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Shadow Animals: How Animals We Fear Can Help Us Heal, Transform, and Awaken
A guide to shadow work with animal teachers
• Explains how the animals we fear or dislike can help us recognize and investigate our shadow the hated, abandoned, judged, and denied aspects of ourselves
• Explores the lessons of a wide variety of shadow animals, including snakes, rats, bats, and spiders, as well as those that only seem shadowy to some, such as dogs, cats, birds, and horses
• Looks at the elements of the psyche each shadow animal represents and presents thirteen animal-inspired exercises designed to examine, embrace, and integrate our shadow selves
We often project qualities onto animals that we don’t wish to admit in ourselves. Thus, snakes are evil, spiders are creepy, rats are dirty, and so on. As Dawn Baumann Brunke explains, the animals we fear or dislike can help us to recognize our the hated, abandoned, judged, and denied aspects of ourselves. As teachers and guides, shadow animals can help us to reclaim the inner strengths, abilities, and wisdom that we have forgotten or disowned.
Brunke explores the lessons of numerous shadow animals, including those that many think of as shadowy, such as snakes and bats, as well as those that only seem shadowy to some, such as dogs, cats, birds, and horses. Though shadow animals may initially appear frightening, they offer profound healing and expert guidance in helping us identify, learn from, and embrace our shadow selves. Brunke explains how shadow animals represent unexamined elements of the psyche--from secret fears and suppressed emotions to unacknowledged prejudices and repressed trauma. She presents thirteen animalinspired exercises, each uniquely designed to help us find and better understand the lost, wounded pieces of our psyche.
Presenting an animal-centered guide to shadow work, Brunke reveals how shadow animals protect and advise, challenge and encourage, inspire and offer support to the spiritual adventure of enlightenment as we awaken to who we really are.
• Explains how the animals we fear or dislike can help us recognize and investigate our shadow the hated, abandoned, judged, and denied aspects of ourselves
• Explores the lessons of a wide variety of shadow animals, including snakes, rats, bats, and spiders, as well as those that only seem shadowy to some, such as dogs, cats, birds, and horses
• Looks at the elements of the psyche each shadow animal represents and presents thirteen animal-inspired exercises designed to examine, embrace, and integrate our shadow selves
We often project qualities onto animals that we don’t wish to admit in ourselves. Thus, snakes are evil, spiders are creepy, rats are dirty, and so on. As Dawn Baumann Brunke explains, the animals we fear or dislike can help us to recognize our the hated, abandoned, judged, and denied aspects of ourselves. As teachers and guides, shadow animals can help us to reclaim the inner strengths, abilities, and wisdom that we have forgotten or disowned.
Brunke explores the lessons of numerous shadow animals, including those that many think of as shadowy, such as snakes and bats, as well as those that only seem shadowy to some, such as dogs, cats, birds, and horses. Though shadow animals may initially appear frightening, they offer profound healing and expert guidance in helping us identify, learn from, and embrace our shadow selves. Brunke explains how shadow animals represent unexamined elements of the psyche--from secret fears and suppressed emotions to unacknowledged prejudices and repressed trauma. She presents thirteen animalinspired exercises, each uniquely designed to help us find and better understand the lost, wounded pieces of our psyche.
Presenting an animal-centered guide to shadow work, Brunke reveals how shadow animals protect and advise, challenge and encourage, inspire and offer support to the spiritual adventure of enlightenment as we awaken to who we really are.
320 pages, Paperback
Published November 8, 2022
14 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
October 29, 2022
This is a book for you if you fear a specific animal (spider; snake; rat; bat; cat; dog; goat; bird; anything that swarms, stings, bites, burrows and invades; shark; frog). But even if you don’t have a debilitating fear, the research here about all these animals, delving into myth, religion, science, history, psychology—basically everything—may feed you.
Dawn Baumann Brunke is a topnotch curious researcher and journalist, and once again, she’s packed a book with everything you could possibly want to know about the animals that so many of us project our terror onto.
If you want to know what you are hiding from yourself about yourself, read this, or just page through the sections that pertain to your curiosity. (I have a particular interest in frogs because of a dream that is still so vivid decades after having it that it still affects me. Although I’m not afraid of frogs, my dream history made me find fascinating every single fact about frogs in the metamorphosis chapter, whereas I found myself skimming or just looking at the generous photos that pepper chapters on other animals.)
My animal fears are place-specific: if a mouse or a waterbug (a giant NYC cockroach—as long as your thumb and an inch wide—that sometimes flies) suddenly appears in my apartment, I have been known to scream. Outside, I have no problem with them; I think mice are quite cute and endearing, and New York City waterbugs are the intellectual equivalent of any human—I’m not kidding; confronting one, you know you are being assessed and you can feel their minds at work. But please, not in my apartment.
There are many exercises in this book to help you shift from fear to acceptance, and therefore know yourself better. But the best recommendation I can give comes from the experience, very early in the book, of following Brunke’s directions to list the characteristics of both your favorite animals and the ones you are afraid of. I was surprised to see that “fast” appeared in all my descriptions of my least favorite if they are invaders. And speed (in thought, in work, in insight) is actually a quality I like about myself. Well, following this contemplation, my dreams shifted! I often dream of invaders, and last night I had a happy, sweet dream about new people coming to live next door, me helping the managing agent, being excited about new neighbors, etc. This is huge!
I got an advanced reading copy, but you can get the book (great cover!) in November. Grab one!
Dawn Baumann Brunke is a topnotch curious researcher and journalist, and once again, she’s packed a book with everything you could possibly want to know about the animals that so many of us project our terror onto.
If you want to know what you are hiding from yourself about yourself, read this, or just page through the sections that pertain to your curiosity. (I have a particular interest in frogs because of a dream that is still so vivid decades after having it that it still affects me. Although I’m not afraid of frogs, my dream history made me find fascinating every single fact about frogs in the metamorphosis chapter, whereas I found myself skimming or just looking at the generous photos that pepper chapters on other animals.)
My animal fears are place-specific: if a mouse or a waterbug (a giant NYC cockroach—as long as your thumb and an inch wide—that sometimes flies) suddenly appears in my apartment, I have been known to scream. Outside, I have no problem with them; I think mice are quite cute and endearing, and New York City waterbugs are the intellectual equivalent of any human—I’m not kidding; confronting one, you know you are being assessed and you can feel their minds at work. But please, not in my apartment.
There are many exercises in this book to help you shift from fear to acceptance, and therefore know yourself better. But the best recommendation I can give comes from the experience, very early in the book, of following Brunke’s directions to list the characteristics of both your favorite animals and the ones you are afraid of. I was surprised to see that “fast” appeared in all my descriptions of my least favorite if they are invaders. And speed (in thought, in work, in insight) is actually a quality I like about myself. Well, following this contemplation, my dreams shifted! I often dream of invaders, and last night I had a happy, sweet dream about new people coming to live next door, me helping the managing agent, being excited about new neighbors, etc. This is huge!
I got an advanced reading copy, but you can get the book (great cover!) in November. Grab one!
October 11, 2022
The song, "Me and My Shadow" popped into my mind and continued on an endless loop the morning after I finished reading the book, “Shadow Animals.”
In part the lyrics are:
“Me and my shadow
Strollin' down the avenue
Me and my shadow
Not a soul to tell our troubles to.”
In the thought-provoking and timely book, “Shadow Animals” by Dawn Brunke, the line “not a soul to tell our troubles to” brought forth a whole new meaning and expanded my love yet again for the animal world for all the wisdom and guidance they've provided me over the years.
It has been a deeply rewarding experience to have healed aspects of my shadow self because of the gentle, caring, and at times, loving persistence of the Animal Kingdom - especially those animals I held some fear about.
So it was an honor to be asked to take part in the chapter on arachnophobia and test a series of questions that Dawn developed that would help uncover clues about my angst about Spider. What it revealed and the insight that bubbled to the surface ushered in a welcome layer of healing!
As we continue to move through these challenging times of divisiveness and fear, it has become clear that the ones we really need to tell our troubles to are ourselves. That which triggers us and causes us pain or angst is an opportunity to go within and heal those shadow aspects of ourselves. We are the ones we’ve been waiting for!
And the animals - especially those we fear– called shadow animals – are the ones who can expand us in profound ways. They are here and waiting to walk lovingly beside us and inspire and encourage us to do the inner work to heal individually so that we may heal on a collective level also.
Dawn writes: “Shadow animals are unique teachers that can help us find and better understand the lost and wounded pieces of ourselves of which we are not fully aware. Some hold clues to repressed memories of trauma or abuse. Some are guides, helping us to explore the puzzling or guarded aspects of our psyche.”
Reading this book I found myself reaching for my Post-it™ note tabs over and over again, marking many passages that resonated, deeply moved me, or invited me to contemplate further. One such paragraph is from the chapter intriguingly titled, "Nightmare."
Dawn says, "To consciously meet our nightmare invokes a deepened relationship between Shadow and self. What we find when we face our fears is often surprising. For beyond the face of fear we encounter a deeper presence. There, in the dark mirror, we see ourselves. Previously misunderstood aspects of who we are gaze back at us, no longer cloaked by fear but illuminated with wonder."
The chapter goes on to share a short, but emotional dream Dawn had about a neglected and abused pony. I was moved to tears as I recognized once again that part of me that had suffered abuse as a young child.
She encourages us to ask these questions: "What is battered, damaged, abandoned, sick, or starved for attention within my self? What small, sad being is at last acknowledged as we open our arms to hold and love it? With care and attention, what might it become?"
While exploring the deeper recesses of our psyche is not always easy, it's that deeper presence that Dawn speaks to that is the reward and once experienced changes us in a profound way.
From sharing the well-researched mythology and folklore and the origins of how many animals came to be deemed as “bad or evil,” plus meditations and simple, but powerful exercises, Dawn eloquently shows us how we can not only heal our wounds - a.ka. our shadow - but how we can also awaken and expand in the truth and bring back into the light the brilliant teachings of the Animal Kingdom.
And so Dawn's new book, "Shadow Animals," and the many years she has devoted to the extensive work and understanding of the animal world, I see as an exquisite gift and a wake-up call to our world at this crucial juncture.
The first step then is acknowledging we each have work to do. Then get yourself a copy of this book, take notes, do the exercises, and open yourself to the treasure that acknowledging our shadow is a way to deepen into a more peaceful place within. Most of all, welcome in the animals and share your fears and unhealed stories with them. They are waiting with the utmost love to guide us home to the heart of who we truly are.
So as I wind my way back to the lyrics that looped through my mind, I see "Me and My Shadow" along with the deeply insightful wisdom shared in Dawn's brilliant new book, "Shadow Animals" as an invitation. An invitation to not fear our shadow, but instead befriend it, acknowledge it, integrate it, and dance in the wonder of it.
For the well-being of humans, animals, and the planet, I highly recommend this book as a way forward to living with more love and compassion not only for ourselves but for all beings.
In part the lyrics are:
“Me and my shadow
Strollin' down the avenue
Me and my shadow
Not a soul to tell our troubles to.”
In the thought-provoking and timely book, “Shadow Animals” by Dawn Brunke, the line “not a soul to tell our troubles to” brought forth a whole new meaning and expanded my love yet again for the animal world for all the wisdom and guidance they've provided me over the years.
It has been a deeply rewarding experience to have healed aspects of my shadow self because of the gentle, caring, and at times, loving persistence of the Animal Kingdom - especially those animals I held some fear about.
So it was an honor to be asked to take part in the chapter on arachnophobia and test a series of questions that Dawn developed that would help uncover clues about my angst about Spider. What it revealed and the insight that bubbled to the surface ushered in a welcome layer of healing!
As we continue to move through these challenging times of divisiveness and fear, it has become clear that the ones we really need to tell our troubles to are ourselves. That which triggers us and causes us pain or angst is an opportunity to go within and heal those shadow aspects of ourselves. We are the ones we’ve been waiting for!
And the animals - especially those we fear– called shadow animals – are the ones who can expand us in profound ways. They are here and waiting to walk lovingly beside us and inspire and encourage us to do the inner work to heal individually so that we may heal on a collective level also.
Dawn writes: “Shadow animals are unique teachers that can help us find and better understand the lost and wounded pieces of ourselves of which we are not fully aware. Some hold clues to repressed memories of trauma or abuse. Some are guides, helping us to explore the puzzling or guarded aspects of our psyche.”
Reading this book I found myself reaching for my Post-it™ note tabs over and over again, marking many passages that resonated, deeply moved me, or invited me to contemplate further. One such paragraph is from the chapter intriguingly titled, "Nightmare."
Dawn says, "To consciously meet our nightmare invokes a deepened relationship between Shadow and self. What we find when we face our fears is often surprising. For beyond the face of fear we encounter a deeper presence. There, in the dark mirror, we see ourselves. Previously misunderstood aspects of who we are gaze back at us, no longer cloaked by fear but illuminated with wonder."
The chapter goes on to share a short, but emotional dream Dawn had about a neglected and abused pony. I was moved to tears as I recognized once again that part of me that had suffered abuse as a young child.
She encourages us to ask these questions: "What is battered, damaged, abandoned, sick, or starved for attention within my self? What small, sad being is at last acknowledged as we open our arms to hold and love it? With care and attention, what might it become?"
While exploring the deeper recesses of our psyche is not always easy, it's that deeper presence that Dawn speaks to that is the reward and once experienced changes us in a profound way.
From sharing the well-researched mythology and folklore and the origins of how many animals came to be deemed as “bad or evil,” plus meditations and simple, but powerful exercises, Dawn eloquently shows us how we can not only heal our wounds - a.ka. our shadow - but how we can also awaken and expand in the truth and bring back into the light the brilliant teachings of the Animal Kingdom.
And so Dawn's new book, "Shadow Animals," and the many years she has devoted to the extensive work and understanding of the animal world, I see as an exquisite gift and a wake-up call to our world at this crucial juncture.
The first step then is acknowledging we each have work to do. Then get yourself a copy of this book, take notes, do the exercises, and open yourself to the treasure that acknowledging our shadow is a way to deepen into a more peaceful place within. Most of all, welcome in the animals and share your fears and unhealed stories with them. They are waiting with the utmost love to guide us home to the heart of who we truly are.
So as I wind my way back to the lyrics that looped through my mind, I see "Me and My Shadow" along with the deeply insightful wisdom shared in Dawn's brilliant new book, "Shadow Animals" as an invitation. An invitation to not fear our shadow, but instead befriend it, acknowledge it, integrate it, and dance in the wonder of it.
For the well-being of humans, animals, and the planet, I highly recommend this book as a way forward to living with more love and compassion not only for ourselves but for all beings.
January 8, 2026
This is a very special book. It helps us connect with our inner selves, the part that speaks to us in dreams and whispers to us in the darkness; the part that we want to shut away and pretend does not exist. The principle of projection is widely understood in psychology. In this book, Dawn helps us to see the ways in which we project our fears and other challenging emotions. In doing so, she invites us to open the cellar in which we have locked those feelings and bring healing and light to them. This is beyond self help, it is deep wisdom.
You can watch Dawn discussing Shadow Animals here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3SuIX...
You can watch Dawn discussing Shadow Animals here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3SuIX...
January 31, 2023
She was a great guest on my Linda Mackenzie Show -- I f you want to hear the interviews here is the link My Archive Page
It will be up for 3 months!
It will be up for 3 months!
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