Letting the Dogs Lead Me

I was just remembering the other day how frustrated I was initially with our dog Jake. Relatively new to us, I had to catch him up to speed with the good habits I had taught our other dog Jesse. Jesse and I had enjoyed free roaming walks together for years. What do I mean by free roaming? Well, at the time we lived on the family farm, which gave us the freedom of about 480 acres on which we could freely roam without worry about traffic or the need to keep a dog on a leash. But Jake didn’t know the habit of listening to me and staying with me yet. And, quite frankly, Jesse’s part bird-dog nose often overruled her sense of hearing and desire to stay with me. I spent a couple of weeks in frustration, hollering at the top of my lungs to dogs I could not see in the timber and underbrush. My enjoyment of our adventures was diminishing rapidly. I found myself threatening the dogs like I had heard some parents do with their misbehaving children, “If you can’t listen to me and stay with me, then I’m not bringing you next time.” This was of no use whatsoever. The dogs merely blinked and looked away. I would sigh, knowing that I enjoyed their company too much to leave them at home. So what was I going to do? Walking with them on the leash spoiled the experience of adventure for all of us.

One day when I had the enthusiasm to attempt another free roaming walk, as we neared the timber I suddenly thought, “what if I change the game? What if I let the dogs lead and I run to keep up with them?” Why not? I loved trail running and needed to get into a little better shape anyway. So off we went. It was great fun dodging through the trees and around the brush, following their lead. My senses were wired, my attention completely in the present moment. At times they got ahead of me and were out of sight. I would start to panic and feel the need to holler one of their names. But something stopped me. Instead I slowed for a moment and tried to silently feel out their location. Then I was off running again. I found that I could very accurately feel their location. This was quite a thrill. By letting go of my need to control them, I was learning a new skill. After a few days of this exhilarating new adventure I found that the dogs were spontaneously stopping and looking around for me! I laughed out loud at this turn of events. They DID enjoy my company, too. We had found a game, a way of being in the wild that we could easily enjoy together.

After a few more days I discovered that because I was no longer having the urge to yell for the dogs, not only were my senses keener and my intuition sharper, but I began to let the dogs get away from me. I knew I could feel their location if I needed to. Instead I began “talking” to them in my head. I would picture Jesse and Jake with their ears up, their attention focused on me. I would think things to them like, “Listen. You guys stay close to me.” or “Listen. You know where I am. Meet me back here in a few minutes.” One day I knew we had gotten quite a ways away from each other. I could not hear or see them and I was getting tired. I wanted to head back to the house. I was too tired to key into their location or yell at them. Instead I thought, “Listen you two. You know that stump where we cross the barb wire fence? Meet me there. Head that way now please.” I turned my own tired body that direction, while scanning through the timber and brush for their (hopefully) hurrying bodies. Within a few minutes I could see the stump. Would they meet me? I consciously opened my energetic heart center and held a knowing there as I walked along. Within minutes I heard the dogs. They were cruising at high speed, straight for the stump. In fact they didn’t even look my way as our paths were crossing perpendicular to each other. They were bent on the stump! Hooray!

Today this memory serves me well as a reminder of the power of the connection between my heart and mind as well as the unlimited and often untapped potential interaction between species. A long time explorer into the nature of consciousness, I thoroughly enjoy knowing how to apply mind/body/spirit awareness to practical, tangible situations and relationships in my daily life. I hope that the readers of this blog will be inspired to their own explorations of conscious living. The photos on this blog entry are of my friends Jesse and Jake. They also are lovely ecards on my ecard site at www.lindaraestudio.com/greetings which is available for public use. Enjoy and have a great adventure of your own today!