It's All In How You Ask

While I always encourage people to talk to their animals and to ask them questions when needed,  I recently noticed that the key words that are often missed when asking an animal a question is "show me."  "Show me" is a wonderful way to not only get information from an animal but to also show them that you respect their intelligence.

It worked like a charm the other day when I was driving home and encountered a Dalmation standing in the middle of the street.  I pulled my car safely around the corner (so Kino would stop barking) and walked back over to him.  After offering him my hand to sniff, he let me pet him.  While petting his neck, I determined he wasn't wearing a collar, so there would be no way to find an address or a phone number for him.  I decided to ask for his help, but rather than saying, "Where do you live?" I said, "Can you show me where you live?"  Immediately he started walking down the street, so I followed along and about three houses later, he walked over to a car and began sniffing it.  I said, "Oh, is that your car?" and he wiggled his rear-end so I took that as a "yes."  Then I said, "Should we knock on the door and see who is home?" and he walked up to the front porch.  Again, I followed along and a couple seconds after I knocked, a man opened the door and said "Charlie, I was just looking for you."

You might think, well, you're an animal communicator, why couldn't you ask him "Where do you live?" and the short answer is, it would have taken too long.  I might have received images and pictures of things about the house - things that would need to be interpreted, etc.  Unfortunately, he wouldn't have said, "oh, I live at 647 Chestnut Street."  Asking him to show me was a much quicker way to get him back home.

There are many times where I hear my friends and my clients ask their dog "What do you want?" when their dog is barking or pawing or something along those lines to try and get their guardian's attention.  "What do you want?" is usually just met with a more insistent tap of the paw or a louder bark, but rarely an answer.  When I gently suggest that they adjust their question to "Show me what you want" it almost always results in some sort of answer.  Upon asking, "Show me what you want" one dog walked into the kitchen and sat down close to the sink.  When I looked at his mom with a question on my face (i.e. What's over there?) she laughed and said, "That's the cupboard where I keep the special dog treats."  Another time when the guardian asked "Show me what you want" the dog walked over to the closet where the leashes were kept.  He was asking to go on a walk.  She said "I'm visiting with Maureen right now, I will take you for a walk after she leaves" and the dog promptly laid down on the floor next to us and didn't make another peep. (I do think that for as much as he likes me, he was definitely looking forward to me leaving that day but at least expectations were clear).

So, keep it in mind . . . "Show me" is a great tool to have in your tool kit, not just because it can get you some pretty quick results, but I also think animals really appreciate it when we acknowledge their intelligence.