This year, in an effort to make the longest and darkest winter nights more enjoyable, I hung some colorful holiday lights around the house and the front of the barn. Having the twinkling colors light my path to and from the barn makes me much happier than the ridiculously bright flood light that typically disrupts my peaceful walk to the barn.

Inside the barn, holiday decorations are minimal. Each horse got a stocking with their initial on it to hang outside their stall. It’s not much, but it makes it feel like Christmas to have just a little something inside the barn.

The night I hung the stockings, I explained to the horses how I would fill them with apples and carrots on Christmas morning. I was getting excited, imagining the fluffy green tops of the carrots overflowing out of the stockings and picturing how they would joyously gobble up their treats on Christmas Day!

I finished hanging the stockings, completed my barn chores and dropped the grain and hay into the stalls, signaling the beginning of the nightly feast. Once dinner was served, I headed for the door. Looking back, as I always do, I send them loving energy from my heart to theirs and call out to them some version of my nightly blessing, “Good night, Babies! I love you so much! Thank you for loving me. See you in the morning!”

None of them gives a hoot that I’m not going to see them again until morning–even though there have been times I’ve pulled out my sleeping bag to stay the night out there with them. They are too busy eating to acknowledge me, because food takes priority over my need for them to show me love in return. I totally get it. This is the life of a horse. Survival is key, so they must eat immediately in case I forget to feed them for days and they risk withering away to nothing! LOL

In the darkness of the following morning, before sunrise, I travel my well-worn path to the barn. I am gingerly carrying with me a steaming bucket of hot mash that is swishing around and splashing on the leg of my coveralls. (On cold winter mornings, I make the horses a mash because it gets them drinking extra water and keeps their system running smoothly—if you get my drift.) They absolutely love mash and I love watching them devour it.

“Good morning, Lovers!!!!” Joyous nickers greet me in return as I walk into the barn. The boys are pacing their stalls, impatiently waiting for their breakfast. Nikki is standing at her gate, eagerly waiting to be let into the open barn to eat and then hang out with me while I take care of morning chores. I serve everyone their mash, then peer over the stall walls to check water bucket levels and poop piles. (Again, totally normal behavior for horse people to monitor these things, especially in the winter, to prevent serious events like colic)

While taking in the soothing sounds of horses ravenously slurping up mash, I stretch on my tippy toes over Hercules’ wall, only to find his monogramed stocking floating inside his water bucket! “Hercules, what happened here? What did you do?”

Glancing just slightly out of the corner of his eye, single eyebrow raised, while still sucking in his breakfast, I hear, “You said apples and carrots.” Haha, I laugh to myself! Yep, I certainly did promise you apples and carrots, didn’t I?

The problem is that Hercules doesn’t know it’s not yet Christmas. He doesn’t know what day it is or care what day it is. All he knows is that he understood me saying there would be apples and carrots in his stocking, and that there weren’t any. Imagine the disappointment! In addition, I pictured it all in my mind when I told them about how I was going to fill the stockings, and he felt the energy and excitement I was feeling of them enjoying all those tasty treats.

This is how animal communication works. What you say, you picture in your mind, and your animal understands it. The telepathic information transfers back and forth between you, so they hear you, feel your energy, and pick up on the images in your mind! You don’t have to be an animal communicator like me to do this! You’re probably already doing it and don’t even realize it. How amazing is that?

So, now that you know a little more how it works, you can practice communicating what you want from your animals. Remember, your animal understands the picture in your mind, so the key is to picture what you DO want, not what you don’t want. I pictured apples and carrots in the stocking and that’s the message Hercules received. If I pictured an empty stocking, he wouldn’t have torn it down, expecting there to be apples and carrots in there!

It’s important to have clear communication with your animals so you build a trusting relationship with them. Give it a try and let me know what happens. I love hearing your stories of how you connect with your animals!

By the way, it goes without saying that the horses got plenty of apples and carrots on Christmas morning!