Identity In Animal Spirituality
Growth and Declaration in an Online Community
Lion J Templin
Feb 2004
Discovering one's specific animal spirituality can be a difficult process.
In today's world of connected online communities of similarly minded people,
this process can be significantly shorted by the insightful help of similar
people elsewhere in the world. However, the process that results when
relying on these well meaning people may not produce results that are
consistent or reliable. Several factors may inhibit the proper growth and
development of successfully integrated Animal Spiritualists because of this
modernized process.
THE MENTOR
The idea of a mentor is a time honored and very successful method of
producing reliable results in almost every walk of life. Appropriately, the
mentor-student relationship is well understood and the mentor similarly
capable of encouraging the correct results. The initial problem of Animal
Spirituality mentoring is the incomplete understanding of the
responsibilities of both mentor and students. Often mentors are not seen as
such, and no organized system exists to insure the student connects with a
qualified individual. In many such cases, those who solve the problems
associated with Animal Spirituality go on with their lives with little or no
need to return their hard-acquired knowledge to those just beginning upon
the same path. In others, potential mentors underestimate their position or
their need and only serve to supply the basics of growth, never making their
full potential available. An example of this is the multiplicity of
websites that explain, often in great detail, the inner-working of the
author's own Animal Spirituality. While these websites can be informative,
their value is only available for comparison with known or accepted
individual situations. Students are not in need of countless explanations
of someone else, for they are really in need of someone who will guide and
watch over their very progress.
On the other side, the student may often consider themselves fully capable
of self-learning without the need for a mentor. This is truly a disastrous
condition, for the student has many enormous pitfalls to traverse, almost
all of which will yield a false result. Today's social ethic contributes to
this problem, as many times the idea that one needs to subjugate themselves
to another *for any reason* is rejected. Respect for the mentoring process
is hard to find. The self-designed programme results in the extreme
multiplicity of variations in self-identification we see today. Almost
every description can be begun as "I'm like this, but .. ", in reference to
some well known ideal .. with a whole series of exceptions, exclusions, and
additions. The long-term results of this are far-reaching and breaks a
structure that should exist into an empty group-coherence later in life.
STANDARDS ...
It is, in fact, a vicious cycle that serves only to harm the community of
Animal Spiritualists as a whole. No mentors results in only self-proclaimed
individualists who are unwilling to seek mentors in the first place. This
results in NO CAPABILITY WHATSOEVER to assess the veracity of any one
spiritualist's claim. Because everyone has self-designed their own
spirituality, there exists no framework for like-minded individuals to bond
into tight coherent groups based upon spirituality. The only community that
can exist is that of a lightly bonded group with smaller tight groups
organized on traditional shared experience bonds, ie, people who have, for
no other reason, been in the same place at the same time.
The argument for coherent spirituality based bonded groups is relatively
simple. Animal Spirituality is a serious thing, or should be, and impacts
one for the rest of their lives. Something that important obviously should
not result in fannish lose knit groups. These are people who should have
expressed great personal fortitude, faced themselves and their true being,
and are still around to carry the torch of an idea that directly contradicts
the basic principals of today's modern society. One does not task
themselves in such a way without the deep understanding of what they went
though, and consequently, what others similarly should have felt. Bonds
based on species, as an obvious example, should be strong .. a brotherhood
of sorts .. a community where each member, though perhaps not liked as a
person, is accepted as "kin" to the entire group. These are not foreign
concepts, one must only look to an American Legion hall to see the bond of
strangers faced with very similar problems and experiences.
But, in this case, the experiences vary greatly. Acceptance is touted as
"you can be whatever you want", but true "brotherhood" examples of
acceptance are extremely rare. Once again, the lack of a framework and
standards of experience result in a wide array of claimants, of which
commonalities are few and far between.
.. AND PRACTICES
In my investigations, I've been told a great number of things regarding
finding one's animal self. I admit that I have posed as a potential student
in search of answers. The most common directive that others have given me
has been a simple "Go with what you feel." Little has ever been said in
terms of self examination, the asking of hard questions, and the
construction of intellectual honesty. I have also been told to not worry
about what species I choose, for I can always chose something else. And, of
course, I have not been accepted by any species based community as a
specific species, only as an individual who was was interesting to talk to
after time. No one has ever offered to mentor my budding-spirituality
persona, nor has any quality attempts to evaluate my statements to the ones
that would listen been well made. The universal statement of "accept
everyone" seems to cause fear in the communities, as they are afraid of
making any kind of judgment call.
SIDEBAR: WHY WONT THEY JUDGE?
The online Animal Spirituality communities broke down into near war
for some time. At the heart of the argument was the determination
of who was REALLY deserving of what title. Was someone *really* a
Furry if they liked the art, or thought they were a wolf in a human
body? The commonality that prevented the two groups in Furry, the
fans and the Spiritualists, from completely breaking from each other
is the reason that both groups coalesced into the same space to
begin with. Artwork. The fans see it as art, imagination,
escapisim. The spritiualists see it as hope, visions, and a view of
the future. Because of this, they are inseparable. In order to
accommodate the apparent rift, both groups have adopted a
reactionary standoff protocol: accept anyone and everyone. Their
attempts to un-define Furry will not last, however. As the
un-definitions of the 90's PC language are slowly being swept back
in favor of once useful language and borders, and so will result in
Furry. More useful definitions will eventually be adopted and lines
will once again be drawn, but more likely in utility rather than
anger.
The "accept everyone" attitude is especially dangerous to the development of
Animal Spiritualists. It allows for nearly *anything* to be accepted ... on
the surface. Of course, each person is still making their own judgment
calls, much like the PC language of the 90's, but they are not expressing
it. What should be groups formed on the basis of similarly powerful and
life impacting decisions isn't happening because of the community force to
accept even those who have obviously not completed the entire span of their
own matriculation. This also provides a reason for those who have achieved
self-actualization to abandon the online communities, as they see universal
acceptance as disrespectful to their own hardships and species. This class
would traditionally serve as the mentors for such a structure.
GRADUATION
Once again, we come back to the tenet that understanding your own Animal
Spirituality is a hardship undertaken by an individual. Obviously, learning
about oneself is a life-long process, but several milestones exist for the
Animal Spiritualist. The most major is the identification of one's own
animal being. This epiphany is a combination of the type of relationship as
well as the species within the relationship. The most basic example is the
realization of oneself *being* an animal (standard frameworks for such a
declaration to be evident to the reader). This momentous occasion is just
the very beginning of a lifetime of learning and understanding the self as
well as the world around them. But what is the result of such a
life-changing event? Well, in today's online mentor-less environment, this
is really the end of the road for many. People are willing to help, in
their own poor way, with someone going through the process of identifying
themselves. The goal ends up being that declaration where the student
states, finally, that that "are a wolf". The student makes said
declaration, and then what? There is no substantive community marker for
the indoctrination of a new member, most likely because the community is so
lightly bonded to begin with. What should be a red-letter day becomes a
mundane event. What should be one of the most memorable moments in
someone's life is lost to the incessant background noise of the community.
SOLUTIONS
The most serious problem, and the hardest one to overcome, is "universal
acceptance". The community needs to get past this reactionary period and
start judging one another again. Not in the previous way, and not along
previous lines, mind you. The future of communities in Animal Spirituality
depends on the capability to judge people worthy of entry into said
communities. This implies a structure of accepted entry requirements, which
are universally applied. A common entry requirement for such closed-gated
communities is the mentor-student process. Students who complete the
mentoring process with a community-accepted mentor are then given entrance
into the community, often with some kind of display showcasing their
learning. The mentoring process insures that similar standards are applied
throughout. This process is common in many other parts of life. Higher
education, for instance, is a situation where the mentoring process
(teaching) culminates in a final display (thesis) and then entry into the
community (degree) as judged by the community (or representatives thereof).
Persons with a masters degree meeting accreditation standards are
universally accepted as people who have completed a known set of tasks and
hardships. Regardless of personality, demeanor, or even respect for the
system, you can ask any one of these degree holders what their thesis was
about. They'll be able to tell you. These communities get even smaller and
close knit as you segregate by degree programme, school, and even graduating
class. Commonalities exist across all groups and those people within the
groups all carry their certification as proof of their validity. Don't
forget that the graduation process in this situation is not without its
requisite pomp and circumstance, pun completely intended. The Animal
Spirituality world could benefit from the same capability as well,
spiritualists given a ceremony to dedicate their learning and entry into the
exclusive group will recall their accomplishments far more than the current
system allows.
That implies a lot of responsibility upon the ones already inside the
community, including the dedication to oversee and accomplish tasks like
mentoring, evaluating, and the execution of ceremony upon new members. Of
course, some side effects will occur, specifically scarcity. Only so many
will be able to perform these tasks, and entry will be limited. Which means
applicants will pre-screen themselves based upon the work involved and the
mentors will achieve a higher order of success with those who are more
committed.
Many will see this in harsh relief from what is currently in place. It's
difficult, it's unforgiving, and it's not easy to implement. Where does the
community start? How does one decide the "first round" of entrants? How
does an entire sect of a community change from a free-association method to
a structured hierarchy? These are questions I am currently unwilling to
attempt an answer for.
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