Dont know where to put this...struggling with cruelty
 

I have put this here as this is something affecting my health and wellbeing.

I saw something horrific online - abhorrent cruelty to a dog in another country. So far away and nothing can be done. I know everybody hates cruelty to animals but this is staying with me and really starting to affect my wellbeing. I don't know how to put the images out of my mind. I just cannot make it go away. I have nearly been sick twice tonight and it has drained every piece of happiness and light inside me. This world just seems to be filled with cruelty and evil and sometimes I genuinely don't want to be a part of it. I feel like I'm starting to have some sort of emotional breakdown from this. Nobody likes cruelty but I feel like I cannot control my reaction this time. I have a family to look after and I cant let things I have no control over take over like this. I don't know why I am even posting this, I don't think there is anything that can really help, knowing it will never stop. I guess I wondered if anyone else reacts like this and what they do to keep going and move away from the feeling it brings.
I feel like I'm carrying a dead weight of sadness inside my mind and even my whole body for those dear innocent lives and what they have suffered. I just can't move away from it.

But you can make it stop Opal Moon; you can change the energy dynamic. That's part of the human being's free will: we are free to choose. Yes, you can never forget, but you can use it as motivation to move forward and to do good in the world. Think of it as being a counter-balance to the dark aspects of existence you spoke of.

I've made it my task to feed the birds and deer (and porcupines!) on my property. Each day, every day of the year. This is how I give back to the innocent animal world; how I lovingly try and bring balance to things. Nothing can overcome love. Be love. Freely give your joy to a world that needs it.

Thankyou for replying, your response made me cry . I understand what you're saying about balance. I try do as much as I can. There's an opportunity for volunteer work at a local animal shelter which I've requested the application pack for recently too, but I guess my efforts just feel futile when I'm in this mindset. I will never understand how or why a person could think it okay to make another living being suffer so immensely.

Opal Moon, the unbearable empathy you feel for animals is what the world is now waking up to on a soul-spirit level. I have read spiritual material that describes our human future this way: there will come a day when every human being who comes across a suffering sentient being, will feel the very same pain and torment as that suffering being. No one will be able to walk by and ignore that suffering being. They will stop and assist. They will do that in the future, because we will have reached a time in our evolution where others' pain will have become everyone else's pain as well.

What you describe with regards to your relationship to animals, is exactly that. You have evolved that particular aspect of your soul life to a point that is well beyond what the majority of human beings are capable of feeling, let alone even understanding.

I put seeds out for the birds. This summer a porcupine would come by each morning at 3 am and eat the leftovers. We grew to trust each other, and after a time the porcupine would scratch on the window to let me know it was ready to be fed. I would then step outside with more seeds, and it would follow behind me to the feeder.

One morning it arrived late when the sun was up. After it ate, I watched as it trudged back home ACROSS THE ROAD! I went into a panic! I didn't realize it was crossing the road each day to my property, and I was now terrified it would get hit. For the next several days I felt guilt, remorse, regret, fear, you name it. I even cried a couple of times. It is an unbearable thought to me -- and I feel it so deeply in my heart at times -- that these creatures who live such pure and innocent lives, are always at the mercy of unthinking and uncaring human beings.

We have such an awesome and profound responsibility to the sentient world, to all life. And slowly the human race is beginning to see and feel that. In truth, it is an evolutionary lesson and soul understanding that is ready to be born within our human collective. This is why fur coats and stuffed animals went out of vogue 40 years ago. And why people are now becoming vegetarians and vegans. It is an awakening that is slowly happening, and will continue to happen for decades and centuries.

I agree. An awakening is truly happening. I have said it before and will say it a hundred times more ...The basis of true spirituality is love and compassion for all living things. Animals suffer in this world more than people realise, not least in the factory farming industry. People need to open there eyes to what goes on.

Yes Starlight. I see it as the basis for all human life and purpose. The very meaning of existence. We are here to evolve our capacity to love. One by-product of that evolutionary process is the soul pain and unbearable empathy individuals like Opal Moon experience. Similar to a young person who experiences actual growing pains, we are growing beyond our physical bodies as we expand our etheric and astral awareness-bodies.

Yes I agree more & more people are going vegetarian/vegan - when I stopped eating meat 13 years ago I noticed a very small selection of 'meat free' alternatives but now there is a lot more dedicated space & choice for these foods. Supply & demand!
I'm also bringing my children up vegetarian & they will be taught why as they grow compared to so many who are kept in the dark. I read somewhere about a child asking if they were eating chicken the animal or chicken the food, thinking they were different things entirely.

It is sad inst it Opal Moon...Let me state the truth as I see it. What would a child do if he/she saw the truth of how their roast beef got to their plate? They would be deeply upset and traumatised and probably have nightmares for months. This is for one simple reason...its disgusting and cruel. A child would only see a sentient being being murdered.

Truly deeply spiritual people know this and to those who know, the wisdom of it knows no bounds. :hug3:

Wise words Baile. You express this well, better than I.

I have been on here arguing this case a few times. I am deeply passionate about this subject and think people need to wake up. The bottom line to me is clear..compassion for all life. It is the basics.:hug3:

I take wild guesses like everyone else. :smile: Part of it is the longer one lives, naturally the more one observes, experiences and reflects upon particular situations. And so things become clearer and clearer. For instance, I could go on about the ignorance of most of humanity with regards to sentient life forms on this planet. I could write, "How can anyone still eat animals?!" But the fact is I ate animals until 2003. So I'm guilty as well of the same unconscious acts.

And so I spend my energy and focus on the positive aspects of such questions. I strive to participate with nature in a conscious, healing way. The sentient world doesn't need my anger or angst (or leftover guilt!), but my conscious, relaxed and directed love.