Most of us have heard the old Neil Diamond song, He Ain’t Heavy, He’s My Brother. He goes on to sing, “No burden is he, to bare, we’ll get there.” There are many stories in the Bible that reference this sentiment. But, what does this sentiment mean to us and how does it affect the relationship between ourselves and our pets?
Imagine that your life has gotten so stressful that you have become over-burdened with your daily activities. You get up, get ready for work, feed your pets, feed your family, go to work, come home and do more work. In time, there is so little happy time, that you feel bogged down most of the time. You might end up feeling depressed and want to just stay in bed.
Author and spiritual teacher, Carolyn Myss, uses a metaphor as an energetic bank account. You spend so much energy doing your stressful day to day work that you become overdrawn on your account. In doing so, you are physically and mentally exhausted, often leading to emotional and physical illness. This harmful energy will also be incorporated by your pet’s energetic profile and in time, have similar deleterious health effects.
How can we break out of this harmful, vicious cycle? By simply making a shift in attitude. We find a way to come from a loving intention instead of a feeling of being burdened. The words of the song don’t mean because he is family, he won’t be a burden. It means that because I love him, this will not feel like my burden. We can easily imagine how many people face this situation daily with a family member. Most likely, the burden of the situation emotionally overrides that family factor.
I had a lovely client of mine who cared for her sick mother. She had two other siblings who went about their business and spent little time helping with the sick mother. The client, because she felt like it was a burden, felt resentment to her siblings and in time, to her mother. She told me every time that her mother got sick and needed attention, her resentment came forward to the point that she would even ignore her mother, often refusing to take her to the doctor. She would tell herself that her mother was overreacting. Then, one day, her mother died, leaving her with a horrible combination of grief and guilt. Needless to say, there was great suffering.
When we make the effort to find the love in ourself that brings out true compassion, something amazing happens. We gain the energy that we need to do the task. This is what is meant when he says, “We’ll get there.”
The belief that an event in our lives is a burden is getting into an alignment of a fearful set of emotions and feelings. These thoughts, emotions and feelings are very low vibrational energy patterns and will psychologically and physically be depleting of our already depleted energy. Most of the fearful energy, on the consciousness scale, calculate around 100-120. Loving compassion calculates at about 500. Anything below 200 is considered harmful energy and will eventually take its toll on us. When we align ourselves with the higher energy state of compassion, caring and gratitude, the energy that comes with those feelings will life us energetically and give us the strength and guidance that it takes to do what needs to be done.
This doesn’t mean that the experience will be a pleasant experience. It often comes with a lot of pain. But, when we are aligned with loving consciousness, even in painful experiences, we are still aware that love is always present and that makes things better. I tell many of my clients to remember a time when they were a young child and they slipped and fell to the ground and hurt themselves. Then I told them to remember what it felt like when they ran to their mothers for support. Even though the pain of the fall was there, they were surrounded by the loving affection coming from their mother and that made it feel better. This is how high energy feelings work. They will always trump low, painful energy.
If you have reached a place where life has been feeling more like a burden than a joyful experience, start by taking baby steps. I know you love your pet and we can use that to change your perspective. Before feeding your pet, take a moment and find the feeling of gratitude that you have for your pet being in your life. It only takes a few seconds to bring that feeling to the surface. You will feel it in your heart area as your heart energy rises. When you feel this heartfelt feeling, then give your pet its food and take another moment and be there completely. Immediately, your awareness will shift from that of a burden to that of a blessing. It won’t be long before you will enjoy that feeling so much that you start doing it for other things in your life. Then, the shift will occur. The negative vicious cycle will have been broken, your energetic bank balance will begin to refill and not only will your burdens be lifted but you will have the energy needed to live a fulfilled life, moment to moment.
