2012. That’s for your trip. If anybody tries to worry you about “everyone’s all going to hell in a handcart when the clock strikes 2012,” you tell ’em, “ You can go wherever you want. I’m going to Italy.”
What exactly is it that animals do for us?
The best way I can say it is that it seems that animals carry God’s love to us. There are all different kinds of animals. I’m not sure that different animals bring different aspects of God’s love or if maybe it’s just that each of us recognizes and relates to a different kind of animal and that’s God’s way of getting His love through to us in a way we’ll be accepting of it. Maybe think of it as product packaging—a different package appeals to a different person. Some people (very few, thankfully) will say they don’t like animals, but then a stray kitten or injured squirrel finds its way into their heart in spite of themselves. Some of us don’t distinguish—we love every kind of animal, whether furry, feathered, or finned. (We might not like all the bugs, but we try!) Every now and then I have a bad night when I’m not able to sleep; maybe I go to bed upset or worried. One particular night I felt completely stressed, just tossing and turning. My brother Harold came to me and took me to a beautiful pond with baby ducks and puppies running and tumbling around it. He told me, “You can play with them, you can hold them.” It was just so calming. Not just calming, but really joyful. I was so relaxed and happy. It’s true that animals are a gift from God—they can change our whole attitude, spending time with them can heal us. The funny thing is that even when we think we are helping them, we are really helping ourselves. If we try to save a bird that has broken its wing, we are giving our care and attention, but the feeling that we get from that might be a sense of self-worth. If we try to calm our big baby of a dog who trembles at the sound of thunder, we’re being given the opportunity to practice compassion. Different creatures bring different gifts, but ultimately all the good stuff is just different forms of God’s love.
Isn’t there any such thing as a bad animal?
Really, there isn’t. Every animal is from God. Every creature is here for a reason. Sometimes an animal could be in our way or scare us, but that doesn’t change the fact. We have a lot of bears around our home in the woods of New Jersey. This past spring, John was out working in the garden and I happened to look out the kitchen window and saw a bear right behind him. I banged on the window and managed to get John’s attention and he was able to get the air horn (we should call it the bear horn since it’s kept just for this purpose) out of the garage and scare it off. Just a short time after that, after a bookstore signing event, I got a note from a woman who’d attended. She said, “You told me I should be careful on the way home, and as I was driving along a bear came out in front of my car! Good thing I was paying extra attention!” I’m glad the bear didn’t eat John, and I’m glad this lovely woman didn’t hit the bear, but if either of those things had happened, it wouldn’t make it a bad bear. They’re both just bears being bears.
Can a dog that has crossed over reincarnate as a cat?
This is a new one for me, and I’m not really the pet psychic, so bear in mind that this is my best guess based upon my own observations, stories I’ve heard, and things I’ve read. I’d say, yes, I believe this is possible. The Egyptians held that no person could be reborn as an animal (and I know this is true; our souls are different—the energy of animals’ spirits is a different frequency from the energy of humans’ spirits), but they never said that an animal could not come back as another animal. There are certain dogs that behave very much like cats—aloof, persnickety, always looking for a soft pillow to curl up on. Just as one example in the
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