and myself. That, along with continued veterinary care, helped get us on the right track.
An animal communicator brings a fresh perspective to your situation. Even if I’ve worked with an animal and/or family before, every session brings something new.
An animal communicator can be part of your pet’s team: you, your family, your pet sitter, your vet, your trainer, the folks at the specialty pet food store, the farrier, the groomer, the bodyworker, and more. I’m blessed to know a number of animal professionals in northeast Indiana to whom I can refer clients and ask questions.
3. Your relationships will improve.
Listening opens doors to a closer and happier relationship between you and your animal friend, but the benefit doesn’t stop there.
That’s because whatever you and your animal are facing almost certainly affects others, from your spouse to your horse’s trainer to the neighbor who mentioned your cat crying while you’re at work. As disconnected and polarized as we humans are, we live in a connected universe. Peace of mind in one arena translates to another. Who couldn’t use a little more of that these days?
To learn more about how animal communication and Reiki can help your animal friend — and you — visit me at www.njcrowe.com.
What we know (or hypothesize) about anything today may only scratch the surface of what we’ll figure out tomorrow — but there’s more scientific knowledge out there than you might think.
Animal Reiki benefits
There are a few studies about Reiki, but not many about animal Reiki specifically. Here’s what I found in late 2021:
• The American Kennel Club recently published a story on the benefits of Reiki for pets, also citing a study you can find on the National Center for Biotechnology Information website. That 2017 (human) study, published in the Journal of Evidence-Based Complementary & Alternative Medicine, indicates Reiki is better than a placebo. In particular, it “activates the parasympathetic nervous system to heal body and mind. It has potential for broader use in management of chronic health conditions, and possibly in postoperative recovery. Research is needed to optimize the delivery of Reiki.”
• An Innovative Veterinary Care Journal article also touts the benefits of Reiki to animals, especially in clinical settings. This one cites an animal-specific 2008 study, “Reiki Improves Heart Rate Homeostasis in Laboratory Rats,” from the Journal of Alternative and Complementary Medicine. It showed Reiki reduced heart rate and blood pressure in noise-stressed rats.
• Kathleen Lester’s 2019 article in the Journal of the American Holistic Veterinary Association, “Reiki as Complementary Care in Veterinary Medicine,” cites numerous scholarly sources to discuss how Reiki can benefit not only animals but the veterinary staff caring for them. (With a shortage of veterinarians exacerbating an already stressful job, I think this will be increasingly important.)
Animal communication: dog brains, cat names and more
I found a bit more research on human-animal communication:
• Dogs have some understanding of what we say and how we say it, Hungarian scientists found. They trained a group of family dogs to enter an MRI machine and scanned the way their brains responded to not only words but their tone. The study appeared in the journal Current Biology in 2014.
• Cats react to the sound of their names, according to a group of Japanese scientists whose study appeared in the journal Scientific Reports. Monique Udell, an animal behaviorist at Oregon State University, told the Associated Press the study shows “cats are paying attention to you, what you say and what you do, and they’re learning from it.”
• Goats prefer positive human facial expressions, says a UK-based study published by The Royal Society. “These findings suggest that the ability of animals to perceive human facial cues is not limited to those with a long history of domestication as companions, and therefore may be far more widespread than previously believed,” the authors concluded.
• Norwegian researchers taught 23 horses to express their needs using symbol boards — for example, to request a blanket on a cold day. “When horses realized that they were able to communicate with the trainers, i.e. to signal their wishes regarding blanketing, many became very eager in the training or testing situation,” the authors wrote in their study, which appeared in Applied Animal Behaviour Science. “Some even tried to attract the attention of the trainers prior to the test situation, by vocalizing and running towards the trainers, and follow their movements.”
When you look at any study, pay attention to who conducted the research, who paid for it, and whether any conflicts of interest are disclosed.
Also keep in mind that many factors influence what we believe about the legitimacy of animal communication, Reiki, or anything else.
Scientific inquiry, by nature, is ongoing, so please send or post a link to any animal Reiki or animal communication study you find that I didn’t!
And, as they used to say on television: Stay tuned.
