Animal communication and Finding Holda

I don’t remember a time when I didn’t love animals.  The walls in my nursery had animals on them, and I even had Bambi curtains.  Being a little girl I remember my momma teaching me to pray for the animals.  She has always been an animal lover.  I’ve been saving and rescuing dogs since I was little.  People would just dump their unwanted dogs at our house.  We’ve even had them dumped as young as 2 or 3 weeks old.  We kept most of them and rehomed where we could.  The only time I did not have a dog is when I went to college and then shortly after.  I used to tell my friends in college, “as soon as I graduate I’m going to get a dog and dishwasher and in that order!”  LOL! 

I guess then that it should come as no surprise that I am an animal communicator.  I think the person who was shocked the most was me.  I have always had a deep connection with the creatures, dogs in particular.  Like I said before I am a funny lady, always cracking jokes.  I have always done the dogs voices.  Spoke aloud for them, and spoke to them.  Known what they what and how they thought.  I have ready many books on dog and animal psychology. Their research mirrors what I knew already that animals do not think the way we do.  Some of their concepts make no sense to us and some of ours make no sense to them. 

Yes I’m crazy, and been to the psych ward to prove it.  But Schizophrenia has never been part of my diagnosis.  Now when I tell you I hear their voices, it is in my head and mostly my heart.  Animals may also speak by sending pictures to your mind. I’m sure if I could smell the way they do, they would send me that as well.  I have never heard them, except in two cases, with my ears.  Therefore these are not auditory hallucinations. Yes I have told councilors this and they look at me a bit weird, but never call for the straight jacket. 

You will find, as you study pagans in general, that this gift is not unheard of.  I know many in the community who speak with trees and plants, some who speak to birds, and even a few who can speak with the rocks. 

Dogs have been my friends when there was no one else.  I believe it was my dog Texas, one of our rescues who helped me to first learn the language of the dogs.  Texas was a beautiful half Lab, half Border Collie that my daddy found as a stray on a location.  He was sleeping under dozers, covered in oil and mud.  It took three baths to get him clean.  Texas was with us 10 years.  He was my best buddy, the one I told all my secrets to, and I believe now probable my first familure.  He died six weeks after I went to college, the vet said of hep c from eating something dead.  I believe he died of a broken heart from missing me. 

Dogs and most animals have a different sense of time then we do.  The watch the way the light falls, the moon and the cycles of the seasons.  They understand routine as well.  That daddy will be home every day about sunset.  I even had one dog, Sassy, that would dance on our heads, at dawn, on every other day.  Because that is when her former owner, Jays grandmother, would get up for dialyses.  She must have had some concept of the ability to count as well.  But the idea of a future, as we understand it, is foreign to them.  Everything is about now, and this present moment.  So when they freak out that you are leaving to go to the store they have two general thoughts.  One is that you will never come back.  The other is that you are going somewhere they cannot protect you.  They believe their job is to love you and protect you.  This is part of why they freak out when you take them to the groomers or the vet.  They often associate the two with physical pain and the pain of being away from you.  They believe you are never coming back.  This is why they are so excited to see you. 

I told you I’ve had two experiences in which I really heard the dogs speak outside my head.  Both times I was sleeping.  The first time, Jay and I were dating, but not yet married.  I was living at home with my parents.  I was asleep in my bed when I was awakened by talking. 

I heard, “Should we wake her up?”

“No, let her sleep.  She had a rough night.”

“Could you move over please?”

I was confused.  There was no one in bed with me, just the dogs.  I was so disturbed by this I went to my pastor at the time.  I was told I heard my angels talking.  I believed him, obviously he was the expert.  But why would there be two angels, and why would one ask the other to move over???  Many years later I was again awakened by voices. 

I heard, “Mommy!  Mommy!  Mommy!  Move the covers and let me in.  Are you okay??  I had to go pee.”  I opened my eyes to me lifting the covers and letting Punka, my Dachshund, jump in the bed.  She had indeed been outside to potty.  No one else but the dogs calls me Mommy.   I began asking other pagans in my community if it could be possible I had heard my dog speak to me.  They told me it was definitely possible.  I know now my dogs were talking amongst themselves and in Punka’s case directly to me.

In the early days of my pagan path, I was working as a dog groomer.  After my encounter with Punka, I began to believe that I could in fact speak to the animals, that I was an animal communicator.  It kind of became known around the office.  One day I had a client come in and speak with me.  She asked me to talk to her dog for her.  She had been robbed, but the dog had been unhurt.  I said I would do my best. 

As I groomed the dog, I laid my hands on him.  I began to ask him questions out loud and he began to transmit pictures to me.  I was a bit taken aback by what he had told me.  That he knew the people who robbed the house.  The robbers had been in the house before.  The dog told me they were friends of his human brother.  The dog told me that he had hid because he was afraid they would take him as well.   When the dog’s mom came to pick him, I gave her the description of the robbers I had been given, as well as the way the robbery occurred and the red truck they had been driving.  What happened next I did not expect.  She came to me a few months later and told me, thank you.  The robbers had indeed been in the house before, and they were friends of her sons.  Also a suspicious red truck had been seen in the area around that time.  For better or worse it seemed I had the gift.  I was floored.

We had just moved to this land, not long before the above story took place.  This land is very wild and full of land spirits.  One day my kids are going just nuts, barking their heads off, about noon. 

I asked the dogs, “What is it!  What are you barking at?”

“Momma!  It’s Momma!”  That just made no since to me what so ever, I’m Momma.  Just because I can hear what they say does not mean I always understand or translate correctly. 

“Momma who?” I asked.

They looked at me stupid and said, “Momma of the dogs.” 

I leaned over the couch and sure enough I saw, with my third eye, what they were barking at.  With my third eye I saw a woman dressed in white with a white horse, coming up from the creek bed.  I had seen her before but told no one.  The fact that they could see her too amazed and comforted me. 

I immediately got on the yahoo groups and began emailing my pagan friends all over the world, telling them this story.  Most of them believed her to be Rhiannon aka Epona, goddess of horses.  But it made no sense to me that a horse goddess would come to me when I had no tie to horses.  But I put a horse shoe on my altar just in case.  No the dogs had said, “Momma of the dogs.”  As I have mostly Germanic dogs, Dachshunds and a Rottweiler.  I thought I would look up Germanic dog goddess, so I Googled the words, and there she was… Holda. 

It took me some years of research but I did find that in her maiden form sometimes she is seen dressed in white, bathing in creeks and rivers, sometimes accompanied by a horse, and noon is her holy hour.  What the kids and I had seen was Holda.  I still believe that to this day.

Holda was my first and still is my main goddess.  Now she is known by many other documented names including but not limited to: Hulda, Frau Holle, Frau Holt, Percha, Bercha, and Herka.  She is the Germanic goddess of the dog, domestic animals, children, winter, snow, lakes and streams, infertile women and is sometimes associated with caves and forests.  She has been seen in all three aspects of Maiden, Mother and Crone.  Although it is perhaps as her crone or grandmotherly state that she is best known in.   I have seen her in all three.  She is known throughout Germany and among the Pennsylvania Deutch.  Many fairy tales and much oral tradition surround her in both places.  Using the internet, many who believe in her, have banded together to share their local heritage of her, as well as their own stories.  In 2011 Garden Stone published “Goddess Holle,” to date it is the only book in English totally devoted to her.  I believe she stirred me in the caldron of life.  I believe has been with me since the beginning, guiding me ever gently back to her.  I encourage you to look into her and see if she may be the right Goddess for you. 

I believe every animal speaks their own language.  Different animals, different things that are important to them, different ways of thinking, and what feels like to me different frequencies.  Dog is my main language.  My cat is rudimentary, as I have no cats and I am deathly allergic to them.  I have a pig, but have yet to hear him speak to me.  I understand most of what he says with body language.  I still have no working knowledge of bird.  The pictures they send get all jumbled in my head.  They come so fast.  Also they often send me colors I don’t understand.  I mentioned this to a bird friend of mine.  Apparently they see colors we cannot, like infra red and ultra violet.  My head is just not tuned for that.  I seem to be tuned into mammals and only at close distances. 

Goat took me a while to learn.  I think it is lower and slower then dog.  Star and I talk all the time.  We say normal things, like I love you, go this way, come here for a cookie, etc.  Mostly what I get from Star and Kali talking is, “OH!  Have you tried this plant!  Oh!  It is so good!  Oh! but what about this one here!!!”  Probable the most earth shattering conversation we have had is over what each finds valuable in life.  She and Kali value good plants, variety, and the ability to walk freely around the property and browse.  Star likes to nibble on my wedding ring.  I explain to her that it is valuable.  She likes to say, “It’s just a shiny rock.  If you can’t eat it, how valuable can it be?”  point taken.  I ask her how she feels about the fact humans eat animals.  She says something to the effect that animals know all their lives that someone may eat them.  They consider it an honor to give their lives for those they serve.  The least we can do is be thankful. 

I think one of the best conversations I have ever overheard, and they do talk to each other, was between Star and Ostara.  We were milking.  Star is always great in the milk stand.  She never kicks.  Ostara was just the opposite.  She would get in the stand, put her head threw to eat her grain, as soon as I locked her in and started touching her udder, she would freak and start kicking.  I did not want to hobble her.  After a while she settled down.  I think in part because of the conversation she and Star had.  Star told Ostara that she needed to give me milk.  She said, “It is an exchange.  They give us grain and a place to live.  We share with them our milk.  Now you just need to settle down.  She’s not going to hurt you.”  Ostara listened to her mother.  We had few problems after that.

I have also had conversations with other animals.  My favorite one was with an Elephant.  My friend and I had gone to a fair.  The Elephant and its owner were in an outside ring giving a demonstration.  It was funny and quite difficult at the same time, as they were both talking.  I could hear the ring master and then right after him, was the Elephants voice saying almost the same thing.  Example:

Ring master:  “I will now give him a loaf of bread to eat.”

Elephant:  “I will now eat this loaf of bread.”

The Elephant loved the crowds and you could feel lots of love for his owner as well.  The Elephant offered rides and pictures after the show.  My friend and I hung around.  After everyone was gone I approached them both.

 I said to the owner, “I know this is going to sound a little crazy but I am an animal communicator.  I would like to try to speak to your Elephant.” 

The man was more than happy to oblige, saying; “I am interest to see what you have to say.  We have been approached by an animal communicator before.”

I laid my hands on the Elephant and began to ask him questions.  He was so funny.  I just remember him asking me again and again if I wanted to ride.  I told him, no I just wanted to talk to him and ask him about his life.  He said okay.  I asked if he was treated well.  He responded that he was and he loved his owner very much.  That he was looking forward to sitting down and having a snack now that the show was over, and was I sure I didn’t want a ride? 

I told the owner what the Elephant had said.  He kind of chuckled.  Apparently I had said just what the other animal communicator had said.  I thanked them both and watched them walk away, into the shade to enjoy a snack. 

My dogs have never told me anything earth shattering either.  I also don’t think, they think as much as we do.  They have lots of free space in their brains, most of the time observing the natural world around them.  They tell me they love me and they are happy.  I can’t ask for more than that. 

Ilsa