Showing results for "Wellness" in Animals

In this groundbreaking approach to the evolution of all life, Richard Dawkins shows how the body, behaviour, and genes of every living creature can be read as a book – an archive of the worlds of its ancestors. A perfectly camouflaged desert lizard has a desiccated landscape of sand and stones ‘painted’ on its back. Its skin can be read as a description of ancient deserts in which its ancestors survived – and, before that, of the worlds of its more remote ancestors: a genetic book of the dead.

There is no denying that the emotional bond between horses and the humans who love them can reach mystical proportions, and nowhere is that relationship more evident than in these 24 true-life accounts of horses rescuing people. Many of the stories recount incidents where death or physical injury was imminent, and only because a horse intervened are the narrators alive to tell the tale.

Riding Home:The Power of Horses to Heal, is the first and only audiobook to scientifically and experientially explain why horses have the extraordinary ability to emotionally transform the lives of thousands of men, women and children, whether they are horse lovers, or suffering from deep psychological wounds. It is an audiobook for anyone who wants to experience the joy, wonder, self-awareness and peace of mind that comes from creating a horse/human relationship, and it puts forth and clarifies the principles of today's Natural Horsemanship....

De Waal reviews the rise and fall of the mechanistic view of animals and opens our minds to the idea that animal minds are far more intricate and complex than we have assumed. De Waal's landmark work will convince you to rethink everything you thought you knew about animal - and human - intelligence.

In all animals, mating is a deal. But few creatures behave as if sex is a simple transaction. Many treat it with reverence, suspicion, angst and violence. In the case of the Black Grouse, the bird at the center of Matt Ridley’s investigation, the males dance and sing for hours a day, for several exhausting months, in an exhausting and sometimes deadly ritual called a ‘lek’. To prepare for the ordeal, they grow, preen and display fancy, twisted, bold-colored feathers.

Does your dog get sad when you leave for the day? Does your cat purr because she loves you? Do bears attack when they’re angry? You can’t very well ask them. In fact, scientists haven’t been able to reach a consensus on whether animals even have emotions like humans do, let alone how to study them. Yet studies of animal emotion are critical for understanding human emotion and mental illness. In The Nature of the Beast, pioneering neuroscientist David J. Anderson describes a new approach to solving this problem.

Mother nature has a lot to teach us, if only we open our eyes. Pigeons and dolphins offer creative strategies for preserving our memories and warding off dementia, while squirrels and pigs harbor secrets for managing chronic pain. In The Book of Animal Secrets, visionary physician and biomedical researcher David B. Agus, MD, explores all these ways—and more—that we can harness the wonders of the animal kingdom in our own, very human lives.

What if human intelligence is actually more of a liability than a gift? After all, the animal kingdom, in all its diversity, gets by just fine without it. At first glance, human history is full of remarkable feats of intelligence, yet human exceptionalism can be a double-edged sword. With our unique cognitive prowess comes severe consequences, including existential angst, violence, discrimination and the creation of a world teetering towards climate catastrophe. What if human exceptionalism is more of a curse than a blessing?

Here is a guide to understanding the profound connection in animal/human relationships and its potential for mutual healing. Providing tools to identify our animals’ messages more quickly, the author shows how our pets’ higher purpose is to help people understand themselves.

At the start of this remarkable story of recovery, healing, and redemption, Ginger Gaffney answers a call to help retrain the troubled horses at an alternative prison ranch in New Mexico, a facility run entirely by the prisoners. The horses are scavenging through the dumpsters, kicking and running down the residents when they bring the trash out after meals. One horse is severely injured. The horses and residents arrive at the ranch broken in one way or many: the horses are defensive and terrified, while the residents, some battling addictions, are emotionally and physically shattered.

When Joe Harkness suffered a breakdown in 2013, he tried all the things his doctor recommended: medication helped, counselling was enlightening and mindfulness grounded him. But nothing came close to nature, particularly birds. How had he never noticed such beauty before? Soon, every avian encounter took him one step closer to accepting who he is. The positive change in Joe's well-being was so profound that he started a blog to record his experience.

In Cow Hug Therapy, Ellie Laks recounts the extraordinary journey that started with her first teacher, Buddha—not the religious figure, but a rescued miniature Hereford cow. One evening Buddha wrapped her neck around an exhausted and upset Ellie and transferred a singular form of healing and comfort with an incredible impact. Understanding that this was something to be shared with others, Ellie developed Cow Hug Therapy, a groundbreaking approach to emotional healing that has proved effective for trauma, illness, disabilities, addiction, grief, and stress.

Caring for horses can give us a sense of responsibility. They can help in times of depression and take us out of ruts when we lose our ambition to do anything. It can help build confidence and allow us to build a sense of self-acceptance. Through interacting with horses, we can engage in emotional healing, relieve stress while building patience and trust. If you want to learn about how to care for horses and how horses can help you in your self-help journey, then this book is for you. If you are a novice or have been riding and caring for horses your whole life, this book is for you.

From Downward Dog to Cobra, Wild Asana invites you into an embodied exploration of the animals that inspire familiar yoga poses. Drawing on wildlife science, anthropology, Hindu mythology, Eastern philosophy, and personal stories, this insightful guide by environmental educator and yoga instructor Alison Zak explores the connections among our bodies, our minds, and the animals that inspire our practice, and invites you to bring the deep nature of animals into breath and movement.

Wild Rituals explores how embracing the rituals of the animal kingdom can make us more connected to ourselves, nature, and others. Behavioral ecologist and world-renowned elephant scientist Caitlin O'Connell dives into the rituals of elephants, apes, zebras, rhinos, lions, whales, flamingos, and many more. This fascinating listen helps us better understand how we are similar to wild animals, and encourages us to find healing, self-awareness, community, and self-reinvention.

In What Do Animals Think and Feel?, the biologist Karsten Brensing has something astonishing to tell us about the animal kingdom: namely that animals, by any reasonable assessment, have developed the sophisticated systems of social organisation and behaviour that human beings call 'culture'. Dolphins call one another by name and orcas inhabit a culture that is over 700,000 years old. Chimpanzees wage strategic warfare while bonobos delight in dirty talk. Ravens enjoy snowboarding on snow-covered roofs, and snails like to spin on hamster exercise wheels.

The human reaction to insects is neither purely biological nor simply cultural. And no one reacts to insects with indifference. Insects frighten, disgust, and fascinate us. Jeff Lockwood explores this phenomenon through evolutionary science, human history, and contemporary psychology, as well as a debilitating bout with entomophobia in his work as an entomologist. Exploring the nature of anxiety and phobia, Lockwood explores the lively debate about how much of our fear of insects can be attributed to ancestral predisposition for our own survival and how much is learned through individual experiences.

In this unusual book, Beverley will explain, step-by-step, the secrets of walking your dog without needing roller skates. The troubleshooting “What If?” sections cover all your questions, and down-to-earth advice is given to help you and your dog learn a new way of enjoying walks together.

We all know that malaria is an infectious disease spread by mosquitos. Female Anopheles mosquitos spread the infection, a microorganism called a plasmodium, when taking a blood meal. But as the quotation often attributed to Mark Twain says “What gets us into trouble is not what we don’t know. It’s what we know for sure that just ain’t so”.

Darwin developed the theory of sexual selection to explain why the animal world abounds in stunning beauty, from the brilliant colors of butterflies and fishes to the songs of birds and frogs. He argued that animals have "a taste for the beautiful" that drives their potential mates to evolve features that make them more sexually attractive and reproductively successful. But if Darwin explained why sexual beauty evolved in animals, he struggled to understand how.