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Earlier this summer I had a conversation with a friend who asked me if I knew about spirit animals.
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| Gracie was a rescue cat that traveled with the Pierce Family from Florida to New Hampshire to Maine in her lifetime. PHOTO BY ED PIERCE |
The term itself may be based upon beliefs held by Native Americans that it’s possible to connect with your spirit animal through meditation and they act similar to what some Christians believe are guardian angels.
My friend told me that spirit animals often visit us during times of great uncertainty or change and that identifying and interacting with them can provide us with new perspectives about our lives and a deeper spiritual connection to our place in the world.
Spirit animals are creatures we may be naturally drawn to, and my friend said thinking about what animal could be my own spirit animal would take time but once I did identify it, I could begin to see how this could be of some sort of service to me in the future.
According to my friend, studies conducted worldwide show that the most popular spirit animals are the wolf, followed by bears, deer, horses, and eagles, based upon a person’s personal strengths, weaknesses, and traits.
For example, a wolf can symbolize a mix of power, loyalty, guardianship, teamwork, and wildness, while a bear is known for strength, power, and tenacity. A deer is associated with gentleness, kindness, and innocence. Horses are known for freedom, nobleness, and endurance, and eagles can symbolize independence, freedom, and self-expression.
With my busy schedule, I never really gave the conversation about spirit animals much thought until last weekend, when an odd thing happened to me. My favorite baseball team, the Baltimore Orioles, are playing games on the West Coast and on Saturday evening I stayed up late and watched the Orioles’ game against the Seattle Mariners on television.
The game started at 9:40 p.m. and went into extra innings before the Orioles won, 1-0, at about 12:30 a.m. Sunday. I went to bed and was sleeping soundly when something unusual woke me up.
I volunteered to take the cat and give it a good home. Nancy came to love Gracie too after we were married the next year. We almost lost her before even getting to know her though. In the first year we had her, she was diagnosed by our veterinarian with bladder stones and was in bad shape. Money was tight and when we were told that she needed an operation costing $2,100 to save her life, we wondered how we could come up with it.
But our veterinarian told us he trusted us, and we agreed to pay him $300 each time we were paid. Gracie had her surgery, and the veterinarian completely rebuilt her bladder so it could function properly. She was placed on a special dry food diet so she would not encounter further bladder issues.
With her health restored, we then enjoyed Gracie’s company for many years, and she went with us through moves from a rented condominium to our new house in Florida. She rode on the backseat of our car when we moved from Florida to New Hampshire, and then with me in the U-Haul truck from New Hampshire to Maine.
She loved to sit and sleep in the sunlight and was a great companion on rainy days while reading a book or sitting in the chair beside me while I worked on the computer. Once when my cousin, his wife and their daughter visited us in New Hampshire, Nancy joined them in staging a “cat party” with Gracie as the special guest of honor.
But two months after we moved to Maine, Gracie’s health began to decline sharply. She was now 16 years old, and she stopped eating. One day Nancy and I came home from work and found she had died. It was very sad and although years have passed since then, both of us miss her to this day.
Early last Sunday morning, I woke up feeling something laying across my leg. It felt like Gracie’s paw as she used to do at night for years when stretched out on our bed. I reached down to pet her, but there was nothing there.
I was reminded of my conversation about my “spirit animal” and I thought to myself that maybe Gracie had returned to watch over me, fulfilling that role in my life.
That would be simply perfect for me. <
My friend told me that spirit animals often visit us during times of great uncertainty or change and that identifying and interacting with them can provide us with new perspectives about our lives and a deeper spiritual connection to our place in the world.
Spirit animals are creatures we may be naturally drawn to, and my friend said thinking about what animal could be my own spirit animal would take time but once I did identify it, I could begin to see how this could be of some sort of service to me in the future.
According to my friend, studies conducted worldwide show that the most popular spirit animals are the wolf, followed by bears, deer, horses, and eagles, based upon a person’s personal strengths, weaknesses, and traits.
For example, a wolf can symbolize a mix of power, loyalty, guardianship, teamwork, and wildness, while a bear is known for strength, power, and tenacity. A deer is associated with gentleness, kindness, and innocence. Horses are known for freedom, nobleness, and endurance, and eagles can symbolize independence, freedom, and self-expression.
With my busy schedule, I never really gave the conversation about spirit animals much thought until last weekend, when an odd thing happened to me. My favorite baseball team, the Baltimore Orioles, are playing games on the West Coast and on Saturday evening I stayed up late and watched the Orioles’ game against the Seattle Mariners on television.
The game started at 9:40 p.m. and went into extra innings before the Orioles won, 1-0, at about 12:30 a.m. Sunday. I went to bed and was sleeping soundly when something unusual woke me up.
For many years, our cat Gracie would sleep at the foot of our bed. She was a rescue cat that I took in before Nancy and I got married. She was very gentle and had been used by her previous owner as a companion to her husband, who was dying of cancer. After he died when Gracie was only 1, the owner was going to dump the cat at the local animal shelter before flying to New Jersey a day before a major hurricane was about to strike the area.
I volunteered to take the cat and give it a good home. Nancy came to love Gracie too after we were married the next year. We almost lost her before even getting to know her though. In the first year we had her, she was diagnosed by our veterinarian with bladder stones and was in bad shape. Money was tight and when we were told that she needed an operation costing $2,100 to save her life, we wondered how we could come up with it.
But our veterinarian told us he trusted us, and we agreed to pay him $300 each time we were paid. Gracie had her surgery, and the veterinarian completely rebuilt her bladder so it could function properly. She was placed on a special dry food diet so she would not encounter further bladder issues.
With her health restored, we then enjoyed Gracie’s company for many years, and she went with us through moves from a rented condominium to our new house in Florida. She rode on the backseat of our car when we moved from Florida to New Hampshire, and then with me in the U-Haul truck from New Hampshire to Maine.
She loved to sit and sleep in the sunlight and was a great companion on rainy days while reading a book or sitting in the chair beside me while I worked on the computer. Once when my cousin, his wife and their daughter visited us in New Hampshire, Nancy joined them in staging a “cat party” with Gracie as the special guest of honor.
But two months after we moved to Maine, Gracie’s health began to decline sharply. She was now 16 years old, and she stopped eating. One day Nancy and I came home from work and found she had died. It was very sad and although years have passed since then, both of us miss her to this day.
Early last Sunday morning, I woke up feeling something laying across my leg. It felt like Gracie’s paw as she used to do at night for years when stretched out on our bed. I reached down to pet her, but there was nothing there.
I was reminded of my conversation about my “spirit animal” and I thought to myself that maybe Gracie had returned to watch over me, fulfilling that role in my life.
That would be simply perfect for me. <
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