Animals and the Afterlife

Part 1 of 10: Honoring Murphy on her birthday

On October 9, 1998, I met my soul mate. Again. At the time I knew nothing about reincarnation, past lives, or even intuition. All I knew was that I’d driven three hours to meet the eleven-week-old Cavalier King Charles spaniel puppy I’d committed to buying the week before by phone. The puppy was bouncing up and down trying to see past her mother and grandmother. As our eyes met, I was stunned to hear her voice in my head clearly say, “Oh, it’s you” and to hear something inside me say it right back.

It took me three years to understand that this dog, who called herself Murphy Brown, was the reincarnation of a human woman who was my childhood friend (yes, human) and later my beloved English cocker spaniel Maggie. On December 25, 2001, that same soul again reincarnated as my Cavalier boy, Alki—yes, the same soul in two bodies in the same household at the same time. And on July 28, 2015, that same soul reincarnated again as another Cavalier boy—and joined me eleven weeks later as my puppy, Oliver Alki.

I know, you’re thinking, what? So, let’s back up.

Before Murphy came, I’d spent many years handicapped and ill, years in which I lost everything—my self-confidence, career, financial security—everything but my family and my quirky sense of humor. Whenever I thought about giving up, I recommitted to creating a life of meaning and purpose, as long as it was fun. In 1998 I decided that fun meant buying a $175,000 dog (okay, a condo so I could buy a dog, but still). All I wanted was a dog. Just. A. Dog. Some might say the universe had other ideas. The dog certainly did.

People debate reincarnation, multiple simultaneous lives, whether humans can be reborn as animals (or vice versa)—even whether animals can reincarnate. Others like me live with the truth: souls can do whatever they want, regardless of human dogma. Souls choose the form they need to do the job they chose before they incarnated, and if everything works out, they succeed. As we all know, though, once bodies, free will, and real life interact, it’s a free-for-all, anything-can-happen world.

Souls also move together in soul groups. These groups of souls experience multiple lifetimes and between-life times, together, however it works out, by choice or by accident. As part of a soul group, my family has been reincarnating together for centuries, freely bouncing between human, animal, and, yes, alien lives. I’ve been human many times, and also dogs, cats, even whales (I still have the hips to prove those), and my current animal family has usually been right there with me. One time, in ancient Egypt, my cat was a woman, and the dogs and I were her cats.

Is this just my weird family, or everyone’s? That depends on soul purpose—and luck.

Reincarnating together happens routinely, even when we don’t know it. From what I’ve seen in my intuitive practice, more often than not our animal companions are reincarnating with us in different animal bodies throughout our lives. Luckily for us it doesn’t seem to hinder (or annoy) them that we are seldom smart (or aware) enough to notice. I’ll illustrate with my own family, which will give you plenty of ideas about yours.

My Dogs’ Lives

The Coming of Murphy

Despite my fondness for dogs, I never thought of them as more than pets until I bought a dog who wouldn’t settle for that. It just took me a while to figure it out. Murphy quickly developed health problems that would derail my finances, my ego, and ultimately my view of life itself. As we worked through her chronic and debilitating illnesses, I noticed they looked alarmingly like mine. Puzzled and furious, I decided that neither of us would have a life of pain and disability, and went looking for answers. A few other things happened along the way.

Murphy wasted no time dismantling everything I thought I knew about the world (which turned out to be a good thing). She was six months old when I noticed that her nuanced responses to people, animals, and the world around her were far beyond what we consider to be animal intelligence. The rest of it is the earthquake’s fault. On February 28, 2001, Murphy was curling up for a nap when she leaped up barking and snarling and dragged us out of our condo—about two minutes before Seattle was rocked by a 6.8 earthquake.

That was a defining moment: I knew my entire world would change unless I ignored what had just happened—and all the other things I’d watched that dog do since we’d become a family. But what was the fun in that? Trained as an investigative reporter, and a cynical skeptic by nature, I knew what I’d just seen: there was clearly more going on in Murphy’s head than I’d ever imagined, and I couldn’t wait to learn more.

Boy, did I! To get us both healthy I studied human and veterinary medicine, both allopathic and alternative care, including nutrition, herbs, homeopathy, chiropractic, and supplements. I explored ethology, behavior, ecology, anthropology, physics, philosophy, ancient and alternative spirituality, animal communication, TTouch, acutonics, and energy healing. I experimented and knocked on doors I didn’t know existed before Murphy came and opened them for both of us. Desperate, curious, determined, I was open to possibilities, even ones that seemed dorky (and are).

I was a rational, anal-retentive, coolly intellectual atheist who’d abandoned religion in my thirties because it just didn’t make sense. I preferred key lime pie to meditation, liked yoga in principle, and avoided anything that smacked of New Age peculiarities. Sensibilities, religion, politics—I figured anything “given” was both open to challenge and needed it, and the eternal rebel in me was happy to oblige.

Although I had never felt comfortable in the world as other people described it, I didn’t understand why until Murphy rattled enough of the cages we lock ourselves into. The human-centric worldview exploded as I discovered a world I never knew existed, from a living, aware universe to reincarnation, spirit guides, and practical mysticism.

Of course there was something else involved, that thing that ties us all together, no matter our experiences: the willingness to love. The woman who in 1998 cheerfully greeted the exuberant puppy who became Murphy also harbored a closed, skeptical heart, wounded by childhood betrayal, grief, and loss, and shriveled by illness and despair. I was willing to love, or I never would have bought Murphy: I just no longer knew how.

We figured it out together. Although it took five years for us to heal, years of heartache and humor, we were perfectly content together, a family: that one of us was human and the other a dog never mattered. I couldn’t imagine one thing that would make our lives better, which means I honestly did not see Alki coming.