How to Connect with Your Spirit Animal

Hey, my astronauts of life, welcome! My name is Joy D. Fanning and I empower spiritual seekers by making guided meditations that help them go inward to explore. So I welcome you here. If this is your first time, please like and subscribe as this really helps me grow this channel and get this message out to everybody. In today's video, we're going to talk about spirit animals. So all this month we are going to talk about spirit animals here on Astronaut of Life. The meditations will have this theme, and these videos that I'm making now I call my personal truth. We're going to kind of dive in and do a little more deeper inquiry into this topic. Speaking of animals, QB wants to say hi. He's always eager to get in the video, which is so funny because he's shy. This video is called How to Connect to Your Spirit Guide. So later this month, I'll make a video on what is a spirit guide, how is it different than like a totem animal or a power animal, But in this video, I just want to kind of focus on how do you connect with them? How do you know who they are? That's kind of a big question a lot of people have, and I myself had at one point. I remember this is back in like 2013. I was at work and I had some clients at the library, and I would go to like the metaphysical spiritual section just to like peruse. I was considered myself an atheist, but I've always been passionately curious, so I was just curious. And I remember looking at a book and reading it and learning about kind of spirit animals and more the Native American context around it, and I thought that was pretty cool. I wondered if I had a spirit animal, and I just kind of left it at that. So we fast forward to 2017, like 4 years later, and I'm, I'm beginning my meditation practice. And for me, I did this mainly on Insight Timer, which I am now a teacher on Insight Timer, so you can follow my meditations on there. But I, I was still learning how to meditate, and guided meditations were my main source of figuring out how to meditate. Because when I would try it on my own, my thoughts would— I would get carried away and then kind of forget I was meditating, right? So I would do these guided meditations and I just did them randomly by whatever I felt like that day. And I remember I can't even tell you when, but at some point in 2017, I was like, ooh, let's try this. And it was a meet your spirit guide guided meditation. So I lay on my bed, I get ready, I do this meditation, and I had always felt this attraction to owls. And they were pretty popular at the time. They still kind of are. You see them everywhere. And I still love owls, even though my favorite, favorite animal is a giraffe. And I kind of have these notions going in there, like, I'm gonna meet an owl or a giraffe, like for sure. Totally set that expectation on myself. And the narrator teacher lady was like, any animal you meet, ask them if they are your spirit guide. And if they say no, just keep going till one of them says yes. I was like, okay, that's easy. So at first I was— because I thought I was an owl, I imagined myself flying, and I see— I'm— we'll just say it's an owl. I just remember it being a bird, and I was just like, are you my spirit animal? And it was like, no. And then it like pushed— I felt pushed down, and I landed in this tree, and I was like, well, huh, I'm not an owl. Okay, it's not an owl. So then I saw like this squirrel, and I was like, Oh, okay, a squirrel, cool. Squirrel, are you my spirit animal? And it was like, nope, I'm not. And then I got thrown to the ground and I was just like, oh, I really need to be up in the air. I'm supposed to, my spirit animal's a bird, I'm pretty sure. So I know I need to be up in the air, but I just started walking on the ground and then I see a snake and I was just like, ah, shit. Are you my spirit animal? And the snake was like, yes. And it kept, you know, slithering ahead. And I was like, oh man, I better follow this thing. So I did. And to be honest, that's all I really remember. I know I conversed with the snake and I remember I had this kind of like, oh, it's a snake. I don't really like snakes. Why is it a snake? But then I researched what have a spirit animal snake means, and it's like transformation and all these other cool aspects. And I was like, oh, well, that's actually a pretty cool animal to have as a spirit animal. Oh, okay. So that's kind of my story on how I first learned which spirit animal was working with me. And I'll touch on this later, but I've actually had several animals come and guide me. So how do you do it? For me, it was as simple as listening to a guided meditation and doing the imagery that they set forth. I created one just this past week. You can use it. I'll put the link down below, and later I'll link it up ahead at the end. To me, that's the number one easiest way, is just to go into meditation and ask. You can do a guided meditation, you can do it on your own, but you want to set that intention that you're going to meet your spirit animal. And the one thing I did wrong that I would suggest to you when I first started was I went in with an expectation. So we don't want to do that anytime we meditate. We want to leave it open-ended where I'm just here to receive whatever message, whatever guide shows up, and we don't put a limitation or an expectation on what we will see. So to me, that's the biggest mistake, is putting that expectation out there, like, well, my favorite animal is an elephant, ergo my spirit animal is an elephant. This could be the case. I have done readings for people where the animal that came through just happened to be their favorite animal. But it's also the case, like me, where it's not their favorite animal. That doesn't mean you don't have a connection with your favorite animal, okay? I would still go look up what that means and why you're drawn to that. But for me, a spirit animal is a guide. They're a spirit guide. They're a part of your spirit team. They come in all shapes and forms, okay? When I see them in the spirit realm, I know which animal they are, one, by their vibration. Also, I, as a clairvoyant, I see it. It can be even mythical animals. I've seen people with dragons, okay, or a unicorn. It doesn't actually have to be an earth animal either. It can be an animal from another planet. So you kind of have to keep your mind really open. That's kind of the biggest, I think, mistake a lot of people go into this is thinking it's their favorite animal or their pet. Like little QB down here on my lap, um, QB is not my spirit animal. To me, he's a little protector, okay? He protects me and he meditates with me. Here he is again, he's sitting on my lap while I'm talking. He calms me. He certainly could be a spirit guide of mine, right? But I don't view little QB as my spirit animal, and I would never call him that. He's— I have meditated with QB, and he looks like if you put little QB in human form, he looks like The Rock, like a big guy who's like this protector, like my spiritual protector, my little guardian. So our big guardian, really. So that's kind of a lot of misconceptions, is thinking it's your pet, thinking it's your favorite animal. I would challenge you to kind of take a step back from that and just keep your mind open. Another thing I kind of just want to quickly address that we might address later on this month is cultural appropriation. Is it right for a white person like myself to have a spirit animal? If, if you're finding issues with this, I would really challenge you to go inward, because in my opinion, this type of thinking where cultural appropriation comes into play, like, oh, spirit animals are just for, for for North American Native Americans or, or indigenous peoples, right? And the Hindu gods are just for people who follow Hindu, and angels are only for Christians and Catholics. That is a form of division. That is— that lives in the realm of duality. And when we go in the spirit realm We are outside of this duality realm. Now, you might hear the terms 3D and 5D, and those are just differentiations of these types of things. 3D is duality, 5D is oneness. So when we have these kind of blocks or issues where we're like, I don't know, man, I'm white, I don't think I'm allowed to— like, I'm not Native American, I don't know if I'm allowed to have a spirit guide. You are totally allowed. More than likely, you already do have a spirit animal working with you, whether you know it or not, okay? Along with your whole group of guides that come from all over— angels, aliens, ancestors, all of this. Because remember, in the 5D, in this— in the spirit realms, it's all oneness. We're all the same. There is no I'm white, you're Black, you're Asian. That doesn't exist. That doesn't exist at all. So you kind of— if you're struggling with this, then I would really challenge you to go inward because that is some form of programming that you have that is a 3D or this duality program where you're seeing things as not for you based on color or gender or what have you, so, or culture. And I could go into that 'cause I live in Colombia, which is a very different culture than America. And so I've had to deal with this a lot. Like, I eat Colombian food. I don't necessarily wear Colombian clothes, but there's always a poncho or a purse that I'm just like, I really wanna have that. It's so beautiful. And then that trigger of, is that okay for me to have because I'm not Colombian, comes up and I have to kind of release it. And one helpful thing for me personally is my husband is a native Colombian. So I'll just be like, ooh, is it okay? Would Colombians get mad if I use this native purse with this native Colombian design? And he was He's always like, no, they would be really happy that you're using it. So that's just kind of my own issue with this. But if that's a block you have, go inward, figure out why that is. Is that programming? And if it is, release it. Okay. Because we want to stay up here in this 5D, in this oneness state where none of that matters. Another thing is, if you believe in past lives, which I do, odds are you, you haven't always been like— I haven't always been a white woman. I know of past lives on Earth where I've been a Black woman, an Egyptian man, a Native American man here, there in Peru, and a Muslim woman. It's— I've had many lives where I've looked many different ways. So that, once you kind of tap into that as well, it kind of helps you kind of get out of this fully identifying as the body you're in now, because this is just your current vessel. And you could even challenge that, because in my opinion, all this is happening at once because the spirit realm is outside of time. So That's getting a little esoteric or a little out there, but let's— let me get back on track here. I've learned through my meditations that we have many spirit animal guides that work with us, and they— this is the same with all my other guides— they kind of do it in phases based on where I am in my journey. So yeah, I have a white snake. He shows up quite often. At first, in that first one, he was little. Now he's ginormous. Okay, that to me also signifies my connection with him. It's a guy snake and just this bond that we are developing as I had to get over my— one of my spirit guides being a snake. Well, I've had a hawk, I've had a lion, I've had a white— it's like a deer, but bigger— um, I can't think of it, but I'll make another video later where I talk about it. Stag! That's it, a white stag with these big antlers, which for me is representative of my divine feminine— my divine masculine energy. I've worked with many spirit animals just for me, and then I've done readings for people where they've had the whole freaking Animal Kingdom show up, or all the birds show up. Every bird that ever was showed up, kind of a thing. And it was like, whoa, you are so connected to birds, or you were just super connected to all the animals. And I've actually had visions for myself where I've seen all the animals there, and they're like, they're helping me. So yeah, that's, that's something I've learned, just doing this work and not having these expectations when I go into meditation on who I'm connecting with. It's always— I've also seen a bat. That's it. Here's the third step: taking action on learning who or how to connect with these spirit animals. Okay, so one, every Saturday this month and going forward on my Patreon, we will do a live group meditation. We did one just this past Saturday on meeting your spirit guides. Or your spirit animal. And I saw a lion. It wasn't my snake, it wasn't the stag, it was a lion. And that was because I've been open to receiving who it was. I didn't put that limitation on it that it had to be my snake or it had to be my white stag or the hawk or whatever. So you can totally join us every Saturday, especially in April. We're going to be doing meditations all around this topic of spirit animals. I'm going to tag it up above, the one we just did. It's here on YouTube. They come out every Monday at 9:00 AM. You can also get them on Insight Timer. So you can, you can use mine, obviously. You can use anybody's. It really doesn't matter. Pick a meditation that resonates with you and just do it and see what happens. And go in it with no expectation. Like I said earlier, go ahead, hit that like, subscribe, and if you want, the bell, because all this month I'm going to be diving into this topic of spirit animals and spirit, spirit animal guides and go deeper into my experiences with the white stag and, and my snake. And we're going to talk about the difference between guides, totems, and power animals and how to know the difference between them. What all they mean. And we can even dive deeper into this cultural appropriation because I think this can kind of halt people when it comes to spirit animals. So if you want to learn how to do it, if you want to meet your spirit animal guide, to me the easiest way is just to meditate. And if meditation is hard for you and you're like, I don't know, I'm still kind of learning how to meditate, and you know you really want to dive into this, I do offer spiritual mentoring. That's through my Gumroad store, so you can subscribe to that membership. We will dive in together and go real deep on who these guides are. I'll use my gifts to help you, and then you can use that information to connect, and you can read all about it. It goes into quite detail on what we'll do together. But if you're really struggling, I suggest that for you, and it's a one-on-one thing, not a group thing. Or if you, if you want, I can just write you a personalized meditation, one and done. You take it and you work with it. But otherwise, the one I posted on YouTube here, other people's on YouTube, I'm— I can guarantee you'll find thousands on this topic. They'll work just fine if, if you want. You might have to do it more than once if you fall asleep or whatever, but really meditation is, is the easiest way to connect with your spirit animal guides. Once you connect with them, it's pretty beautiful how they show up in your reality all the time. So like I said, this past Saturday I did the Meet Your Spirit Guide, and I saw a lion. I had been seeing images of lions for months, and I was like, okay, if it's a repeating image and you like— like, lions aren't my favorite animal, I don't really have any connection with them, but boom, lion, lion, lion. I'm like, all right, I get the message, there's a lion energy around me. And boom, I meditated, there he was, right? And we had this beautiful meditation together where I got some messages and help for myself. So that's another thing, is the synchronicities. And like I said, it's— it could be your pet, but odds are it is not. And it's— odds are it's not your favorite animal. So is there— is there an animal that you don't have an attachment to that keeps popping up? That's to me that where— where the secret sauce is, or so the synchronicities around that, because it's not you seeking it out, it just happens to show up all the time. So that's kind of what I got for today in how to connect with your spirit guides. Ideally meditation, to look for synchronicities on animals you're not attached to. All right, so every Wednesday now, at least for a while, I'm going to be posting these personal truth videos on Wednesday as I take a break I'm doing interviews and everything. If you want, I would love to have you join my Patreon. It starts as low as $3 a month. That's less than a coffee, you guys. And you're gonna get daily insights from my guides, all the videos you have on YouTube, and then these Saturday meditation groups that are just beautiful where we meditate together. There's also different tiers where there's special meditations that are just on Patreon. And then another level where you get a personalized meditation every month. So if you have enjoyed this video, if this has helped you in any way, if my meditations have helped you in any way, I would totally appreciate it, appreciate it, and love to have you in my community on Patreon. You guys are amazing. Thank you so much. I love you all. Namaste.