The REIKIDOGS Blog

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Ingrid 6/24/2003 - 4/18/2018

Ingrid was the boss of the house, the boss of the toys, the boss of the boys, but never, ever, the boss of me. She was my princess and in her last year, everything she requested was hers without question. If I was busy on the computer and she wanted to push her head under my elbow to demand some petting, I stopped typing. When we came in from outside at night, she sat facing the fridge, looking at the top of it like a star gazer, waiting for me to take down the jar of treats and reward her for nothing more than coming back into the house. I dread taking my shower this morning, because she was the bathroom girl and i always wobbled getting out of the shower in an effort to avoid stepping on her. But the bed -- that was the throne from which she ruled. I bought her a leather ottoman last year to help her climb into it which she did immediately without any prompting or instruction. She slept on the lower right quadrant of the queen size bed but sometimes inched her way up next to me which

Living with an Old Dog: Every Moment a Blessing

This morning I thought my old girl, Ingrid, had died, and I was stunned as I tried to lift her head and leg and they just fell, heavy, onto the bed. I didn't even see her breathing. It felt as if there was no life in her body at all. I surrounded her with my body, thinking she was gone, calling her name.....and then she moved. :-'(. I thought, "this is the way I want you to leave," peacefully, without drama. Maybe she was practicing. I cried much of the morning. But she's still here....a blessing. She turned 14 last week and quietly enjoyed a small birthday party attended by her two housemate dogs and three other dog friends. She was subdued but enjoyed enough birthday treats to the point of vomiting them up onto the couch at midnight. She can no longer climb into the bed and anxiously paced back and forth along the foot board until I lifted all 50 pounds of her and she curled up and slept till morning. On occasion I would awaken in the middle of the

God’s Covenant With Animals: Stewardship, Not Rule

What is our human responsibility to the earth and its non-human inhabitants? Traditional Biblical scholars would say one of master-servant and ecologists would say one of caretaker. However, using either frame, neither movement has responded in full view of the evidence presented throughout the Bible that God clearly included animals in covenantal relationships. With Biblical scholars neglecting the sanctity of animals and secular environmentalists neglecting God. A closer look at the Old Testament reveals that God designed humankind’s role in relation to the animals as one of stewardship rather than domination . Traditionally religious people often cite Scripure justify a master/servant relationship between humans and animals rather than one of partnership, but deeper investigation invites us to see texts rich with references, both literal and figurative, to the partnership between humankind and the animal world. From Genesis through Prophets and Wisdom Literature, the

Listen to the Message. Really Listen.

In the late 80s and early 90s, I was just beginning serious metaphysical work and simultaneously experiencing rough patches in my exterior life. In between jobs and desperate, I did a lot of Walter Mitty type fantasizing: thought I would go work on a reservation in South Dakota, move to a village in South Africa and live among lions, and if that didn't pan out, move back to NY and resume life as a starving poet. I was living in Coral Springs at the time, just having moved there from Delray Beach (I have lived all over South Florida).I was broke and finally using the Publix gift certificates that my friend had given me when I'd lost my last job (most generous gift and most humbling experience). In meditation,thinking I would see myself communing with the buffalo clan, I sought confirmation from the spiritual realm and received a very clear answer: SOUTH. Well, first I got pissed off that my intuition was clearly not working. Then I started laughing and threw it back to my

Well, We All Shine On: Karmic Lessons from the Animals

“Well, I didn’t see that coming!” “What goes around comes around.” “I hope he gets what he deserves." We can all identify with having uttered or heard these phrases after falling victim to someone’s ill intentions or witnessing an unprovoked self-serving or predatory act. Every such action has more than one victim but we will likely not see the justice we crave in this lifetime. While we might want to even the score, we are better served by allowing the laws of karma to heal the effects naturally. And that means, essentially, learning from our mistakes on higher levels, sometimes in future incarnations. But we want it, and we want it now ! Sometimes we expect karma to engulf us like a huge wave, and as John Lennon said, knock us off our feet, forcing us to learn that pestering lesson once and for all. But a life outside of isolation doesn't always allow for such easy returns. Usually karma presents itself in more evolutionary ways, and in real

Wings Bigger Than Ours

A client just wrote to me, upset for months over an incident with an injured baby bird. It had fallen out of its next, and she took it home to care for it, hoping to return it to the nest when it recovered. Such rescue is always an act of love. She was feeding it and put it down for a moment, but that moment esalated like fast forward when her dog suddenly leaped, grabbed the bird, and killed it. For months, the woman has been blaming herself, assuming responsibility for the bird's death. She came to me for some clarity. I didn't have to stretch to empathize wit her. I have been in that position a number of times. For years, I was actively involved in Muscovy duck rescue, retrieving scared, injured, abused and victimized ducks from lakes, parking lots, streets.Once I took in an almost newborn duckling -- tiny and still yellow -- who had been abandoned and seemed to have a broken leg. I called the president of the rescue group to ask for instructions on its c