678. Emelie Cajsdotter

the means or the fuel through which Brahman, a greater reality, is realized. So life is not some mistake that the whole universe has somehow fallen into and we should just get out of and be rid of as quickly as possible. It's a tremendous opportunity, like you say, and there's an unimaginable scope of possibility which can be realized if we just engage in the game from the proper perspective and not try to just escape from it, ASAP.

Yeah, and see it as something like a riddle that we are meant to solve, and then we've solved it, and then what? Right, keeps on going. So there's a couple of themes here that come up again, that your whole teaching in your book is based upon, that I want to explore with you. One is the idea that animals can get enlightened because I have this bias going back decades that they can't, and I'm willing and eager to re-examine that.

And another is just the sophistication of some of these animals' thought processes that you

communicate with. In some of the passages in your book, they were saying things that I had to really put on my thinking cap to understand what they were saying, these philosophical insights and everything. And I think, "Okay, wait a minute. Now, horses and other animals don't even have a prefrontal cortex, which we're told is that tool that enables humans to think in sophisticated ways that other animals don't have. And so how are they thinking these thoughts?

And is it because it's the higher self of the animal that has all this wisdom and somehow they don't have the neurophysiology to articulate it, which we do, but that doesn't mean they don't have access to that kind of wisdom. I've asked myself all these questions too. I started off believing that humans are the only ones with an abstract ability to think. And every time I think I know something, I'm being proven wrong. So I guess that will continue also beyond this interview, of course.

But I guess it's where we put the consciousness. And some animals describe the consciousness as the bridge between the physical existence and the soul, the possibility for materia to become aware of itself. If it is so, we just play with that thought. If that is so, then perhaps everything that is alive knows that it's alive.

If being alive means that soul has entered materia, and that can only happen if there is consciousness connecting them, that could possibly mean that everything that is alive knows that it's alive, which means that we have a conscious expression of our experience of life constantly, no matter what we are. But I think as humans, what we have done with our gap and our personal gain and all of the things we discussed in the beginning, is that we are doing

what we've also done to other human beings. We take away their person, we depersonalize them, and then we take what we want. So, if black people don't feel anything, then we can use them as slaves, right? I mean, we believe that the children couldn't feel pain not long ago.

Yeah, sure. I think it was Descartes who popularized the notion that animals are just machines and they don't even have consciousness and they don't feel pain and the noises they make if we caught inflict pain upon them are just some like mechanical thing going on. That makes it easier for us to take what we want. If our ego needs constant food,

that's a way of doing it, right? Yeah, I mean the Nazis and also like in the conflict in Rwanda, they were referring to people as cockroaches, so you can do whatever you want because it's just like a cockroach. Yeah, and the scary thing is that we are able to do that to ourselves. So, I guess the way back is to again meet everyone in person. It's like, okay, this tree is a person, this tuft of grass is a person, it's not a human, but it is someone. And perhaps that someone doesn't

have a nervous system like the tree. It doesn't mean that the tree's experience of life is limited. The experience can be deeply philosophical, devoted, and religious, but the tree would not be able to phrase it because the tree wouldn't have the need to phrase it because the tree constantly is in this experience, most likely in connection to other trees and where do one tree begin and how

is the soul and consciousness in plants? That's another fascinating question. If you let a seed down and that seed's become another tree, from which point are the two of you being isolated? Is it different souls in these two trees? Or is it different consciousness? Or is even the question relevant?

Well, my guess is that there would be different souls superficially and one soul fundamentally, the way on the ocean you have different waves superficially, but it's all really the same ocean if you go a little deeper. Yeah. We have this common consciousness and we have the individual and we have the individual person that could experience all these things that are written about in this book. I am the one putting words on it to the experience of sharing that instant now with another species.

And then of course it's like a conversation between you and me. meet tonight because we are very interested in spiritual philosophical questions. Naturally, when we talk to each other, that's what we're going to talk about, even if it wasn't a job. And it's the same with me and the tree because I am so interested in life and existence and spiritual matters and human and all of these things. That will come up in the conversation, most likely.

interested in what I'm interested in, Of course, not every animal or plant is but sometimes you meet a kindred spirit and regardless of what species that is, there will be creativity in that

meeting point. There are horses in the herd that, for lack of a better word, because I know that the minute you put a word on someone's role in the herd, you've fixated it and it's not good because you create an identity and it's not what we want, but I tend to call them memory Jordan where an old mare was close to pass over to the other side and she was

carriers. I met them at first in sharing her time with another mare and they were passing on something and I thought that the memory carrier knowing the history of her herd and her species kept all that in her mind and that she had to teach the other horse all of these things so the other horse would also remember it and they tried to explain to me that the stories only appear in the moment of sharing. It's not

that an individual continuously remembers them like a computer. They only become alive when we truly meet each other. So who does the story belong to if I meet a tree and experience this deep philosophical conversation? Was it in the tree before and recorded into me or did it happen because we met? Because something happens when our consciousness are meeting in the same point. But I think the need to put it into an explanation, that would be a human

need. That is no need for the tree. But I believe that the tree still experienced something very valuable in the moment of sharing. Not in the explanation. If I meet somebody that I went to high school with, we might all of a sudden start having all these discussions about things we experienced in high school, which both of us have forgotten about for 50 something years. Is that what you're saying? But then those memories come up because it's relevant to our particular interaction.

Yes, I guess it could be like that. Yes, definitely. Because we cross paths and I have a pony at home and she describes time as yarn, but not put together neatly. It's a mess, like a completely messy, yes, a tangled, messy yarn. Because time, when we think about it as parallel, tend to think like these neat little lines, as if we would stack books on top of each other. So that's not how time acts. It comes and goes and it meets, it keeps meeting itself in all these

variety of angles. There is a chronological time represented by the thread itself, but the way it meets itself is actually totally irregular. I like that thought because it means that we are not just sort of puppets controlled by destiny, it matters what we do when we enter time and we have choices, but it seems like all other species have it too and we're missing out because for some reason we believe that we are the only ones that go through these developments. We seem to be the most isolated

species in the sense that we create an identity that is very clear. It's like for me as a human being, it's very obvious when I am dead and when I am alive. There's no doubt about that. You weren't born, but one minute later you are, and you are alive and then you're not. And for other species, it seems to be a lot more floating. How you come and go, what your identity is. It's

like, yes, it's I identify with myself, but I also carry the herd. If I am a plant and I decay, I die partly, perhaps, and my body turn into something else, and I am aware of that. So, I think in our isolation, we miss out on so many dimensions of life. To me, the spiritual path is more about being able to truly appreciate this life, more than reaching something outside of it, really, because we are already in constant, we live inside of the Creator in a way.

Yeah, I was a student of a famous spiritual teacher and one time he said, "Every day is life. Don't pass over the present for some glorious future." Yeah, yeah, exactly.

So what you're saying then about plants and animals, if I've interpreted it correctly, is that they're more tuned into the collective, first of all, of their herd, of their species, of the forest or whatever, and also they're more tuned into that level of life which is more fundamental than the comings and goings of individual bodies, so that the death of the body is not as big a deal to them as it is to someone who is tightly identified with

their individuality and unaware of the more universal nature. It seems to be like that. It seems to, for us, perhaps not our opinion of death, but our fear of dying, is that it's a kind of extinction to us. Yeah, people feel that, because they think, "This is what I am. I'm nothing more than and this dies undone. Yeah, and everything is done because there is nothing that can no longer relate to anything. So it's the end of all things in a way. But if you are aware of the cycle of the body,

because I mean, the body will incarnate as well. I mean, it's the same molecules creating another body. We actually have molecules and atoms in our bodies that were in Jesus's body and Buddha's body and we're very grateful for those. Yeah, but not necessarily Elvis Presley because he was too recent. So, there hasn't been time for the molecules to circulate around. Yeah, that's a gift for someone else. But also, it seems to me that the experience of life itself, to us, death is outside of life,

because it is outside of time. And animals seems to agree that death is outside of time. I mean, they taught me that, it's not my idea, but it's not the end of the journey to them. Nor is it for us, but we just don't realize it, a lot of us. Now, this thing about hierarchies, I want to see if I can get you to agree that there are hierarchies, but there aren't hierarchies. And

let me explain what I mean by that. But let's say one of your horses has intestinal parasites, so you give it ivermectin or whatever is used to treat intestinal parasites, and your intention is to kill the parasites, because you consider the horse to be more valuable than the parasites which are living in its intestines. So there's some kind of value judgment there. Horse is more important than parasites, let's kill the parasites. Wouldn't that imply a hierarchy?

I would have thought the way you describe it a while ago. Now the horses are beginning to teach us so much about how the grazing animals relate to grass and the ground and the microbes underneath the soil, that we are actually not using these deworming things anymore because we don't want to cut that cycle. We try to find other solutions. Natural, more natural ones. Yes, and also it becomes a problem. I mean, horses are meant to have a certain amount of

parasites to actually keep balanced, but not too many. The reason why they become too many is actually because we are destroying the land, the way we treat the land, and the way we put too many horses in the same paddocks or not in tuned with all the other species. So perhaps the horses couldn't exist without the parasites. So at this point, there is

a change in me in that particular area at the moment. Alright, well let's say another example. Okay, mosquitoes spread malaria. So we don't want children to die of malaria, so we kill the mosquitoes as many as we can and get mosquito nets to starve the mosquitoes if necessary so they won't suck blood out of the children and give them malaria. So we're valuing the children above the mosquitoes. So there's again some kind of hierarchical judgment there.

I'm not sure I would call it hierarchical, but I see what you mean. I'm thinking that for everyone who is alive, again we speak about appreciating life and how that is also spiritual, perhaps the center of the spiritual quest in a way because it leads us back to life. Everything that is alive will try to survive. A horse that would be attacked by a mountain lion will try to survive until the very, very end.

The mountain lion will try to kill the horse in order to survive and risk its own life to feed its own children. We are all designed to do what we need to do in order to survive, but is that a sign of cruelty or is there a deeper balance in the system? So of course if a mosquito would kill my child, I would kill the mosquito to save my child because it would be a natural instinct to preserve life.

It doesn't necessarily mean that I think my child is more valuable than the mosquito, but it is my instinct to do so and it's the love for my child and the fear of what will happen if I lose this child, of course, also the more selfish part. The mosquito will do the same from the mosquito's angle because that's what we are designed to do. And if this happens in a balance, the animals chasing the horses will make them run in a particular

way that is actually good for the grass. When we keep horses separate and we try to protect them from everything, it changes their pattern of grazing. So they become sick and the pastures become sick. So we had to figure out systems, how we can actually make them run and I wouldn't say that we frighten them because we don't want to cause anything negative but we do need to get them stressed and excited to the point of recreating how they are supposed to move because otherwise

they don't stay healthy. So I guess we are designed to meet in this play of life and death and interaction between bodies if that becomes cruel or creates suffering in us, it will at times, but perhaps it doesn't necessarily have to be, I don't think it's possible to live a life without pain, but when we move towards suffering, then it's more of a question how we look at it, I suppose.

Pain, I think, is inevitable and I think it doesn't mean, I don't need to dislike the mosquito, I don't need to hate the mosquito, I will do what I'm designed to do for my species to survive, as would the others, but I think when we have this gap to all the other species, we are losing a sense of value and a sense of self-respect. So we have a short-sightedness in our way of interacting that other species obviously don't have because they are not destroying the planet the way we do.

I totally agree. There's some kind of balance point in here I'm trying to find. Obviously we're in the midst of the sixth great mass extinction and hundreds of species go extinct just about every day. There's just been a huge reduction in wildlife populations over the last decades and it seems to be accelerating. And I mean, we're cutting down the rainforest in Indonesia to plant palm trees, to get palm oil, and it's eradicating the habitat of the

orangutans and so on. So there's this human hubris and egotism and greed and sense of superiority that makes us feel that these other species are disposable and we can dispose of them in order to gain some economic advantage. And obviously that is terrible and it's destroying the world.

Now holding that thought in mind, can we also think that, well, there are levels of complexity in nervous systems and levels of sophistication of function, and I'd rather be a human being than a mosquito because it's higher up the biological evolutionary scale and possibly the spiritual evolutionary scale if we define that as the ability to cognize and embody pure consciousness and express it and live it in daily life.

Dr. Debra Hixson I would see that as a circle more. It's like if you have a herd of horses, you could see that there is one horse that none of the other horses can move around, almost none. And then there is one that perhaps most of the horses

can shift around, but can bet on it. If the herd is big enough, the area is big enough, and their way of expressing natural life is big enough, then the one that everyone else is shifting around is the only one that can move, the one horse that no one else can move. It always becomes a circle in the end. Moving means the horse that can't be moved is just sort of stubborn and strong. Yes, exactly. No one can tell him what to do. Yeah, no one can shift his place.

The other guy, everybody can push him around. And then it makes you confused because it's like, but why can he, because we again, we look for a line and I think a hierarchy is an expression of a line and when you bring it into a circle, it becomes confusing. Okay, so yes, we are definitely one of the most complex individuals on the planet. Is that good or bad or is it just complex? Well, the whole universe has grown from simplicity to complexity over the past 13.7 billion years.

seems to be the direction of evolution. Yes, and you can experience it as an evolution because if life is so hungry in wanting to experience itself, it will keep creating more and more complexity in order for more diversity. That would be natural. But do we need to put it on a scale, or can the experience of being a mosquito be as fulfilling and spiritually fulfilling,

even if the mosquito wouldn't express it. Because I contain all these microbes. Is this a bacteria? Is someone? I wouldn't be able to answer that question. But what am I actually containing? Am I really just one person? I don't have an answer to that. I just like to disturb my thoughts a little bit. Well, we're all conglomerates. I mean, we can each contain 40 to 100 trillion cells. Most of them aren't human because the microbiome is all these non-human cells and we can't live

without it. And so, it's important, obviously. And how does it affect the consciousness? If a tree or a plant or an insect can have, equal to me as a human, a complex and a spiritual experience of awakening, then perhaps that is not tied to the complexity in itself. Our ability to explain it and to share it and

to create art would be different. And I think, again, like we say that the humans have this interpretation and it makes us isolated and we've seen the negative effects of that quite strongly on the planet, all of those things you just said. But what if there is also a positive aspect to that? What if we can actually add things to this creation? I still wouldn't say that it would make us better or more evolved, it's

just a typically human thing. Perhaps we wouldn't be creative unless we have could use that as a creativity but it opened the self to include the rest of the world. It will only be creative when we are no longer ruled by the ego or no longer ruled by personal gain. For as long as we are tempted by personal gain, the gap between us and the rest of the world will sadly, I think, be

destructive. The good thing is that it's and our selves to include the rest of the reality and then we would no longer be possible for us to open up ourselves and so destructive because we wouldn't be drawn to that. I remember once in one of the classes we had in this school that is run by horses because they give us all the exercises and this was in early, it was about this time of the year or beginning of April and in Sweden it's cold and we were supposed to connect

with insects. We were gathering early in the morning in a forest and it was foggy and rainy and dull and grey and we were supposed to meet insects and I was thinking, I must have missed something in this conversation because it's too cold, there are no insects. But I don't want to go against the idea of the horses because I trust them to see the entirety better than what I do. So it's like we better follow their path because we've let humans decide

and be the boss for long enough. And we've seen where that took us. So let's try another version. So we all gathered in the forest and waiting for insects to come out. And after like about two hours, I saw this tiny fly. I don't know what you call them in English. In Swedish, we call them knott. They're tiny. They are like a millimeter. - Maybe a gnat, G-N-A-T, yeah. - Yes, it would be that. And normally they annoy you because they bite and it burns and they're in the way and you just want

to disappear, right? But now, after waiting for one, for two hours, and connecting to this tiny flying dot, which was one of the most fascinating things I've ever done, and how an entire person can fit into that tiny body and have a full experience of life and knowing the Creator in doing so, I will never forget it. And then I was thinking, so if we were truly connected to to this planet, we wouldn't need almost anything to be fascinated by life.

We really don't need to be so hungry for all these spectacular experiences. If we truly connect to the rest of the life on this planet, in a way, that's all we need. So we wouldn't naturally not be so destructive, because we wouldn't all the time look for things outside of ourselves. It's all inside of ourselves, truly. Yeah, yeah. I guess where I'm skeptical, and I don't know if you're going to be able to convince me in this conversation. I have no need to convince you, so that's fine with me.

It's fun to talk about it. It's just that the idea that a gnat can have an experience that's as rich and full as a human being can have, given the gnat's extremely limited nervous system and sensory capabilities. I mean, obviously, there are all kinds of animals that have more sensory perception than we do. Bats and dogs, you know, all kinds of animals can perceive things we

can't perceive. But in terms of being able to know oneself as one with God consciously, the way, you know, an enlightened being or enlightened saint can do, I'm just a little skeptical there. Dr. Annette: I understand that and I totally respect that. I think from the Nets' point of

view, that's the starting point. I think they never really left the Creator, which means that the journey, we are speaking about enlightenment as a journey from being unaware to becoming aware and to find the invisible because the invisible and the eternal and the tangible, they're disconnected to us. So, we need to reconnect them. We need to find someone if the consciousness is the bridge between the soul and the body, we need to find someone who can walk that distance.

And the one who walks that distance, it's quite important that he doesn't fall asleep on the way because then we have to start all over again, which we do daily because we constantly fall asleep, right? What if you never fell asleep? Then you wouldn't know anything else and it wouldn't really be a journey. What if the rest of the planet is already there and the ones doing the journey is us. So when we walk that distance, we enter into the life where everyone already is and they are

actually receiving us. And they seem to be happy, they seem to want us to come and join the party. Even with all our destructiveness and all the suffering that we keep creating, they seem to really welcome us and help us along the way. So if we saw them as never disconnected, we wouldn't need to believe it to be true or not, or to be able to explain it or not.

But what if we just gave that a chance? We could learn so much from other species that we have no idea that we could because we just presume that they would have nothing to say in the matter. Pete Well, species certainly have a lot to say, I mean, judging from your book. Anna But it's just me that can't be quiet.

Pete No, no, no, you're doing great. But I believe this is what Ken Wilber calls the pre-trans fallacy, which is that there are certain characteristics of quote-unquote more primitive life forms like gnats that seem similar to supposed characteristics of enlightened beings. They're completely in tune with nature, they're completely spontaneous, they're just acting on natural instinct and doing exactly what they're supposed to do,

given their role in life, and so on. And those things could all be said of someone who's enlightened. The messy part is unenlightened people who are in the middle who have free will, who have lost the connection with nature and haven't regained it in a deeper sense in terms of becoming consciously aware of the Godhead of pure consciousness and then having their life

completely in the flow of that cosmic intelligence. And so then we create all kinds of trouble. I mean the world would be just fine if there were no humans and it were just the animals doing their thing and the world will also be fine if there are only enlightened people and animals, but no people to cause all the problems we cause. The problems arise when we're in this teenage phase as a species and we're exercising our free will but without the requisite wisdom to exercise it wisely.

Yeah, I would agree with that. But I'm also thinking that I would add then one thing to the Gnat or anyone else who is just doing what they are designed to be doing, but perhaps they know that that is what they're doing. It doesn't just happen because they are designed like that and they're not just without will being guarded around by the Creator. Maybe they know that that is happening.

If they know that, then they can tell about that experience and that can remind us what we are missing and it reminds me of the gap. And when I am reminded by the gap, perhaps my longing to find the Creator yet again is becoming more awake than it was before. Rick Yeah. My spin on that would be that certainly the… Diana But the knowledge, sorry, but the knowledge would then not be related to the brain of the gnat. It would be the spiritual awareness of the gnat.

Is the consciousness tied to the brain or is it tied to the soul? And then I'm thinking, well, I couldn't have had that conversation with all of these individuals if it was to the brain, because a tree wouldn't have a brain, a tree wouldn't have an image of the world that I could ever even relate to. We can still meet, and in that meeting point, perhaps a tiny bit of a translation can be passed on to me as a human.

It will always be distorted in some sense, because the minute my brain knows what I'm experiencing, it's no longer the tree, it's me, right? So it's basically being lost the moment it's being found.

So whatever I'm trying to put words on will always be limited, but you would still die for that glimpse because that reality of sharing another individual's experience of life, it's still, even if it's just a glimpse, and that's all you can pull out and try to put words on, it will still be worth it because of the love of the creation, I suppose.

Yeah, now I know you've had fairly sophisticated conversations with chickens, but have you ever had a meaningful conversation with a gnat or a worm or a slug or, you know, some much more rudimentary life form? Yes, yes, but I think the limitation is with me, because when I have a conversation with a horse or a dog, with animals that lives with people, then we have a lot of common ground. know what it's like to go for a walk, we know what it's like to go for a ride, we have lots to talk

about that my brain can relate to. So my brain is really happy and responds. I remember the first time I got in connection with an insect was in a parking lot outside of a shop and I saw a parking lot. It would look the same to me and you but for the insect this experience of the parking lot it was completely different colors that I couldn't even relate to. It felt hilly and there was a completely different planet and it didn't even know about me or humans. I realized that, okay,

so I'm not at all in the center of this insect's life. It's so different to me that it's very hard for me to follow. So it becomes less of a conversation and more of an instinctive experience. You get this sort of experience of what it's like to be that and then it's gone again. and for a long time I thought that, this is funny, for a long time I thought that other species communicate in this sort of tiny dots. It took me years to realize that it's no, it's my awareness.

I fall asleep all the time so all I can get is glimpses because then I fall out again and then I struggle to get in to be able to listen again. So the limitation would be mine because I need to stretch my abstract ability to what cannot even be compared to the human experience.

And I do that every time I experience something that is outside of my comfort zone, if you would call it that, or what has been experienced so far. But it would take me forever. So, in this lifetime, I'm more likely to have longer conversations with animals that I have more that are less abstract to me. Right. is what I believe right now, anyway. Yeah, this is making more sense to me as I go along with you here. Here's an insight that might help.

So, we probably both agree that there is universal consciousness, universal intelligence, it permeates and orchestrates everything. Are we on the same page with that? Yeah. Okay, so that being the case, that universal consciousness is our very essence. yours, mine, the camera, the gnat, the worm, whatever. If they are conscious or even if

they're not conscious, that consciousness permeates them. And if they are conscious to some degree, then they are a reflector of that consciousness in a certain way, depending upon the nature of their nervous system. And the character of their personality, if you ask me. Yeah, which is

related to the nature of their nervous system, I suppose. So, maybe like you say with the insect, for instance, who sees the parking lot so differently than you can barely conceive of it, you know, and it is a conscious experience for them. They have senses, and, you know, that universal consciousness, it's active in them as just as it's active in us. They wouldn't be able to function were it not.

And there's some sort of level of that consciousness, which is not just unmanifest, but is active, engaged, creative, orchestrating things, and you're able to, you, Emily, are able to tune into that as it relates to, or as it interfaces with, the gnat. We're really picking on gnats in this interview. You know, that was unexpected, wasn't it? I know.

And therefore, there actually can be some kind of meaningful communication, because you're not just communicating with the limited gnat consciousness, you're communicating with the archetype or the deva, you could say. You know the word deva, right? The spirit of the gnat kingdom. And that spirit could be quite wise and quite profound. Well, there's a great

thing in your thing here. This is from the Maori medicine woman. She said, "If you're no longer able to communicate with the plants and instead reduced to having to read about their knowledge, then you should not be working with medicine." So how do you communicate with plants, you obviously communicate with the deva or the spirit of the plant in question.

Dr. Shefali: I think it is the same. It is all the same idea. To me, all of these individuals will still be persons, individuals, as well as the common consciousness that we spoke about. There is also an individual translating it or living it. I would say perhaps living it is a better word.

But when we don't have an ego surrounding it, perhaps it goes through in a way easier. Perhaps it's just a, I'm not saying it is so, but perhaps it is so. And then whatever species you communicate to would be less relevant because you're still meeting someone. If it's a plant, if it's a tree, the difference between a plant I think and why that's never been so popular as animal communication is that it's harder for us as humans to know

the form we are relating to. There is no nervous system, there is no head, there is no feet. The whole concept of beginning and end is complicated because some develop because they develop longer roots and all of a sudden there is another plant popping out of the same root.

Is it two different plants or who am I talking to? What if it's not really relevant and if I let that go and I just open myself to receive the being of this plant and I leave my ideas and opinions aside for a moment because otherwise there is no emptiness for the plant to come in and then I just see what happens.

To me the experience of plants is that they often communicate gifts, what they are good for, how they contribute and what you find when you do this, I mean I do this as a full time job for the past almost 30 years, is that nature seems to be very generous. We live on a planet where generosity is one of the keys. It's like everything that is alive seems to have a natural generosity. It always creates more than what it needs just to survive for itself. The chickens would explain the same thing.

Not every egg is supposed to be a chicken. There are also eggs that are supposed to be food. We give more than what we need for ourselves. It's just that humans, we seem to forget that we are also beings on this planet. supposed to be generous. And when we constantly relate to what we gain from something, we trade. We don't share, we trade. It's different. Nature doesn't do that. It constantly gives.

And with plants, I think you get really reminded of that. And that's how they also explain that even when we destroy this planet, if we just leave it for a long enough time, it will start healing itself. It's the generosity that makes that possible because there is already an extra

in each tuft of grass, in each tree that will give something back to the earth. If we have destroyed it badly enough with whatever radioactive substances or chemicals or whatever, perhaps we also need to put on some conscious acting into that. But nature in itself is healing because it's in its nature and that's why it's not revengeful. It's like we're waiting for nature to hit back. It's like we continue to destroy it until it hits back. But that's perhaps not likely to happen. It's

the consequence of our actions might hit back. But there is no thought in nature to be harmful to teach you something. Nature seems to teach through compassion. The entire idea of teaching is the more I am able to feel inside of me the effect of my actions, the more I learn. I don't really learn as much from being punished. And that's what we see when we punish dogs and horses to do as they're told because we believe that they live in a hierarchy where the leader

is punishing them so it's natural. But why is it then when I meet animals that are perfectly obedient and perhaps even very good in competitions or whatever and they're totally submissive, they they are never happy, they should naturally be happy. We are not happy in submission, we know that, why would anyone else be? And I think that's where the idea of a hierarchy

can become harmful. Not the way you describe it from an evolutionary point of view, but we need to recreate the circle of it, because otherwise we tend to believe that by bringing us to the top and having a different sense of value when we look at the others, we are losing that possibility of entering into this reality. And to me, what is the point of spiritual awakening if it doesn't happen here, if it doesn't happen from the heart and we can't

share it with the rest of the life? It's not a career, we're not making a spiritual career, we're not moving on to somewhere else where there is a university class for the best ones, right? We're diving into the eternal, unconditional, compassionate love that we came from, whether we're good or bad, we're going to end up there. That's beautiful. You're so eloquent. I really appreciate this.

I was kind of reminded as you're speaking of a movie by Michael Moore, I think, called "Where Shall We Invade Next?" I don't mean to laugh, but it's very human, isn't it? And he was talking about the prison system in, I don't know whether it was Sweden, Denmark, Norway, one of the Scandinavian countries, and he was

saying it's almost like a country club. I mean, these people are treated so nicely that they really rehabilitate and they have very low recidivism rates and everything compared to the punishment mentality that we have in the US and probably other places.

There's a number of things I'd like to talk to you about. One is that you've sort of subtly alluded to it just now and there were parts in your book which made me think of it which I think you feel maybe in part because of your communication with horses and other animals and also just your own insights that society is undergoing a big transition. Let's talk about that a little bit. There's certain things, I live in Iowa, which is in the middle of the US, and there are something

like, I don't know, 22 or 3 million pigs in Iowa, and 3 million people. And those pigs don't have very good lives. Most of them live in CAFOs, which are these confinements of 1200 hogs that you can't even turn around because it's so tightly confined. And it pollutes the environment, it pollutes the air, Iowa has the second highest cancer rate in the country, so all kinds of problems from it. So when I see something like that, I can't imagine an

enlightened society in which such a thing could exist. What's your vision of an ideal world that we might hopefully come to realize, and our treatment of animals, what would it look like in such a world? And what do we need to do to help transition to that world? And what are we doing to retard our transitioning to that world? I believe that a truly compassionate experience, and compassionate to me would mean the expansion of the self to include others than me.

I believe that's the only way to really come to an insight that would change me, that would motivate me to change. Because I believe punishment only lasts for a short while. watch a horrible movie or someone who's filming the reality of these pigs and for a couple of weeks no one will eat pig meat because you just can't because it's painful for you to see that movie and you don't want to contribute but then you forget. There are actually laws against taking movies like

that you can get arrested if you bring a camera into one of these places. Yeah brilliant so that's not possible then but sometimes there are these brave people that do these things. Right they sneak a camera in or something. Yeah, but we forget that and eventually we go back to our traditional culture because that's the easiest, right? I believe we need to practice compassion from when we're small.

I think one big mistake is that we tend to believe that humans are the only ones that can feel compassion as if that would be inbuilt and without doing anything we're just going to be in that

state. And I think we definitely have the possibility to become compassionate but we we need to constantly practice because when we don't constantly practice an opening it will just naturally start closing itself because that's how it goes and the reason why I really believe in this is that I've had the experience of animals talking about life after death and I've met people that talk about life after death and the interesting thing is that their stories

are exactly the same. It's not just a little bit similar and if you're really

trying to look you can see some similarities. They are exactly the same, on the dot the same. And the key in these stories, the way I see it so far, is that all of these individuals describe that after you pass, you pass over and you leave your body here and your experiences goes back and is planted in the soil in a way quite beautifully. You bury the body and the experience of the body is also being transformed because we have cellular memory, right? And then the soul continues on its

journey somehow. And everyone keeps explaining the same thing and it's that at one point you meet a being. It's never really described as a person but it's still someone and this someone is so loving that there is no words that can describe it really. It's this complete, compassionate, unconditional love. And with the presence of this extremely loving non-judgmental being,

you go through your entire life. And the animals will describe it as you go through every second of it, not just the sort of main traces or big events or whatever most important conclusions, but every single second you relive your life. And because you're outside of time, it's not relevant how long it will take, you have all the time in the world and if you're out of time, you're actually also outside of any form. So there's no limitation to how many individuals can go through this at the

same time because you are no longer in a place. And with this going through your entire life with this compassionate being is that you don't only experience what you've done yourself, but you experience how the rest of the world have experienced you. So you get the full compassionate insight into how your life has been. And of course you could choose to see that as a punishment if you believe in that there has to be justice because if you have killed someone and you

will truly experience how the other one experienced that, well there is an insight in that. But it's not brought to you as a punishment because it's brought to you with this complete compassion because there seems to be nothing else that would make you dare to become so vulnerable that you can truly receive that experience. And with all these insights, then the people with near-death experiences, they tend to go back to life after that. So, the story sort of ends there,

if I've understood it right. I haven't had it myself. But some animals continue this story by saying that after this deep insight in your life as an entirety, you go into a state of forgetfulness and no one knows what happens there. And to most of the species that describes this, that is also where God comes into it or the Creator, whatever you choose to call it, because that is beyond the individual awareness. There is no longer any individual that can

remember anything. There is complete nothingness. And the great mystery and why there perhaps is a God is because no one knows what happens there. But out of this nothingness where everything merges together in some nothing and everything at the same time, the individual is born again.

Out of that comes the individual, the seed that sprouts, the person that is born comes out of that and that is the big mystic miracle that no one can ever explain and perhaps we don't want to explain it because it would take something away. But if you think about that learning and that insight, what if the only way for us to come to a true insight in what we're doing is through compassion, then that seems somehow logic to me.

And when we bring humans into the room of having animal teachers, like we do here, there is something about that meeting point because if the animals are what we described, they are already in connection with a greater whatever. I would also say that there are scales there when we say the animals can also make the journey. Because animals that are brought to our civilization, and like the pigs you describe, like chickens in a factory, like horses that are being whipped in a

riding school, they can also lose that connection. It just seems that their way back is perhaps a bit straighter and shorter than ours. If they get reminded, it's like they more quickly go back into it. While with humans, and I guess that has to do with our identification and our ability to

interpret what we experience, we like habit. If you have a dog that has been abused by a man wearing a blue sweater, that dog will, even after the treatment of post-traumatic stress disorder and the entire healing process, most likely this dog will avoid men with blue sweaters for the rest of its life because it's a survival instinct. But a human in the same situation is sadly likely to marry the man with the blue sweater. Why do we choose habit over discretion?

- Suckers for punishment. - Yeah. We seem to feel so safe with the habit that it's worth the risk. Even if we know we will die from the habit, we know we can die if we smoke, but the habit is stronger. And perhaps that's why we have more twists and turns on our road. So, Animals can get into bad habits. I mean, they've done experiments. Oh, they definitely can. You know, where rats are given cocaine or whatever, they get addicted. They can, they can, definitely.

But it takes an unnatural environment for that to happen. Right, right. And I guess it's the same for us. We've created an unnatural environment. But if you have, for example, like we have in this place, we have animals that have been abused, and most of them have had some sort of level of post-traumatic stress disorder, they heal it. and then they meet people and I guess when we enter a room with our physical being, our stories come

with us, whether they are spoken of or not. So when you have these animals that have healed or are in a process of healing and they have no judgmental ability because they don't build their world on

opinions, then something happens to us. Something happens to us in our courage and vulnerability to meet ourselves when we have an animal present compared to if they were not. So I think there's a great chance for us to dare to go one step further to practice meeting God when we leave this body. How much of that can be done here on this planet so that we can come to these insights and give back this love? What if this planet is a reflection of the other side outside of time?

How much can we bring back from there already when we are alive? Like the Sufis are talking about dying while you are still alive. And I meet animals that speak about that as well. And one horse, he was so sick that he was really preparing to die. And he invited me to be with him. And me and another horse, because he said there is always a witness. When someone is doing this, there is always a witness so that the story will be brought back to the living.

So it was me and another horse sitting with his dying horse and he went through the whole process of shifting his consciousness from his limited being, if you want to call it that, his personality as a person, to a greater sense of self, a more wide sense of self. And when he did that shift, he could see himself as a young foal and he could see how this young individual was, he was scared of everything. He was worried about the future, he was afraid of pain, he was afraid of humans,

and he had this huge love towards himself as this tiny foal. So all he wanted to do was to tell him that, "Please, my dear boy, you don't have to worry about anything. It's all fine. We're all going back to God." But then, before he did that, he was like, "No, wait a minute. I will not tell him, because I trust him so much that he will be able to find this path by himself, that I love him enough to trust him to go through all the pain and worries and sufferings that he will go through

so we can finally meet here, because otherwise we would never have done that. So there is this love in setting someone free to also make all the mistakes he needs to make, and it was beautiful to follow him on this and he survived. He survived his injury, he healed after that, he lived for another year and he had a tumor. After a year the tumor was so big that it was the end of it and I was sitting with him in this field next to a lake and we both knew that he was dying in a few

days and he was like, "This is fine, I've already done the big death." The big death, that was a year ago. This step outside of existence, this is just, this is the small death, the small dying And I'm thinking perhaps it is the same for us, that actually we are so tied to the habit of our identity that that's a bigger sense of dying than actually losing the body because of the repetition. Perhaps it is like that, but what if we can start that journey already here?

Pete Yeah, like you say, it's die before you die. Then we need compassion. So before we have that compassion as a natural element in our human training, like we had a horse that described the human beings as not fully upright yet, it's like we are not completely there yet. And there is still hope actually also, because this is not all that we can be, but we need to do something about it. We need to have a will to challenge ourselves I suppose. That's what I like with your questions

when you challenge me. I love this because it's there is such a respect and curiosity in it and we need to do that to each other and dare to do it because it's not criticism it's bringing out more of ourselves right? Yeah. So I think sadly nothing will happen for these pigs perhaps not before compassion has become a subject in school that is scheduled into our lives. Not something we do in the spare

time when we have a nice moment and the sun is setting and the weather is good. It has to be part of our everyday practice. Very good. There's several seed thoughts that I want to talk to you about in everything that you've just said. One is how to make compassion more of a universal development for humanity. Another is on the subject of reincarnation, I have a question or two. And so have I. Yeah. It's like...

And another is about what you do there with your school, because as you speak, I mean, you mentioned it's a school and a farm. And as you speak, I keep visioning that, wow, this is a place where you should have like retreats where people can come for a week or two, 40, 50 people or whatever number you can accommodate and work with you, work with the animals and just kind of immerse themselves

in the kind of wisdom you're expressing and also just your orientation to animals. I think it could be a lot more beneficial for people than a great many spiritual retreats that people go on these days. So there's that. I mean, do you have anything like that when you say it's a school? Yeah, it took a long time. I mean, it's a process and I don't know where it's going, because it started with the animals coming here in a very bad state and they needed time to heal

and they needed a safe place. So my idea, I was 21 when I moved out here by myself with this crazy dream that no one believed in, perhaps not even me, but the urge to do it was stronger and I had nothing to lose basically. To create a place where you can be yourself without being judged, where you don't have to be someone else in order to be accepted, in order to survive, in order to make

money. I wanted that for the animals, that they've been whipped, they've been threatened to be killed because they don't give people what they think that they deserve to get from these animals. We forget that if I buy a horse because I

want to jump with that horse, for example, well I buy that horse from another human being. I never made a deal with that horse. It's slave trade actually. I want a service from that animal and I pay someone else for it and then I get disappointed when I don't get anything back from the animal, to the point where I have these explanations that perhaps I should kill it, because I deserve better. It's very sad when you think about it like that. So I wanted to create a place

where you can feel safe, where you're not gonna get sold. This is the end of the road. If you come here as an animal that were close to die, in a severe state of PTSD, most of them, then it's not that once you're better you will be sold. We take away the concept of being sold because it's problematic. It means that you have a limited value and animals, even if you're worth 10 million dollars, it's still very limited

value because you can count it. And all species seem to describe that no matter what you are in this creation, the life in you is equally big. But it's not more life in you or me than in the tree or the elephant or the mosquito or the gnat or whatever. The actual life, it's unmeasurable and there is a value in that we need to be able to sense it in ourselves to really, really value this creation, I guess. And therefore, we can't have animals for sale

because it would go against this idea. It would not only make the value of the animal smaller but it would reflect back on me because that's how I would see them. But all along, which I didn't know, was that the animals was also thinking that this is exactly the place that human needs. So exactly what you say is where they are going. Because they say that

humans need to practice this too. It ties in with the idea of how can we develop more compassion, because I think spending a week or two in a place like yours would definitely help to culture people's hearts and their compassion a lot more, which would have a lot of lasting value. Yes, and it does, which is so hopeful that it seems to work. I mean, you have to come by free will and you have to accept the full fact that you have to do the job yourself.

You're not going to be given anything. That needs to be clear because otherwise we are waiting to be fed with wisdom and then we will come out in the other end as more wise people. We need to take it in and it's our own responsibility. The horses are there, whether we can go to where they are, that's our responsibility. We need to follow the urge. But it seems to really work. So I was creating this place for the animals and the animals seems to all along be creating it for us.

Because they say that since we have developed this gap, we have this gap. I mean, I guess in the end it's a gift, but without the connection to the entirety, it's problematic. Like you say, we are teenagers. We really are. But because we then all the time interpret the world, then we believe that that's what everyone is doing to us too.

if I'm creating a world based on opinions, I believe that everyone else is doing it too, whether I think it or not, which means that as a human being I probably have an underlying fear of being judged all the time to some extent, which means that I also have a protection against that and that protection is in the way in the development of compassion. That's going to be problematic. So in order to

start practicing compassion I cannot feel judged. I think if we copy what might be happening on the other side is that we go to a place where we are not being judged, when we are met with full compassion and perhaps that's the only thing that can make us see ourselves fully. Then naturally that would be what we need to create here and we need a place that is safe enough for nature to create at least what we can with our resources,

a natural environment where life can interact with each other. It would be different if we are cutting down the forests around, we don't own almost anything. The farm where I live is tiny, so we are renting land all over the place, so all the animals can have a place. And now we have a situation where land is being sold, it's complicated, and we're now trying to think that, okay, to make this place last, because now we are in a transition step, to make this place last, perhaps in a legal

form, we need to create a foundation. Because if we create a foundation, it means that legally, the land will actually then own itself. And if the land own itself, then we are moving closer to an equal meeting between human beings and other species, and then we are one step closer to compassion. And also it has to get past me. I can't be in the middle of this, that's not the idea. Even if I started it, it shouldn't be owned by me and die with me.

sitting in this world. We're hoping for that. So that's a project that is It needs to have its own landing and happening now because exactly what you say, we had a horse dying, naturally they die, they live here all their lives and they die and it's sad of course but there is also a beauty in it. And the last thing he saw before he died

is similar to what you said. In the first line at the end of the field where he was standing, he saw rows of people waiting and they wanted to come in and said that when people are really longing in their hearts to experience this, you are meant to welcome them. You don't turn them away. And that is really important. And we're looking for forms for that, because this is so new. The school started in 2018. And now we're on

our third class, and it's 30 students and they are chosen by the horses. So they have to send a letter in to me because I need something that is them. And then what, you read the letter to the horses? Yes, I read the letter to the horses. I don't think they are at all interested in the content. It's like, I've done this, this is my name. They get an image of the person when you... They get an image of the person.

And it's fascinating because they don't seem to choose the people because you are chosen and you are better than this one and you have this ability. They seem to choose them because something in that person is being seen. I remember one horse explaining that I was reading a letter and she saw a pair of hands and she said, "Who would only show the hands?

That's interesting." And because that connection had happened by the curiosity of the horse, that person was then welcomed. And it seems to be that they mainly invite people because of the timing of things, not because of who you are and what you're good at, because there's never an explanation. It only seems to be that the timing is, "At this moment, our paths are crossing, so you can come. What percentage of people who apply can come? Well, for the last class we had about 200

people applying all in all and there's place for 30. Wow, interesting. And I'm thinking that the longing inside of the people that cannot come all at the same time, because we need to be able to focus, we cannot commercialize this, it wouldn't work. It has to be, yes, you pay, I mean, you pay a fee because we have to pay our taxes and all that. Oh, sure. People should pay, yeah. Yeah, but the point is not that. I mean, that's what we need to do.

But why we have to limit the numbers is also because of time and space. You want to have time to meet these people. What if people watch this interview and a thousand people want to come? You're going to have to limit the numbers. And after one year, the ground core, the sort of basic course, is two years and we meet on weekends. we're outside all the time because the horses are outside all the time and I think

it's important that it's not too comfortable. I don't mean it as it has to be uncomfortable, but I think we need to feel things. We need to experience it with the bodies. If it's rain, we're outside and we feel the rain. Sometimes we're cold, sometimes we don't understand anything, sometimes we're frustrated. That's important. The fascinating thing when you take a group in like this is that normally in school, you know, you learn things and you prove to your teacher

that you've learned it. Here, you seem to get exercises from the mainly the horses and you're not actually supposed to be able to succeed all the time because if you succeed all the time, you're actually creating an identity around being a successful student. So in some exercises, you get a glimpse. In some exercises, you see what is between you

and the meeting point with the other one. In some exercises nothing happens at all because your presence is holding the space for perhaps that one student that is getting a glimpse in that exercise. So you cannot be a successful student in this concept, but after one year you get a mentor horse. After that first year, the horses have observed you and sometime during that year you would have, perhaps only for a second, but some connection would have

happened that makes one horse feel particularly responsible for you. And at the end of the year, that horse will explain something to me about that person that I write down as a letter. So in the winter, because of the weather, it's cold in the winter. So the course is from April to November. In December, it would be the lack of comfort would be too obvious, right? And then the horse that becomes your mentor will give you personal exercises until we meet again in the

the spring. And to me, that is so private that when I write it down, I feel that I shouldn't read it. So I never read it twice. I just try to get it down and put it away because it's not for me. So it's two years like this, they meet eight times and they have these studies in the winter. And then after the first two years, lots of the students didn't want to finish. They wanted to come back. And I thought, well, there is nothing saying

that they can't come back. So we have some students doing follow-up years. So some did five years. So every second year we start a new class. Because to go that deep and to be able to write these letters, if it's a hundred, I wouldn't be able to do it. But I think this has to happen in the physical. But there are things that we can share online. So we're creating a platform for stories that pandemic taught us a lot about how we can share things

when we can't meet and some of that is valuable, right? So we can have a platform where people can take part of what we're doing here and start practicing at home, even if you have to wait for your place to come into one of the courses. Let me ask you a couple of questions here. With all you're saying, it sounds like there's a lot you can teach people, but can you actually help them to acquire the kind of ability that you have?

Yes. What percentage, again, talking percentages, are able to achieve some degree of animal communication the way you do it? I would say all of them to some extent, but very individually. It's like for me it will happen a lot through vision, because I would see images and I would get feelings and instant experiences. Before I did this, I ran away from home when I was very young because it was complicated and I earned my living painting portraits.

For me, it would naturally come as images, because that's the fastest way probably for my brain to perceive something. wouldn't necessarily be an image for someone else but it can still be a very deep experience of the other one and I would say that that has happened to all of the students in different ways, in different degrees, but the really hopeful

thing is it's possible. It's not something that you teach as a method but by placing a person in an environment that and we practice a compassionate being, a compassionate interaction, like in lots of exercises, is non-judgmental and somehow safe someone will be with the horse, I mean for example we can have a person sitting on a horse with closed eyes and no bridle and saddle, you're completely vulnerable.

And we have another person just holding that space that can foresee if something happens, that is protecting this in a way. We need to practice holding that space for each other. The one holding the space

is as important as the one doing the exercise for that to take place. So it seems to be more about the space that we are upholding. It's not really a technique but it's re-entering that space. Seems to be what does it. The exercises are probably just designed differently to fit different people from different angles. That's why there is a variety. The real exercise seems to be around one question or two, which is from me to the horse, "Who are you? Who are you? Or who are you?" The

longing to meet the world. And then the question, "Who am I?" Which we will never be able to answer, but it doesn't make it less relevant. I've seen a number of TV shows about prisoners who are allowed to work with horses or dogs or even sometimes, I think there was one where they were able to have pet cats. And it was tremendously, it was a wonderful service for the animals, but it was extremely rehabilitative for the prisoners. So we were talking earlier about criminal rehabilitation.

It would be cool if your thing could be systematized in a way to be introduced more widely in that I think it could eventually because if it starts to, I mean it obviously lives its own life and when you start practice this thing starts to happen. And it's like you said, this is where we are now, we have this course and we have a children's group that came today.

They were practicing lying down on horses that are loose in a herd so that their spine is following the horse spine until they are just floating in the sort of similar experience of bodies. to go through the body really helps. And then we have a horse that started a hoof school in how to trim the horse's feet. When we take away the relationship between the horse and

the ground, we have to replace that somehow, and we replace this technologically. But what if we go in a compassionate way and experience this relationship between the hoof and the ground and become part of that? And that's for farriers because it's so detailed, so need to have some basic knowledge before. A farrier is somebody who trims horses. Yes,

exactly. And now, just recently started a course with a horse that is helping to plan the grazing, in which fields should we move the horses in which time of the year? Because we lock them in, right? We lock them in pens and we have harvested the grass, we have disturbed all the functions underneath the ground. So it's a hard job for her, but she's teaching us

about it. And we get to follow her, we're going to meet her six times this year, and follow her connection with the ground and how a grazing animal, it's not only how they eat but also how they move and how they trample on the ground that makes a difference for the grass and how it grows. And I guess it's like what we find here and what kind of concepts, if people would come from far away it maybe then we would need, like you say, like a retreat for a week that is more intense, for example.

would be complicated with a weekend, I don't think there is a limited form. The form will develop as we try it out, because we're not a university. We don't have a form that we need to, and there's no structure. We are creating the structure. We are outside. Our classroom is outside. I wouldn't be surprised if after this interview, people want to come from all over the world. And if they do, if anyone does, yes, you're welcome. I did that with cows for a few

months. And what you say about shoveling manure is actually also interesting because in order to receive something, we must give something. And we make that trade and as we know, we need to pay bills. You also get paid for what you do and that's one system that we have. But then we have the system of giving without thinking about what we will get back. And that part needs to be there too. We run this as a welfare, as a sanctuary, because the animals have no obligation to contribute with

anything and we don't sell them so we don't get any money from them. And that's a sanctuary. You pay for the teachings because that's how we can pay the bills and do it all legally correct. And

we have students that also do what you say, they come and they shovel manure. We also work with the a theatre school, a physical theatre school, and they did a project where they come and clean the barn for a couple of hours and after that they get an exercise from any one of the species in how they can find different aspects of their bodies that can be used in their artwork. And that's one of the most fascinating things I've ever done because it's something about

giving of your time and your effort and it will help in what you will gain back. You can't do it in order to gain something, but there is something in that giving. And one of the horses that was really teaching us this, he also said that it's part of your fee and what you take, it has to be a gift. So I will always give a bit more than what people pay for,

and people will always give a bit more as well, but it could be in any kind of way. You can bring coffee, you can help cleaning, but we need to feel that none of us are, it's not just a trade, we're also meeting because we really want to meet as equals, as people. Let me ask you that question about reincarnation. Let's just fit in reincarnation so we sort that out too.

Someone named Petra Miskoff in London asked, "Do animals say there is reincarnation, that they are reborn?" And before you answer her question, I just want to add one. Have you ever met animals or horses who had been human beings and are now horses, or have you met

human beings who had been horses and are now human beings? Well, whether things can be proven or not has to be. Let's say a horse tells you, "Yeah, I was John Shmoe. I lived in London in my last life, and now I'm here as a horse." There is a difference. There is a difference. When we talk about reincarnation with humans, we seem to always have some sort of scale where you become a human in in the end and then you stay a human. It's like if you've been a human, you don't go back.

Animals, I would say, talk a lot about reincarnation, but there are two different things there that I don't hear as much from humans, and that's complex. How private is reincarnation? If we follow the road to this forgetfulness where everything is merging into one and out of that we are reborn. How can I know for sure that it's just my soul and nothing else?

Well, the Buddhists seem to have this idea that you just scoop a bucket into the ocean of karma and come out and there's a new life for you, which may be a conglomerate of many people's karma. As I understand it, I might be misrepresenting that. And the Hindus have more of an idea, it seems, that our individual jiva or soul remains discreet and moves from life to life and evolves as it goes along and accumulates experience. And perhaps both of those can be true without contradicting each other.

If you're not too linear, I had this just beautiful, it needs to just be put in here. Sometimes in the classes, we can ask questions to a particular horse that is interested in a subject. And there was this questioning with an elderly mare. And somehow the questions led up to her speaking about prayer. And you think that is purely human. But it seems like praying is a natural state for pretty much everyone on this planet. And she described prayer, and this will

lead to reincarnation. She conveyed an image of something that looked like what the soul was made of, like the matter of souls. And on that big sort of light mat, I would describe it like that, like a carpet sort of thing, there were little circular, like oval things that were drawn. And she said, "They're only drawn there. These are the individual souls. They are not cut out. They are just drawn. So you can see them. This is the individual, but it's not taken out. It's

not separate. So we are individual, but we are never disconnected." And to her, the meaning of pray would be- - Sure, just like waves. They're individual waves, but they're not disconnected from the- - Yeah, exactly. And for her, the meaning of praying would be to remind yourself about that. You wouldn't pray to get something, but the prayer would lead you back to the memory that we are not disconnected and that would bring a sense of hope. That's nice.

It's really beautiful and it makes a lot of sense, I think. So, the scooping thing, like Fanny, a horse that seemed to relate to reincarnation all the time, and she helps people by seeing those stories, say that we cannot really say which story belongs to whom. But we can say that some stories have affected you and really affected in who you are now more than other stories. But to whom the story belonged is perhaps less relevant. It affects you and that's

what counts. And she also had one woman saying, "What if life is too difficult? What do you do when life is too difficult?" And she said, "Well, if your life is overwhelming and it's too difficult, then others will come and help you. Meaning that what she basically said is like, your karma is not only yours. You might be helping someone else in their karma. Someone else might be helping you. Karma is not personal. It's something we do together. And I like that thought as well.

But the same horse also say that when you leave this life, you go out through, she sent an image of a little, like a little gate, like a little door. You go out there. when you enter again you go in through the same door. Because you go in through the same door you actually also bring on your old clothes. So even if you're everyone and everyone is in you, you also follow a personal story. And if you go through all of this in a couple of minutes,

perhaps both are true. We are being scooped up as a mixture but there is also a personal story. but in the personal story we are never disconnected and we're continuously helping each other. So that's one thing that comes from animals and the other thing is that they seem to never really make any scales of anything. It's like whether you become a human being, a stone, a tree, water, I mean you can be an element,

it doesn't really seem to matter. It's like you will enter this life and get exactly the experience that you need because life seemed to really wish us the best. It's like there is something kind behind all this. precisely We get exactly what is best for us, we just don't understand it. And this circular thing, it seems to just be circles moving in all directions rather than a ladder and eventually you end up with God. It's like you are never disconnected from God. So you just keep going

in and out. So then, what you do and what you give in this life is much more important than who you are. They all seem to relate to reincarnation, but not as a ladder to reach a goal. Interesting. I guess what you give is the proof of who you are, you know, it's the walking of the talk, so to speak. Here's a cute little bit from your book. Among all the animals I have been communicating with, there's one question that they repeatedly continue to ask.

How is it that you people have forgotten where you once came from? Yes, that's the entire story, right?

Yeah, it is. So, there's a lot of interesting stuff in your book that we haven't had a chance to get to. You had some amazing experiences in New Zealand, which were far out, I mean, interesting stuff. You have had some amazing experiences in Jordan. Oh, definitely.

And there's this fellow Muhammad who somehow or other you actually just sort of Merge consciousnesses with at some point and and he was treating horses through you and you were treating horses through him And that was all very interesting And then there's the whole time travel thing where you keep flashing back to this time where there's a green and and a young girl and all this stuff and we don't really have time to talk about all this

Stuff right now you once saw the king of Iraq as an apparition not the current king of Iraq with some ancient king of Iraq who actually showed up in the stable with you and was conversing with you. And then I thought I'd really lost it until I went back to see my, I can say that I work for her, but she's also my great friend. So I don't know what to call it. She is my friend, but everything seems to be normal to her. So when I come back from the stables and she's related to this person.

She was the daughter of King Hussein or something. Yes, exactly. And I said, I saw this person at the stables and he told me these things and now I've really lost it and I don't know what to do and she's like, "What did he look like?" And I described him and his essence and the way he looks and she brings out a photo and she says, "Is it him?" Yes. Well, that's normal, you know, because he used to be king in Iraq and some of the horses here are

relatives to the horses he had. And to her, this linear, that we come and go and that we keep connecting beyond time, it's everyday life for her. It's very interesting. Yeah, it's everyday life for you too. Yes, I struggle a bit more than her, that's the only thing. So here's a good quote that maybe we should wrap it up on. You can comment on it if you want. I can talk to you for another two hours about all these things, but maybe we'll do another one one of these days and cover some

things we didn't. We can, I mean you're always welcome here anyway. Thanks, yeah it'd be fun to, I mean it's a lot easier to do a Zoom call than it is to fly to Sweden. We can start like that.

It's fun to do that too, but here's a little something that an end note which you can comment, Oh, I mean, here's another thing you said in the book that I thought would be interesting to talk about that we didn't get to, which is that there were situations in your life where trees nearby were being clear-cut and you ended up having a visceral reaction to it in terms of your kidneys failing and your heart having problems and stuff like that, like you were in training with the soul

of the trees that were being killed. Alright, so here's this point that could perhaps be a a wrap-up point. I'll try to pronounce this Arabic word but alhamdulillah. Yeah, alhamdulillah. Whatever happens it must be for the best of everything. I may not be able to see it at the time but I have faith in the way things are. Yeah. That's a good thing to live by. Yeah, it is. I try to do that. Whatever God does is for the best is another way of putting it. Yeah. So is your place in pretty good

shape? Are you in dire circumstances now of losing the thing because you don't have enough money? What's going on there? Both. We are losing a farm that has been the center point of the educational part because it's the best grazing paddock for the horses. It's huge. And that's up for sale and they want us to buy it and we don't have enough money. Announcement people, if you would like to contribute. Yeah, that would be very helpful

because... On your website I'm sure there's something about how to contribute. Yeah, there is. And if it was only that, it would be easier, but then we're losing another huge paddock because of a solar cell park. We're losing three more paddocks because they're being replanted with trees instead of kept as grazing land. So when we lost all these, you come to the question, well, is this a sign that we should just stop what we're doing? But there are no other signs of that.

The horses are not saying that. So what if this is that we need to reach out to the world and say that we need help. Is this important enough for enough people? Then the horses always said that this place is being kept and held by many small good deeds. So if we can collect more small good deeds, that will then be turned into this foundation. A foundation can only be built

around something that is physical and exists. So the idea is, if we can get enough money to buy this particular farm that is for sale, we will turn that into a foundation. So that farm would meet your needs in terms of space and all that? Yes, it would. And then we would turn it into a foundation and it means that we can receive and welcome more people because we will have a more solid ground, literally. If we can't

achieve that, then we will have to trust that God wishes as well. We're not going to give up. Then we will continue to collect things until we can buy something else. Because I truly believe in this foundation to create this non-judgmental space that will continue past us that live now. We have information about it in the website and anyone that contributes anything, it goes

only to that. There is no administration fees, there's nothing. It definitely will either be this farm or something else that will show itself to be the one. Do you know the story of the old man and the boy walking on the beach and seeing a lot of starfish? Do you know that story? No. this relates to what you're talking about here. So an old man and a boy were walking along the beach and the tide had gone out and there were just thousands of starfish as far as I could see that

were lying on the shore and drying up in the sun. And you know they're all going to die if they didn't get back in the water but they couldn't get back in the water. So as they walked along every few steps the old man would bend down pick up a starfish and throw it in the water. And after a while the boy said to him, "Why bother? What difference can it possibly make?

There are thousands of them. What difference can you make? So when the boy said that, the man reaches down, picks up another one, throws it in the water and says, "Made a difference to that one." - Yeah, exactly. Exactly. - So you're Peter Place. I mean, people might think, "Okay, there are millions of animals

in the world. There are 22 million pigs in Iowa. There are all this stuff. What can your little farm with 150 animals do?" But it not only makes a difference to the animals that you actually treat

or help, but something like that is like a beacon or a transmitter that creates a quality in collective consciousness that is sorely needed in the world and that may in fact be multiplied if your transmitter is bright enough or strong enough or whatever, such that more things like that will crop up and collective consciousness will change and, you know, will help to bring about the transformation that we were talking about earlier to what society actually needs to be,

if it's to survive and flourish. - Exactly. If we get a chance to talk again, that's what the Jordanian horses are really speaking about. The connection between the transformation of the individual and how that affects society and how that cannot be taken apart from each other. So I guess it counts. It's like every glimpse counts, every intention counts.

Yeah, they say that there are yogis in the Himalayas who just live in a cave, but they radiate an influence without which humanity would be much worse off. I truly believe that. Yeah, something like what you're doing I see in a similar way. It creates an influence that is sorely needed and that really helps the world in a much bigger way than people might realize is possible.

A couple more questions came in, might as well ask them, they're kind of goofy and a little out of context with this grand conclusion we just reached. Here's one from a fellow named Srinath in Dallas, Texas. I'm sure your answer to this is yes, can you converse with cows as you can with horses? Yes. Yes. They probably speak a different language, but you can converse. It's like everything that is alive, if everything that is alive knows that it's alive, there is always a meeting point.

Yeah, I mean you have several stories in the book of communicating with trees and those trees had a lot of interesting things to say. Here's one from Sriram Ganesh in Chennai, India. When you say not all eggs are meant to be chickens, certain eggs are meant to be eaten, who decides it, the egg or the eater? Will not this concept that things are meant to be eaten justify anything? That is a very good question. Does the pig decide he wants to be food instead of live his life as a pig?

We need more time, that's for sure. Yeah, it's right. I wouldn't say... When you use the phrase "meant to be", it's complicated. I think what the chicken meant is that not every egg will be a chicken. Some eggs will be food. Who decides how much is free will and how much of our actions is guarded because of what we choose and how much can we choose? And how much of our actions is because we are unconsciously acting on the greater good? We wouldn't know that, would we?

No. Okay. And how much does our awakening change one of the horses that really made the basis of this school? It's like, so where are we going with this then? Well, one of the things is freedom, not freedom to do whatever we want, but freedom to truly choose because we are not so tied to our identifications. So we are not just pulled by forces. Have more discernment or discrimination. And how much will that choice change the entirety and the ability for others to do that?

I mean, all of that is in that question about the egg, right? Yeah, it's interesting. Alrighty, this has been great, Emily. I really enjoyed this. I liked your book, and I like talking to you even more than your book. So thanks so much. Thanks for what you're doing, and thanks to those who've been listening or watching. I'll obviously have a page up on Backgap with a little bit more about Emily and links to her books and links to her website and so on, so that you can go there.

There's a lot of interesting things to read on the website. You know, hopefully people listening to this will contribute to you financially, some may want to come for courses, and I just really hope it helps to boost everything you're doing, because I think what you're doing is really important and beautiful. hopefully just the inspiration that might come or just challenging the thoughts to something that wasn't before. And we're constantly changing. I mean, the website is changing.

So much is happening now. And forms of meeting and teaching, that part feels very hopeful. That's why I believe that we're not meant to shut down. We're meant to find the next level of ground. Just also in this case, it's the ground literally.

Yeah, I was reminded again of my teacher who was Maharishi Mahesh Yogi and very early in his mission he was sitting in some redwood forest in California with a small group of people and he was the only teacher at that point of Transcendental Meditation and he was talking about these big plans of getting everybody in the world to meditate or lots of people and someone said, "Well, how in the world can you do that? You're just one man." He said, "I'll replicate myself."

So I hope what you're doing can actually result in people establishing things similar to yours. Yes, yes. All over the world. And that is happening. It starts to happen, actually. It is hopeful. Lots of work to do, but it's also hopeful. Great. Okay, well thank you. My next interview will be towards the end of the month and I'm going to be talking with two people that I've interviewed previously, but on different topics.

topic of this one is going to be about what's going on with extraterrestrials. Are they really visiting us? And we're not going to spend too much on that. We're going to kind of jump to the conclusion that they are, but then we're going to get into a why. Does it have some kind of spiritual significance? I think it's going to be an interesting conversation for me, at least. So that's why I'm doing it. But anyway, I hope you'll join us for that. And there's an

upcoming interviews page on batgap.com where you can see what we've got scheduled coming up. All Alright, thanks Emily. Thank you. We'll be in touch. Thanks to those who've been listening or watching. We'll see you around. Bye bye. Bye.