Ep541: Throwback To Ep195: What Kind Of Animal Are You?

Oct 22, 2026

Explore animal medicine as a spiritual practice, from lifetime animal totems to meaningful encounters with turkeys, salmon, otters, badgers, skunks, and deer. Discover how heightened animal senses, card rituals, and everyday wildlife sightings can become invitations to reflect, find direction, and connect more deeply with the natural world.

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INSIGHT

Animals Carry Lessons From The Living World

Native American animal medicine views each animal as carrying a distinct purpose, history, and lesson.
This tradition treats animals as teachers within humanity’s broader connection to nature and the planet.

INSIGHT

Animals Sense Danger Before Humans Do

Animals may detect environmental danger through sensitivity to pressure, vibration, frequencies, and other subtle signals.
Jim Fortin connects animals’ survival instincts with the broader nonphysical sensing humans also possess.

ANECDOTE

Annual Totems Turned Animal Cards Into Lessons

Jim Fortin’s group drew annual animal cards, treating each selected animal as that year’s lesson and focus.
Participants chose freely from a shuffled deck, then repeated the practice each year.

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Are You A Turkey, Otter, Badger, Skunk, or Something Else? In all my time doing the podcast I’m surprised that I’ve never talked in depth about “Animal Medicine.” So, here you go. I was introduced to “Animal Medicine” two decades ago and I have consistently used it over the years for healing and guidance. Many of the students in my transformational program initially had not heard of it and when they start using it they become surprised at the true guidance it can help us within life.

In this episode, I talk about how to use Animal Medicine and I share the various engagements I have had over the years and what that has done for me. Almost all of us humans have heard, “We’re all connected” and for most of us, it’s hard to get our mind around that. Let’s go further and it’s not just us people that are connected, all consciousness on the planet is - and that includes the animals.

Animals can be incredible guides as they each have different abilities than humans and they are amazing at providing life wisdom/guidance if you just observe and learn from them. I mean, heck, your dog alone, if you have a dog. What could you learn from your dog? Specifically, most of us look at the fact that our dogs are absolutely happy all the time, even when they don’t feel well they most often wag their tails.

There is so much to learn from life and in particular the animals and I dig into it in this episode. I talk about the meanings of certain animals that cross your paths and I talk about your lifetime animal totem and that’s what I mean in the headline, “What kind of animal are you?”

Transformational Takeaway Let the animals in your life be your guide to higher wisdom, knowledge, and guidance.

Mentioned Resources Medicine Cards

Disclosure: Some of the links above are affiliate links, meaning, at no additional cost to you, I will earn a small commission if you make a purchase.

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With gratitude,

Jim