Martha Norwalk
Interview By Lainie Farmer
About
This is how Martha describes herself on her website, MarthaNorwalk.com:
Martha teaches and practices the art of inter-species telepathic communication — the ability to relay visual images between animal and human — as a means of exchanging thoughts and feelings with our animal-friends. It is a practice that produces a great deal of controversy but, at the same time, results in a profound bond between human and animal. This is, of course, in addition to her ability to draw upon a wealth of knowledge and experience in the raising, training, caring, and healing of a variety of animals over a 25-year career as a vet-tech and animal behavior consultant.
Martha teaches and practices the art of inter-species telepathic communication — the ability to relay visual images between animal and human — as a means of exchanging thoughts and feelings with our animal-friends. It is a practice that produces a great deal of controversy but, at the same time, results in a profound bond between human and animal. This is, of course, in addition to her ability to draw upon a wealth of knowledge and experience in the raising, training, caring, and healing of a variety of animals over a 25-year career as a vet-tech and animal behavior consultant.
Excerpts from the Interview
Encountering Opposition
Lainie: Do you feel you experience opposition to your profession? Naysayers, or what have you…
Martha: Mmmmm, no, not so much anymore. I don’t attract those types of people. When I first started I wasn’t confident in my ability, which people could intuitively sense. Now I have been in this profession for almost thirty years. I am surrounded by people who understand what I do, and am recommended to people who actually want my help because they know I can help them.
Breeds
Martha: The man who was holding me up on the phone before I came to meet you had called because he had bought a poodle off of the internet and it was causing him all sorts of problems. Never, ever, ever buy an animal off the internet.
L: Why not?
Martha: Because people can sell any old animal on the internet and it doesn’t have any regulations. There aren’t any restrictions for breeding and most of the time people just don’t have the resources to properly breed an animal.
L: So you think it’s acceptable to breed animals?
Martha: Oh, yes! As far as my own animals go, I have six cats and one dog. Five of the cats are Abyssinians and the other is a rescue cat- to cover that base. And my dog is a Golden Retriever. Abyssinians are my breed of cat and Golden Retrievers are my breed of dog. Those are the only two breeds I will have.
“Pet” as a Description
Me: I saw on your website that you don’t call your animals “pets”. What do you call them, or rather, what is your relationship to them?
Martha: No, I don’t call my animals pets. I think that denotes a sense of power or ownership of them. Instead I call them my “friends”, “companions”, and “kids”. I’ve never had children of my own except for a stepson from a previous marriage. So they are definitely my kids. I love them just as much as I would love my kids, if not more. Sometimes I have to call them pets just because there are no other words in that situation that will work for what I am trying to say.
Zoos and Food
Martha: Animals are highly intelligent and intuitive. They recognize that we all live many lives and are willing to volunteer themselves to humans.
Me: What do you mean by “volunteer themselves to humans”?
Martha: Well, look at Keiko. He lived a pretty miserable existence in Sea World, but when he was moved to the place in Portland he was perfectly happy. Then humans started to get involved and they decided he needed to be set free. But nobody asked Keiko if he wanted to be set free. They decided to do what they wanted with him. When he was let go by Iceland or Norway he didn’t live very long because he wanted to be with humans. He was raised by humans and that is who he wanted to spend his life with. That’s what people don’t understand. They have to ask animals if they want to volunteer their lives to us. Sometimes they say no, but lots of the time they do. We are all where we want to be in our lives and humans need to realize that animals come to the earth plane to give their lives to us.
Me: So you are saying animals can be used as tools?
Martha: In a way, yes. But it is because they are giving themselves to us if we ask. It’s okay to eat animals or have them in zoos to look at as long as the animals are asked first. I don’t know how old you are- if you remember this- but, have you heard of what happened with the Macaw Indian tribe and the whales?
Me: Yes, I remember.
Martha: Ok. Well when it came out in the news that they were allowed to hunt whales, I got on my radio show and talked about how bad and evil it is to kill these majestic creatures. Then I went out one time to watch them do it. They performed a ceremony and they prayed for whales to sacrifice themselves and they only took what they needed. I thought it was so beautiful and amazing. Then I realized that I was going to have to go back on my show the next week and tell everyone I was wrong. I pissed off a lot of people, but I really don’t care. I know that animals give themselves for our use.
Lainie: Do you feel you experience opposition to your profession? Naysayers, or what have you…
Martha: Mmmmm, no, not so much anymore. I don’t attract those types of people. When I first started I wasn’t confident in my ability, which people could intuitively sense. Now I have been in this profession for almost thirty years. I am surrounded by people who understand what I do, and am recommended to people who actually want my help because they know I can help them.
Breeds
Martha: The man who was holding me up on the phone before I came to meet you had called because he had bought a poodle off of the internet and it was causing him all sorts of problems. Never, ever, ever buy an animal off the internet.
L: Why not?
Martha: Because people can sell any old animal on the internet and it doesn’t have any regulations. There aren’t any restrictions for breeding and most of the time people just don’t have the resources to properly breed an animal.
L: So you think it’s acceptable to breed animals?
Martha: Oh, yes! As far as my own animals go, I have six cats and one dog. Five of the cats are Abyssinians and the other is a rescue cat- to cover that base. And my dog is a Golden Retriever. Abyssinians are my breed of cat and Golden Retrievers are my breed of dog. Those are the only two breeds I will have.
“Pet” as a Description
Me: I saw on your website that you don’t call your animals “pets”. What do you call them, or rather, what is your relationship to them?
Martha: No, I don’t call my animals pets. I think that denotes a sense of power or ownership of them. Instead I call them my “friends”, “companions”, and “kids”. I’ve never had children of my own except for a stepson from a previous marriage. So they are definitely my kids. I love them just as much as I would love my kids, if not more. Sometimes I have to call them pets just because there are no other words in that situation that will work for what I am trying to say.
Zoos and Food
Martha: Animals are highly intelligent and intuitive. They recognize that we all live many lives and are willing to volunteer themselves to humans.
Me: What do you mean by “volunteer themselves to humans”?
Martha: Well, look at Keiko. He lived a pretty miserable existence in Sea World, but when he was moved to the place in Portland he was perfectly happy. Then humans started to get involved and they decided he needed to be set free. But nobody asked Keiko if he wanted to be set free. They decided to do what they wanted with him. When he was let go by Iceland or Norway he didn’t live very long because he wanted to be with humans. He was raised by humans and that is who he wanted to spend his life with. That’s what people don’t understand. They have to ask animals if they want to volunteer their lives to us. Sometimes they say no, but lots of the time they do. We are all where we want to be in our lives and humans need to realize that animals come to the earth plane to give their lives to us.
Me: So you are saying animals can be used as tools?
Martha: In a way, yes. But it is because they are giving themselves to us if we ask. It’s okay to eat animals or have them in zoos to look at as long as the animals are asked first. I don’t know how old you are- if you remember this- but, have you heard of what happened with the Macaw Indian tribe and the whales?
Me: Yes, I remember.
Martha: Ok. Well when it came out in the news that they were allowed to hunt whales, I got on my radio show and talked about how bad and evil it is to kill these majestic creatures. Then I went out one time to watch them do it. They performed a ceremony and they prayed for whales to sacrifice themselves and they only took what they needed. I thought it was so beautiful and amazing. Then I realized that I was going to have to go back on my show the next week and tell everyone I was wrong. I pissed off a lot of people, but I really don’t care. I know that animals give themselves for our use.
Reflections
Why I chose this topic:
I thought the topic of animal communicators was an interesting topic because there is so little information on them as far as academic writing goes. They aren’t extremely visible in the public sphere and I felt as though their work should be explored. I was wondering how it is that these people were able to communicate with other species, and if they are able to, then why aren’t they more visible to the public, when us humans are still arguing over the idea that animals are a second class species and they can’t reason or feel pain. I was also curious as to what the methods were in communicating with animals, and how the communicators felt about some of the topics we discussed in class.
Surprises/Reflections:
I thought I had gone into this project with an open mind, but because I didn’t hear what I expected, I was disappointed. I expected to be reaching out to a new group of radical thinkers who believe that animals are just as worthy as humans, if not sacred. How else would people in such a profession be interested in it if they did not think that all animals have the ability to live free lives without human intervention? When Martha and I met at the Red Robin in Monroe she ordered a chicken sandwich. I wondered how a person who can communicate with animals could turn around and eat them. During the interview she stated that animals volunteer their lives for our needs and pleasures. I felt that statement was just a coping mechanism to justify our daily actions of using animals as tools. Martha is a very spiritual woman who practices Ananda Yoga, and says animals have so many lives that they don’t have any problems with giving one of their many to humans.
Another disappointing part of the interview was that Martha admits to not actually being able to communicate with animals. She advertises that she can communicate with animals, but she says it is actually her psychic friends who do the communicating. She can talk to the animals, but she does not know what they are saying back. Martha calls herself a behaviorist. She rarely even meets with the animals, but rather, she does phone consultations with their owners instead. She says that in her experience with animals she has been able to predict their actions and dictate them. So instead of meeting with animals to find out the individual reasons why they act the way they do, she can give a general reason for a certain type of behavior, and that is the answer all the time. It seems as though she actually has very little connection with animals, and her practice is more anthropocentric. If a person is accusing their animals of acting in a certain humanlike behavior, it is because the person acts that way and not the animal. She says that nine times out of ten the problem is with the human and not the animal. I feel that this approach wouldn't be so troubling if she was able to redefine her profession. Perhaps instead of saying she is an animal behaviorist, she should say she specializes in human behaviorism which is conducive to training and cohabiting with animals. When she says she is able to communicate with animals she is being very misleading with that language. If Martha is able to communicate with animals, then she should be able to know what they are saying back to us. Because she isn't listening to what they have to say she is anthropomorphizing them. When humans do that to animals they do not give the animals credit for having a free will and a potential. Instead, they are keeping animals in a box of preconceived notions that humans think they already know about animals. As a result, nothing is learned about animals, and their capability to think becomes very limited, therefore preventing humans from understanding how we affect animals and how animals affect us.
Collaborative Effort:
Even though we all did our interviews separately, we collaborated on the questions we would ask and the direction we would take with the information we collected. We all sat together and decided how we would go about collecting data for our project since there was so little of it. We decided that since it would be difficult to get us all together with our varying schedules, we would conduct the interviews separately and report back with important themes after we transcribed them. Since we all had a similar line of questioning, we were able to pull out pertinent topics related to class and put together a project with very important things to say about the field of animal communication. The best thing about our collaboration was that while we were all working toward a common goal, we were still afforded a great deal of autonomy and creative license with our processes. In the end we were all able to add the best parts of our creative process and put together an informative website capable of expressing what we learned about the field of animal communication.
I thought the topic of animal communicators was an interesting topic because there is so little information on them as far as academic writing goes. They aren’t extremely visible in the public sphere and I felt as though their work should be explored. I was wondering how it is that these people were able to communicate with other species, and if they are able to, then why aren’t they more visible to the public, when us humans are still arguing over the idea that animals are a second class species and they can’t reason or feel pain. I was also curious as to what the methods were in communicating with animals, and how the communicators felt about some of the topics we discussed in class.
Surprises/Reflections:
I thought I had gone into this project with an open mind, but because I didn’t hear what I expected, I was disappointed. I expected to be reaching out to a new group of radical thinkers who believe that animals are just as worthy as humans, if not sacred. How else would people in such a profession be interested in it if they did not think that all animals have the ability to live free lives without human intervention? When Martha and I met at the Red Robin in Monroe she ordered a chicken sandwich. I wondered how a person who can communicate with animals could turn around and eat them. During the interview she stated that animals volunteer their lives for our needs and pleasures. I felt that statement was just a coping mechanism to justify our daily actions of using animals as tools. Martha is a very spiritual woman who practices Ananda Yoga, and says animals have so many lives that they don’t have any problems with giving one of their many to humans.
Another disappointing part of the interview was that Martha admits to not actually being able to communicate with animals. She advertises that she can communicate with animals, but she says it is actually her psychic friends who do the communicating. She can talk to the animals, but she does not know what they are saying back. Martha calls herself a behaviorist. She rarely even meets with the animals, but rather, she does phone consultations with their owners instead. She says that in her experience with animals she has been able to predict their actions and dictate them. So instead of meeting with animals to find out the individual reasons why they act the way they do, she can give a general reason for a certain type of behavior, and that is the answer all the time. It seems as though she actually has very little connection with animals, and her practice is more anthropocentric. If a person is accusing their animals of acting in a certain humanlike behavior, it is because the person acts that way and not the animal. She says that nine times out of ten the problem is with the human and not the animal. I feel that this approach wouldn't be so troubling if she was able to redefine her profession. Perhaps instead of saying she is an animal behaviorist, she should say she specializes in human behaviorism which is conducive to training and cohabiting with animals. When she says she is able to communicate with animals she is being very misleading with that language. If Martha is able to communicate with animals, then she should be able to know what they are saying back to us. Because she isn't listening to what they have to say she is anthropomorphizing them. When humans do that to animals they do not give the animals credit for having a free will and a potential. Instead, they are keeping animals in a box of preconceived notions that humans think they already know about animals. As a result, nothing is learned about animals, and their capability to think becomes very limited, therefore preventing humans from understanding how we affect animals and how animals affect us.
Collaborative Effort:
Even though we all did our interviews separately, we collaborated on the questions we would ask and the direction we would take with the information we collected. We all sat together and decided how we would go about collecting data for our project since there was so little of it. We decided that since it would be difficult to get us all together with our varying schedules, we would conduct the interviews separately and report back with important themes after we transcribed them. Since we all had a similar line of questioning, we were able to pull out pertinent topics related to class and put together a project with very important things to say about the field of animal communication. The best thing about our collaboration was that while we were all working toward a common goal, we were still afforded a great deal of autonomy and creative license with our processes. In the end we were all able to add the best parts of our creative process and put together an informative website capable of expressing what we learned about the field of animal communication.