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 For
many years after taking up Pagan ways, I seldom
connected with animal energies, even though many of
my friends had totem animals or animal guides. Two
years ago, that changed. I was leading a tarot
card meditation and a wolf came to me and
befriended me.
The
interesting thing about this is that my father had
been terribly afraid of dogs, and passed that fear
onto me as a young child. Even as an adult, I was
frequently uncomfortable around dogs. It was one of
those old internalized fears that we simply accept
as part of ourselves, even when we grow into very
different people.
The wolf who
came in my meditation led me through undeground
rivers and dark places; we emerged, as if reborn,
on a Mediterranean island. After following her down
into the dark and up again, my fear of dogs was
gone, and I took the sacredness of animal wisdom to
heart in a new way.
It was only
a few months after this experience that I met
Karen, the woman I was to marry. When I learned she
was an animal communicator, and when
I experienced her full and constant awareness
of the living creatures around her, I knew that
I was learning something wonderful, something
that had been missing from my life and from my
spiritual practice for far too long.
Wolf had
helped point me toward Karen, although I had not
yet met her when Wolf first came.
Those of us
with European heritage often grow up with negative
images of wolves from folklore and fairytales. For
our ancestors, it seems, the wolf became a symbol
of the dangers of the wilderness, a way to keep
children behind closed doors at night.
In North
America, however, native people understood Wolf to
be a guide and a teacher of deep wisdom, as well as
a protector of community. This touches the nature
of real wolves more closely. Wolves are certainly
hunters and carnivores, but they are hardly the
renegade killers of European legend. The phrase
"lone wolf" is a cliche of our language, yet
real wolves are devoted to their mate and their
family, and are highly social creatures, with
sophisticated modes of communication,
interdependence, and caring.
I spoke with
wolf again this morning, and asked for wisdom that
I could share in this article. The answers came to
me in images, and I share them with you now in
words.
I am
old.
Light
dances in my fur.
I have
walked along the streams and along the ridges of
land.
I have
walked under the Sun by day, and under the Moon by
night.
I am the
maker of paths. I am the keeper of
paths.
All who
walk where I have walked will know what I have
known,
If they
tread softly and listen.
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