The Difference Between Spirit, Totem, and Power Animals

Welcome, welcome, welcome, welcome. My name is Joy D. Fanning, an astronaut of life, and I help spiritual seekers go inward to explore through meditation. So this month on the channel, we are talking about spirit animals. So today we're going to talk about the difference between spirit animals, spirit totems, and power animals. So let's get to it. What are the differences between these three things? For the most part, they're very similar, but I just kind of want to briefly explain the difference and how I view the difference in my own practice and when I communicate with them. So I'm using this website called whatismyspiritanimal.com. I will link it below where you can just read all the information. For me, it gives a very good kind of definitions and explanations on these differences. Spirit animals are animal guides who appear when we need, when we need them, like when we need love, when we need strength, we need courage. So for me, this would be a lot— the lion. I see the lion occasionally. I see a hawk occasionally, and I occasionally see this white stag. So these are my spirit animals. They, they come and go as we need them. They can vary. And if you can do one of the meditations, maybe one of them will show up. But this— they're, they're— they just come to you when you need them to give you this energy that you need. So how do you connect with them, right? How do you find out who they are? For me, the best way is meditation is, is a great way that they show up. So you can meditate And when you do this, don't hold any expectation of what animal is going to show up and just see which animal shows up. And if you don't pick up on a vibe during that meditation, you can totally look it up online on what this animal represents. As you can imagine, a lion represents courage. So when I see a lion in meditation or in my reality, I'm like, oh, okay, I'm— he's helping me kind of cultivate this courage within myself as I'm working through these things in my life. They could also just show up in your dreams. Sometimes we might dream of an animal. If you don't have a dream journal, I would certainly recommend it, as well as a meditation journal, to kind of write down everything you see and experience in your dreams. And in meditation, but they could totally show up in your dreams as well as a way to communicate with you. This happened to my husband a while back. He had a dream of two cats. One, they started off as kittens. One was blue and one was white. And then in his dream, time passed and he like went to sleep in his dream. And when he woke up, the blue cat was huge and ugly and destroying things. And the white cat was still small small and like this little kitten. And I was like, hmm, there's something to this. So we looked it up and the meanings behind it being blue and white really resonated with what we are going through together, like as a family. So it was really interesting that these cats showed up in his dream. They had these unique colors. I would say that's always something to pay attention to, is the color of the animal. If it's big or small. All of these things have a meaning and you can decode it. So I touched on this a little bit in my last video, but another way these spirit animals will show up is just through what you see in everyday. So for me, before I met the lion in meditation, I would see a lot of images of lions like on Facebook or on Instagram. And it was like, wow, okay, there's lions everywhere. Apparently there's a lion around me. And then I meditate and lo and behold, I meet the lion, right? So be aware of what you see because symbols, these things, these all kind of show up for a reason. Another thing, especially if you are clairaudient, is maybe you'll hear the animal versus seeing it like I do. So you might hear a lion roar randomly and be like, what does that mean? Why am I hearing a lion? Why am I hearing, you know, paw prints? Or, you know, not paw prints, but, you know, like footpaths. If you hear things, keep in mind on this, or maybe you'll smell it right there. They can use all your senses to connect with you. So just be aware, especially if you don't know which spiritual gift you have, like clairaudient, clairvoyant. Clair sentient, these things, all the clairs. If you're not sure, just stay open to all of it and kind of collect the data, right? And do it that way. You'll figure it out. According to the whatismyspiritanimal.com, animal totem is who you are. So for me, the animal that's my totem is the white snake. And I just kind of want to pull this up real quick on what the white snake means. I'm going to read this verbatim on another website called animals-spirit-animals.com, which I'll link below as well. People with the snake totem are often finding that they are, like the beetle totem, going through constant changes in their lives. Luckily, they usually move through smoothly. They also have a natural ability to balance energy. Often people with this spirit animal are gifted healers. So notice how it uses the word spirit animal even though at the top it says snake totem. Once again, they're almost interchangeably. You will hear me call the white snake my spirit animal simply because I, I connect with it via meditation in the spirit realms. So to me, it's, it's always with me. It's been with me for years. That's why I feel it's my totem. It's representing of who I am. And I can say that I have rapid changes in my life all the time. The biggest example being I left my home country of the United States 2 years ago. I bounced around to several countries and ended up here in Colombia. That was a huge change in my life. I've also had fairly recently changes in my job, changes in my new business, changes in friends. I'm constantly having change. So to me, it makes perfect sense that this snake totem The spirit animal is there to help me with this. With the snake totem are very charming in social situations. They are also very good at holding other people's attention. In other words, there is something mysterious about your gaze, your intensity, and your ability to sense what others are thinking or feeling. Along with this charm, there is also confidence and self-assurance that many people find alluring. People with this power animal can slither in and out of the conversation with ease and grace. Moreover, they are flexible and open-minded. One thing, as you get to know me, obviously I'm on a spiritual path that creates an open-mindedness, right? I've always been open-minded, questioning things. You can't see it, but I have a tattoo right here that says passionately curious. That that totally resonates with me. Obviously I got a tattoo of it, right? So once again, this is just using— I'm using this as an example. So if you find a spirit animal that shows up a lot, like this snake does with me, and when you read about it you're like, wow, this is like almost like the results from a personality test or something, then that's probably your totem. It just means it's representative of who you are. And once again, to relate back to that last video, I was not— I'm not really a big fan of snakes. I've never really liked snakes. I don't really hate them. I don't really hate any animals. I'm a vegetarian. I love all the animals, right? But snakes were not like on my favorite list. And when the snake showed up, it was more like, oh, But then when I read about what the snake means and represents, it was like, oh, well, this, this is really cool. So it may or may not be your favorite animal. Just kind of keep your mind open on what it could be. And if it's like me, if it's a snake or a beetle, I can't imagine too many people loving beetles. But, you know, keep your mind open. They all have different energies that they bring to the table. So the third one is a power animal. The power animal is a spiritual energy that you call on from within to invoke for assistance for a specific situation. You can ask this energy to stay ignited in you for your whole life or only for certain circumstances. We are all connected. We share so many DNA pairings with plants and animals that you really are a mammal, insect, bird, fish, reptile, amphibian, fish, and crustacean. So when we invoke or call on from within means a literal reawakening of the part of yourself that has been lying dormant or has been injured and needs healing. This is really cool. Personally, I'm not sure which animal would be my power animal. That's something for me to discover. But I love this idea, right, that there's this— you know what, I kind of feel like mine's more like a plant, actually, because I have— I don't know if you can see— I have a huge connection to trees. So maybe mine's a tree and I have this inner tree inside of me. I just freaking love trees. Or maybe I'm an animal that lives. Maybe my power animal is one that lives in a tree. But once again, I'd have to meditate on this and kind of focus on what animal can come from within that I have. So who knows, maybe I'll write a meditation, or that one of the next videos will be on, on me discovering this. That would be pretty cool, right? But I, I am really drawn to this idea that it's within you. This feels very Native American to me. On how they viewed spirit animals and how it embodies you. Not kind of like a totem, right? Because you are the totem animal. But this power animal is one you can invoke or call from within. So this makes me think of like, oh, you know, werewolves or, or, you know, shapeshifter people who can bring out this energy and then embody it. And it says you can do this for your whole life or only in certain circumstances. So I don't know about you, but that is pretty, pretty freaking cool, right? I'm gonna list these websites below so you can look at them and learn more on your own. But this is just a quick overview of what a spirit animal, spirit totem, and power animal are. And, and how to figure it out, right? I would say to figure out this power animal, what I'm going to do is meditate on it and literally go within. That's meditation. And see what comes up. I don't know. As I'm saying this, I'm getting images of a bird. So which— the trees, birds. That makes sense, right? Maybe it's the hawk. I'm not sure. I'll have to meditate on it. But I'll also list below the current spirit animal meditations you you can use. I always make guided meditations. I always make personalized meditations if you want one where you really want to hone in and figure this out. And if you really want to dive deep with me, I have a one-on-one program I call my Inner Explorers where we really go deep and we can explore this and many, many other topics. This is all— you can be found on my Gumroad store. If as well, if you want a free meditation for your higher self, go to my website astronautlife— astronautoflife.com and scroll down to the middle, subscribe to my newsletter, and boom, there it is. You'll get the play— you'll get— you'll be taken to a web page where you can download a higher self guided meditation for free for you to use as often as you want. But that's it for me, you guys. Please like and subscribe. Also, if this content helps you, if my meditations help you and, and you love to support me, I would love to have you join my Patreon group. Membership starts at $3 a month and goes up. I do specialized meditations just for the Patreon people. At the $20 level this month, they're going to be on the higher self, so if that's something that interests you. I'm gonna do a variety of topics each month, and as more people join, I'll even create a poll where you can vote on what the topic is. So I would love to have you join over there. Thank you guys so much for watching and subscribing. Namaste.