Dogs and Cats, Men and Women

Keesha, Angel and Toby

Someone said to me that she “likes cats if they are like dogs.” That’s sort of like saying she “likes men if they are like women.” When I described how one of my cats likes to cuddle under the covers and lie on his back like a little monkey while I scratch his tummy, she said: “That’s what I mean! That’s like a dog.” I am equally a cat and a dog lover, and I’m not sure why people prefer one over the other. I think it’s because they’ve had bad experiences. Not all dogs bite and not all cats are neurotic narcissists. Animals come onto this planet with lessons to be learned, just like we do and they can change and grow if we provide those opportunities. A well-attached, well-loved animal will by and large be pleasant to be around, barring a genetic trait (which happens with humans too). Granted, due to biology, dogs are more forgiving. They’ve been domesticated longer. A cat who has been raised in a rough environment will shut down and likely stay shut down, whereas a dog will be more open to winning our love.

Pablo the cuddle bear

Animals are not here solely for our pleasure and yet we take great pleasure in their company. We are graced with their presence and granted the responsibility to take good care of the animals we bring into our homes. Each creature will have a different personality and, unless we get them as kittens and puppies, a previous history – a childhood. It takes them some time to adapt and show their true personalities. And for the ones who’ve had a rougher past, if we can honor their space and timing, they will become great teachers and, often, kind companions.

Angel Boy

For example, our cat Angel Boy arrived on our doorstep on a snowy five-degree day weighing 5 pounds and matted. He was the type of cat who would put up with pretty much anything and slept a lot. About 18 months from the time he arrived, he “woke up.” One day he followed me around, watching me brush my teeth, cook meals, and take a bath. It was as though he finally trusted us to keep him and not to hurt him and that safety gave him the permission to be himself and to explore his environment. He still pretty much put up with anything, but we discovered he also had a sense of humor and a whimsical personality.

We do this to each other. An article by hetero relationship specialist Alison Armstrong, author of Celebrating Men, Satisfying Women, says that many women treat men as though they are “hairy women.” Now there’s an appealing image. :p But it’s worth reading about the opposite sex to learn about the universal patterns related to how they communicate, how they show their love and how they view the world. I know the men who've read about female joy (and I'm not just talking sex here) can make me purr. There is awareness we can gain to bridge the gaps so that we can begin to raise our animals and children to feel safe and to engage with all of the people in our lives with tolerance and unconditional love.

The Art of God

photo by Vanessa Hill Rogers

  We are never separate from God. This is one of
  many lessons I have been learning from
  discussing my relationships with my spiritual
  masters, Helen Lordsmith and JoLee Wingerson,
  for the last 15 years (I am a slow learner). I have
  heard it said “We are God” or “We are part of
  God." Ultimately spiritual experience is personal
  and the way we frame it is unique to us. We
  decide what that relationship will be. Sometimes
  we pattern God after a wicked parent (which is
  interesting because individuals with Dissociative
  Identity Disorder also develop a personality
  modeled after their abusers).

  I feel connected to God - some Cosmic Chemical, Energetic Power, Paternal-Maternal-Fraternal Force. I like the image Marianne Williamson used of one wave saying to another wave: “Do you believe in the sea?” But, as fate would have it, humans are not created to be sailing smoothly with God in our sails. We are born thinking we are separate sinners, and our egos want us to confirm that with proof, because the ego seeks power at the expense of our health and happiness. People will treat us in exactly the way we believe we deserve to be treated – as Ego or Spirit.

Lovers and friends will come and go, but who are we between those times? Why do we give away our power to the Other as if we are not enough. When we give away our power to them, we are no longer the person the Other chose.

When I’m doing it right, my happiness is not dependent on who walks in the door on a particular day or what they are saying to me. I am totally flowing. To learn this I have kicked and screamed when someone walked out the door or didn’t appear in the way I expected. My heart has been shattered by conditions and expectations, and re-pieced. As as result, I’ve become a better teacher, mother, counselor, lover and friend as I’ve learned how to sculpt my life without expectation for the materials or the outcome. Oh how I’d like to be able to CONTROL things. Grr. My ego is a pirate!

With awareness of the fact that we are never separate from God, we are never apart from the people whom we love. We can feel them in our hearts. This is not a THOUGHT. This is something FELT and, amazingly, we can shift or morph or grow into this feeling state of being. The example I have had to model what true love looks like is my grandmother, Mutti, who died 15 years ago. I can feel her hands wrapped around me when I was a baby. I can feel her embracing me as a teen when I cried after breaking up with a boy. I can feel her braiding my hair, and I still smell her food. Her love was so total and complete. The safety I felt in her presence was so thorough that to this day she is woven into my heart and the loss of her does not throw me because I can still FEEL her. (Papa was great too but he was working long days to help support us.)

Mutti and Papa

I did not realize that this could apply across the board. The trick is to be totally open and present with the people in our lives, the people we love – without conditions. We get into trouble when we think: “I’ll only love you if you stay with me the rest of your life.” That’s a thought. The heart wants to feel. TODAY. LOVE. GO DO IT. Your kids will move out. Your lovers will leave or die. Your friends will move. Your parents are doing the best that she can. What is your personal barrier to love? Because that is the faulty belief that you are separate from God. That is the illusion standing between you and Heaven on Earth.

A Change for Humanity

I met someone who was once beaten to a pulp and lay in a hospital with “eyes like plums” he describes it, broken nose packed with cotton. Who does these things? I’ve met people who have been raped; people whose parents and grandparents have physically or sexually tortured them; people with parents who abandoned them or raised them with such neglect the thought of human connection is foreign. I have read case studies that left me shaking and crying. Victims have no choice but to dissociate, as many as 70 million people learning to function with splits in their consciousness; with lack of awareness about the Dissociative Disorders most never get the help that they need. So much of the damage is done behind closed doors, evidence of the loss of deeper connection between families and communities. Neighbors and family members turn a blind eye, often too damaged themselves to step in and advocate for the innocent.

But, I am blessed to live in a country where when the secrets bust loose, when kids are old enough to report, when wives or husbands are brave enough to leave, there is a place to go; there are services available to help. I live in a country where we can speak our minds and practice any religion we choose. We can celebrate our government or criticize and protest. 

Yet, by and large, we are consumers, striving for more things outside of ourselves to fill up the unnamable, confusing emptiness inside of us - slow to eliminate plastic, to recycle and compost, to eat healthfully, to break habits that pollute our ocean, skies and bodies. For this reason addiction is rampant. We are willing to turn a blind eye to preserve what we consider is safe and easy. We think it’s okay to frack and build pipelines that carry tar sands oil despite what happened to the Kalamazoo River. That could NEVER happen to us. But it has happened to us. We are one. Every tragedy is personal. I live an hour from where the Aurora shootings occurred and one of my daughters was at the Batman midnight premiere. There but for the grace of God goes she. We mourn the news, yet we are detached. The top 1% has a carbon footprint the equivalent of a small country - all of our footprints are too big. We are afraid of what we don’t know and hesitate to venture outside of our box. The computer culture is detaching us from our actual lives – we are beginning to lose sight of what is actually present in our immediate environment.

All that being said, I believe in people.

What’s the answer? Tell personal stories to feel less alone. Be discrete about the stories you retell. Listen. Create a culture of service. Pray. Focus on the positive. Be accountable. Listen. Reach out. Be tolerant. Stand up for the innocent. Get out into Nature. Dance. Leave your comfort zone. Be an example of love and peace. Seek and receive help. Forgive. A lot of forgiveness which means searching your memories, plumbing the depths to forgive as far back in time as even your ancestors can remember. Every action, every prayer, every example you set of tolerance and love is a step closer to change for humanity. God Goddess Big Beautiful Universal Loving Energy, please bless us all!

For information about Dissociation, please read Dr. Marlene Steinberg's A Stranger in the Mirror: Dissociation - the Hidden Epidemic.