animals, meditation and science

What does it mean to meditate with animals?

Animals sense us and they react to us.

When we meet animals in the here and now with a calm body and mind, they are usually peaceful towards us. Our interaction with them becomes harmonious and we are clear in our communication.

When we engage in silent meditation such as zazen, we create an atmosphere that has a calming and relaxing effect on animals. They connect with us mentally and follow us into peace.

Some do this consciously in order to relax with their animals, others use the calmness of body and mind unconsciously or intuitively when interacting with animals.

What does science say about this? Not much so far. This is because the fields of research into meditation on the one hand and animal consciousness on the other are still very new areas of research.

Current science recognizes that animals have emotions and consciousness. It also recognizes that animals and humans can share emotions. Emotions are transferable between individuals with a close relationship. This applies to humans as well as to human-animal relationships. However, the degree of emotion transfer is individual and depends on various factors.

Scientists also recognize that trust and relationships between humans and animals can be strengthened through emotional communication.

However, research into reciprocal emotional dysregulation or co-regulation is still in its infancy, especially when it comes to relationships between humans and animals, i.e. between different species.

However, we can explore for ourselves what effects our body-mind unity has on animals by simply observing ourselves and animals, without judgment and with curiosity. What does this reveal? How do animals react to us? What do we feel in our bodies? How do we react?

We can practise a form of mindfulness or silent meditation, such as zazen, and observe whether and how animals in our vicinity react to this.

This would amount to a kind of science about meditating with animals. Insights from this can be useful for a more harmonious relationship with animals. But we can draw even deeper insights from this, for example into the essence of our nature.

Science shows certain parallels with Zen meditation. Both observe what appears in the moment without judgment. Each insight can produce new results through repeated observation. Science and Zen meditation are awake and open to the moment.

While science usually analyzes purely intellectually, poetic comparisons are more suitable for describing experiences in meditation, which point to something that cannot be grasped intellectually.

So if we want to look scientifically at the effects of meditation on humans and animals, we need to ask the right questions. We can describe what we observe. This can be the parallel relaxation of humans and animals during meditation. Emerging physical tension or restless movements can also be observed. This may indicate a restless mind or other causes. Such investigations can be useful in order to recognize which form of meditation could be useful for which situations when dealing with animals.