Dying From the Animal’s Perspective
I have the privilege of sharing some of life’s most poignant moments with animals and their people. Our animals often have a unique and profound perspective that informs our lives. As Cata, a mixed breed canine, neared death, she shared this beautiful communication with her human, Taryn Kama. The reference to the waterfall is a reference to a peaceful place that was theirs alone, where the gentle cascade of the water washed away all sorrows.
From Cata:
I am not leaving, just changing form. Remember the waterfall. Stand, set, lie in it with me. Let the golden stream wash over you and cleanse you of all your sorrows and tears. I recede into its depths to a non-place and non-time. Cata is released and I am pure energy, no longer confined by form, no longer graced by form.
The experience of incarnating afresh on Earth has been amazing, challenging. Creating through a body allows expression and contact that is qualitatively different than spirit to spirit. I long for this expression. It’s all filled me in a different way than Spirit to Spirit. It is an expansion of who I am, yet a fragment of who I am.
The same is true for you. You are all you have been and will be and are in timelessness and placelessness. Though you know it on one level, you don’t know it as I know it, from a more distant perspective that can see it all at once. You are limited to seeing it and feeling it through your human eyes and body. When I am in my dog body, the body limits my sight and behavior to dogness. When I float beyond my body, my perspective is timeless.
We have been together before and will be together in the future. Sit in the waterfall. There are many being forms yet for you to experience in this lifetime. I’m glad we walked together for a time. Do not be sad. Your loss is not as great as you think.
The space I left in your life is not a hole, but an opening for what comes next. I am a field that you can call to coalesce and feel as Cata. My love will envelop you and hold you and support you. Do not go into the hole, go into the opening. Sit in the waterfall and be cleansed. This part of your visible life is an ending and a beginning.
This physical fragment of who I am is dissolving. I am not dissolving. I remain who I am. See the body within the spirit, not the spirit within the body. Draw a dog silhouette within a huge circle. The space within the circle, including the silhouette is who I am. The silhouette is just an expression of me you can see with your physical eyes—plane matching plane.
Soar above that perspective and see us as we are—intermingling, interlocking, interdependent energies with consciousness that form and reform, without changing our essence. Water to ice to steam to water, all different expressions of the same substance.
Grieve, Love, Live…
Grieve the body, not the loss. Grieve our physical togetherness, our physical partnership, not the loss. Rejoice in the time we shared it, in our continued connection over space and time.
Love again. Experience another dog being, another dog expression. Each of us is unique and also similar. Enjoy our true expression of unconditional love. It exists before we take form and continues afterwards. It is the true expression of the universe. I’m leaving now. No need to call for me. Trust I will return as spirit when you least expect me.
Live in the present on Earth having a human experience. Enjoy your time here. And overbearing loss, a death, a struggled to create cannot take away the joy of working, living, creating. Every day expresses you as you are; your full expression in that moment. Flow easily into the expression of joy, gratitude, love. Enjoy your physical body. Live on Earth in the present. There is time enough to experience other realms. Do not miss this one by casting too far away in time and space.
With much love, from the being you know as the dog, Cata.