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Today I want to write about FEAR.

For the major part of my life I did not grasp the importance of fear in my life and in our society.

When it became clear to me what kind of grip fear had on me, I realized it were dogs who had opened my eyes and my heart.

Over the last 17 years I have been helping dog loving people in their (inharmonious) relationships with their pets. Thousands of times I have heard dog owners say things like : I am(was) afraid that…, or,  I am(was) worried that….

For many years I did not pay attention to the specific significance of these expressions. In the English language, almost any sentence can begin with: I am afraid that….

Living in London in the eighties I even thought that the use of the expression I am afraid that… gave the person speaking a sophisticated, cute, elegant or even high bow and stylish air. But, although I started using it myself I never got the knack of it.

Having started my work as a dog listener I paid more and more attention to my clients who were (and are using) the expression I am afraid that…

I paid more attention because in many cases I could see the reality of the fear in their eyes, their faces, their body language and in their behaviour with dogs. I did not see persons wanting to give themselves a sophisticated air. I saw persons who were (are) really suffering.

Must I now explain to you that dogs can read and feel this fear in their owners too?

No, of course not.

You must know that dogs can read, feel and notice it much clearer and faster than I do.

Dogs know very clearly that fear creates a weak energy.

Why?

Because dogs are born hunters.

Hunters have to chase and kill a prey before they can eat it.

Do you think that a prey running for its life is full of fear or not?

Of course it is and the members of a pack of canines chasing a fearful prey are delighted by the prospect of turning that prey into a meal.

Let’s leave the pack eat their prey and return to human beings and what fear means to us.

Since I got involved with the ManKindProject I became conscious of the role fear played in my life. Personally I was especially plagued by fear of failure, fear of poverty and fear of not being good enough. When I started accepting these feelings of fear, it began to loose its grip on my behaviour. The result was that I was not ruled anymore by fear on an unconscious level. I could accept fear as a positive force within my life.

I discovered that feeling fear is positive but that ALWAYS feeling fear is debilitating. I will give you a few examples.

If I am afraid that driving past a red traffic light can cause an accident, then what I am feeling is good fear.

If I am afraid that confronting a hungry lioness in the bush represents real danger for me, it will make me stay away from such a confrontation. That is good fear.

If my being afraid of falling of a cliff prevents me from doing silly things in the mountains, that good feeling of fear will save my life.

Instead of continuing to give more similar examples I am assuming that you understand what I mean. You do understand it? I mean that fear is in many ways a very good safeguard of my life.

But if I ALWAYS feel fear when approaching a red traffic light, if I ALWAYS think of hungry lionesses, even when I am in my living room, if I ALWAYS see myself walking on the edge of cliffs, then this feeling of fear is putting me constantly under stress. This stress is turning my muscles into stiff and painful shields against…yes against what? Mostly against feelings of  fear for situations that never happen but only exist in my mind; In my imagination. In our Western society the feelings of stress are so strong in many people that our bodies loose all the essential minerals ( the building blocks of our bodies) resulting in a very weak immune system. As soon as our immune system is weak we cannot protect ourselves against infections, starting from a simple cold to very serious diseases. This is not happening in our imagination. This is real.

Well, are you thinking: What is happening now? Why is this man who calls himself a doglistener writing about fear?

Well, as long as I was under the unconscious spell of my fearful feelings I was always negating I had these feelings. So, I can accept it when fearful and stressful persons are saying that they are not afraid and not stressed. Yes, I can accept that although I do not believe it.

Our dogs accept it too.

They look at their owner, see the fear and feel the weak energy. In addition to that they have to endure the spoiling behaviour of many owners and their conclusion is:

I CANNOT RESPECT THIS PERSON NOR CAN I ACCEPT HER/HIM AS MY LEADER.

It reminds me of my point regarding dog training classes.

If a person full of unconscious fear and stress takes her/his dog to dog training classes, the result will in many cases be nothing, nada, niente, rien du tout, nichts, niks.

Because dog training classes do not tend to deal with human stress. In many case they even produce more stress for the persons and the dogs involved. Because the person is feeling the fear of failure, the fear of not being good enough and the dog is not accepting the leadership of her/his weak owner.

On the other hand if I create a stress-free opportunity, like in my walking group, people and dogs will FEEL the difference.

The first time when a member of my walking group told me that walking her dog with me was some kind of therapy for her, I was amazed.

Today I am still pleasantly surprised when people tell me similar things. Since that first time many more walkers have told me how they got rid of their fears while walking in my Sunday morning dog walking group. They are not afraid anymore their dog will run off, being bitten or bite other dogs and/or persons. Some even come to grips with traumas that have been haunting them for decades. Like the lady who told me this: As a young girl I have been bitten by a big dog. For the major part of my life I felt terrorized by every big dog that came close to me. Here I am walking with you amidst more than thirty dogs without a leash and I feel fine. If someone would have told me that a few months ago I would have laughed and said that I would never do such a thing. Thank you so much for your walks.

My answer was: Thank you very much for being so open and honest to me but I say thank you to the dogs. They are my teachers. They helped me getting to grips with my own fears.

Do you want to tell me something about your fears?

Write to me on brunosdogs@gmail.com.

I will be delighted to read your message.

Kindest regards from Brunothedoglistener.

Well-educated dogs are stable dogs.

Stable dogs have stable owners.

www.brunodogs.com

00 34 690 19 29 76

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Around this time, Yves Leterme is being sworn in as Prime Minister of my home country. What a disgrace! He won the elections in June of 2007, almost two and a half years ago. He then tried to form a government, in which he did not succeed. He needed help from his predecessors, who solved the political crisis that was caused by him, in order to become Prime Minister for the first time somewhere in March of 2008. Leterme was Prime Minister of Belgium until December of last year, when he was forced to resign due to the Fortis scandal, the Belgian bank that was sold by his government to the French. Herman Van Rompuy then became Prime Minister, and worked silently during the past couple of months.

Somewhere during the last summer, he became Minister of Foreign Affaires, until last week, Herman Van Rompuy was chosen to become the first President of the European Union. A very capable politician moves on to Europe, only to be succeeded by the most incapable politician throughout the Belgian political history.

By having him back, Belgium is cruising directly towards another political crisis, a crisis not seen before in Belgian history. Leterme is not capable of running the country, that’s a fact. He has lied to parliament, he has lied to the Belgian people and he has won the elections in 2007 by promissing irrealistic promisses. People like him do not deserve a second chance.

But apparently, some Belgian politicians do not agree with this, and are giving him a second chance. I can only hope it’ll be the last one.

I don’t have the capabilities to look into the future, but I don’t give it a lot of time before his second government will fall. A time-frame? Let’s say Eastern of 2010 to end this new government, followed by new elections in June of next year…

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My home country Belgium has made a fool of itself one more time in front of the rest of the world. Not only has my country more ministers than any other country in the world, with more governments than a country as China for example (and there are only about ten and a half million people living in Belgium). There are the “peaceful fights” between the Flemish speaking in the North and the French speaking in the South (I always call myself a “Dutch speaking Belgian” as I hate the separation between the two regions) and as a result of this, there are various “Flemish authorities” who think of themselves that they are very, very important. The people working over there have egos which are almost rising as high as the Mount Everest.

What has happened? Two professional tennis players, Yanina Wickmayer (WTA-18) and Xavier Malisse (ATP-95) have been suspended to compete during the next year because they have forgotten to fill out their whereabouts as the WADA always expects every athlete in the world to do so. The ban is effective immediately, and lasts until November 4th of 2010. They have been suspended by the “Flemish Doping Court”. This means that Yanina Wickmayer has to stop immediately to compete at the B-Masters in Bali where she started yesterday. The only thing they can do is go into higher appeal at the International Sports Tribunal, TAS in Switzerland.

Wickmayer (20) made three times a mistake against the system of the whereabouts, which every athlete in the world has to fill out. Malisse (29) failed in filling them out twice, and missed one doping controle. They have not tested positive, but according to the rules, three offences is the same as one positive test.

They both have a logical explanation for their mistakes. Wickmayer said that the password to log in didn’t work, and the registered mail that was sent to warn her arrived while she was competing somewhere abroad. Malisse says that he couldn’t fill out the details because he didn’t have internet in the hotels where he was staying and on the tournaments where he was competing. And he forgot to tell the WADA that he was going to stay in the States instead of participating at Roland Garros in Paris where he was invited to have a doping test done.

So far the rules. Rules which are pretty insane in the first place. WADA expects every athlete to tell them where they are going to be, on each and every hour of each and every day, for the next three months. I don’t even know where I will be tomorrow or Saturday. I only know that I will be in Canada next week, but don’t ask me where I will be next Tuesday or Wednesday afternoon. Somewhere in the greater Toronto area, that’s the only thing I know. So I honestly believe it’s against the human rights to ask every athlete to fill these details out in a system that is pretty difficult to handle in the first place. And don’t forget that a lot of professional athletes are not amongst the most intelligent people anyhow (but don’t get me wrong, I don’t know Wickmayer nor Malisse personally, so I don’t know about them).

But again, this tiny little region in Western Europe which is called Flanders has got an organisation that wants to be more catholic than the Pope. For once we have an excellent talent coming up (after Justine Henin and Kim Clijsters - who both are returning to professional tennis again), the Flemish anti-doping authorities are just ruining two magnificent careers of two young athletes.

The Flemish should become a little more chauvinistic and take a look South of the Belgian border. I’m giving only one example: the French have tested the French professional cycling teams on average three times less than they tested the foreign cycling teams.

When things like this happen, I am not proud to be a Belgian. As a matter of fact, I feel deeply ashamed to be a Dutch speaking Belgian today…

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Sitting on board this TAP-Flight which is taking me from Amsterdam back home to Portugal, I can’t stop thinking of you Erik, my friend. Yesterday, your family and friends said goodbye to you. Your spirit was amongst us, while your body was still in Saudi-Arabia where you died so unexpectedly. Karin, your beloved wife told me that you are going to be repatriated today, probably at this very moment. So we might both be 35000 feet up in the sky, me flying south, while your body is going home up north.

We all cried because you are no longer with us, we all laughed because the memories we all have from you will never be forgotten. We were angry because of the injustice, we were thankfull because we had known you.

Speechless, that’s what I am right now. It just makes no sense. It doesn’t feel right, knowing that we will never hear your voice, hear your laughter again.

Erik, you have always been a very special person. You were always ready, on time, whenever or wherever we were supposed to meet. But yesterday, at your remembrance service, your “funeral”, it struck me, as it struck some of our mutual friends that your body was not present. As if you wanted to make a statement that somebody had made a terrable mistake by calling you out of this life far too soon and that you did not agree with that. Your “funeral” was certainly the only one I have been to where the deceased person was not present. As I already said, you were a very special person, even after your death, yes indeed.

Erik, whenever you found out that one of your friends was facing a problem, you only needed two words: “Where?” and “When?”. You couldn’t wait to meet with your friends to help solve their problem! That was typical for you. No mountain was too high, no obstacle too difficult, no bridge too long. You simply would not rest until you had found a solution.

Knowing that you have lived your life to the fullest, realising that you sucked everything out of each and every minute, out of each and every second of your life only brings little relief. Although you have lived through enough experiences and adventures to fill up three lifes, and thus it seems to me like you have lived for 138 years instead of 46, it also brings little relief.

Peter Melders, one of our mutual friends stated it perfectly during his speech yesterday: “We can only assume that the one who has called you out of this life must have had a serious reason for having done so. Otherwise, you will be making a lot of trouble up there!“.

Erik, thank you for having been my friend. To me, it sure was an honour and a privilege to have been one of yours.

Farewell my friend…

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