Animals give thoughtful answers

This past week, when I went to give a reiki treatment to one of my animal clients, her guardian told me that she and her husband had been trying to figure out if their dog would like another dog companion. She asked me if I could talk to her dog about it, which I was happy to do.

It was such an enjoyable conversation and a sweet reminder of just how robust the thought processes of animals are. They think, they feel, they process information, just as we do, and they really appreciate it when all those thoughts and feelings are acknowledged.

When we started talking about it, her first question was, "What would the dog look like?" Her guardian confirmed that if they got another dog, it would be the same breed as she was, so the answer was "He or she would look a lot like you." She was quiet for a few minutes and I could tell she was really thinking about how she wanted to respond.

When she was ready to talk, she told me she was not sure if she wanted another dog in the house. She explained that she was conflicted, because she really did like playing with other dogs and she thought it would be fun to have someone around to play with all the time and at the same time, she wasn't sure she wanted to share her mom and dad with anyone else. She really wasn't sure what she wanted.

We told her that we understood how she felt and that there was no pressure. She asked if we could check in again in six months and ask her again. Her mom smiled and said, "Of course, we can talk about it again in six months."

This sweet little dog thought about it a little longer and then had some more ideas. She wanted to know if her mom and dad could babysit some other dogs in the next six months, so she could get a feel for what it would be like to have another dog around all day and night. She thought that it would be important for her to "try it out" and see what it was really like to share her mom and dad with someone else, especially at night. Her mom agreed that if the opportunity presented itself, they would certainly babysit the dogs of any of their friends who were going out of town, so she could see what it was like.

This pleased her immensely and she seemed so content. She appreciated the fact that her mom and dad were interested in her opinion and she was so happy everyone understood her concerns. She closed her eyes and just soaked up the reiki after that. She got so relaxed, she even fell into a sound sleep during the last part of her reiki treatment.

One of the things I love about the work I do with animals is they never cease to amaze me. Even though I know they think and feel and process things, to have the opportunity to witness it again and again is still one of the sweetest parts of my job. I am in awe of animals, of their minds and of their hearts . . . and I think I will be for the rest of my life.

Reading body language

I often tell people that even if they can't receive telepathic messages from their animal, they can still communicate with them. It's just a matter of watching their animals' body language when they talk to them. Animals will give you answers and show you what they think of what you are saying, through their body language. By watching them, and their reactions to what you say, you have a wonderful way to enhance your own communication with your animal.

I find that I coach my clients a lot, to help them better communicate with their animals, so that they don't always need someone like me. It's not that I want to put myself out of a job :-) I just believe very strongly that the better we can communicate with our animals, the stronger our bond can be and I want to do what I can to help strengthen the bonds between humans and their animals.

Recently, I was at a client's house and she was telling me that one of her cats was driving her batty because she didn't know what she was asking for when she would meow loudly. She was telling me that when her cat starts meowing like crazy, it makes her crazy because she doesn't know what she needs . . . Is she hungry? Is she in pain? Does she just want attention? Is she trying to tell her something else?

I suggested that she tell her cat, "If you're trying to tell me this, then this is what I need you to do." She looked at me with a puzzled look on her face and just as I was trying to figure out a better way to say what I had just said, her cat came into the room and started meowing like crazy. Her guardian said "See, this is what I am talking about." I asked her, "What do you think she's trying to tell you?" and she said, "I don't know, maybe she's hungry" so I said, "Well, then tell her, "If you want food, I need you to go stand by your bowl" and immediately, her cat walked over to her bowl. Her guardian giggled with delight over the clear communication she was receiving and promptly opened a can of cat food and put it in the bowl. All was quiet, as her cat happily devoured the can of food.

The next time I was at her house, she said, "I need you to talk to my other cat Niko, he's been beating up one of my other cats recently and I don't like it." So, when Niko came into the room, I started to talk to him, explaining that it wasn't ok for him to beat up his brother and immediately he turned his head the other way, refusing to look at us. His mom and I couldn't help but laugh, seeing his obvious reaction to what I was saying to him. We started to talk about something else and Niko began having eye contact with us again, but when I went back to talking to him about how he needed to stop beating up his brother, once again, he turned his head away, refusing to look at me while I was talking to him. Clearly, he was telling us that he didn't want to hear what I was saying.

That was just a few days ago and I'm still waiting up an update from Niko's guardian. If there hasn't been any change in his behavior, I'll need to talk to him some more the next time I am there and see if I can find out why he's suddenly so intent on beating up his brother.

I think you will find that you can increase your understanding of your animals if you observe their body language more closely. Talk to them and see how they respond. They may surprise you, by showing you they know exactly what you are saying to them.

Animals as Guides

I believe that all animals are willing and able to serve as our guides while we are here on earth. The key is whether or not we're paying attention enough to receive the guidance they are sharing with us. While we most often think of our pets playing this role, the truth is, any animal, bird, reptile or insect that we encounter, may be attempting to give us guidance.

I have written about this before in past blogs, and mentioned one of my favorite books, Animal Speak, by Ted Andrews, that I frequently refer to when an animal "shows up" in a way that catches my attention. I emphasize "show up" because when we are getting guidance, the animal (or bird, reptile, insect) will make a point of getting our attention.

For instance, I see crows in my neighborhood all the time, I see and hear them when I am sitting in my backyard but I don't necessarily see that as "showing up." On the other hand, the other day, when I was sitting in the backyard, a crow landed on my fence right in my line of sight and then he sat there and stared at me for quite a few minutes, not moving, not adjusting his gaze. I knew he was "showing up," so I went inside to get my Animal Speaks book and see what guidance he was offering me.

The other night, I was leaving a clients house and she mentioned that a couple nights earlier, a friend had driven her home and they were sitting in the car visiting. They saw an opossum walk in front of the car, not once but twice. I told her my assumption was that the opossum was trying to get their attention. Of course, we can interpret the presence of an animal anyway we want. We can think "Ick, what is that thing doing in front of my house?" or we can consider that maybe it is trying to give us a message.

I mentioned once before that a friend of mine had been doing a lot of hiking with his wife and several days in a row, a badger crossed their path. The badger was close enough to make his presence known, but he didn't do anything to frighten them. He and his wife thought it was odd although they didn't give it much thought beyond that, but when I read to him, from Animal Speak, what a badger represents when they "show up" his jaw dropped. He said he couldn't believe how clearly the "message" related to the very things that were going on at the time for he and his wife, the very things they had been discussing while they were out hiking.

And just a couple weeks ago, I had an experience so strange, I feel compelled to share it. It was a warm day, so I had the back door opened. (I don't bother to close the screen anymore, since Lucky was kind enough to make german shepherd sized holes in it for me. I am sure she was thinking it would be helpful to me if I didn't have to get up and open the screen door when she wanted to go out back). :-) So, the backdoor was wide opened and I was up in my office. I heard a strange buzzing sound and looked behind the blinds in the window and realized a bee was buzzing against the glass. I told him to follow me and I'd show him the way back downstairs and out of the house but he didn't follow me. :-)

I got distracted when the phone rang, then got busy doing other things and finally went back up to my office to send some emails an hour or two later. When I sat down, I heard the buzzing again only this time it was louder. I looked behind the wood blinds and saw not one but two bees. I rushed downstairs, got a cup and a piece of paper, since I now knew I wasn't going to get the bees to follow voice commands, and went back up to begin the rescue mission.

I gently scooped the first bee into the cup, put the paper over the top so he wouldn't fly out and then deposited him on some flowers in the backyard. When I came back in, I closed the door, so he couldn't accidentally come back in, then headed upstairs to rescue the second one, only to discover there were three bees there. One by one, I gently scooped them into the cup, brought them outside, closing the backdoor behind me to ensure they didn't come back in.

Once I got all four of them safely outside, I heard the dryer buzz, so I went to the laundry room to get my clothes out of the dryer when I heard that familiar buzzing again. I looked around and sure enough, I found another bee in the laundry room. I went and got the cup again and got him transported to the flowers outside.

After I folded the laundry and put everything away, I sat down on the couch and once again, I heard buzzing. I couldn't believe it. It felt like I was in some alternate universe. In all the years I have lived here, never once has a bee come into the house. I looked behind the shutters in the front window and found two more bees. Once again, I got the cup and piece of paper and one by one, brought them outside, closing the door behind me each time.

I was thinking to myself "What in the heck is going on?" and "Why did all these bees want to come inside the house today?" when all of the sudden it dawned on me . . . they were clearly trying to get my attention. I grabbed my Animal Speak book and read up on what it means when a bee "shows up" in your life (or seven of them) :-) I smiled as I read what they represent, because they were things I definitely needed to hear that day.

So, I encourage you to pay more attention, whether you are at home, or out in nature, or on your way to or from work . . . are any animals, birds, reptiles or insects "showing up," trying to get your attention? They just might have an important message for you.

My Uncle Jim

This past week, my uncle Jim unexpectedly passed away. It came as a shock to everyone because he wasn't ill and seemed to be in good health. When my cousin (his daughter) asked if any family or friends wanted to write a favorite story about her dad, I knew it would be a good thing for me to do, since writing seems to be one of the best ways for me to process my feelings when someone dies.

I sat down and wrote out a few of my favorite memories of my uncle Jim, then sent them to my brother and sister, to have them check facts for me, since I wasn't sure if my memory of the events was accurate. Apparently, either my memory is great, or theirs are no better than mine because they didn't see anything that needed to be changed. :-)

I decided to share one of the stories in my blog this week, in part to honor my uncle Jim and also because it's a story about one of my favorite childhood dogs, Clancy, and it was fun to remember how he ended up being a permanent member of our family.

We grew up in California, so we didn’t get to interact much with all our relatives on the east coast. We got to see Uncle Jim more than anyone because his work would often bring him out to the west coast, but I still didn’t know him well. I had always assumed people on the east coast were no-nonsense types, conservative, more formal, and less emotional than those of us in California. I have no idea how I formed this opinion, but thanks to uncle Jim, I learned that those generalizations I had made about east-coast folks were wrong.

One year, back around 1979 or 1980, uncle Jim was in California on business and came over for dinner. We had just adopted a new dog a couple of days earlier and my parents weren’t sure they were going to let us keep him. Us kids, of course, had fallen in love with the dog and were determined to keep him.

Somehow in all the commotion that evening, our new dog, Clancy, slipped out of the house. When we finally discovered that he was missing, we were all frantic. I don’t even know if we were done with dinner yet, but immediately everyone was up from the table and out the door, in search of our missing dog.

This was when I began discovering my misconceptions about uncle Jim. I assumed that he would think we were all crazy for making such a big deal about a dog we had only had for a couple of days, but much to my delight, he joined in the search and seemed just as concerned as the rest of us that the dog was missing. There he was, walking the streets of a neighborhood he wasn’t familiar with, yelling “Clancy, Clancy!” along with the rest of us.

After an hour or so of combing the neighborhood, we came back to the house to regroup. Uncle Jim and I were walking into the kitchen together, when I heard my mom talking out loud to God. She said that if he helped bring Clancy back, he would never have to leave again, that we would for sure keep him. I don’t know what I was happier about, that I heard my mom make this promise to God, or that I had uncle Jim as a witness.

After several more hours of frantic searching, we finally found Clancy! When he was safely back in our house, us kids were excitedly telling him that he was going to get to stay forever, when my dad said, “We don’t know that yet.” I quickly pointed out that I had heard mom make a promise to God that he would get to stay. I saw my mom hesitate for a minute, so I chimed in with, “And uncle Jim heard her too.” And that seemed to be all it took to secure her promise and give Clancy his forever home.

I was delighted to find out that night that my Uncle Jim had such a good and caring heart and that he was willing to side with the kids when it came down to parents vs. kids. After that visit, I had a whole new perspective on my uncle Jim and looked forward to his next visit.

I sent the above story, as well as another one to my cousin and the next day, I got an email back from her telling me how much she, her mom and her sister had enjoyed the stories. She said the stories made them all laugh and cry and she wanted me to know how much they appreciated them.

It got me thinking about how much it means to someone to know what their loved one meant to other people, whether that loved one is a person or an animal. To know how someone's life was impacted by the deceased shifts the focus to their life, rather than their death, and to me, that is one of the most important things we can do . . . to honor the life, instead of focusing on the death.

So if you encounter someone who has lost a loved one, whether it's a person or an animal, and that loved one touched your life or impacted you in some way, I hope you will let them know. You will be giving them a great gift, helping them to focus on their loved ones life, helping them to remember why that life was so important . . . and giving them something positive to focus on in the difficult weeks and months that lie ahead.

Grief Support

Lately, I've been thinking a lot lately about the sadness that comes along with the passing of an animal companion, not just because of my own loss, but because I am faced with loss quite often in the work I do. I recently realized that since last July, I have lost approximately one animal client per month, which has been painful for me, regardless of what an honor it is to help animals and their guardians through that final and often very difficult stage.

I will confess that I have had moments here and there, where I question whether I can keep doing the work that I do. Knowing that I will have to continue to face the transition of many more animals, and knowing that I will feel each loss very deeply, weighs heavy on my heart sometimes. In those moments, where I feel overwhelmed by the losses, I try to remind myself that death is a natural part of our experience here on earth and that it is as important to honor an animal during their life as it is to honor them during their death. And still, it is a challenge that I face.

For the guardians who have suffered these loses, I do everything I can to ensure that they feel supported and not alone and yet, I am still always left wishing I could do more to ease the pain and sadness they experience. I know there is just no way around it. Losing one of our beloved animal companions is going to hurt like hell, no matter what.

In recent weeks, I have been fortunate to learn about some of the support resources that exists out there for people who have lost a pet, because Jewel's mom has been doing a fair amount of research, as she navigates through her own journey of grief, and she has been kind enough to pass along what she had found. I thought it might be helpful for me to share with all of you, the things she has shared with me.

First of all, there is a fabulous website she found called: Animals in our hearts. The website is filled with resources, such as an on-line grief support system, information on animal communication, articles about the grieving process and the afterlife, etc. They also have free teleclasses. The next one coming up on May 11th is titled, Legacies of Love: Finding the Grace in Grief. They offer other teleconference workshops on a variety of topics (including dealing with grief). It looks like a wonderful place to find support, answers and comfort.

Their web address is www.animalsinourhearts.com

There is another animal website Jewel's mom found called The Animal Communicator Forum. I was pleased to see information on this site that can help grieving guardians as well, such as an article called "Exploring Myths about Healing Grief" and a section of the website called "Death and In Spirit" that has information on the dying process, grieving and reincarnation. There is also a section where you can listen to recordings of previous teleseminars from 2009 and 2010, with many of the topics of those seminars being relevant to people who have experienced a loss.

You can locate this website at: http://animalcommunicatorforum.com

There are also some great books out there. Here are a couple of recommendations:

Animals in Spirit, by Penelope Smith and Animals and the Afterlife, by Kim Sheridan

And there is actually a place here on earth called the Rainbow Bridge. (I had no idea). It's a national monument in Utah. If you want to learn more about it, you can go to: http://www.nps.gov/rabr/index.htm

For those of you who are dealing with your own grieving process, maybe some of these resources will reach an unmet need and help you find some more peace.

As for the precious animal clients of mine who have made their transitions in the last 10 months, I miss them all very much. Each one of them touched me very deeply, and while I shed quite a few tears over each of their departures, I have felt truly honored to have been a part of their lives, and in many cases, been a part of their deaths as well.

For the guardians of these incredible animals, who had the joy and the privilege of sharing their lives with; Hanna, Bood, Lucy, Montana, Natalie, Shadow, Lacy, Jewel, Misha and Kiki . . . I hope you will all remember that the love your animal had for you when they were here is just as strong as it always was. Their physical departures can't stop the love that exists between you. And I hope you will also remember that your beloved animals are watching over you . . . still caring very deeply for you and hoping you find more and more moments of joy, as you adjust to life without them in the physical world.

Seeing a Sign

I awoke Thursday morning, doing what I usually do when I wake up . . . mentally reviewing all the things that are on my schedule for the day and what I need to accomplish and then trying to will myself to get out of bed and get the day started. (Unfortunately, I’ve never been one to excitedly spring out of bed like some people do. With me, it's always been a process.)

So Thursday started out like any other morning, except that when I finished my mental review of the days activities, I felt my eyes well up with tears. I thought it was odd, as I didn’t know what there was to cry about. I laid there a while longer, fighting back the urge to cry, unable to identify what was making me feel sad. I just kept thinking “What is wrong with me today?”

Once I finally managed to get up and get some coffee in me, I got into “busy” mode . . . returning phone calls, reading and responding to emails, doing some laundry. I was determined to keep myself busy and ignore the sadness that was lurking below the surface, but in between calls, in between emails, I kept getting pictures in my mind . . . pictures of Lucky’s last day here and they were pictures that made my heart ache.

I didn't know why I kept seeing images of her in our final days together but I found myself wishing we could have that last day again . . . wishing I could lay on the floor with her, and listen to her breath, feel her fur against my face. The images would come, and then I would force myself to get working on my to-do list again . . . until the images came back into my head. After a while, I finally stopped and looked at the calendar and saw that it was April 15^th. It was 6 months ago, to the day, that Lucky passed away.

The strange thing was that I knew this “anniversary” was coming and I even warned my best friend last week that I feared I may be emotional when the day arrived, but it had been such a crazy week, between work and dealing with insurance companies, car repairs, rental cars, etc . . . I had completely forgotten it was the 15^th until I looked at the calendar.

I felt better knowing what was making me feel so teary, but I didn’t know what else I could do about it, so I kept plugging along, trying to power through my to-do list. Around 3pm, I decided to go for a run. It was the first time I had been out running since the car accident almost two weeks ago and again, I felt teary on the run. I tried to rationalize that it from the pain that I still feel in my back and neck, but I knew in reality, it was probably a sign I needed to just "be" with the feelings of sadness I felt, instead of trying to ignore them.

When I got back home, I looked at the clock and then my calender. I had an important conference call at 5pm and then a client appointment at 7pm, and it was already 4pm, so I decided I’d better give myself some time right then to work through the emotions that were coming up. It may sound odd that I was "scheduling time to be sad" but I've learned in recent years that shutting the feelings out when they are coming up doesn't do anything but make me work harder to keep the feelings at bay.

I sat down on my bed and began talking to Lucky. I told her I couldn’t believe it had already been six months since she left because in some ways, it felt like it was just a couple weeks ago. I told her I missed her terribly and that I wished she was still here. I told her I didn't know if I would ever be able to remove her bed from our room and that it makes me smile when I pull a sweater out of the closet and find her hair on it.

I picked up her urn from it's spot on the shelf and held it in my hands. On the front there is a plaque that says “Lucky (For me)” That is the title of the book that I was working on in the last few years of her life, that I have yet to finish and publish. I wondered if I would ever get the book done or if the exercise of writing it was just for she and I. I thought about how my friend David helped me decide that was the right thing to put on the plaque, when he drove us to the place where she was to be cremated. Not only was it the title of my book, but it summarized perfectly the way I felt about having her come into my life . . . it was certainly "lucky for me."

This next part, I hadn’t wanted to share with anyone, because it’s a little embarrassing, but if I don’t share this part, then the next part won’t make as much sense. So, with a cringe as I type . . . I’ll confess that the next thing I knew, I was curling up on the floor, in the spot in the hall where Lucky passed away. At first, I was in observation mode . . . I focused on what I was seeing from where I was laying, thinking about the fact that it was the last view Lucky had before she left. It made me smile because I knew she had been able to see the big beautiful tree through the window in the front of the house, and she could see the CD towers with all my treasured music. She could see the coffee table and the couch, where we spent so much time, sharing meals and playing with tennis balls. I was glad that was the view she had in her final days here, it was a nice view.

And then the tears came . . . and they came on strong. There I was, laying on the floor, clutching her urn close to my heart and sobbing. I had moments of thinking “wow, Maureen, this is kind of pathetic” but I would push those thoughts out because I knew I just needed to feel what I was feeling and the truth was, I felt sad. I still miss her with every fiber of my being.

My mind was swirling with thoughts, some of which surprised even me. I realized a lot of my sadness was over the fact that I hadn’t received any signs that she has been here in spirit, and sadness over the realization that I didn’t really need any signs to know that she has been around.

I used to watch Crossing Over with John Edward all the time and I remembered how many times spirits came through to people who were totally skeptical about “the other side” and how it seemed to be more important for spirits to get through to those who didn’t believe in an after life. I realized that since I am not skeptical, I technically don’t “need” a sign because I already believe in the spirit world, I already believe that spirits can still see us and visit us once they cross over. But I felt sad that since I didn’t need any convincing, I may not ever get a “sign.” It felt childish but it was what I felt, so I just accepted it and tried not to judge it.

I laid there, holding her urn and crying until I felt I had gotten it all out. Then I calmly got up, put the urn back on the shelf, washed all the tears off my face and sat down to prep for my 5pm conference call. It sounds kind of odd when I type it out, but it felt very normal and very natural. It was a way for me to process what I was feeling and that is what I had done. It actually felt like a huge accomplishment for me, to just acknowledge my feelings, and give myself permission to feel them, since I spent the first 30 years of my life stuffing my feelings and judging them as a weakness. I was glad that I had given myself the time to feel, since my old pattern of stuffing feelings was attempting to resurface earlier in the day.

The conference call went well and then I got ready to go see my client. She lives about ½ hour away, so I was in the car by 6:30pm, making my way up 280. I was feeling alright, although I am more tense in the car these days, since the accident. I find that I am much more concerned about what other drivers are doing than I used to be and feel on edge when I am in the car.

I was cruising along, listening to the radio when all of the sudden a car changed lanes right in front of me. At first, I was irritated that they pulled in front of me with so little room between us but then my eyes glanced down at the license plate. It took my brain a minute to compute and I felt like I was doing one of those slow-motion-blinking things, as I tried to focus on the personalized plate in front of me. It said “LUKY4ME.” It didn’t look like a California plate . . . it was a fuzzy mixture of red and white, and as I was trying to focus more intently, to figure out what state the plate was from, the car abruptly changed lanes again, into the fast lane and zoomed off.

I wondered for a few minutes what a person with “Lucky for me” on their license plate might look like and I wanted to catch up to the person and find out, but the rental car that I am driving right now doesn’t seem to want to go any faster than 65 mph, so even though I tried for a few minutes to catch up with the car, I was unable to.

I slowed back down, wondering why I hadn't been able to see what the driver looked like and then it dawned on me . . . that I had already seen what I needed to see. It was my “sign." My sweet girl had found a way to get through to me . . . and as I continued along the freeway, I was filled with feelings of gratitude. She knew how much I wanted to see a "sign" that let me know she was still with me and she found a way to reach me. I laughed to myself as I realized it was probably also a sign that I need to stop whining about the fact that spirits only come through to skeptics. :-)

Finding the good in the not-so-good experiences

A week or so ago, I was listening to a speaker who was talking about her beliefs that something good can come from things that may not appear so good on the surface, which is a concept I believe myself. Such as when a client's animal was hit by a car years ago (which is obviously not good) but when they went to the vet because of the injured leg, the vet found a tumor that they would have never known was there, as the animal seemed to be in perfectly good health. If the tumor had gone undetected, it might not have been treatable, so in a strange way, being hit by the car ended up being a positive, since it helped them detect and remove a tumor that could have taken the animal's life far earlier.

This speaker also said that we are meant to meet the people we encounter in our lives, no matter how random the meeting may be . . . that there is a reason for everyone we cross paths with. I have had this experience myself many times. One instance that stands out in my mind is many years ago, the holistic healer I was working with told me that I would be able to help myself more if I developed better body intuition. I had no idea what he was talking about or how a person might go about developing body intuition and I left his office feeling rather confused.

Two days later, I was scheduled for a conference call with some work colleagues. We were using a conference call system where each person dialed in using a specific number, so that we could all connect. When we got on the call, we discovered several other people on the line who weren't part of our group. We realized the conference service had double booked the line, so one of my colleagues said she'd call the conference service and get it straightened out. She asked me to stay on the line, so I could let the rest of our group know what was going on. While we were waiting, I asked the other people on the call what they were meeting about and they said "We coach people on body intuition." My jaw dropped. (and yes, I ended up working with them to develop body intuition, not knowing at the time that a couple years later, I was going to change careers and really need that skill).

Last weekend, I was unfortunately involved in a bad car accident. I had stopped for a pedestrian, who was waiting at a cross walk and the car behind me stopped, but the car behind them barreled into us at a very high rate of speed. All three cars were severely damaged. (The pedestrian was fine.) We spent several hours on the side of the road waiting for police and EMT's to arrive. It was a long, frustrating night, followed by an even longer and more frustrating week.

Hours were spent on the phone dealing with insurance companies and car repair shops. The realization that the guy who caused the accident did not have insurance, even though he said he did, made the experience even more frustrating. On top of that, my back and neck were injured far worse than I thought at the time of the accident and by Wednesday, I was at a chiropractors office getting x-rays and hoping they could give me some relief from the physical pain I was experiencing.

When I met with the doctor to review my x-rays, he said, "For as awful as it was that you were in a car accident, it may have actually been a good thing because there are some things going on with your spine that really need to be addressed." I thought it was interesting, since I had just listened to the speaker the day before the accident reminding me of my belief that something good can come from things that don't seem so good on the surface. I thought the timing was interesting . . . that I was being reminded of this, the day before I was rear-ended.

As for her other message, that everyone we meet, no matter how random the meeting, come into our lives for a reason . . . I have been thinking about that a lot as well. The couple who were in the car behind me were two of the loveliest people I have ever met. They were an older couple, about my parent's age, maybe a little older. Since we were on the side of the road for several hours, we had a lot of time to visit. I remember at one point telling them that of all people I could have been involved in an accident with, I was grateful that it was people that were so nice, who I felt so safe and comfortable around. They said they felt the same way.

Since the accident was one week ago tonight, I decided to call them and see how they were doing. I ended up talking to them for 40 minutes and in spite of the difficult week we have all had (with insurance issues, car problems and back pain), we had a lovely conversation. I don't know yet why we all met each other, but the ease and pleasantness of our interactions make me feel that there is some good that will come of it. Before we hung up the phone, the husband said, "We feel like we have a new friend in you" and I admitted I felt the same way.

And there is one more interesting piece to this story. My previous chiropractor no longer works in my neighborhood, so I had to find a new one this week. I remembered that over a year ago, I received a glowing recommendation from a woman who took her dog to the same holistic vet that I took Lucky to. I dug through my old emails and finally found the name and number of her chiropractor. When I called, they had just had a cancellation 5 minutes earlier, so they were able to get me in that day. At one point, the gal who runs the front office asked me what I did for a living. When I answered her, her eyes got really big and she said, "Someone just told me the other day that I should find a reiki practitioner to help me with a health challenge I am facing, I'm so excited to meet you."

I guess the long and short of it is, I am really glad that I listened to the speaker that day, because it was a nice to be reminded of these concepts. It gave me a different perspective in which to view the events of the last week, helping me to see the positives instead of letting myself get mired in the negative aspects of what I have had to deal with this week.

I am going to be able to get some issues with my spine addressed that I didn't know existed, I have some new friends and possibly a new client. I like being able to focus on all of those aspects of the experience, as it makes it much easier to keep moving forward with a smile on my face.