Cow Consciousness
An Interview through Sharon Callahan
by Sun Mi Kim
Our relationship with cows is complex. After years of exploiting this species for its milk and meat, most of our society has allowed the droning echoes of such long-held practices to dull our sensitivity for these living, thinking creatures. We may become outraged at the extinction of birds, frown at the mistreatment of cats and dogs – but how many of us extend our sympathies to cows? Cows and steer provide what is considered the staple meat for many humans. So much so that rain forests are being cleared at alarming rates to make room for ranches to raise them. And while we don’t often like to think of it, our treatment of them in the name of profit and efficiency has created tremendous horrors for these beings – these feeling, wise beings who are very much our equals. Before the outbreaks of Mad-Cow Disease which has brought certain ranching practices to public light, very little has been known about how these animals are treated. It has been a welcome ignorance – we simply did not want to know. Yet if we are to increase our understanding of our interrelatedness with all things in our journey back to Oneness, we must now open our eyes to everything that we have perpetrated. The transgressions of one is the burden of us all – it takes only passive allowance for a crime to be committed. This interview is done directly with the group consciousness of the cows through Sharon Callahan, an animal communicator. The answers to these questions have surprised me. As another living creature, I’ve been appalled; as a mother, heartbroken. Please listen and read with your heart. As difficult and painful as it is to become conscious of these things, it is also liberating and expanding. And what aches we feel are merely the growing pains of an emerging heart.
Q: Were cows meant to provide humans with milk? Is this one of the purposes of your existence?
A: No. No species is put on the Earth to be exploited by another. You have lost your power. You are meant to provide your own offspring with milk. Our milk is meant for our children. The qualities of milk of different species are specifically suited to those species and carry not only physical nourishment but information from the collective consciousness of the species from which it originates. There are circumstances in which a sharing can occur for the benefit of all. We joyfully give of our milk in such circumstances. There have been human women who nursed baby animals. If such sharing is done in love and reverence it is blessed. In very early times (Lemurian) as humans and animals began to explore being closer, we did share our milk consciously and with great joy, but the taking and receiving of our milk was sacramental in nature. We were tenderly cared for, brushed, bathed, adorned. There was an understanding that in order for the milk to be nourishing, great love and care had to be extended to the animals from which it was taken. We were communicated with tenderly which created an alchemy, making our milk suitable for human consumption in small quantities. During this time bees were kept in the same sacred way and their honey used for medicinal purposes in sacramental ceremonies. All things and beings are composed of energy. The energy that goes 
into something is the energy that comes out. Without a sacred relationship between human beings and cows our milk has become not only un-nourishing to you, but poisonous. Our milk was never meant to substitute for your own milk in nourishing your children – only as a supplement to your own in small quantities or as sacramental gesture between species. Human beings are suffering from excessiveness. Too much of everything with too little thought. When you stray from sacred relationship with us, our milk becomes a poison unto you. Nothing of the sacredness of the old times remains today. We are forced to give many, many times more milk in a day than is natural for us. We are kept pregnant to accomplish this and our children are taken from us sometimes shortly after birth and raised for meat and many other innocents are slaughtered before they even have a chance to experience the world.
Q: And just for the record: as humans became omnivores, eating meat as well as plant life, was it part of your contract with humanity to offer your flesh for our consumption?
A: The only contract is a contract to teach and to learn love. No creature wants to be killed and eaten. All creatures seek life, happiness and freedom from fear. Our contract with you has to do with teaching the lessons of love and compassion and how love and compassion relate to health and wellbeing. It is your species’ choice to take the path of greed, excess and ill health. The lesson is being learnt.
Q: In the past, cow’s milk has been thought of as one of the most nourishing substances humans could consume. Recently, however, more and more people (particularly children) have been developing rather severe allergies to dairy products. Can you give us insight into this?
A: Our milk was never meant to substitute for your own milk for your own offspring. As you stray further from sacred relationship with us our milk becomes poison…filled with the energies and vibrations of greed and ego as well as poisons that you feed us which are carried in our milk. We are forced to keep producing offspring who are taken to slaughter. How nourishing can our milk be when we suffer not only from lack of sacred relationship to you, but suffer as well knowing the fate of our children. Our milk is filled with grief. And you are failing to nourish your own children either physically or spiritually. Your children need nourishment from you. You are failing to teach your children to be nourished through the other senses. Sight, hearing touch, smell and light. You have come to put too much emphasis on physical nourishment through food. You have lost touch with the more important forms of nourishment. As you return to an understanding of nourishment on a spiritual level you will need far less food than you now believe, your species will return to health, and you will come into right relationship with other creatures. Your children suffer greatly from not being nourished directly by your own bodies and not being taught to derive nourishment directly from the life force present around you at all times.
Q: Do you have a sense of how your grief (which is poured into the milk humans ingest) is affecting humans?
A: All things are vibrational. The vibration of grief permeates our milk making it as a poison for you. . . a poison for your spirits as much as your bodies. When you ingest our milk such as it is, you carry the vibration of grief and suffering in your bodies and spirits.
Q: Are humans meant to be sustained primarily by the life force that you earlier mentioned, by what some call Prana? Is the mere sight of beauty truly nourishing to our physical forms?
A: Yes, beauty in all forms is nourishing to your physical forms. You have regresses into a dense state of materialistic existence from the eating and overeating of what you now perceive to be food. To return to an ability to be sustained on more vibrational nourishment is something of a process. It is not a matter of being sustained on prana or beauty alone. Nourishing oneself from the fruits of Earth is one of the great joys of living and allows the fruits and nuts of the trees and plants to reap the benefit of your partaking of their offerings. It is all a matter of getting back to a more rarified experience of Earth life one in which each morsel of food or beauty is relished, blessed and honored, each meeting with another being is cherished as a sacred meeting.
Q: As we have domesticated cows and steer, your species has appeared in many places on the earth including places that you are not indigenous to, like the rainforests. Is there a specific place on Earth, and no other, that you were meant to inhabit?
A: We are able to adjust to many habitats as we have lived in close relationship with human beings for so many eons. We are an important element in many different landscapes. When well cared for we offer a sacred image of contentedness, gentleness and motherliness which is beneficial to all who see us. Humans forget that nourishment can come by way of sacred imagery and that it is possible to be nourished through our eyes by an image of motherliness and tenderness.
Q: In some traditions, cows are held in reverence. Myths exist speaking of your mystical nurturing nature, and in many places in India your species is venerated. Can you give us some insight into the origins of these?
A: All beings should be held in reverence. Cows embody the divine feminine…the giving, the nourishing, the receptive aspects of the Divine. Our bodies (dairy cows) are the epitome of femaleness. We should be revered for the divine qualities that we represent as should all other creatures be revered for the divine qualities which they represent.
Q: Is our exploitation of your species, then, representative of our exploitation of the Divine Feminine? Can you name specific practices that humans can enact to restore reverence for cows and for the Divine Mother?
A: Yes, it would be our observation that your exploitation of us is a reflection of your denial of the Divine Feminine in yourselves and your exploitation of the Divine Feminine in all things. The degradation of the feminine spills over into your interactions with each other and all of nature. Misuse, overuse, disrespect of the feminine aspect of animals, nature, Earth and yourselves. If you dishonor the feminine in yourselves you cannot honor it in other beings. Only through cultivating a respectful relationship with the sacred feminine can you alter your disastrous attitude of dissociation from nature and your own bodies and spirits and generate instead the compassion needed to reverse the course of destruction you have set for yourselves, all beings and Earth. In order to return to a relationship of respect for 
the Divine Feminine you must be willing to feel the pain you have inflicted on other human beings, animals and nature. It is only through feeling the pain of other beings that healing can begin. When a woman gives birth there is pain. The pain must be accepted for the birth to occur. In order for you to birth a new relationship with yourselves, other beings and the Earth, you must be willing to go through the pain. Your species has been in denial of the pain it has inflicted on other beings. To come into a loving, transforming relationship you must drop the denial and face the pain. It can’t be glossed over it must be faced directly. The outcome of facing the pain will be the salvation of Earth.
Q: What do you envision as the “perfect” relationship with humans?
A: One of sacredness and love and mutual nourishment.
Q: Barbarous practices among some ranchers have been pointed to as being the physical cause of Mad-Cow Disease. Can you name specific spiritual and/or energetic causes for this disease?
A: All diseases originate in the mind of man – within his own distorted thinking. Our species act as a mirror of your own thinking. You are being driven mad by greed and exploitation of other species and Earth itself. We are being driven “mad” by your treatment and exploitation of us and over the loss of our children.
Q: What are the greatest concerns that you have right now? And are there any that we have not mentioned yet?
A: We do not desire to make you or your children sick. We are very distressed that we are being made a part of your diminished health. You have enslaved us into participating in your demise just as the horses were enlisted to carry you into war as you killed one another. It is much the same. Please think on these things. We are very troubled by this.
Q: Were you meant to have human caretakers? Should you be allowed to roam free the way buffalo once roamed the plains?
A: In the true meaning of the word “to take care,” yes. We should all take care of one another. Animals take care of human beings in many ways. When human beings domesticate a species, they take on responsibility for that species. In a sense you have created our bodies to be dependent on you. As we are, we cannot survive roaming free. You have created a situation of dependence. We must return to sacred relationship with one another which would include a cessation of breeding us to the extent that you do and an allowance of our bodies returning to a more natural state.
Q: Most of us are so lost in the practices of our time. Can you give us some specific ideas as to how we can return you to a more natural state, especially as you mentioned that (at least at this time) you require human caretaking for continued survival?
A: Enjoy the simple beauties of life – the sun and moon and stars. The beautiful sights of the world will nourish you and you will find over time that you need little more than these simple pleasures. Be brave enough to face the pain that arises when you begin to connect intimately with other beings and nature. Walk on Earth with consciousness. Remember that all things have consciousness and deserve your respect and reverence. It is not difficult to return to a more natural state. It is a choice that can be made in any moment. In any moment you can be reborn. You can start again – just choose a life of simplicity, love, harmony and beauty. It is that easy. If you do this all of nature will rejoice and will reflect such love back to you as you cannot now imagine. When this begins to happen you will no longer be greedy. You will no longer over-consume the bounty of the Earth and balance will be restored.
Q: For now, what can your caretakers do to help alleviate the stresses that your species are facing?
A: It is a difficult mess you have created. It requires a shift in consciousness that most of you are unwilling to move into at this time. Perhaps the lesson will only be learned as your species becomes more and more ill from partaking of our milk and our bodies. As you stop exploiting us for the perceived benefits gained from doing so a natural balance will be restored. It is not for ourselves alone that we say these things. Exploitation of Mother Earth is harming you in many ways.
Q: Any last thoughts or other issues you’d like to address?
A: Treating one another with love, compassion, and sacredness is the solution to all difficulty.
Ref: Sharon Callahan’s site: http://www.anaflora.com/ : “Sharon Callahan is a writer, photographer, internationally recognized animal communication specialist and leading pioneer in the use of flower essences for the treatment of animals.
“Although Sharon’s ability to communicate with animals has been with her from childhood, a near-death experience in 1987 enhanced her ability to communicate with animals telepathically, giving her a deep understanding of the role of animals in the spiritual lives of human beings. This experience led to the creation of the Anaflora flower essences for animals, the first flower essences made exclusively for the animal kingdom. Since that time Sharon has pioneered the use of flower essences in the treatment of animals.”
All Creatures LARGE & small 