It is incredibly therapeutic to be in contact with an animal that comes to you. It’s affirming, it makes you feel loved and wanted and there’s a safety to it. Maybe this is why I’m such a dog person.
But to make contact with an animal whose natural instinct is to run from you?
That’s healing.
In order to make contact with an alpaca in a way that feels safe for both of you requires a huge amount of work much of it invisible. Much of it happening in the nervous system, body and mind.
It requires conscious awareness of what you’re thinking, how you’re holding your body, where you’re standing, how you’re breathing, what you’re feeling.
If you truly want connection you must be aware of the energetics between you. The non-verbal communication happening through every micro movement, every breath, every flick of the eyes, every wave of emotion.
Many of our alpacas have been approached by humans many many times and have learned that our interactions are safe.
But the little ones, the nervous ones, the sensitive ones. They ask more of us. And I wouldn’t have it any other way. There is nothing more rewarding than making a fearful creature feel safe.
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And the magical thing about this work?
It’s often the most fearful and anxious amongst us, those who have been made to feel fundamentally unsafe, who are best at understanding the needs of these creatures.
We are often living life as a prey animal and their behaviours are familiar to us.
You don’t have to be completely regulated to make contact. In fact some of our alpacas intentionally seek out those who are struggling. There seems to be something different about the nervous systems and energetics of us more sensitive, nervy creatures that attracts many alpacas.
They are wonderfully intuitive. The relationship goes both ways.
Carly x
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