Psychic Pets: How Animal Intuition and Perception Has Changed Human Lives

by Emma Heathcote-James

Overview

Investigating and celebrating inspirational tales from the animal kingdom, this revealing collection contains testimonies from around the world. Special animals include dogs who have the ability to sniff out cancerous tumors; a horse carrying its injured rider away from danger; and cats and dolphins who have foretold pregnancies. Discussed here is the question of whether animals possess an innate psychic ability that gives them their powers of perception, perhaps even permitting them to see into the future. Ultimately, this study functions as a call to take a look at what humans might be missing by not giving animals the respect they are due.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781843582717
Publisher:	John Blake Publishing, Limited
Publication date:	06/01/2011
Pages:	252
Product dimensions:	5.70(w) x 8.90(h) x 0.90(d)

About the Author

Emma Heathcote-James is the author of After-Death Communication, Seeing Angels, and They Walk Among Us.

Read an Excerpt

Psychic Pets

How Animal Intuition and Perception has Changed Human Lives

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By Emma Heathcote-James

John Blake Publishing Ltd

Copyright © 2007 Emma Heathcote-James
All rights reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-84454-357-1

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CHAPTER 1

Are Pets Psychic or Just Super-Sensitive?

'Lots of people talk to animals ... Not very many listen, though ... That's the problem.' THE TAO OF POOH, BENJAMIN HOFF

Ask any dog or cat owner and they will vouch for their animal's acute senses, especially for impending storms, family members' illnesses and moods, knowing when a family member is due home, or when returning home from unfamiliar journeys or, indeed, knowing when they were almost near to their destination in the car. Maybe it is down to smells, vibrations and perhaps recognising local sounds that our ears are unable to filter. Whatever the answer, are they 'psychic', super-sensitive, or do the two equate to the same thing?

We've all heard the stories:

• a pet cat jumps up onto the windowsill every day, several minutes before its owner arrives home

• a pet dog barks just before a certain person calls on the phone, as if knowing the call was being made

• a pet parrot, who's learnt to talk, says things seemingly in response to what its owner is thinking

• a beloved pet, somehow lost on a family trip, miraculously finds its way home – sometimes travelling hundreds, or even thousands, of miles

Are they remarkable stories of animal telepathy, or their sense of direction and premonition, or are they examples of animals' keen senses, or evidence of an unexplained psychic ability?

How are these things possible? Do our pets – perhaps even all animals – possess some innate psychic ability that allows them to tune in to human brainwaves, or even to see the future? Or are they just more sensitive than humans to visual, aural, magnetic and other subtle environmental factors and changes – and thus, because we are not aware of these subtleties, their actions seem miraculous? It's an ongoing debate, usually with the psychically minded and a lot of devoted pet owners on one side, and the more sceptical and scientifically minded on the other.

After publishing articles and pleas for help in numerous newspapers and veterinary surgeries, zoos and safari parks, as well as animal-related magazines, the question – I believe – has been answered by the amazing personal experiences outlined throughout this book, all stating that their beloved pets and animals do indeed seem to exhibit a sensitivity to things unseen, or a psychic connection to another world.

As with all my other work, the problem of language and all connotations ascribed to a word come into play. 'Psychic' perhaps isn't the best word to use, as it conjures up images of crystal balls and Mystic Meg. Maybe, we should simply state that animals are, rather incredibly, 'super sensitive'. Pets seem to have the amazing ability to sense what we cannot and, in ways that we don't understand, to communicate with us, perhaps even after death. Animals appear to have a more finely tuned sixth sense than humans and the fact they possess such skills which cannot be explained rationally has inevitably lead them to be called psychic.

A survey was carried out by telephone in London to find out how any pet owners had observed seemingly telepathic abilities in their pets. Fifty-two per cent of dog owners claimed their animals knew in advance when a member of the household was on the way home, compared with 24 per cent of cat owners. Of the animals that reacted, 21 per cent of dogs and 19 per cent of cats were said to do so more than ten minutes before the person's return. Seventy-three per cent of dog owners and 52 per cent of cat owners said their pets knew when the owners were going out before they showed any signs of doing so; 43 per cent of dog owners and 41 per cent of cat owners said their pets responded to their thoughts or silent commands and 57 per cent of dog owners and 37 per cent of cat owners said their pets were sometimes telepathic with them. Forty-six per cent of people currently with pets and 37 per cent of people currently without pets said that they had known pets in the past that were telepathic. Thirty-nine per cent of those currently owning pets and 38 per cent of those currently without pets said they themselves had had psychic experiences. But significantly fewer of those who had never kept pets had had psychic experiences themselves. The results of this survey are compared with two similar surveys in the north-west of England and in California. The general pattern was remarkably similar in these three very different locations and shows that seemingly telepathic abilities in pets are common. In all locations, dogs were more responsive than cats to their owners' thoughts and intentions. The potential for experimental investigations of these abilities has already been discussed in the scientific community.

Harvard and Cambridge biochemist, Dr Rupert Sheldrake, author of Dogs That Know When Their Owners Are Coming Home (Arrow, London, 2000) is the expert in this field. He believes animals have abilities that humans may have possessed at one time, but somehow lost. Through his extensive research, he has concluded that there are three major categories of unexplained perceptiveness by animals:

1. Telepathy – a psychic connection that some pets may have with their owners through connections Sheldrake calls 'morphic fields'. It is this ability that enables pets to 'know' when their owners are on their way home.

2. The Sense of Direction – this ability accounts for the 'incredible journeys' some animals make to be with their owners, including homing pigeons.

3. Premonitions – which may explain why some animals seem to know when earthquakes and other events are about to occur.

1. TELEPATHY

In the section of Sheldrake's book on telepathy, he asserts that this ability arises from the strong bond that develops between humans and family pets. He relates several anecdotes from pet owners who believe that their animals are psychically picking up their intentions, and one story, about a mixed breed dog called Ginny, is particularly interesting. His owner told Sheldrake:

'I just cannot understand how my dog can know when I am going to walk him. Only my thinking of it is enough for him to jump about joyfully. In order to exclude the possibility of eye contact and information through the other senses, I left the dog outside in the garden and behind closed windows and doors when I thought of taking him. And still the same result every time: He acts crazy out of sheer joy and expectation. When I dress to leave for work, however, he remains totally quiet.'

A friend of mine has a beautiful Springer Spaniel called Billy and he, too, has a wonderful knack of being able to distinguish between 'walkies' time and when John is simply opening the back door to go instead to the car, bike or simply out to the garden. At first we thought it could be argued that this very perceptive dog is picking up some kind of cues from John. Perhaps Billy was simply noticing his attire, or hearing him pick up the lead, or car keys, but as with Ginny, even if he decided on a quick walk through the fields in his work clothes, Billy was there, ready and waiting, while at other times when he went through the back door, he would remain on his bed without a flinch!

It has been argued that there could even be an odour cue which a human releases with a certain intention that only the dog can smell. More difficult to explain, however, is the story of a cat in Switzerland that seemed to know when a specific telephone call was coming:

'After my father had retired, he sometimes worked for an acquaintance in Aargau. Sometimes, he called us from there in the evening. One minute before this happened, the cat became restless and sat down next to the telephone. Sometimes, my father took the train to Biel and then used a moped to get home from there. Then the cat sat down outside the front door thirty minutes before he arrived. At other times, he arrived at Biel earlier than usual and then called us from the station, and the cat sat down near the telephone shortly before the call came. After it, she went to the front door. All this happened very irregularly, but the cat seemed to know exactly where he was and what would happen afterward.'

And, of course, there are anecdotes of dogs and cats who 'know' when their owners are coming home, such as that from T, who wrote:

'When I divorced my husband, I got an apartment alone with my cat, Bo. He always met me at the door when I came home from work, but that isn't the strange part.

'I decided to move across country and to save money I stayed with friends for two months before leaving. They told me that when it was time for me to come home, Bo would sit in the front window and look for me, then run to check out the back door since I came in one way or the other. It's real odd because I never got off work at the same time every day – it always varied by two to five hours! But Bo always knew and waited for my return!

The actual word 'animal' derives from the Latin anima, which translates as life principle, breath, air, soul, or living being. Thus, recognition of the spiritual essence of animals and respecting them as fellow intelligent beings is vital. Some believe animals are able to communicate with humans who are open to the telepathic connection, comprehending their intentions, emotions, images, or thoughts behind the words, even if the words themselves aren't totally understood.

Perhaps this isn't such a weird concept when we consider that babies are born without any knowledge of language – babies pick up on the thoughts, intentions and body language of their parents and then language is learnt and becomes the main vehicle of communication. Yet speak to any body language expert and they will be quick to tell you the vast percentage of the language behind the words that comes from stance, stature and mannerisms. Does the same apply to the animal kingdom when it comes to comprehending humans? After all, we all know dog and cat body language – perhaps we are just as easy to read and our thoughts are the same?

Interestingly, and worthy of mention here is the story of Washoe the chimpanzee. She was born in Africa about forty years ago and cross-fostered, that is removed from her biological parents and raised by surrogates. The special thing about Washoe is that she acquired American Sign Language from her human companions. Washoe is the first non-human animal to acquire a human language and her adopted son Loulis is the first to acquire a human language from another chimpanzee.

The four chimpanzees at the Chimpanzee and Human Communication Institute – Washoe, Loulis, Tatu and Dar – have all learnt extensive American Sign Language vocabularies and live together as a social group. They gesticulate and vocalise as free-living chimpanzees do, but also use American Sign Language in their interactions with humans and with each other to answer questions, make requests and describe activities and objects. This is phenomenal and really adds another dimension to the debate on animal telepathy and whether they know what we are thinking.

I mentioned earlier the ability of some animals to 'know' when an earthquake is about to occur. Before the quake actually starts, rats and snakes have been seen fleeing their burrows, horses and other farm animals have become agitated and birds fly away from the scene in great flocks. Again, this is almost certainly a case of super-sensitivity to the environment rather than true precognition. The creative senses subtle vibrations, odours and electric and magnetic emissions resulting from the stresses within the earth.

Much harder to explain, however, are incidents in which the pet truly seems to have foreknowledge of some disastrous event or problem – even knowing when friends, partners or colleagues are up to no good – an event for which there can be no sensory cues to pick up on. Sheldrake includes several interesting examples in his studies, including this one:

One morning my dog, Toby, tried to stop me going out of the front door. He barged against me, leaned on the door, jumped up at me and pushed me. He is normally a quiet, loving dog and knows my routine; I would have been back within four hours. I had to lock him in the kitchen and left him howling, something he has never done before or since. I set off at 7.30 am and by 9.40 am I was involved in a horrific traffic accident resulting in a fractured neck and right arm, and many other injuries. In the future, I'll listen to Toby.'

When I was on a phone-in show for BBC Radio Newcastle, Joyce from Blythe called and recalled how her dog suddenly used to get up and go to the air-raid shelter minutes before the siren went off!

I also received some amusing anecdotes about animals knowing better than us about our choice of partners! One letter was from Jane Donovan about her perceptive cat Lulu, who liked to help her choose her partners! A few years ago, she was seeing a guy who Lulu made a point of showing her disgust and disapproval of him by sitting on his smart, black work trousers which deeply annoyed him. Later, when they were upstairs in bed, she snuck up behind him and sunk her claws into his bare backside. Suffice to say, not long afterwards their 'relationship' fizzled out, much to Lulu's delight!

Similarly, in Australia, pets were keen to let Susan Henderson know what they thought of her cheating husband. As she explains:

'I am, and always have been, an unashamed "cat woman". My estranged husband never has been; in fact, he openly says he hates cats. My cats have always slept on my bed and indeed slept with us for five years. However, at the time that it turned out he was having an affair, they shifted their sleeping positions to sleep around me, between us, and on his chest (which he hated with a passion)! As my husband's marital behaviour deteriorated (unbeknown to me at the time), the cats began to show their distaste and suddenly started to pee on his side of the bed (soaking his feet!), on the floor on his side of the bed (so that he put his foot in it as soon as he got up) and then on the kitchen floor where he would be the first to stand in the morning to make his cup of tea!

'Then they started peeing in his shoes. One even peed in the washbasket of his work clothes (no one else's) while I was hanging out the washing with the basket on the ground beside me. It got so bad that a cat-house was built outside for them to sleep in at night as we just couldn't understand their sudden bad behaviour. Well, then they started climbing in the window of his car and peeing on his car seat. When he wound up the windows, they peed on the roof and sprayed on his windscreen. Every day. There were two other family cars, and they never peed on or sprayed either of those. ... After he finally moved out, the cat living in his new home started peeing in his car. My cats still climb up onto his car and piddle down his windscreen whenever he turns up here, but since his departure the peeing in the house has come to an abrupt halt!'

All Susan's cats have been astute when it came to men ... she recalls, 'When I was a teenager, my stepfather was a philandering husband too ... thinking about it, our cat used to leave mutilated mice in his slippers!'

Sceptics write off all these occurrences, attributing this to the distinguishable sound of the car engine or the person's keys in the lock, or just the coincidence of knowing people or events would turn out the way they did. However, I can verify our daft childhood Basset hound always knew when Mum was on her way home – he would move from his bed at the back of the house to sit behind the front door about ten minutes before she pulled up in the drive, be it her arriving home from school at a regular time, or having popped out to the shops, or to visit friends. This is the case for so many pet owners.

(Continues...)

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Excerpted from Psychic Pets by Emma Heathcote-James. Copyright © 2007 Emma Heathcote-James. Excerpted by permission of John Blake Publishing Ltd.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
Excerpts are provided by Dial-A-Book Inc. solely for the personal use of visitors to this web site.

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Table of Contents

Contents

Title Page,
Dedication,
Foreword,
Preface,
Acknowledgements,
Introduction,
Chapter 1 Are Pets Psychic or Just Super-Sensitive?,
Chapter 2 Natural Instinct,
Chapter 3 Animals and Superstition,
Chapter 4 Dogs as Working Partners,
Chapter 5 Assistance Dogs,
Chapter 6 Animals and War,
Chapter 7 Animals as Therapy,
Chapter 8 Life-Saving Pets,
Chapter 9 Special Celebrity Animals,
Chapter 10 Animal After-Death Communication,
Appendix i Assistance Animals,
Appendix ii Animal Organisations and Other Link,
Appendix iii The Animals' War Exhibition at,
The Imperial War Museum,
Bibliography,
Copyright,

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