A Small Furry Prayer (22 page)

43

Certainly the mirror neuron system is fantastic, though perhaps not quite the mythic land of shape-shifting and language sharing the shamans describe. But how far away is it, really? Empathy, like all of our emotions, exists on an sliding scale. At one end are sociopaths, people incapable of feeling any empathy. Next come people with autism, who experience very little. Then those with Asperger's, a disease that allows for more than autism, though not quite what most of us experience. Moving toward the other end, there are hippies, humanists, and other folks who feel for our whole species; beyond them are the animal rescue community, the die-hard environmentalists, Earth Firsters, tree huggers, and other biotic egalitarians. At the far pole are those who see no separation between self and other: the meditators who experience occasional unity, the mystics who experience nothing but.

And maybe somewhere along this chain, hidden away for centuries, tucked between the
all things are equal
of biotic egalitarianism and the
all things are one
of cosmic unity, might be a place where some things are more equal than others. Where some things are one. A place reached when boundary of self extends beyond the confines of skin, not as far as the entire universe, only as far as the parts of it that most remind us most of ourselves—the animal kingdom, which, as both Claude Lévi-Strauss and Paul Shepard figured out, has always been our most accessible link to universal mystery anyway.

The shamans say that humans and animals can speak the same language, though they didn't specify what that might be. But could it be that we are holding out for the miraculous when the biological works just fine? Humans and animals already share the common tongue of emotion, which is perhaps why Castaneda didn't hear that coyote talk—rather he
felt
it talk—because the only way for this language to be spoken is through empathy.

Let me put it another way: St. Francis is the most celebrated animal mystic of all time. If we can believe the hype, birds dug him, rabbits came to sit in his lap, and fish stuck around for his sermons. His most famous trick involved a wolf who'd been terrorizing the town of Gubbio, Italy, eating livestock and killing people. Francis decided to help the villagers by going to meet the wolf. Hunters who had done the same had not returned. His friends begged him not to go. The townsfolk begged him not to go. He went anyway, and the wolf charged at him. According to the AmericanCatholic.org version of the story, this is what happened next: “Francis made the Sign of the Cross toward it. The power of God caused the wolf to slow down and to close its mouth. Then Francis called out to the creature: ‘Come to me, Brother Wolf. In the name of Christ, I order you not to hurt anyone.' At that moment the wolf lowered its head and lay down at St. Francis' feet, meek as a lamb.”

All that God power and hand waving sounds impressive, I know, but plenty of rescuers get the same job done using far less fanfare, and with pit bulls, no less—which are wolves plus a long history of selective breeding for aggression. After a few years of this work, even I can manage a version. In Chimayo there are a lot of wild dogs and a lot of unchained, unfenced, attack-everybody-who-comes-along dogs. At least once a week, some neighborhood bad-ass comes charging at me, and I do the same thing every time. I turn and half-shout “hey” to get their attention. This usually slows their charge. Then I start talking to them like an old friend, calm and assertive, my first question usually “So what's up with the ruckus?” It took some practice, but these days, by the third question, the dog has usually quieted down or gone elsewhere. Calm and assertive are also the same two qualities that dog whisperer Cesar Millan claims are his secret. But St. Francis had a better card up his sleeve: empathy.

Yawning is contagious, for the same reason that emotions are contagious, because mirror neurons make the process happen automatically. And for the same reason that seeing a symbolic representation of a social signal—the word
yawn
—can make you yawn, seeing the word
empathy
can make you feel for another. But you don't need to see the word
yawn
to trigger the action; just thinking it is enough to make it happen. And because mirror neurons link us to our nervous system, thinking the word
yawn
will also make you tired. The same holds for empathy. Thinking about empathy creates more of it. And thinking about empathy is most of what St. Francis did.

St. Francis's prayer is all about altruism, its key line being “for it is in giving that we receive.” It's also about how to live altruistically, which Francis felt meant cultivating empathy. Right before the giving and receiving line comes his formula: “O Divine Master, grant that I may not so much seek to be consoled as to console; to be understood as to understand; to be loved as to love.” Every one of those is an action involving a switch in perspective, moving from the egocentric to the allocentric, not just accidentally face reading and feeling for another but intentionally trying to put yourself in their shoes, really striving for the experience. In making empathy the cornerstone of his faith, Francis was inadvertently hypertraining his mirror neuron system.

Mirror neurons are the neuronal architecture involved in this process, but as Jaak Panksepp pointed out, there's also neurochemistry to consider. In the early 1980s, Washington University in St. Louis geneticist and psychiatrist C. Robert Cloninger began to unravel this puzzle. Cloninger wasn't interested in mirror neurons, rather in mental illness. He knew that assessing the Big Five personality traits alone could not predict vulnerability to mental disorders; for that, he discovered, character traits are needed as well. These traits are nurture, not nature. They are, as Immanuel Kant once said, and as Cloninger repeats when asked to define character, “what people make of themselves intentionally.”

Cloninger found there are three character traits that govern mental life and can be used to measure its stability:
self-directedness
, or how goal-oriented you are;
cooperativeness
, or how much you're willing to play nice with others; and s
elf-transcendence
, the most important one for this discussion. Self-transcendence describes spiritual feelings that are independent of traditional religiosity. “It gets to the heart of spiritual belief,” says National Institutes of Health geneticist Dean Hamer in his book
The God Gene
, “the nature of the universe and our place in it. Self-transcendent individuals tend to see everything, including themselves, as part of one great totality. They have a strong sense of ‘at-one-ness'—of the connections between people, places, and things.”

Self-transcendence, Cloninger also found, is also a blend of three traits, or subtraits, that “hang together.” That is, in personality profiles, if you test high for one, you'll usually test high for all three. These are
mysticism
, a willingness to believe in the supernatural;
self-forgetfulness
, a willingness to get lost in the moment; and
transpersonal identification
, again the most important one for this discussion. Hamer explains it this way:

The hallmark of transpersonal identification is a feeling of connectedness to the universe and everything in it—animate and inanimate, human and nonhuman, anything and everything that can be seen, heard, smelled, or otherwise sensed. People who score high for transpersonal identification can become deeply, emotionally attached to other people, animals, trees, flowers, streams, or mountains. Sometimes they feel that everything is part of one living organism. … It may inspire people to become environmentalists. Although there are no formal survey data, it is likely that members of the Sierra Club and Greenpeace score above average on this [trait].

In other words, transpersonal identification is the character trait one develops as empathy extends beyond self and species and into the wider world; it's the biophilia instinct at work, without which there could be no cross-species altruism, no Rancho de Chihuahua, and, as we'll see in a moment, perhaps no mystic experience of the shamanic variety.

Dean Hamer is the one who discovered the gene responsible for self-transcendence. Technically, it's called VMAT2 and regulates the flow of serotonin, dopamine, and norepinephrine, but Hamer calls it the “God gene” because these three neurochemicals both govern self-transcendence and have long shown up in the brain during so-called mystical experience, including the experience of unity Newberg described. Since that experience is kinesthetic—we
feel
one with everything—then unity might be described as the ultimate social emotion. And if unity is an emotion, then, given the correct prerequisites, it should be like any other emotion: it should be contagious.

Take wolves. They're a social species who, like dogs and humans, have a long history with mirror neurons, as face reading is a technology needed to live in packs. Serotonin, dopamine, and norepinephrine, meanwhile, are found in all mammals, as is the right parietal lobe. So wolves have the neuronal architecture to be able to experience unity. We don't know if it's part of their common repertoire, but we do know it's possible. And this brings us to a slightly different version of the story of St. Francis taming the wolf.

In this version, the wolf charges at Francis, who goes into his power-of-God routine. Wolves are innately curious, so this gets the animal's attention. He slows his pace to gather more information. He starts face reading to do so, and his mirror neurons get in on the act, and pretty soon the wolf is feeling Francis's feelings. While we'll never know what Francis was feeling, his faith was about unity, and his methods were of empathy. Most likely, he was feeling what Westerners call love and Easterners call compassion: a pure empathetic reverence for all life, the end result of well-trained mirror neurons, the feeling of unity. So why did that wolf lie down at Francis's feet? Because wolves have mirror neurons too and unity is contagious, and why bother attacking yourself?

This is science, for sure, though perhaps also sorcery. Arthur C. Clarke famously said, “Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic,” and face reading is a seriously advanced technology. Even after hundreds of millions spent on research and decades of international effort, we can't duplicate it. Andrew Newberg's research suggests real-world correlates for mystical experiences, and mostly that's what scientists have found once they started looking. Shamanic experiences shouldn't be any different. Maybe the mystic time where humans and animals swapped consciousness and spoke the same language is less a magic act than a function of neurons and neurochemistry, a wondrous bit of biotech mostly forgotten in our rush toward Nintendo. Maybe this explains that talking snake in the Bible. Maybe our exile from Eden is really a bad case of cognitive decline, the cure for which is still available to anyone who bothers to cultivate empathy.

One thing is certain: it's always about how you tell the story. From the right angle, it's all archetypes. Man leaves behind frivolity of the city and seeks meaning among the beasts. Along the way he meets a holy woman who smokes sacred plants and communes with donkeys. His journey becomes arduous. He survives ruffians on the road, evils spirits disguised as bobcats, being caged with a mountain lion. He enters the dark night of the soul. The torrent drives him into wilderness. He goes up the mountain. The great dog spirit saves his life and grants him the gift of vision. His return to society is celebrated with the sacred sharing of puke. Alas, he must leave again. One final quest to a distant land. He encounters more danger, meets a wizard in the road, some bit about cattle. Finally, triumphantly, our hero returns to civilization with the power of Dr. Dolittle: he can talk dirty to the animals.

Seriously, does any of this sound familiar?

PART  NINE

The obscure we see eventually. The completely obvious, it seems, takes longer.

—Edward R. Murrow

44

Stilts arrived one day in January, a California transplant, short-haired, coat mostly black, spots of tan, a pinched face, long nose, wide eyes, a few teeth left, missing half an ear, all his tail, standing about two feet high, with the torso of an armadillo, the legs of a giraffe, and it kind of worked for him, and kind of made him look like a stilt-walking hobbit with an eating disorder—thus his name. His demeanor was half what J. D. Salinger once called “shy, reclusive Pennsylvania Dutch lesbian who Wants To Write” and half Woody Allen lost in a Stephen King novel. Or something like that. He was pretty quirky.

And really, he didn't much like his first day with us. Meeting a new pack is the canine equivalent of switching high schools. We take it slow. We have ambassador dogs who are always welcoming to strangers, and, go figure, our best ambassadors are our gay dogs. Thus Smash and Hugo always come out first. Our real tyrants are the bull dykes, thus Dagmar and Squirt stay hidden away until the very end. In between, we tend to work things around size. Big dogs meet big dogs first, small dogs meet small dogs first. And this was a problem with Stilts: he was significantly bigger than the small dogs, significantly smaller than the big dogs—which is sort of like being that same new kid except black while everybody else at the school is either white or Asian.

After introductions came what usually comes: collapse. In recent times, Stilts had gone from person to person, shelter to shelter, state to state, and who knows what else. He needed to sleep off the shock. Two days is typical, but Stilts stayed in bed for a week. When he got out of bed, he just switched rooms. A month later he hadn't much moved from a pillow under a table. Attention, affection, good food, great pack, general silliness, long hikes, lots of freedom, lots of love—these were our standard arsenal, and none was working. When I took Stilts on walks, he would wander off and hide. It was a little frustrating and a lot heartbreaking. How to get this dog to bond was the mystery. And then I went mountain biking and got an idea decided to push him off a cliff.

I'd been mountain biking with a group of strangers in the mountains outside of Santa Fe. One of the obstacles in our path that day was a giant boulder. On either side of the boulder were long drops, so the way forward was straight over and don't waver, a technique referred to as “point and pray.” So we pointed and prayed, and afterward we stood in the middle of the trail hand-slapping and back-slapping and giddy as hell. This happens because, besides adrenaline, an adrenaline high includes endorphins, dopamine, and norepinephrine. These chemicals are critical for high-risk situations because endorphins mitigate pain, while norepinephrine and dopamine are performance enhancers that speed up reaction times. But endorphins also produce social bonding, and dopamine and norepinephrine do the same for romantic love. So potent is this combination that after a two-second ride over a rock we were all acting like college kids in a new relationship. So maybe, I thought, if I could get Stilts to do something dangerous with the pack, maybe that would help.

I had the perfect something in mind. Ever since I started the Five-Dog Workout, one route—a crazy-looking ridge run that dumps over a series of small drops and then over a large cornice and on down a gorgeous sandstone cliff—had my attention. Every time I walked that way, I stared at that route. Was it even doable? The cliff looked too steep, the drop off the cornice too big. But something about it made me want to try, and something about it kept scaring me away. I suppose I was waiting for a sign.

I got one a few days before Stilts arrived. Igor, Bella, Bucket, and I were out for a hike, climbing a tall ridgeline just before sunrise. The route I'd been eyeing was directly across from us, though it was early and the cliff was mostly shadow. A few minutes later, we topped the ridge as dawn swept down the mountains and the whole valley lit up. And there, suddenly visible in the middle of my route, sitting fifty feet below the cornice like he'd been waiting for us, was the biggest coyote I've ever seen.

He was bigger than any of our dogs, as big, pardon the pun, as a wolf. He looked like a wolf too, thick fur of silver, paws like salad plates. He noticed us immediately, and I expected that would be the last we saw of him, but instead of running away, he stayed exactly where he was, staring at us. We stared back, five minutes, ten minutes. Then Igor barked once. The coyote nodded once, stood up, and was off. Rather than running down the cliff, he went in the other direction, bounding up the route in six strides, maybe seven, then over the cornice and gone. It was like a three-hour ballet condensed into a moment. It was amazing. When it was over, the route had a name, I had my sign, and there was no real choice in the matter.

We ran Coyote's Line that day. Turns out Bucket is scared of heights and had to be carried over the small drops. Igor and Bella jumped those drops and jumped the cornice as well. Bucket took one look over that edge and found another way down. I thought about going with him but knew I'd regret it later, so five-four-three-two-one and point and pray. There was a bit of hang time in the air and a bit of a hip check on the landing, but soft, moist dirt and after I bounced back to my feet, momentum took over. My job was one foot in front of the other and nothing more. A few steps later the dogs were at my side and we were bounding down together, falling five feet with every step, falling deeper in love with every step, falling deeper into each other along the way—which seems exactly the point.

In
Play Together, Stay Together
, Karen London and Patricia McConnell point out that “the type of play we engage in with our dogs is relatively rare in the world of animal behavior … the fact that dogs and humans stay playful as adults is uncommon, and is a significant part of the relationship we share. To some degree, play isn't what makes our relationship with each other better, play is what creates the relationship in the first place.” I'd come the long way round to this conclusion, but this is also, I have decided, the real reason I think dogs are sacred and dog rescue a viable path toward enlightenment—because it's a path where play is not only encouraged but rewarded.

A few months later, after coming back from that mountain bike ride inspired, I returned to Coyote's Line with the same crew of dogs, minus Igor, plus Stilts. Stilts didn't have much trouble with the ridge but wasn't so sure about the cornice. Once again Bucket took one look and went off to find another way down. Stilts tried to follow, but I put my hand on his back and spun him toward the drop. So much for good intentions. Five-four-three-two-one—but what was I thinking? There was no way I could push him off a cliff.

I apologized to Stilts and let him go, figuring he'd follow Bucket down and, who knows, maybe that would do some good. I decided to show him what he was missing so gave a whoop and jumped the cornice. Bella jumped with me. We landed about the same time and bounced down the slope like pinballs, coming to a flatter section where she kept going and I slid to a stop to check on Stilts. He was still there, still staring off the edge. At first I thought he was frozen in terror and I would have to climb up after him, but then he did something I've never seen a dog do before: he reared up on his hind legs and kicked his feet in the air like a stallion. He did it twice in a row and then started barking, and barked straight off the cornice. He stuck the landing and kept barking all the way down the cliff, barking into the arroyo, where, without breaking stride, he smashed into Bella and bounced into Bucket and they all rolled into a game of bitey-face—the first playful contact Stilts had with another dog.

Immediately I felt that huge rush of helper's high. I was suddenly in the zone, happy in my flow. The dogs must have gotten a contact high. We immediately scampered off down the canyon, playing follow-the-leader as we went. I ran after Bucket for a while, then Stilts—who turned out not to run like an overweight hobbit—and then Bella took the lead. Her style had not changed. She still prefers going up and over and across whatever's in her path. Normally, because I can't duplicate her acrobatics, this is when I drop out of the game. But I was in a groove and Stilts was having fun, and before I could make up my mind we ran into a wall.

The arroyo had taken a sharp right turn and Bella had stuck to old habits. She went straight, leaping from the ground onto the backside of a juniper root sticking out of the wall. It was about five feet up, a big jump for me, but without even thinking about it I leaped up after her. Bucket came up after me, then Stilts after Bucket. And we did it again and again. The moment Bella lifted off her perch, I would land on it. And the perch I had just vacated was instantly filled by Bucket, and Bucket's old spot by Stilts. Bella went rock to crack to root, and we went after her. It was like team hopscotch, only played vertically. As we leaped up the wall, I felt my entire sense of self begin to blur. For a few moves it felt like my perspective had expanded, as if I had somehow merged with the dogs. There was a voice in my head—my own, a dog's, it's hard to say for certain—letting me know that as long as I did exactly what they did I would make it up that wall. Eight moves later, that's exactly what happened. The whole pack had run straight up the side of a cliff. This was more than a contact high.