Episode 022: What Else Is Possible? Dogs, Nature & Letting Go

What happens when we stop expecting life to repeat itself?

In Episode 22 of Unruly By Nature, Sue, Rachel, and Kim explore how curiosity can transform the way we experience challenges with our animals, ourselves, and the natural world. Beginning with Charlie's injured dew claw and the conscious decision not to repeat an old story, the conversation unfolds into something much bigger.

How our expectations shape our reality 

How dogs mirror our own patterns

How nature constantly reminds us that life is always evolving

Together the trio explore intuitive decision-making, co-creating with our animals instead of controlling them, the remarkable intelligence of plants, seasonal wisdom, healing, trust, and what becomes possible when we let go of certainty.

This is an invitation to slow down, wander with curiosity, and discover that every moment offers a new way of seeing ourselves through relationship with the living world.

Thanks for wandering the wild edges with us on Unruly By Nature.

 If you loved this conversation, share it with someone who’s ready to explore the deeper side of life with dogs.

Rachel Knott - Animal Communicator

Website: rachelknott.com

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/myanimalmatters

Kim Howatt - Author and Imaginal Adventurer

Website: kimberlyhowatt.com

Substack: https://kimberlyhowatt.substack.com/

Sue Mimm - Life Explorer

Substack: https://suemimm.substack.com/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/groups/pawsreflectconnect

Until next time — stay curious, stay connected, stay unruly.

xoxo 

Kim, Sue, and Rachel

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:38

And we're live. Here we go, ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, kids and dogs, cats and everything else. Plants who use it. Alligators too. Welcome back. We're here for episode number 22. 21 was an absolute joy to have our guests Jennifer and Walter on last week. And we got some wonderful, wonderful feedback. So please go back and check that out if you want to open the conversation with somebody else as well that we did. But this week it's just back to the three of us, the wonderful three of us, the Kim Howitt and Rachel Knott, and myself, Sue Mim. And this week I'm gonna kick off with um a little experience that's currently happening in my life, and then I'm gonna throw it out to you ladies to um to take it from there. So my darling dog Charlie. He ripped a toenail about a week ago. Um, it's the the dew claw, um, so it's right on the side there. And I didn't see it happen, but it was probably happened when we were down at the river, and he loves to play, and there's lots of rot rocks and stones and things, and he was probably a bit, you know, rushed in whatever he was doing and ripped the claw. So when I noticed he was licking and gnawing at it, and I realized I'm gonna have to take him to the vet to get it removed because it was hanging on there and it looked really sore and it was bleeding. So I thought, okay, I'm gonna have to take him to the vet. But this is not the first time our dear Charlie has done this. In fact, it's the third time that he has done this. And the last time, which was about 18 months ago, it was in winter, um, we had a real run with it because it became infected not once but twice. We had two rounds of antibiotics, we had to be at the vet, we had um just about surgery to have the foot removed. No, it was really bad. It got really bad, and Charlie and I got into a real head-on head because he would did not want this bandage on. He insisted on licking it until it was bleeding again, and I had to keep this wound clean, and I had to keep him away from this w away from licking it. And it was really, it was a it was tough for both of us. It was like a head-on-head fight, which is seems to be the story of Charlie and I. I want this, no, I want it like that, right? Two control freaks trying to trying to fight it out, like who's gonna win this?

SPEAKER_03 3:07

Like wrestling with your mirror.

SPEAKER_00 3:10

Exactly, exactly, exactly. So when this happened this time, I was like, no ways, no freaking ways, are we gonna do this all over again? So I just literally sat down with him and I said, This was before I went to the vet, and I said, here we go. I said, let me just tell you, it's not gonna unfold the way it did before. And he's just like looking at me with these sweet little timid eyes, as if to say, you have no idea. But really, it's uh I just I actually just decided in the moment, I said, that's it. We are not having a repeat of what we did last time. Because the thoughts had already started going down that, oh my god, it took like six, eight weeks to have this thing go through. And then it was a longer, extended period after that, because then it got once the bandages came off, he started licking again and blah, blah, blah. And I just said, straight out, we're not doing this again. End of stories. So it was like, so what now? And the question popped into my head, what else is possible? Because immediately I realized how we jumped to conclusions based on previous experience, which is perfectly normal. That's what our brain is there to do. It predicts it predicts the future based on what our past experience is. But I just said I refuse to have that as my future going forward. I refuse to repeat the scenario as we had before. So things are unfolding really well so far. But I'm leaving it completely open because I never say never. Uh, he had a bandage on for the first 24 hours, started trying to lick it. I put on a cone for the next uh 24 hours, and then I took it all off and I said, It's up to you, buddy. Let your body heal, leave it alone. And we had like one day where I kept giving him the mother eye, like every time he went near it, I went stared at him, gave him the mother look. And he refrained and he let it go, and it's healing beautifully. So we are like what seven days in, seven, eight days in. It's healing beautifully. Um, he's not licking it, he's not paying any attention, he's not limping on the foot, and it looks really good. So, fingers crossed. But it was for me, it was that turning point to say what else is possible, and I refuse to repeat the scenario the way we the way it played out before. So that was really interesting. A because I set a clear boundary, is I'm not gonna have to do this again, and secondly, how strong our uh what is it, prediction machine is our mind, the prediction machine is like this is how it went before, so therefore it has to be like this again. And it doesn't. So that's my little story, and I'm gonna throw it over to you girls. Have you had a situation where you've come in with perhaps pre-conceived ideas or previous experience and you feel like oh my god, this is deja vu, it's happening all over again.

SPEAKER_01 6:06

And yeah. If it's turned out differently, or if it hasn't turned out differently, if it's turned out the same. Or what are your thoughts around that?

SPEAKER_03 6:17

So anybody want to go in first? I I uh you know, I think that we had something somewhat similar, not a toenail, because weirdly in the US, like even our rescue dogs come to us without duke claws, they take them out here, which I'm not a fan of, but they do it in.

SPEAKER_00 6:37

Yeah, actually.

SPEAKER_03 6:38

Yeah, so n Zam had duclaws, but Django and Zori don't. However, there was a it was probably a month ago now, like we were getting ready to go out to dinner. So we'd been inside all day. It was really, really, really hot here. And we had stayed, we'd been out earlier in the morning and everything was fine, but I got out of the shower, we were ready to leave in like 10 minutes to celebrate our friend's birthday. And Django came up to me and his eye looked like a ball. Like it was massive. The and I'm like, what did you do to your eye? And I mean, and I couldn't tell. And he he always walks between your legs and like gives you his butt to pet. So like I we were trying to see it, but he kept spinning through my legs, and it was like, all right, we gotta go. So we went to dinner, we came home, and he had ripped the entire bottom of his eyelid, like just wide open. We're like, wow, okay, we gotta go to the ER vet. Now it's 10:30 on a Sunday night, so that'll it was a three or four hour wait, I think. So we go, and they like, but Django is not a vet dog. He does not enjoy the vet. And somebody that close to his face is just gonna that like so. My preconceived notion was there's no way that they're even gonna be able to, they're gonna have to put him to sleep to even take a look. Because when he had his neurological episode in October, we went to our vet, our normal vet for that, because there wasn't a whole lot they could do. But he was like fine with one visit, but he didn't want a lot of attention. But he very willingly got in the car, went to the vet, they sat in the waiting room. There was people all over the place. He was just laying there. Like Jim took him because I was with Zori, and like he sent me pictures. They took him back, they examined him, they never put him to sleep. They said he was a saint. And I'm like, Are you sure you took Django? Sure, I took because I don't think you did. And like, so he came home obviously in a cone because he wouldn't quit rubbing it. He was rubbing it on furniture. And when we weren't like, they couldn't find anything. There was no tumor, no none of the things that they like, they did some heavy tests too. And we went to scent work class like two or three days later, and it was still really messed up. But he couldn't get through the picnic tables at class, so we're like, we're taking this cone off you, but if you go after it, we're putting it back on, and that dog left his eye alone, and it's it healed instantly. So yeah, it was a similar story where he just was, I think because we were different. But I will tell you that I was worried about him going to the vet, and that's probably why I didn't end up going, you know, why Jim took that role because he was calm, and I was calm about it, but I think like I had the more notion, so he was a better choice to let go, and it just went so well. It he just showed us so much about what's possible, I think, in that moment. So yeah, I I absolutely agree with you 100%.

SPEAKER_00 10:00

I love that. Yeah, and that's I mean, that's a another whole thing that that you hear, Kim. I mean, I think it's very brave of you to say, Jim, you go, because you know, I know that I probably will bring a lot of emotion into this and possibly make the situation worse or not, or whatever. It's something that we we don't like to admit out loud sometimes. I think when we take it's you know, when we take our dogs to the vet and and it's under circumstances that are very challenging, we can easily um project our own worries and fears onto the situation, which obviously the dog feels in that situation. Not every dog, I mean some dogs are fine, but some dogs certainly take on that extra projection that we are doing. Um again, so it's you know, us predicting, us projecting onto them how that outcome can be very different. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 10:52

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 10:53

I'm just processing what you're both saying and thinking about my own reflecting back on my own experiences. But the bit I think when you said Sue that you were clear with him and said, We're not doing this again, and he maybe he's the type of dog that needs that like strictness at times, or maybe likes that guidance, and so he needed to hear that. Because as much as they, you know, they have their own intelligence, they're still learning, like we are, and and maybe you had a foresight that he didn't necessarily have in that moment, so he obviously needed mum to be, and sometimes like people, some people like direction, don't they? They they like guidance and someone coming in and saying, no, that's not gonna happen. So then they feel like they can relax a bit. So maybe there was a bit of that in there, maybe. I don't I don't know. Um, but I think I'm I'm thinking of a situation with Darcy where she smashed her leg. It was a really interesting situation. And this is comes to the the the bit of are we creative? Was it a create co-creation or did I predict it? So my Bex has gone out, my partner had gone out, and we in our last property we had these concrete steps that went up to the garden, and the whole time we'd had Darcy as a pup, she'd run up these steps, and every time she would run up these steps, I would wince because they're you know really sheer concrete steps and she never injured herself. But there was this one day, one evening, she went out and for whatever reason I said to her, mind the steps, Darcy. And then she smashed her leg on the step. So did I I know I'm going off piste a bit, but did I predict that? Did I create it? I think it's the same thing. So anyway, she smashed she like and and she really felt that. So it was it was you know, the wound was maybe about a centimetre and a half open with deep. And I I didn't felt I didn't want to take her to the vet. I didn't feel like it was a vet visit. Many people maybe would have done, but because I've got my toolkit of clay and yarrow and all of those things, I just did that. And and I actually let her lick her wound and I felt quite relaxed about it with her. But if it had been another dog, I'm thinking if it was Cosmo, I probably would have interjected. But the reason I felt I let her lick it is because of who she is, and I sort of felt like she needed to, but she wouldn't obsess over it because she's that's kind of not really her character. Um so actually I f I actually felt relaxed about her cleaning it and whatever, and it and it healed beautifully, and it healed up, and then I think a week later then it opened started to open up again, and then a piece of bone came out. So she actually chipped. I know, she actually chipped the bone. But I don't I think it's the collective energy, isn't it? So I don't think we make our dogs anxious. I think we're just picking up on each other and we're giving w so I feel like that with Darcy, I just I have confidence in her because I feel that she just is naturally quite good at self-regulating and quite there's something about her. I feel not to get too involved with her. Whereas with another dog, I would have probably got more involved because maybe they needed that and maybe they like that guidance. So I feel like we always do exactly what that relationship needs. Um, and I just feel from Charlie that he needed you to be firm and he needed that like right. I'm just thinking, you know, as a kid when I went ended up in hospital and my mum would have been like, you can't, you know, and I quite liked it because it would have meant I could relax and just enjoy, you know, being the patient, or you know, it's maybe that there's that as well a little bit. I don't know.

SPEAKER_03 15:45

Well I actually think that that's like it's so brilliant, Rachel, how you pulled that in the clarity piece, because just really quickly, it it is that piece of us that's self-honest. And I think you weren't stressed out about Darcy cleaning her wound because she gave you a clear message intuitively, and that's just it. When Django had his neurological event in October, I had a very clear message he needed no help. So we let him walk around and stumble and fall down in the yard for a couple of days, and then he's acting like a freaking puppy now. But this time when we came home, he wanted help, so he accepted it, right? And it's and and it almost did what you said. I was anxious about it, but I know how I get when I have to go to the doctor, like for me, right? But it was this, it's like when you allow that space, I think, for these clear, I don't want to call them instructions, but messages to come through both ways. Because it's just I think she gave you complete like sense of calm. She helped you, right? It is the mirror always. And I I do we attract anxious dogs because they're helping us with our anxiety, but we are also helping them. Yes, it's not a one-way street.

SPEAKER_00 17:12

No, it's definitely yeah, two-way for sure. Which reminds me, Kim, and and this is another part of the same story, and I'd forgotten about that, but you just reminded me when we got to the vet, and it happened to be the same vet that we saw 18 months ago, the same clinician was there, and she said, I think I treated trying. I said, Yes, you did, for the same thing. And um, she said to me, She looked at it this time, and the last time Charlie had actually had actually tuned it off, chewed his nail off first before we got there. This time I was just hanging on, hanging on. But it was still quite tight. It wasn't just hanging on by a little thread, it was still quite tight. And she gave him a and thank God Charlie's really, really great at the vet. He's really, I mean, he knows when he's really sore, he's he's like still and say, says, help me. And she looked at it and she said, Look, I don't trust myself to pull this off without causing a lot of pain because it's still pretty much, you know, there. She said, I'm gonna have to give him a um a sedation and um then we'll see from there so I can really have a have a good look. And I straight away, I don't know why, but I straight away just got the message. I said, No, we're not gonna do it. And she just looked at me and I said, He's 14 years old, um, he has a history of epilepsy. I'm not I'm not undergoing that risk. So she says, Well, then we're gonna have to hold him and I'm just gonna have to rip it off. And I said, Yes, we're fine with that. And I don't, as I was saying it, I thought, like, God, I'm making a decision on his behalf. He it's his body and it's his pain. But it was so clear. It was just for me, it was there was no it that was the clarity. And she said, Okay, we're gonna put him on the side. It took three of us, I said, one, two, three, put him on the side, and she said, Here it goes, one, two, three, anyway, ah, and it came off, and that was that. So, I mean, literally, it worked out perfectly, but thank you for that reminder because that was I beforehand I probably thought, oh, I don't know what's best, and this is a risk, and this is a risk, and I don't know what to put him through pain, and what happens if and blah. It was as clear as daylight. I just said, no, we're not gonna do that. So it's really interesting.

SPEAKER_03 19:18

It can be that sense of hyper responsibility, can't it? That we feel like they don't we have to protect them, we have to save them, we have to fix that. I mean, it just it it just takes me back into that hyper responsibility and how much pressure comes off when you realize that that's not how it works.

SPEAKER_01 19:37

Exactly.

SPEAKER_00 19:39

So just I want you to elaborate a little bit of uh into that, please, Kim, because I don't think our our some of our viewers really understand that, that sort of co-creation where we think we are making the all the decisions, we think we are you know having to do it and taking on that hyper responsibility when in fact if we let go, it is a co- what what do you want to call it?

SPEAKER_01 20:04

A co-creation, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 20:06

Yeah, I mean it just it's it's you know, in a way part of it is that beautiful mystery that we get to unfold as we go through this life. And I think when we have dogs, we experience this type of co-creation when we're okay to allow it. But we tend to be so focused and over-driven to give our dogs everything in this world. You know, they're domesticated and they want to live with us, and yes, we find well, they can go out and find their own food, some of them. You know, we have we've had all kinds, and I think different ones required not require, but different ones co-create with us at a different level because I think they teach us. We had Biggs who wouldn't do anything for himself. He was uh like a prince in a castle that wanted to be served all the time. But I think we feel such responsibility and guilt. Like how many dog owners would feel guilty that their dog ripped their dewclaw or tripped up the stairs, right? Like oh, I I should never I should never have let them run up the stairs. I sh I should have minded them on the rocks more.

SPEAKER_00 21:26

In fact, that was Kim, that the that's exactly what the vet said to me because obviously she'd seen it happen again. She said, Where did he do this? And I said, I'm not sure, but I think it was in the river. She said, What was he doing? I said he was playing. She said, Well, surely, you know, and straight away it was a pointing figure. Well, why did you let him do that? Because he's a dog and he enjoys playing in the water, and that's what he does. So must must I prevent him from doing something, his most favorite activity in the world that brings him joy every day, just so that I don't have to get the guilty feeling that that he hurt himself? And that and that's that he hurt himself.

SPEAKER_05 22:03

Yeah. He didn't have he he he could he, you know, uh is what you've you said this right at the beginning, uh Kim, and it stuck with me. They're sovereign beings, they are on their own journey. Yes, they're domesticators. What even the hell does that mean? I don't know. They live with us, but they are having their own experience. And like Darcy went off after a hair yesterday, and I had the whole mixture of emotion of woo, this is fun. Oh my god, this is terrifying. Will she come back? Oh, should we have let her off? All of the gamut of emotions, but I just know, you know, if she'd fallen over, whatever that's also her experience, that's her journey too. And you know, and I don't think there's ever any accident. I think it is just feedback and for growth.

SPEAKER_04 23:08

And I just don't and experience, and here we are.

SPEAKER_05 23:15

Like Darcy had to walk into two electric fences for her to realize maybe don't sniff them. You know that but if I hadn't let her do that, then that would have been exhausting. There's a lot of electric fences around here. So she kind of had to have her own experience of that.

SPEAKER_03 23:35

Well, and all of this comes, I think, Sue, you said it, right? I mean, it's all like the vet like kind of gave you a hard time in a way. But yeah, like again, she can't make you feel guilty. You just are carrying guilt from something long ago, most likely. But it's also social construct where we've grown up and accepted all of these rules that like are just somebody created them, and so we don't know what is really you know how it's gonna transpire. And I think our dogs are here to just show us that there's so much more possible, but it's when we need to do something or should do something, or I didn't do this, and oh my god, I feel terrible. It's like those things are just hyper responsibility, and not and exhausting. It's exhausting and it just keeps throwing you back into the past and all the things you should have done rather than doing what you did, which was handle the moment. But if you didn't have guilt in in your life, the vet A maybe never would have said it, or B, you would have just not even heard it. Like how many things somebody says that you don't hear. I see how much I've changed now compared to five years ago when life with Django I thought was going to be impossible.

SPEAKER_01 25:02

Yeah. Yeah, it's pretty amazing when you think about it.

SPEAKER_00 25:06

It's like you say, it's what Rachel was saying, it's it it's very hard for for us to actually go there to say, well, it's kind of their experience and they're having it, because we feel that responsibility that we should be preventing these things from happening. You know, that's what a good parent does, that's what a good dog guardian does, is they take care so that they don't get hurt and injured, etc. But if if we don't have experience and experiences in life, it's the same as uh, you know, people who wrap their kids up in cottonwool and you know never have, and then they go out into life, and life is just far too overwhelming for them because they've never had the experience themselves of falling down or breaking a leg or not being having mum there to, you know, do whatever, or have a hard, tough conversation with somebody or even a relationship. You know, it's not it's not comfortable because they haven't had the personal experience of that. And if we if we can accept that having animals in our lives is going to mean we're gonna have ER visits and we're gonna have um illness and sickness and hurts and bangs and you know, sometimes serious ones and sometimes not so serious, but it's it's part of the game, it's part of the the the contract we signed up for, right? And and so letting them have their experience and being able to I think it gives, like you said, Kim, a great amount of freedom when we can step back from that hyper responsibility and just give them the freedom to have their experience and not feel you know the guilt and the shame and all the the things that we want to put on ourselves.

SPEAKER_03 26:39

Yeah. There's no rule book, there's just a guidebook. And we can we can venture away from that if we s if it feels right for us.

SPEAKER_05 26:48

So Yeah. I'm just we were talking about plants before we got in here because we've all it's all it's warm at the minute, we're in summertime, and I'm relatively new to gardening, and I have quite a few pots, plants in pots, just because of parts of our garden. And I I I was looking at mine the other day thinking, oh no, you're so dead, like you look so dead, and and I think you know, not there wasn't any self-blame in that, but I was just like, oh no, they look completely dead, and then just give them a little bit of water, and and they just revived. And I think so. That's also the piece is is we kind of we're in these limitations of what we think is possible, and and I we've talked about this in a podcast episode before, where where you come into the day saying, I wonder what I'm gonna create today to learn about myself. Yeah, what else could happen? What am I gonna learn about the plants, learn about nature, learn about my family, learn about myself? What am I it's coming from that self-learning, honest place of I'm here, I landed here on earth, I'm trying to work things out and enjoy myself and just have this experience. I don't know where it's gonna end up. And as opposed to that, like trying to control everything and like I've been there, I totally was the control freak. And it's like I'd wake up in the morning thinking, what have I got to worry about? Because if I can remember what I've got to worry about, then I don't need to worry about it because I've thought about it. You know, it's just this spin cycle, and then when I finally really, you know, started to understand that okay, okay, okay, right. We're creating this, is it, this is we're we're creating not just with everything, with everything in life, you know, the plants in my garden with the birds and the bees, the clouds there. It life is a creative, it's an an unfolding. Um, but I guess it's the you hear that in the pop spiritual world of oh, I created that, I manifested that. And we're you know, when it's the things that we like, but it's when it's something we don't like or something that's really painful, we're like, yeah, I know I don't know. Yeah, I wouldn't I wouldn't have created that. No, but it's all the same thing, it's all the same, it's just some bits we like and some bits we don't like. Uh and and there are things, yeah. Uh and I feel where is our animals and nature isn't they're not in that paradigm of uh thinking things are an accident or beating themselves up for licking a wound, or you know. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 29:42

Yeah, and it's it it's interesting that because it again coming back to the the experience with Charlie, like you said, control has been our biggest teacher between the two of us because right from the beginning I recognized that we're both control freaks. And um and so it was head against head, it was resistance against resistance. And when I made it very clear that I wasn't gonna happen this wasn't gonna happen again, and I was not gonna take control of the situation like I wanted to before. His control also didn't the you know, the control that he needed, you know, to to get that wound under control himself, etc., or go against what I was doing, it's just that that resistance fell away. Uh yeah. Yeah. So it's you know, it again for me it was such a obvious control mirror. You know, are we gonna go in this head and head again? Or do I just r release control and say whatever happens will happen, and I'll deal with it on a day-to-day basis as we go through this together. And it's not gonna look like it did before, it's gonna look different. Yeah. And then you will be different. Yeah, and then he didn't have the urge, perhaps, you know, because he does, he gets very obsessed, like you said, he's got that obsessive compulsive. He doesn't he can't stop when he starts, you know. And I literally remembered the last time, I mean, Hubert didn't believe me, my husband, because I as he came home one day and I said, Hubert, he's been licking his foot like incessantly again. And he says, Well, just move his head and tell him he can't do it. I said, You try. He literally picked this dog up off the floor, and he's not light, I mean he's 25 Ks. Picked him off the floor and he was still licking his wound, or four legs off the floor, and he was still at the bloody wound, you know? Yeah, I mean, it was that kind of obsessive compulsive that he has. So yeah, just interesting. Interesting that the once I released the the pressure, the resistance on his side also. And some just like calling Kim.

SPEAKER_03 31:33

No, I was gonna say that's just it, isn't it? Like what happens when you pull on a rubber band just a little bit? Yeah, there's a little bit of tension, and then what happened if somebody else grabs onto it and pulls the other side? There's a little more tension, and then tension becomes resistance, and then resistance becomes like almost the battle. And so it's like we do that within ourselves too. And Rachel, it just I your story about the plants that died, you know. I mean, they had another purpose to serve, and if you look at it from the plant's perspective, they needed to go feed some other plants, yeah. And like they're helping they needed to go so the ecosystem could thrive, and like that's the unselfishness of nature, and we just try to control through that rather than seeing the bigger picture, and I think it opens up to that wider perspective.

SPEAKER_05 32:28

I was on a call with uh one of my uh Zoopharma mentees before um our podcast, and she was telling me, Oh, hang on, I'm gonna switch. You take every cough, particularly cough. Interesting.

SPEAKER_03 32:43

I'm gonna Rachel was on a call with one of her Zoopharma mentees and she started coughing.

SPEAKER_05 32:52

Uncontrollably. We're talking about um, she's bought these caterpillars, so it's like a school project, and you bought these caterpillars and you watch them over weeks then go into their chrysalis stage. And I've never done that, I've never witnessed that whole process.

SPEAKER_00 33:13

You didn't have silkworms when you were a kid? No. Oh wow, we had them by the box.

SPEAKER_01 33:19

Did you?

SPEAKER_05 33:22

Oh, I was fascinated. So she was saying then they go into this mushy mush, like in the chrysalis stage, but she said at the top of the chrysalis is this like beautiful gold like dot. And then of course they turn into these incredible butterflies, don't they? But it's that like we know that they turn into the butterfly, but we don't a bit like the plants, because it's you know, you're looking at the mush, I'm looking at my plants, going, Oh no, you've died, as in that's the end, but it of course isn't the end, it's just an evolution. As you say, it could they go into the soil and the something else will eat it, and then another plant will come in its place. But I just loved that you sh you can witness it's it's the different phases, and and that is our phase. That is, you know, I it wasn't random that we were talking about that because we'd been talking about some really difficult experiences she'd been going through. And I was like, you literally are describing what you're witnessing as in the chrysalis stage, it's the mush, and you're so desperate to get to the butterfly stage, but the the caterpillar isn't like, oh no, what's happened? You know, they they just uh they yeah, exactly.

SPEAKER_00 34:42

As far as I'm aware, yeah, who knows how they perceive it, but yes, it's certainly and Rachel. I I was witnessing something very similar with simply with watching my um hibiscus is just started to flower and it's just an absolute beauty. But just a few months ago, it was just sticks. Do you know what I mean? It was just a bush with sticks, and when you actually look at it, it's got yeah, it's the stark thing that looks half dead for the whole winter, and now it not only has grown these beautiful leaves, but these incredible complex f blossoms that open up, and you think, where did that come from? You know, we we are surrounded by miracles all day, every day, and we have we take it for granted. We take everything for granted because we just see miracles around us all the time, and then we say, Oh, well, there's no miracles in my life. Have a look around. There is constant miracles happening, and nature is such good evidence of that.

SPEAKER_05 35:41

Like the teeny tiny ants that carry these massive sticks on their back, you know, they're like and the collective intelligence that's that that they're all you know, they just work effortlessly from I don't know, the you know, the energy fields that connect them. They just this this incredible ecosystem just working together.

SPEAKER_00 36:03

And what causes like our my neighbors got a a a similar um the same variety, just a different color.

SPEAKER_01 36:11

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 36:11

Two, you know, two gardens down. And I looked at hers, and the day mine got its first blossom, so did that. How is that possible? How is that possible that yes, it's the same species or whatever, but on the exact same day that the first blossom arrives, another species of the same in a different garden does the same? I mean, that in itself is a miracle. How do they how do they work that out? You know? The intelligence is just so far, it's so way out there, and we forget. We just forget how brilliant it is.

SPEAKER_03 36:45

Yeah. Well, I you know, we're not the smart ones, are we? I am I am drinking hibiscus tea though this morning.

SPEAKER_00 36:52

Oh, nice. Yeah. Uh delicious.

SPEAKER_05 36:55

That's really cool. Well, I don't even know what a hibiscus is. Like, what does it look like? Is it purple? Is it like a gray?

SPEAKER_00 37:03

Mine is purple, but they come in all pinks and even whites or whatever. And it's just, you know, it's a hibiscus is is that flower that's very often synonymous on beech prints. You know, anything to do with beachy prints or whatever, you often see the hibiscus flower. It's one of those, just it's just an extraordinary beauty to look at. Is it called the butterfly plant? It's not that.

SPEAKER_05 37:23

No. No. Okay. I'll have to go and look that up now.

SPEAKER_00 37:29

But yes, so I also have started um harvesting my flowers once they're doing their thing. And and you can eat them fresh in salads, you can make yeah, dry them and make a lovely tea.

SPEAKER_03 37:43

Tea is tasty. It's tart, yummy.

SPEAKER_05 37:46

Hibiscus tea. I made myself a Melissa um lemonade. That one of my friends had been saying you've got to get some lemon balm in your garden. And uh for whatever reason I had hadn't until this point. Oh my I mean it smells so good. So I did an inf I think it's called an infusion where you just put or steep it in hot water for 30 minutes with some lemon rinds and then a little bit of sugar.

SPEAKER_01 38:17

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 38:18

Oh my word, it was so good. Lemon, but I'm all and actually I've got Melissa.

SPEAKER_00 38:23

I I Oh wow, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 38:26

I'm gonna have to talk to you offline on that because we have lemon balm outside, but I usually just cut it and put it in a vase. Like with chamomile or and lavender or whatever, and it just makes really nice, like aromatic.

SPEAKER_00 38:38

It does, it's got a beautiful, but yes, just and I eat the leaves.

SPEAKER_03 38:42

Yes, yeah, they eat the lemon balm leaves, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 38:44

Fresh, yeah, delish. We had like grilled fish on the weekend and just grab some lemon balm and put it on top of the fish while it was grilling. It was delicious. Yeah. So you must try that, Kim. Um, that's one of my favorites, and mine, my bush is really big now, so it's ready to um you can't get away with that euphemism.

SPEAKER_01 39:10

I've c I can't not.

SPEAKER_04 39:17

That's a good one. I mean it is summer. It is after all. Yeah. The wildness of nature. Yes, exactly. I was thinking sorry, go on.

SPEAKER_00 39:34

No, I was just thinking the other day when we were you were talking about oh I wasn't you who mentioned it right or something about before we pick a plant. You know, ask it it's you know, if it I I well I know I had mentioned it, but I don't know if it was you who had first mentioned it to me. When you pick a plant, you ask it to withdraw its energy first before you cut it, so that you're just giving it time to withdraw its energy from that specific branch or whatever. So I was doing that the other day with my um with my herbs, my rosemary, and whatever might I was standing back and talking to it and saying, I'm giving you a few moments to pull back your energy, and uh, my neighbour's like looking at me.

SPEAKER_01 40:19

Fantastic. Talking to my plants.

SPEAKER_05 40:23

Maybe she'll do that, Matt. I think it's so normal. My mum talks to her. I mean, I've never heard of talking to her plants, but she says she talks to all of her plants. It's the first thing she does in the morning is goes out, goes outside into her garden and tends, like nurtures and tends to everything in the garden. It it's such a um feminine quality, isn't it? It it's so and I'm really I'm 51 now and I feel like really my 50s is my plant era. Like as much as I've worked with plants with dogs, but in the form of essential oils and hydrosols, this is the first time I've really looked at and appreciated and enjoyed plants. So is that like, is that an age thing? Is it where I is it personal to me? I don't know. Is it, you know, my family are very my mum is very planty, her father was very planty. I just I find it so nourishing to go out and look and and so I think talking to your plants is so normal. Why would it be any different from talking to our dogs? I'm like, hey little one, oh my god, that's a really pretty one, or you know, although there are some I'm a bit harsh with, like I like this morning, you know, I hacked back my cat mint today, but I felt like she could handle it. Like it felt like you know, she could handle the hacking. But I think I think we're always in communication with them. We're always talking to them. But I love I like that I just think it makes me makes my heart happy that we talk to plants.

SPEAKER_03 42:14

Well, I I think that like that's just so beautiful because we have a massive garden with tons of herbs, and the last two seasons we've just let them I was trying to I was trying to control where things grew. I will admit it, I'm recovering. I'm gonna be recovering. The last two seasons we've just let things go. And the the funny part is as I walk through the garden and it's to what you were saying, Sue, where you just like listen and you allow the plants to pull back their energy. I think we sense that, and then we know whether you know Catmet wants to be hacked. I mean, I could take that to another euphemism of people liking it rough, but some people you know, uh but I think you just feel what you can who's asking for maybe some support in your garden when you just but I think you have to just wander slowly without like a gender free, yeah, correct, and just less and that because that's how the communication, and I think you can take that to our dogs and cats and animals too. You just wander through life with them, and then you feel when they are asking for support, just like sometimes we ask for help, and and that's it's all legitimate, but plants and animals do the same, and I think it's a matter of just wandering and listening with intention. So beautiful.

SPEAKER_05 43:56

Wondering and listening, yeah. That's a made maybe. Maybe that's why I also I have some in pots because ever so maybe ever so often, every so often I'll just because the plants are learning about the environment that I've planted them in. I feel I'm learning about them, and so they're also learning about themselves. So the what this is just pinging my head. I feel sometimes I will just pick some of my pots up and I'll move them into an another location. And my mum says she does this all the time. She's always moving her pots around. And she says she she thinks she's doing it because she wants them to look nice. I feel like it'll but I I feel like, isn't that coming from the plant too? That it's the co-creation. Like that plant, even there's nothing visually different that I can perceive, but I'm just like, I feel I want to put that one there because I'm spending more and more time in the garden because it's summer and it's warm, more in more community communication with them, a bit like we are with our dogs. But I love what you say about wandering. That's got and you said without intent just that being to feeling with just feeling that pool, I feel to do this. And if you drop the plant and the soil goes all over the ground, that's not an accident. It's you know, it's it needed some new soil. It needs some new soil, it needed a shock. Maybe it wanted to not be in a pot anymore, and I'm and I'm like, and I'm gonna put it in the ground.

SPEAKER_00 45:44

I just it's I just think it's it's I mean when you consider life through that lens, and it is just it's just a beautiful uh adventure all the time. I wonder, you know, when we say I wonder what's gonna happen today, and all those little events that happen, if they weren't, if they were literally just exactly that, you know, through communication, we that this needed this and this needed to change and that needed to what it respond in this way or whatever. Imagine how well it's not imagined, just look at life through that lens and see how different it can be. It's really just a beautiful adventure.

SPEAKER_05 46:24

Have you ever communicated like I know we're talking about plant communication here, which is fascinating. Have you ever sat and done that like intentional communication with a plant and and said, right, I I wanna just hang out with you and see what have you ever or or someone guided you into I know we did it with the oils all the time, but with an actual have you done that either of you?

SPEAKER_01 46:50

I've done it with a tree, but not with specific with the plant. I'd say I definitely did it with Pink Lotus.

SPEAKER_03 47:01

And it wasn't in real life, but it was with the plant when I wrote my presentation for your course. Yes, and it was like something happened in that moment, and I think it was almost the moment that I learned about intuitive connection because what came through was so like radical for me at the time, you know. And I love to sit like we have uh our patio is surrounded by so many plants. I mean, in one tiny little area, we've got lemon balm and lavender and blackberries and strawberries and Aesop and honey berries and St. John's ward. And like, I mean, the list just goes on and on and on. And watching them all grow together, it's like I sit out there, I talk to them all the time.

SPEAKER_04 47:53

They're like, here she comes.

SPEAKER_03 47:55

Yeah, you know, and and and again, always asking permission if I can, you know, take a few chamomile flowers and fill a vase, and can I cut off us some stalks of lemon balm?

SPEAKER_05 48:11

So cool. I just it excites my heart. I've I've just I'm now looking at the Melissa w with I don't know, I just I feel like our um conversations are always evolving, aren't they? And we're always it's fascinating how we're bringing the plants in more today. Uh and I just think oh, I don't know, I just feel really um invigorated and excited by it because I think plants have been on this earth for what how religious millions, billions in of years, so their intelligence is way beyond ours. On you know, are they sensing? I remember someone um she's an aromatherapist saying she was talking about um essential oils, but she was talking about how the plants they know what is coming on a on a on a planetary level, or they know like things are coming before we know it's coming because they're adapting their chemistry. They're they're adapting, they're way advanced, they're way more advanced than we give them credit for on what they're tuned into. And uh I just feel this some more fun conversations we could have perhaps with some guests that talk about plant communication. I think that might be fun. They're not just a pretty face. No, they're actually intelligent. Yeah, they're definitely not just pretty faces.

SPEAKER_03 49:53

No, I mean it is, you just look out at a at a look at a forest or you know, a rainforest, for example, and how many different things grow in there. And they're it's just so and and we're talking about plant communication, I fully think, because it's summer and like they're just fully living their they're out there partying, man. They're they're living their best life before, you know, before they go for a nap in the winter.

SPEAKER_01 50:21

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 50:24

Yeah, no, it's fascinating. And I was I was having this thought the other day, because I'm sure you all also experiencing it this with the incredible heat that we're having. Um, it's so, so dry here. The rivers are really low. Um, my grass is like not happy. It's just like this is way too hot, you know. Our grass is like likes lots of rain and tender, loving care, doesn't like these drought conditions and harsh temperatures. And even you know, the natural vegetation that doesn't get watering every day, etc., and from the rain, it's some of it's looking really, really sad. And again, you could go down, oh, the poor plants and they're dying, and they're you know, again, uh when you were saying, Rachel, about how they're adapting, they probably have an intelligent way, knowing that this is the next cycle, knowing that this is you know the future where perhaps different species will start evolving or coming to the fore where other species that weren't that drought resistant, for instance, will start dying out. And it's just a natural process, it's a natural evolution of nature, and we see it as devastation, we see it as what what you know, you know, it's gonna destroy vegetation, it's gonna destroy the ecosystem. Well, you know, maybe that's what's needed. Maybe a whole rebirth of the ecosystem is needed. We being part of that ecosystem, by the way.

SPEAKER_01 51:43

Yes, yeah, yeah, yeah. We certainly are.

SPEAKER_03 51:50

I mean, we have hawthorn trees, and we didn't know that. I was naive to hawthorn trees when we moved here. But they go through cycles where they don't bloom, they look dead. So you think that they've died, but they're just resting. So they'll go through full summer seasons where they don't produce the flowers. They're gorgeous when gotta wash the thorns, but they're gorgeous when they're flowering and you know they're kind of majestic looking, but then they'll go through a couple years so like our little foresty areas will have like all these like dead, not dead trees that you know, and it's like, oh, should we take those?

SPEAKER_01 52:27

You know, no, they're just doing their thing. Yeah. Gorgeous.

SPEAKER_00 52:35

Yeah, it's fascinating, really fascinating. And we can just again, you know, the whole thing of slowing down, like you said, that wandering through the garden and just being open, open. I think let's leave it on that note, because that's just such a beautiful concept that you've you know brought up there, Kim. Is if we can just use every day like that to sort of wander through our lives with curiosity and just be open to what what we're receiving. Um and realizing that a lot of our time our thoughts are not just our thoughts, they're coming they're coming they're coming from, you know, we're just tapping into a whole lot of um thoughts that are happening from all sorts of beings, including the plants and the animals and the insects and and the wind and the water and all of that together. Um yeah. Certainly a beautiful way to live, I think.

SPEAKER_03 53:26

It's a beautiful big thought to leave at the end of the podcast. Well what essential oils do you ladies have?

SPEAKER_05 53:37

I have lemon balm, Melissa. Which I've never been drawn to. Ever, ever, ever, ever, ever. Uh I've just never. So since having the plant, I'm now really loving the essential oil. Interesting.

SPEAKER_01 53:53

Interesting. Yeah. How about you both? Do you have an oil too? I I have pink pepper. Oh, lovely.

SPEAKER_03 54:05

You always have something different. I love that. I do just anti-everything and helps with digestion and yeah. Jenga was all about it this morning. I'm like, I can read this out.

SPEAKER_00 54:18

I haven't visited my pink pepper in a very long time. You've given me ins you've inspired me to go visit her again.

SPEAKER_03 54:24

It's so subtle, but it's so good.

SPEAKER_00 54:26

Yeah. I actually wanted I actually would wanted St. John's wart because it's I I seem to wherever I go, I'm being very drawn to it. I suddenly find it, you know, when it's suddenly a plant that you just see kind of everywhere. Interestingly, I I don't know why, but I just never presumed it was a water uh water loving plant and that it grows a lot where water is. I'd never noticed that before. I'd actually thought it was more sort of because I often see it in sort of quite arid reason regions or arid soil, let's say, you know, very chalky s you know, sandy kind of soil. But the ones that I've seen I've noticed again and again and again, they near water. So um we were gonna talk about this, but maybe we'll bring it to the next episode. This this whole affinity that I have at the moment for water, and Rachel was saying as well, her swims in the ocean. Anyway, I wanted to find um my essential oil, but I couldn't find my St. John's water. So I grabbed whatever came into my hand, and I actually grabbed two of the same because it was um it's eucalyptus. But it's um interestingly, I've got two different bottles from two different suppliers and two different come from two different c countries. This latest bottle that I bought comes from the local region of the Italian dolomites where where I was. Um that's where they um distill it. Where the actual tree comes from, I'm not quite sure, but that's where they distilled it. And it's a very different has differ different n not the sa it has similar properties, but the scent is actually quite unique from from these two different ones. And I I thought that was quite interesting that you know not every tree is the same. And so the oil might smell differently in one region than it does in another, depending on where the plant was come from, depending on the season it was harvested. All of those factors can actually give it different properties and different sense. Um so I thought that was quite interesting that this one is a lot sharper and it's got such an aliveness to us, and the other one is more gentle and soft and subtle. So I thought it was just interesting. That uh it's not always the same because again, you know, the plants come from different environments and they process differently. And so why should it be, you know, every tree is unique, so why shouldn't it have a slightly different note to it?

SPEAKER_03 56:52

Yeah, I get I get uh Manuka honey from New Zealand. And you can scan the top of the cap and see what it where it comes from, but they're very open about how it might smell different, it might taste different, and the color will be different, that the textures won't be the same because depending on the region that it came from, there's different plants there. And there's different pollination. So in it is every single one's like the surprise. It's just a little bit different.

SPEAKER_05 57:23

And it's offering different communication and messages through its scent, isn't it?

SPEAKER_01 57:27

Oh yeah, for sure.

SPEAKER_03 57:30

Yeah. All of it very tasty.

SPEAKER_00 57:33

Yeah, that is fascinating with the honeys, Kim, because we can we can actually get honeys here specifically where they call it like um forest flower honey or lavender honey or whatever. And it's not because it's been flavored, it's because the bees in that area, the main plants that they are, you know, getting their pollen from is those particular things. That's fascinating, and it does like you said bringing in some of the plants' medicinal qualities into their honey as well. It's fascinating, isn't it? Yeah. Nature is just a miracle.

SPEAKER_03 58:04

Some of them's the wildest honey we ever tasted. We got in Mount Aetna, Sicily. And we were on the mountain, and it was just the most flowery tasting, like gorgeous honey. I I I we ran out. I mean, couldn't I could have brought it home. And we, you know, it was so sad the day that we didn't have it anymore. And it was more clear. It was really it was a lighter color. It was really interesting because it's very um cindery there. So the plants that grow are definitely very hardy, but lots of flowers.

SPEAKER_01 58:40

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 58:42

So good.

SPEAKER_01 58:43

Vine.

SPEAKER_00 58:44

I look forward to I look forward to the day that we have the technology that we can really start communicating with plants. I mean, I know there is already, there's a lot of technology that you can use to they make music now. You know, they put on little sensors and they make music from the different plants and trees and things. But I look forward to the day that technology will well, we have the technology, don't we? Right from inside our bodies. It's that develops quick enough that we can really yeah.

SPEAKER_03 59:15

I look forward to the day that we record an episode of this podcast in the same room.

SPEAKER_05 59:20

Yeah, that would be cool. Yes. How exciting. It would have to be somewhere beautiful in nature, yeah, with lots of plants and maybe a collective of other people, and we can all play. That would be amazing, wouldn't it? Yeah, that would be fun. That's what we're uh attracting in. Yeah, for sure. Just like the flowers attracting in the bees.

SPEAKER_01 59:50

Awesome. Brilliant.

SPEAKER_00 59:52

All right, ladies, thank you so much. And for another wonderful, wonderful gathering. Um, even though we are in three different countries, it does feel like we're sitting in the same room to me.

SPEAKER_05 1:00:03

I know, and look how colour coordinators we all are. We're all wearing terrible boys.

SPEAKER_04 1:00:10

That's wild, isn't it?

SPEAKER_03 1:00:13

I love it.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:15

And if you like what we do, like and subscribe. Yeah, please do like, subscribe, and share this episode. Share our podcast with anybody who you think might ask us questions, you know.

SPEAKER_03 1:00:27

If you'd like to be a guest, reach out. Yes, that too. That too. Brilliant. Yeah. Thank you.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:35

We'll see you in two weeks again. Bye bye.