On Animal-Human Connections and Disconnecting from Social Media
It's still early days without social media but I am feeling the benefit emotionally and maybe cognitively. All I want to do is read and write and I have so much more time I can spend moving - either slowly without a plan or deliberately and effectively without distraction. Right now, I'm still with my animal clients on a week long live in sit and I feel more present in my work which is such a blessing for me. I've always put my all into my work (to a fault - enter perfectionist ideology), but I am a human who often feels like I'm never enough and therefore by extension, I can feel like my work is never enough. Of course, that is very layered and heavy, but the removal of social media at this moment seems to have removed a piece of that puzzle because it removed the element of being able to instantly compare myself to other professionals. I'm not being bombarded with feelings of resentment and envy because a lot of people have more resources than I do, or I'm not questioning whether my handling methods are correct because I saw someone else with a different opinion than mine...and on and on and on (and of course add in the influence we experience for out lives outside of work!). This constant bombardment is all too much for a fragile human brain - as all of ours is. All I have to go on currently is my own education, experience and the evidence that my client's like and trust me because of their behaviour toward me. Willow, my rather introverted kitty client just walked up to me asking for a pat which she doesn't often do, and that's enough evidence for me. Historically, these cues were enough insight into how we were doing. Somehow with the rise of social media, especially the very black and white thinking we often find online, we began to have too much access to others' and their opinions (opinions are not facts!). With that access, there is a myriad of ways we can tell ourselves we're not good enough.
After university, I began to study animal-human connections with the intention to work in equine therapy. I did eventually do this job for about a year, and that education was probably one of the most impactful in my understanding of my own self. Animals are so pure; they have very few motives besides pleasure and joy - they want food, companionship, sniffs, playtime and that's about it. give or take. They are honest about this and completely vulnerable in their asking for it because they need us to provide a lot of, if not most of it for them, for their entire lives. Their honesty and pure intentions is why it's so much easier to use them as a tool for therapy than our fellow humans. Animals are honest and they don't lie. They don't mask. They're always 100% truthful and our responses to their behaviour is not a reflection of them but of us, whereas sometimes our reactions toward other humans, things get a little muddled (not always us, sometimes is them, sometimes it's both). Animals are fantastic for teaching us our limits, for example. When we get annoyed by a behaviour we should or could take a step back, or they teach us to be more assertive as they can be very persistent when they want dinner 3 hours early and we do have to say no or they'd be eating all day. Or they can teach us where we need to soften, lighten up and be be patient; submit our need for control which is very hard for most people to do.
I'm in an amazing position to do this introspective work on a regular basis and it has helped me tremendously in order become a better version of myself (occasionally a "worse" version because sometimes that necessary for a perfectionist/people pleaser) - for my own well being, for my clients and for my friends and family.
I'm still with Salt, the 3 month old kitten. He's certainly teaching me presence, patience, humility and bringing out my sense of humour. All the other pets around him ignore him, which I always wonder a bit about in the non-human animal world, so because of this I am his sole form of enrichment. He's my biggest teacher at the moment and I welcome it with open arms.
We're currently all (except Salt because he can't come outside yet) sitting outside enjoying each others' company and an 8am sunbath during a quiet yet (dis)connected morning.
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