Stephanie Stephan: Hello, welcome to Purrs, Barks and tweets with love. My name is Stephanie Stephan and this is a podcast for animal lovers. of all kinds, all species, ⁓ they are all special and they all have stories to tell. ⁓ I would love to talk about elephants. ⁓ though I am not surrounded by elephants where I live, I am looking forward to spending some time with them in the future in an elephant sanctuary. I will make it a point to make a visit and spend time with them. Get to know them better up close. And why did I pick elephants to talk about today? I don't have a specific story to tell, however... I want to point out how special they are because perhaps we look at them from the perspective of, yes, there is another species of animals roaming the earth. And yes, they're pretty big animals and maybe that's all we think about. And I want to shift that perspective and bring to light some of the qualities the elephants have that we as humans, we perhaps could consider adopting in our day to day lives so that we can be a better version of ourselves. One of the qualities of the elephants is empathy. They are a matriarchal society. They follow a female leader who will point the direction of water and food and the entire herd follows the female leader. That says a lot about trust. It says a lot about having that sense of unity and not always have a male to dominate but a female to lead. It's different. The dynamics within the herd are completely different if a female is the one setting the path as if it is a male that is imposing the path. And whether we are female or male or non-binary, perhaps what we can extract out of that quality from the elephants is that... that sense of community, that sense of oneness does not have to be dictated by any type of dominance. It can be influenced through leadership, which is what the female elephant does. But empathy does not stay there. That's not the only quality that they have where they show empathy. Because as female leaders, they are taking care of the young, they are taking care of their elderly. But in addition to that, they are also taking care of the departed ones. Any elephant that has passed, for whatever reason, will be taken to an elephant sanctuary. And it is a ritual that the entire herd does in order to honor the ones who are already passed. That is absolutely outstanding. What a great way to pay respects to the ones that have been part of their life, to the ones that have been part of their community, to those that have been their family, their friends for many years, because the life of an elephant can be up to 70 years in the wild if they are not killed, of course, for their ivory, which is something we can mention later, by the way. But having that female leadership brings a lot of empathy. into how they live and it doesn't stop at taking care of the young and the elders it also continues with honoring the departed ones and it is such a beautiful thought to know elephants have these deep emotions and have this deep respect for others ⁓ and they care of each other ⁓ whether they alive or dead ⁓ I love that about elephants. Perhaps we can learn a little bit about, we can be more empathic in our day to day lives. Perhaps we can consider the elephants as an example of how can we pay respects to others a little bit more? How can we honor others? It is just beautiful. Did you know? Elephants are the counterpart of the whales on earth. And let me explain that a little bit more. Whales communicate the through whale songs. ⁓ is vibration that send through the ripples of the water. ⁓ and other whales and other locations can hear. They also use the echolocation, which we are pretty familiar with, to identify the whereabouts of objects or other animals that are in the water. It is fascinating. The way they navigate through life is completely different from the way that we navigate through ours. Elephants, similarly, they use seismic communication, which is a vibration that they sense on the ground and they are able to communicate through it at long distances with other elephants and other animals. That is fascinating. Who says that we need to have? human words to communicate a message. When we have vibration, echolocation, and songs to actually communicate through different elements, through the water and through the earth, elephants in particular use that seismic communication. ⁓ particular ⁓ example is ⁓ the vibration on the ground. ⁓ I find that fascinating. You know, as humans, we walk around all the time. using our limbs. Have we ever stopped for a second to realize that we can communicate through the vibration that we create on the ground so that somebody else somewhere else can pick up that vibration and understand that's our signature movement and that's us coming? Amazing, right? Just to think about that they are able to do that and we are using the ground as ⁓ our to ⁓ to transport ourselves from one place to the next and we do not use that at all but elephants do amazing another trait of the elephants that I would like to point out is their sense of strength of course it comes with their size it's part of their nature they are the largest mammal there is on earth And what does that mean? Really? They are walking... They can actually run very fast. After 25-30 miles per hour, actually. That's pretty fast. ⁓ strength, ⁓ size... There something ⁓ to... with... ⁓ is... in those moments when we feel weak. when we feel that we are falling apart, in those moments when we need to hold on to something to give us strength, to anchor us because we feel like we are just falling into pieces. Something that is the closest to having a rock to hold on to so that we can weather whatever storm in life we are going through. If we can just for a second visualize the strength of an elephant and just connect with that essence, that spirit of the elephant, perhaps we can some of that strength ⁓ that it can help get through storm ⁓ with a bit ⁓ more grace. That is quality that we can learn from the elephants ⁓ is ⁓ that and that unity, empathy. the respect for one another. in so doing, we become better human beings. It's not a competition, it's not about being better than anyone else, it's just about self growth. Can we be just a little bit better than we were yesterday? Can we just learn a little bit better the lessons that we have in front of us so that we don't have to go through the same lesson all over again? when we need strength and we don't know where to turn, perhaps we can think of the elephant ⁓ capture some of that strength from that essence they have. ⁓ we can feel more empowered ⁓ and a bit stronger to get through it all. ⁓ that is why I chose to talk about elephants today. I hope you can see elephants from a different perspective now. Perhaps you admire them a little bit more. Perhaps you appreciate them a little bit more. perhaps you can even feel curious and intrigued about learning more about how magnificent these animals are and what other qualities we can learn from them. Until the next time, would suggest you ⁓ love animals, these beautiful creatures, to never anything is made out of ivory ⁓ because ⁓ that one the main reasons they are being killed today. they are being killed in the wild illegally ⁓ brutally, by the way. perhaps if we ⁓ admire ⁓ we will a point of not supporting anything that has to do with any part of their body that is being sold. if you'd like to hear stories about animals, ⁓ all means, I invite you to check out my book, The Path to Unconditional Love. ⁓ can be found anywhere online. ⁓ explain ⁓ all of stories about different animals ⁓ that also bring a little of wisdom that can help us be better human beings. Until then... Be kind to others, most especially be to all animals. I will to you next week. ⁓