From Linda's Desk
Exploring the Mystery of TTouch and Interspecies Communication
Linda Tellington-Jones
TTEAM Connections Volume 10 Issue 3 July-September 2008
Two days after receiving a PhD from Wisdom University and taking on the responsibility of Chair for the study of interspecies communication I had an epiphany inspired by a series of events working with Amy Phelps – head giraffe keeper at the Oakland , California zoo. It occurred as I was gathering photos of my work with exotic animals for my keynote presentation of Tellington TTouch to the American Behavior Management Alliance (ABMA) conference in Rhode Island next April.
As if “out of the blue” of theta brainwave inspiration, it occurred to me that the special relationship that occurs with TTouch, resulting in animals developing a deep trust and often relating to humans in unique ways, deserves closer study, contemplation, and recognition. I invite each one of you who read my following premise - and resonate to this thinking - to open your hearts and minds and join me in exploring the mystery of TTouch and interspecies communication. Together we can bring a new awareness to humankind of the importance of animals in our lives.
Oakland Zoo Heart Hug Day
At 9:30 on June 21st, before the start of the TTouch presentations and the Heart Hug ceremony, I TTouched the giraffe, Tiki, at the request of Amy Phelps. Amy has been TTouching Tiki now for several years, and she wanted me to see the progress she has made since my first visit a few years ago. She was also curious to see how Tiki would respond to me and was fascinated and surprised that she stood quietly and longer than ever before and took much less food than was normal when she was being worked on. That's what started me thinking about the “mystery” of TTouch.
Three days later, on the east coast of the U.S., I awakened from a deep sleep in the wee hours of the night and was inspired to write a letter to Amy musing about the mysterious and unidentified aspects of TTouch.
It was 1:00 a.m. in the magnificent foothills of the Berkshire Mountains of Massachusetts I woke out of a deep sleep with an image in my mind of Amy's power point presentation of her TTouch training of giraffes for which she won Zookeeper of the Year award. I recalled the surprise in her voice when she said to me, “Tiki stood still for your TTouches for 30 minutes with far less food reward than was usual.” That was no surprise to me. TTouch is a language without words and over many years we have countless cases of a great variety of species stopping to “listen” to the language of TTouch – to interact with the TToucher with a fascinating level of attention. I began to muse about the significance of Tiki's response as well as Amy's surprise.
Under the auspices of Wisdom University 's Institute for Interspecies Communication, a study of TTouch – “as a language without words” could be a worthy subject for a masters or doctoral study.
In those wee hours of the morning as I was reviewing our discussion of photos I plan to use for my presentation to the ABMA, I began thinking about just how different the TTouch approach is from other forms of training. Perhaps much of the difference lies in our intension to communicate and connect at a cell-to-cell level and the way in which we respect and honor the intelligence of animals and the role they play as our teachers.
I saw in my mind's eye the image from Amy's power point presentation of Tiki's hoof placed carefully on the x-ray plate, with the weight carefully dispersed so she would not crush the plate and yet provide a clear picture of her diseased bones. Amy stated, almost apologetically, that she had verbally asked Tiki to place her hoof on the plate, just so and indicated that she had partially shaped the behavior with food reward and the clicker.
“I'd like you to pick up your hoof, please”
That sounds like the standard form of behavior modification except for the fact that Amy referred to my suggestion that if she wanted a specific response from an animal all she had to do was to verbally ask. She told the story of her experience at the Bitterroot Ranch in Wyoming when I asked her, as a very experienced clicker trainer, if she would use clicker to retrain a fourteen hundred pound mare who could not be shod because she refused to pick up her feet. Because of the mare's size and strength, it was impossible for the blacksmith to force the mare into cooperating.
Amy said she would be happy to work with the mare with clicker, but could not imagine just how she would get her to lift up her foot in the first place, once she has acquainted her with targeting. I suggested to Amy that she verbally ask the mare to pick up her foot. She did and much to her surprise, the mare picked up her foot, and of course, Amy was able to reward her. Since then Amy has been integrating verbal cues with her giraffes with much success.
Many years ago I discovered that when I add a specific verbal request while asking a horse for a simple response – like “take two steps back, please” - that s/he will respond more readily when the verbal request is given in addition to a signal on the halter or on the body. Although I have been doing verbal requests for countless years, I am still surprised at the rapidity of the response. Interesting that I expect dogs to understand my verbal cues but am still surprised and delighted every time a horse responds, even though it works almost every time I ask and has done so for more years than I can remember.
What made me start thinking that we might be seeing a special form of interspecies communication was Amy's response when we were going over the photos and film of me working with a variety of animals at the San Diego Wildlife Park and other places in preparation for my presentation to the Animal Behavior Management Alliance Conference.
Keiko, star of the Free Willy film
While we were watching a DVD of me working with Keiko, the orca whale star from the film Free Willy, Amy observed that the trainer was not cueing him as frequently with the whistle as would normally be expected, but he was still staying on his back and allowing me to TTouch him. This was especially significant because Keiko was exceptionally shy and would not approach a stranger or take food from anyone he had not known for at least a month.
It never crossed my mind that Keiko's trainer would have to continually cue him because I could tell he was listening to me through my hands. And as I write this, I am questioning whether he could also be feeling my heart coherence or is it a very simple communication from my expectation that he is receiving my “transmission”. When I work in this way I very specifically clear my head of thought and go to a place of stillness to allow a cell-to-cell communication. I believe that is how I have been able to work with so many animals in the way I do.
Lynne McTaggart's take on Quantum Physics
For several months I have been immersing myself in the concepts of quantum physics as described by Lynne McTaggart in her book, “The Field”. The research described so thoroughly has given me a deeper understanding of how each thought has an effect on the entire planet. I first learned about the effect of thoughts from reading Rupert Sheldrake's theories more than thirty years ago in his book The New Science of Life, and this concept has been a guiding light in my life and theories of TTouch over all these years.
In her book, The Intention Experiment , Lynne McTaggart writes, “In the course of trying to find a scientific explanation for homeopathy and spiritual healing, I had inadvertently uncovered the makings of a new science. During my research, I stumbled across a band of frontier scientists who had spent many years re-examining quantum physics and its extraordinary implications….the most heretical evidence of all concerned the role of consciousness. The well-designed experiments conducted by these scientists suggested that consciousness is a substance outside the confines of our bodies – a highly ordered energy with the capacity to change physical matter. Directing thoughts at a target seemed capable of altering machines, cells, and indeed, entire multicelled organisms like human beings. (p.xv) Targeting your thoughts …or intention…appears to produce an energy potent enough to change physical reality. (p.xvi)”.
Three of the “frontier scientist” discussed in The Intention Experiment, Rupert Sheldrake, Russell Targ and Fritz-Albert Popp, have had a role in my development of TTouch.
Rupert Sheldrake's Flowering Tree Ceremony
Rupert Sheldrake I first met at the Peaceful Cultures Conference at the Ojai Foundation in California in 1984. He taught us how to communicate with trees in “The Flowering Tree Ceremony” – a tree mediation that I have since taught to thousands of students on several continents with often astoundingly profound messages being received. I had already read Rupert's book, “The New Science of Life” and had integrated his theory - that our collective thoughts create our universe - into my daily life.
Russell Targ of Stanford Research Institute had a major influence on my life with a study he conducted on 40 attendees enrolled in a Robert Monroe workshop at Esalen Institute in Big Sur, California in 1974. We were all given written tests to determine our use of logic and intuition. He told me that I had as close to a 50/50 balance of logic and intuition of anyone he had ever measured. This started me on the path to learn how we activate logical or intuitive use of our brain and the influence of TTouch and TTEAM on the activation of both hemispheres.
When Anna Wise, then director of the Biofeedback Institute of Boulder, Colorado measured my brain wave activity and validated, as she had surmised, that I was functioning in “The Awakened Mind State”, researched extensively by Maxwell Cade and Anna Wise, she organized a study of 30 TTouch students in the summers of 1984 and 1985, It was found that TTouch activated all four brain waves – beta, alpha, theta and delta – in both hemispheres, when a person was both applying TTouch to an animal or another person, or was being TTouched.
The Influence of Quantum Physicist Fritz Popp on TTouch
Fritz Albert-Popp has had a huge influence on my understanding of the healing potential of TTouch. I had the privilege of meeting with him in his lab outside of Dusseldorf , Germany two years ago for several hours because of his study of the light in cells of plants. I have been “seeing/experiencing” the body of humans and animals as having less light when there is fear or tension or pain or disease and I was hoping to understand what it was I was “seeing”. His explanation that the light in cells is a result of communication or lack of it between cells gave me another level of clarity and purpose.
All this is leading up to a new way of thinking about interspecies communication. In those early morning hours in the Berkshire 's comments that Keiko's trainer, Janette, was using less than usual reinforcement to keep Keiko on his back set off a flood of memories of animals I have connected with in special ways over many years.
Sharing the TTouch of Trust with Kenyon Bear
How did I get Kenyon, the 6-month old bear we were sent to rehab by Montana Fish and Game, to allow me to TTouch his paws and his mouth in less than 30 minutes after I met him with no behavior reinforcement techniques? And then what made him come out of his house and approach me so quietly that I completely trusted him when he took my eyelashes ever so gently in his lips – first on my right eye and then my left eye – and minutely moved my eyelids and then sat back and look at me as though to say, “Now you know you can trust me”. Thank Heaven that was filmed by Kid's TV Express or no one could believe it.
A Coyote Named Mindy
And what about the coyote at the San Diego Wildlife Park who could not be lead? In six sessions of 10 minutes each, I was able to teach her how to teach me to lead her. After her first “lifted-lip” response she wound up happily following me with a loose rope around her neck and she later became an ambassador for coyotes at the Los Angeles Zoo – where she apparently was lead around to greet visitors.
And what about the bear who had sensitive paws and would not walk across the gravel to go on stage at the San Diego Wildlife Park as part of the education program. In just minutes he let me TTouch his mouth and paws so that he was then able to walk across the gravel as soon as I had finished working with him. There was no use of behavior modification to handle him – just my open heart and quiet mind and TTouch.
Communing with a Rattlesnake
And how did I communicate with the rattlesnake that I carried to safety in my car in a bucket without it ever once appearing frightened. Instead it gently touched around the top of the 5-gallon pail with its nose, and when I released it, it slithering about 10 feet away coiled and quietly breathing so I could hear it! In this case I didn't TTouch it at all - just cleared my mind and sat quietly in a state of deep appreciation.
Dr. Isenbugel and the Zurich Snow Leopards
Remarkable communications brings to mind the photo of Dr. Ewald Isenbugel, retired head-veterinarian for the Zurich Zoo and professor at the University of Zurich vet school, giving an injection to a snow leopard through the fence. There was no food given before or after! This is a snow leopard I TTouched some years before when she was thought to be dying of a seemingly incurable respiratory disease. After 25 minutes of TTouch the fever was broken and she recovered. Could that one TTouch exchange contribute to this exceptional behavior, or is it the magical connection that Dr. Isenbugel has with animals, or both. He has promised me that he will write about his feelings and connections, which I promise to share with you all.
Communication and Conflict Resolution with a Hungarian Stallion
This journey into the past takes me to a sunny morning at Pebble Beach , California when I rode a lovely 6 year-old Hungarian stallion named Brado onto the cross country course for practice before a Three-Day-Event competition. He had been shipped to me at our Pacific Coast School of Horsemanship and Research Center from Virginia where he had been slated for the U.S. Equestrian Three-Day Olympic team but because he was very spooky and resistant about jumping ditches, he did not make the team. He had only arrived for training a few weeks earlier with the warning that he was exceptionally talented but could not be made to jump over a ditch. The Pebble Beach Three-Day-Event course was one of the premier courses in the country at that time, with many natural water ditches, and since I had competed for many years successfully at that event, I chose to see if I could change his mind about ditches.
As I approached the first ditch out on the course just to see what he would do, he stopped dead in his tracks about 40 feet before the ditch and took on that stiff-legged, hard-necked posture that some stallions tend to do when they become resistant. Rather than fighting with Brado, which is what everyone else had already tried and failed at, I simply “emptied my head like a gourd.” (I learned about this useful state from reading “Judge
Dee and the Blind Samurai” about a 14th century samurai who could never be defeated because he would empty his head like a hollowed gourd and no one could approach him. It's a great way to stop unwanted left-brain chatter or negative thought and leave room for positive outcome.)
I sat quietly, not allowing Brado to go left or right or back, but not urging him to go forward, and simply held the intention that he would lose his fear and go forward when he felt safe and confident. In a few minutes he walked forward on his own, jumped he ditch easily, and I never had one stop at a ditch in all the years I competed with this wonderful horse.
Intention and the Quantum Field
I think there is something else happening in all these cases that can perhaps be explained by this new understanding of the implications of “The Field” of energy of quantum physics: That “ intention characterizes a purposeful plan to perform an action, which will lead to a desired outcome.”(p.xxv.)
Intention, Entrainment and Heart Coherence
To hone one's ability for effective communication and TTouch I believe intension, entrainment and heart coherence are areas for study and practice. In The Intention Experiment Lynne McTaggart discusses “entrainment” (defined in physics as two oscillating systems falling into synchrony) at length and gives exercises to practice clarifying our “intention”. Anna Wise, in her book, The High Performance Mind , writes on page 214 about the experience of entrainment that occurred between myself and a mare I was TTouching while her brain waves were being monitored with the Mind Mirror.
TTouch and Heart Coherence
Karin Freiling, in our TTouch for You workshops in Hawaii and Germany , has been using the Freeze Framer in informal studies of our students. We have found that self-applied Heart Hugs can bring a person into an ideal state of heart coherence in a very few minutes. I believe this state in the person is reflected – or maybe entrained? – in the animal. It's clear that animals respond differently to a quiet, grounded person than to a person who is stressed. The Heart Hug can calm an animal by calming the person with the animal.
Dr. Ellen Gurkey has an interesting study measuring heart coherence using the HeartMath Institute's freeze-framer. The mare would approach and stand close to Ellen when she was in a state of ideal heart coherence (heart rhythm) but would walk away when Ellen thought disruptive thoughts. She points out that this is only one example, but it's an area ripe for exploration. Many of us have taken for granted the trust that develops with TTouch. It's time to examine some of the unidentified aspects of TTouch evident in the countless experiences I'm sure many of you can think of.
We are collecting stories for two purposes: Wisdom University Institute for Interspecies Communication website at www.wisdomuniversity.org
And for 2009 November 6,7,8 the TTouch conference in Arizona entitled: Exploring the Mystery and Magic of TTouch & Interspecies Connections . Put the date on your calendar and prepare to share!
New Mexico TTEAM Training
I had such a wonderful time co-teaching the New Mexico training with Carol Lang, Kirsten Henry and Andrea Pabel Dean. This was such an enthusiastic go-getum group from six states and Switzerland and Russia . We had two very experienced veterinarians and a vet student from Moscow and we had a great time sharing TTouch with riders and their horses.
Dr Janet Varhus, veterinarian from Colorado brought her horse Nanka
Nanka, a very attractive bay Arabian gelding with a teacup muzzle and very sensitive personality, was a challenging horse who had been trailered from Colorado to my Santa Fe , New Mexico week-long training. Dr. Janet Varhus, had not owned him for very long and she had bought the gelding because she felt sorry for him. He had extreme fear about any movement around his hindquarters due a bad experience with a trainer scaring him with ropes. Because of it he was tight in the muscles of his croup and was inconsistent in his stride behind. In addition, he rested one hind foot or the other more than 90% of the time, not wanting to put weight on both hind legs at the same time. Head lowering, Leg circles, Tail work, lots of Playground for Higher Learning and chest driving made a huge difference in the level of trust between horse and rider.
At the end of the clinic, we all witnessed the joy of his owner, Dr. Janet Varhus, DVM, being able to ride this horse bridleless with just the “Liberty Ring around his neck. This accomplishment was seen by his rider as nothing short of a miracle. And the horse went exceptionally well in the Lindell instead of a bit.
Dr. Varhus said: I learned to trust my intuition and pay attention to small things and I gained an understanding of my horse and validation of my own thoughts. Nanka and I learned to trust one another, to be calm, leave the past behind and look forward to new things. He was disconnected with his hind end. During the training Nanka became more balanced, more realized.
Most important, Nanka and I became a team at the TTEAM training. My horse, Nanka, was therapy for grief over the horse I lost. The clinic helped me with my grief and gave me a new partner.” An update on progress: I have a Shetland, a mule and Nanka. Nanka was the very bottom of the hierarchy and pushed around. Since we came back from the clinic, Nanka is the leader. I have not seen him aggressive but he has become the passive leader. Interesting.
Gus and Liz Kendell
Liz hauled her 17 year old Arabian gelding Gus, all the way from Nebraska to Santa Fe hoping the clinic would help them to create a bond. Liz won the NATRC region award for best horsemanship and a week of TTEAM was her reward. Liz was quite distraught from having to retire her brilliant champion NATRC mare. Gus had been her father's endurance horse and under the circumstances it was not surprising that she and Gus had trouble bonding.
After the clinic I called her to see how they were doing.
Liz says: Gus is very different since the week-long clinic in Santa Fe . He's not so aloof. He comes up to greet me when I walk into the paddock which he never did before. He sometimes chases the other horses away from me when I come into the herd. When I started riding him last year he often had all four feet off the ground. It was go, go, go. Now he's more laid back. It's really cool. There has been a significant personality change. Before the clinic his attitude was, “You are not my real rider”. Now he is attuned to me and we're communicating. I was standing on my parent's porch the other day and he came right up and stood there quietly with me. He would never have done that before. That was not normal for him.”
Back On The Trail
On August 31st we're off on another whirlwind tour to Slovenia , Italy , Switzerland , Germany , the Netherlands , and Austria . In Slovenia we will be celebrating the opening at the new location of the “Kaja and Grom Ranch” and celebrating their 20 th anniversary. This will be the official opening of the Animal Ambassador, TTEAM & TTouch Center in Slovenia . For a decade Darja Znidersic has been teaching TTouch to 2000 children each year who come from many countries to learn a gentle way of being with animals and nature. Check out their beautiful website (in English) by going to our www.TTouch.com Worldwide Links page. Scroll down to Slovenia.
September and October will be an exciting series of trainings for horses, companion animals and humans. In Austria I'm teaching my first one-day seminar on the subject of TTouch for You and Your Horse. In the next newsletter I'll have some wonderful photos taken with Ingrid Klimke for my next book on TTouch for Dressage Horses. Ingrid was on the German Gold medal team in Beijing and we'll have some photos taken by Gabrielle Metz taken in May and new images by Gabrielle Boiselle of Ingrid TTouching her Gold Medal horse.
November is a busy month. We'll be back in the U.S. in time to vote! And then on to a week of TTEAM training near Austin with TTouch Teacher Penny Stone and a 2nd annual weekend companion animal training with Marnie Reeder; then off to Santa Barbara, where I will give several presentations daily at the Trail Blazer Magazine Festival, the First Expo Created Exclusively for the Equestrian Trail Rider, November 14, 15, 16. Sign up at www.trailblazerfestival.us.
My last weeklong training on the fall tour before heading home to Hawaii is in Petaluma , California - TTouch for You and Your Horse. Participants go home refreshed and rejuvenated with many new tools for enhancing their health and happiness and deepening their relationship with their horse.
And of course, watch for trainings in North America with our brilliant instructors, Robyn, Edie Jane, Debby and Kathy, and our talented and dedicated TTouch Practitioners.
Carol Lang, Lora Sepion and Kate are working like beavers on a new look for our website home page so check in and watch for more TTouch pics on You Tube. We've had lots of interest in the You Tube section. If you have some interesting video footage of you TTouching an animal, send it to Carol and we'll get you on the website.
I look forward to your feedback about “The Mystery of TTouch” – that magic we so often take for granted. And I am already champing at the bit to share with you my thoughts about the effects on the humans applying TTouch to their animals or humans.
Many blessings, Heart Hugs and Aloha from the balmy breezes of Hawaii,
Linda
