The Spirit Language and Signs of Nature

Creating your animal totem, benefits of it and over 150 animal dictionary

1 of 4 great animal spirit/dictionary books

The first part of Animal-Wise is to teach you about animal totems and how to create your own animal totem by selecting the correct animals for yourself.

By using the 7 Chakras of the human bodyas  a starting point, Ted Andrews adds an 8th element, your feet as the base totem.  This gives you the following 8 elements of the body that need an animal that represents each individual element:

1. Feet (base)
2. Root or Base (gonads and ovaries)
3. Spleen (adrenals, spleen & liver)
4. Solar Plexus (adrenals)
5. Heart (thymus)
6. Throat (thyroid)
7. Brow (pituitary)
8. Crown (top of head)

Animal Wise guides your through the process of selecting the right animal for each part of the body, making it fun and simple.  It can take anywhere from a few days to a month or more to find the right animal for your animal totems, but it is well worth the time.

Who should buy Animal-Wise?

If you have read my site for the last few weeks you may have noticed this is the 4th animal spirit book and you may be wondering which you should pick up.

Ted Andrews has created a book for anyone who really wants to find out how to REALLY build a correct animal totem for yourself, that is the main puprose of this book.

Also, Animal-Wise does an amazing job of describing the animals, many times each animal will get 2 full pages of text that describes the animals personalities better than any other animal spirit book.

Another great feature of this book is the fact that the animals are quite rare and you will probably not find these animals in the other animal spirit books.

Highlights of Animal Magick by D.J. Conway

• a VERY long list of deities and the animal familiars associated with them
• Short chants and meditation methods to help connect you with your favorite animals
• Really informative descriptions of the animals, including history, superstitions, attributes and chants

First off, what is a Familiar?  You maybe thinking this as you read the sub-title of the book.  D.J. Conway, author of Animal Magick, describes familiars in the first chapter like this:

“Familiar” actually comes from the Latin word famulus, which means an attendant.  The ancient Greeks spoke of personal daemons, a type of spiritual helper in either human or animal form.  Our present word “demon” was corrupted from this Greek word.  The actual Greek word for familiar, such as will be discussed here, was paredrii.

So basically a familiar is something that sends you mental messages to you.  Many people practice this form of Magick without even knowing it!  When one is obsessed with a particular animal and collects small statues and paintings of them, they could actually be communicating with an animal familiar.

Familiars and power animals are similar but not the same thing.  Familiars was born out of Europe from Shamanism, which lead to Wicca and Paganism.  Power animals, or animal totems, was born out of the Native Americans but also exists in almost every culture around the world.  A person can call on a “power animal” at any time and be “possessed” by that animal.  They would do this, lets say, if you are about to go in front of a huge audience and need confidence in speaking, you could call on your Chimpanzee or Dolphin power animal to boost your confidence.

With that out of the way, let’s get to what this book is about. I tried to explain what a familiar is, but the first chapter does so much of a better job than i can ever do.  Animal Magick is a great introduction to the European version of Animal Spirits.

This book is broken up into 3 parts: 1.) A Familiar What?  2.) Working Together, and 3.) Animal Allies of Fur, Feather, Fin & Scale.  Below you can find a total breakdown of each different parts.

Part I: A Familiar What?

1. Familiars & Humans
2. How to Attract a Familiar
3. Legends & Deities
4. Animal Familiars & Magick, A Meditation for a Familiar.  Shape-shifting Meditation

Part II: Working Together

1. Meditations
   Learning from the Falcon.  Snake Energy.  The Spiders & the Fates. Exploring the Oceans.  Riding the Unicorn. Into the Underworld.  Communing with the Night.  Pegasus.
2. Rituals
   North Direction.  East Direction.  South Direction.  West Direction.  Protection Ritual of the Wolves.  Prosperity Ritual of the Wolves.  Love Ritual of the Wolves.  Spiritual Growth Ritual of the Wolves.  Cat Magick for Calling Spirits.  Dream Work.  Opening the Psychic Senses.  Gaining Wisdom.  A Protective Mirror.  Renewing & Healing Magick.  Invisibility Magick.  New Beginnings.
3. The Beauty of Friendship

Part III: Animal Allies of Fur, Feather, Fin & Scale

1. The Cat Family
   Domesticated Cats.  Cheetah.  Cougar.  Jaguar.  Leopard or Panther.  Lion.  Lynx.  Tiger.
2. The Wolf Family
   Domesticated Dogs.  Coyote.  Fox.  Jackal.  Wolf
3. Land Creatures
   Antelope.  Ape or Monkey.  Ass or Donkey.  Badger.  Bear.  Beaver.  Bison or Buffalo.  Boar, Sow or Pig, Bull, Cow or Cattle.  Deer or Stag.  Elephant.  Elk.  Ferret.  Goats.  Hedgehog.  Hippopotamus.  Horse.  Mongoose.  Moose.  Mouse.  Opossum.  Otter.  Oxen.  Porcupine.  Rabbit or Hare.  Raccoon. Ram or Sheep.  Rat.  Skunk.  Squirrel.  Weasel.  Wolverine.
4. Birds & Winged Creatures
   Bat.  Blackbird.  Blue Jay.  Cock. Crane.  Crow.  Dove or Pigeon.  Eagle.  Falcon.  Goose.  Guinea Fowl.  Hawk.  Heron.  Hummingbird.  Ibis.  Lovebird.  Magpie.  Nightingale.  Ostrich.  Owl.  Parrot.  Peacock.  Quail.  Raven.  Robin.  Sea Gull.  Sparrow.  Swallow.  Swan.  Turkey.  Vulture.  Woodpecker.  Wren.
5. Amphibians & Reptiles
   Adder.  Chameleon.  Cobra.  Crocodile.  Frog.  Lizard.  Scorpion.  Snakes.  Toad.  Turtle or Tortoise.
6. Aquatic Creatures
   Carp.  Dolphin or Porpoise.  Eel.  Fish. Octopus.  Salmon.  Seal.  Whale.
7. Spiders & Insects
   Ant.  Bees. Beetle or Scarab Beetle.  Butterfly.  Dragonfly.  Spiders.
8. Mythical Creatures
   Basilisk.  Centaur.  Dragon.  Griffin.  Pegasus.  Phoenix.  Satyr.  Sphinx.  Unicorn. Winged Bull.  Wyvern.

Part IV:

1. Appendix:  Deities & Their Familiars
2. Bibliography
3. Index

The First Part introduces you to familiars, the four different types of familiars, the two ways to attract familiars and, my favorite part of the book, Legends & Deities, which explains how almost every single culture has been obsessed with animals, including America.

The Second Part talks about meditation and rituals.  The meditation section will inform you of the powers of meditation (which i fully believe everyone should meditate) and how to connect with animals during meditation.   This is actually a very interesting section if you try to practice a few of the listed meditation exercises.  What i like about meditation is the practice of visualizing things (if you are following my blog, you will notice i like to think and visualize!).  Once you start meditating, the exercises describes a scene in which you are introduced to a certain animal in a certain way.  I recommend reading the exercises to a tape recorder, your computer, ipod or whatever in a slow and relaxing voice and then replay it back as you meditate.  If you do do this, leave a few minutes of silence in the beginning to let yourself become relaxed.  The way that i start of meditation is visualize myself walking up to a beach and sitting down by the water.  As i watch the waves come crashing in and over my body, i let my breaths represent each crash of water coming over my body.  After a few minutes you can start thinking about other things.

The Ritual part of the book is a little confusing, but basically it involves chanting about a certain animal.  Each ritual will tell you what supplies you need, like incense, staff, herbs, rattles, drums, offering bowl and so on.  This may seem strange to some people, but it can be a VERY powerful experience if you ever do decide to try them.

the Animal Allies section is very, very informative.  This is the section dedicated to describing the above listed animals.  What i really like about this section is how D.J. Conway describes the animals, giving more of a history lesson explaining how different cultures have treated and dealt with the animal.  Also, i really like the 3 added sections per animal:  Superstitions, Magickal Attributes and a Chant.

Summary

I think D.J Conway’s Animal Magick is not just for someone trying to get into Shamanism or Wiccan magic, but will be enjoyable for the average animal lover.  This is a great resource for looking about the meanings of animals, and especially interesting for history buffs and deity lovers, because at the end their is an impressive list of deities and which animals are associated with them, 12 pages to be exact!  For example, i am obsessed with the Mayans, so naturally i love Quetzalcoatl, one of the most important Gods in their culture.  Here is how Mr. Q is listed:  Quetzalcoatl (Aztec; god): hummingbird, dog, snake.  Another Example:  Horus ( Egypt; god): falcon, hawk, cats, goose, antelope, dragon, wolf.  Super cool!

Steven D. Farmer - Animal Spirit Guide Book Review

An easy-to-use handbook for identifying and understanding your power animals and animal spirit helpers.

This was the first animal spirit book that i ever purchased and i am so glad that i picked this up.  This book gets right to the Animals, listing quite a few more than my previous book review, Animal Speak by Ted Andrews.

With over 200 animals listed, Animal Spirit Guides is a great book to pick up and research quickly a certain type of animal.

The book lists each animal into three main sections (look below for an example):
1.) When an animal shows it, what it means
2.) Call on an animal when you are looking for a certain feeling, emotion or power, and
3.) what it means if you have this animal as your “power animal”

So basically this book is just a list of all of the animal and what they mean.  The introduction is short, about 20 pages but is very informative.  It tells you that even if you live in a city, you can still receive animal spirit messages.  You can pick up on animal spirits by looking for animals in advertising, images on products, and the most obvious when you see the animal.

The introduction also teaches you the 4 main ways to get a message from an Animal Spirit, those 4 being: Visual, Auditory, Kinesthetics and Cognitive.  For more information on these methods, please purchase the book.

Animal Speak, The Spiritual & Magical Powers of Creatures Great & Small

Learn the Language of the Animals

If you really love animals then Ted Andrew’s Animal Speak is the perfect book for you.  Animal Speak will help you understand and appreciate each and every animal’s amazingly different personality.

Discover the power and spiritual significance of many animals,  birds, insects and reptiles.  Each animal can help you in life once you learn what they are trying to say to you and the world.

This book will also help you create your own animal totem, which was made famous by the Native Americans tall and beautiful Totem Poles which have many animals stacked upon each other.

Animal Speak Overview

Animal Speak is broken into 4 parts which will be explained below.  If you are looking for a book to list most of the popular animals and their spirit meanings, i would recommend Ted Andrew’s other book called Animal Spirit Guide which is more of a reference book.

What this book focuses on is really becoming attuned with the animal spirits by teaching you different methods to spiritually connect with animals.

Part 1: Symbols in the Nature World
In 4 chapters, Ted Andrews sets up the world we live in and how we should live a proper life by observing nature around us.  In big cities we are rarely in nature so we have lost this ability, but Animal Speak does an amazing job of teaching us “City Folk” how to become attune with animals and nature.  Learn how to read signs and omens in nature and understand the meanings of landscapes, which help shape the personalities of each animal that lives in such diverse places in nature.

Part 2: Winged Enchantment
This section of Animal Speak is the largest and most detailed, and it is easy to see why.  Andrews describes the power of the air, feather magic and working with bird medicine.  At the end of the section you can find a dictionary of bird totems, which is quite extensive.  If you are more into birds than animals you should consider this book over Ted Andrew’s Animal Spirit Guide book which focuses more on mammals.

Part 3: Understanding Animal Medicine
This part of the book describes how to create your own animal totems and understanding animal rites.  When trying to understand a certain animal i often like to read the description Ted Andrews describes in detail on each listed animal.  I love to find out a person’s favorite animal and then look up the meanings in this book and also Animal Spirit Guide.  This section also includes a dictionary of animals, which includes it’s keynote (important personality facts) and cycle of power (which season).

Part 4: The Exotic Language of Insects and Reptiles
The smallest section of the book deals with the lives of insects and reptiles.  The last section of Animal Speak explains the two last groups separately and also includes the dictionary of insect totems and reptile totems.