September 18, 2023 • 11 mins
What if striking a balance in caring for both ends of the leash - the human and the pet - could ensure a healthier and happier life for you and your pets? This podcast episode invites you to explore this intriguing concept. As your host, Dr. Edward the Healing Vet, I navigate you through the essential needs and desires of both, the pet owners and their pets. We delve into the importance of ensuring the basic necessities like food, shelter, social connections, and recreational activities for everyone in the household. This episode emphasizes the significance of self-care and warns against the pitfalls of neglecting your own needs while caring for your pets.
As we progress, we take a deeper dive into the realm of desires, differentiating them from needs. We explore how both our pets and we humans have healthy and unhealthy desires, and how crucial it is to balance these for maintaining harmony in the household. The discussion further leads to the importance of fostering healthy discomfort and the perils of succumbing to unhealthy desires. This episode concludes by encouraging critical assessment of desires and considering their long-term impact before indulging in them. Join us as we embark on this enlightening journey on how to cultivate a balanced, healthy relationship with your pet without compromising your wellbeing.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
Hello, I'm Dr Edward the healing vet.
I'm here for my weekly how tohelp your pets session, which is
also going out to our petspeople and harmony podcast.
If you're listening on apodcast, welcome.
If you're watching live,welcome.
If you're watching the videos,welcome.
Today's themes, or this week'sthemes, are desires and needs.
(00:23):
Now I'm really hot on talkingabout both ends of the leash
talking about the human side ofthe human animal bond and
talking about the animal side ofthe human animal bond because
it's really easy, as someone wholoves your pets, to kind of
(00:45):
neglect yourself to care forthem, and this is kind of like a
false economy.
It really doesn't do anyone anygood and in the long term it's
not the best way to go for yourpets.
So today we're talking aboutdesires and needs.
And how are those of you herelive?
Please say hi in the chat, butyou know where you're from.
(01:05):
Love to hear where you'rechecking in from around the
world.
So let's talk about desiresversus needs.
We're going to start offtalking about needs Now.
There are fundamental needs thatall living creatures have,
that's, our pets and ourselves.
We need to have safety, we needto have shelter, we need to
(01:26):
have healthy food.
We need to have socialconnection and love and support.
What are the other ones we need?
Oh, there's a couple of othersthat are just momentarily
slipping my brain because mybrain is kind of you know, it's
(01:47):
Monday, give me a break butthese are the fundamental things
that we need to provide for ourpets, but we need to not
neglect ourselves.
Either, you know, we need tomake sure that we have healthy
food or we won't have the energyto be present with and care for
our pets as they need.
We need to make sure thatshelter is secure for us, that
(02:07):
we have security and safety inour lives so that we're relaxed
and not stressed, because ifwe're stressed, then that
impacts our pets.
And we need to make sure thatwe have healthy exercise.
That's another thing that ourpets need is space to move
around and exercise and allthese kinds of things.
So these are primary needs thathave to be cared for before
(02:30):
anything else.
Now there are other needs thatwe humans have which are a
little bit more complex than ouranimals, and if we neglect
these more complex needs forsocial connection, for perhaps
(02:51):
spiritual practices, forcommunity, for having recreation
and hobbies, things that keepus active and our brains active
and our creative life alive, ourcareer, education.
There's a whole lot of needsthat the human side of the leash
needs to be cared for as well.
(03:12):
So when you come to needs, theykind of need to be
non-negotiable.
You need to make a realpriority to get everything in
place you can to have all of thefundamental primary needs of
your pets met, but also yours,and you have to find a balance
in that so that you and yourpets are getting everything you
(03:33):
need and no one's beingneglected.
The pets are much less likelyto be neglected than the human.
I find in this situation, nowwe always it's the human who
neglects themselves to care fortheir pets.
Now you really I really want toemphasize this that it's super
important that you care foryourself and look after yourself
(03:55):
as well as you look after yourpets.
And then that brings us todesire.
Now, all living creatures havedesire.
You know our pets.
Let's start with our beautifulpets.
You know my pet.
I've got Pavati here.
I'm going to disturb a littlebit so that those of you are
watching video can say hello.
You might be able to hear herpurring away if you're on just
(04:17):
the podcast, but Pavati has adesire to come and sit beside me
and video bomb everybody.
Whenever I'm doing doing thesekinds of presentations and
talking to you people out therein the internet world, mitzi has
a desire to be close to me.
Is that just a desire?
Is of need?
There can be kind of acrossover that all of us our
(04:40):
animals and ourselves have thesefeelings that we want what we
need, which is also a desire.
So there's a little bit ofoverlap.
But when it comes to desires,it's really really important to
understand that we have, and ourpets have, healthy desires and
unhealthy desires.
(05:01):
Now, healthy desires mightinclude a desire to exercise, to
get fit and well.
It might have a desire to wantconnection, healthy relationship
with your pets or with otherhumans.
Other healthy desires mightinclude a desire to grow and
evolve as a human being, tolearn more, to learn better how
(05:21):
to care for yourself and how tocare for your pets.
And healthy desires can includedesires.
But in our animals they mightdesire to hang out with their
best mates.
They might have a desire forparticular toy, they might love
to go for a drive.
In the case of cats, they mightlove to roam the streets at
night, which my cats desire verymuch and I'm not actually
(05:42):
allowing them to fulfill thatdesire, which has led to quite a
bit of grumpiness of cats inthe evening.
So that's a healthy desire forthe cat from the cat's
perspective, but it's anunhealthy desire for the cat
from my perspective due to thedanger of them being out and
about and also due to the factthat one of my cats got picked
up by the pound.
It cost me nearly 900 dollarsto get them back.
(06:06):
So there's all these differentthings that you have to balance
out to get to a point ofbalancing needs and desires for
your pets and for yourself.
Now you might have pets whohave an unhealthy desire to put
pressure on you they're human togive them all the food they
want whenever they want, and ifyou do that you'll get a really
(06:28):
fat, pudgy pet that will havehealthy shoes.
But that's not a healthy desirefor the animal, even though the
animal probably thinks it's ahealthy desire.
So you sometimes got to do whatyour pet doesn't want so that
they don't manipulate you intofeeding their unhealthy desires.
(06:50):
And we humans nearly alwayshave unhealthy desires as well,
which are, you know, perhapslike me, you like chocolate more
than you should and you eatmore of it than perhaps is
healthy for you.
And a lot of humans have desiresfor various substances or
activities which are actuallyharmful to them, but they don't
(07:15):
show up with the courage anddetermination that they need to
show up to to say right, I'm notgoing to do this harmful thing
even though I desire it anymore.
And that is really a hard now,easy later solution.
You do the hard thing now andthen your life will get easier
later, but it doesn't get easierimmediately.
So you have to then have ahealthy appetite for what I call
(07:36):
healthy discomfort, and youhave to also be willing to have
your animals go through healthydiscomfort at times, in that
perhaps you know your dog doesget a little bit overweight or
your cat does get a little bitoverweight and you need to put
them on a diet.
Now, when it comes todinnertime and they've had half
(07:57):
their normal amount of food andthey go, oh, I'm hungry.
Now you mean I'm not gettingany more food.
And they start you know, in thecase of a cat, maybe now and
complaining on the case of yourdog, giving you the sad puppy
dog eyes and I'm going to die ifI don't get any dinner.
If you then give in to youranimal, you're doing them a
(08:18):
disservice.
So not all desires should be met.
You should meet all the healthydesires you can for your
animals and all the healthydesires you can for yourself,
because that increases the grosshappiness of the household and
that's a benefit to everyone.
But if you meet unhealthydesires, it does seem to make
(08:41):
everyone happier, at leastinitially.
But there's a cost.
There's a cost of harm down thetrack.
So you could kind of define anunhealthy desire as something
that, while it might give shortterm pleasure, it causes long
term harm, whether that's a dogthat loves really unhealthy
treats like smacos or too muchfood.
(09:02):
Maybe it's a human who wants todrink, you know, three or four
glasses of alcoholic beveragesevery night, which will cause
harm over the long term.
There's all these differentthings that we have to balance
out.
So, in essence, you want towork out what the primary needs
are for the humans and theanimals in the family unit.
(09:23):
You want to make sure that youcan meet them in an equal and
balanced way for humans andanimals, not neglecting humans
in favor of the animals.
Super, super important.
Then it's a good idea to whenyou do have desires for things
to kind of sit back and go.
Well, is this a healthy desireor is this an unhealthy desire?
(09:45):
Do I have the resources, in thecase of desire for luxury
things, to actually indulge inthem, or will indulging in them
then mean that my financessuffer and the whole family
suffers as a result?
So it's really important tobalance this out, and I know
that a lot of the time when I'mtalking about how to help your
pets, I'm talking about moreabstract things.
(10:05):
I'm not talking about immediatepractical things that you can
do with your pets, like how tomake them walk on, lead without
pulling or whatever.
But these more abstract thingslike desires and needs are
incredibly important to get ahandle on in your life for the
benefit of your beautiful petsand of your beautiful selves.
So that's it for me this week.
(10:26):
I'll be back next week.
I don't know what the theme fornext week will be yet, but I
look forward to talking to youthen.
But in the meantime, make sureyou get stuck into getting needs
met for everybody and kind ofmaybe do a bit of a desires
audit and look at which ones arehealthy.
Give them lots of attention,make sure you feed them as much
(10:47):
as you can in the context ofyour life, and the unhealthy
ones maybe bite the bullet.
Embrace some healthy discomfortand stop feeding your unhealthy
desires for your pets and foryourself, and everyone will be
happier and healthier when youdo that.
Thank you so much.
Goodbye for now.
Have a beautiful week with yourpets and give them a pat from
(11:08):
me.
Bye for now.
Hello, I'm Dr Edward the healing vet.
I'm here for my weekly how tohelp your pets session, which is
also going out to our petspeople and harmony podcast.
If you're listening on apodcast, welcome.
If you're watching live,welcome.
If you're watching the videos,welcome.
Today's themes, or this week'sthemes, are desires and needs.
(00:23):
Now I'm really hot on talkingabout both ends of the leash
talking about the human side ofthe human animal bond and
talking about the animal side ofthe human animal bond because
it's really easy, as someone wholoves your pets, to kind of
(00:45):
neglect yourself to care forthem, and this is kind of like a
false economy.
It really doesn't do anyone anygood and in the long term it's
not the best way to go for yourpets.
So today we're talking aboutdesires and needs.
And how are those of you herelive?
Please say hi in the chat, butyou know where you're from.
(01:05):
Love to hear where you'rechecking in from around the
world.
So let's talk about desiresversus needs.
We're going to start offtalking about needs Now.
There are fundamental needs thatall living creatures have,
that's, our pets and ourselves.
We need to have safety, we needto have shelter, we need to
(01:26):
have healthy food.
We need to have socialconnection and love and support.
What are the other ones we need?
Oh, there's a couple of othersthat are just momentarily
slipping my brain because mybrain is kind of you know, it's
(01:47):
Monday, give me a break butthese are the fundamental things
that we need to provide for ourpets, but we need to not
neglect ourselves.
Either, you know, we need tomake sure that we have healthy
food or we won't have the energyto be present with and care for
our pets as they need.
We need to make sure thatshelter is secure for us, that
(02:07):
we have security and safety inour lives so that we're relaxed
and not stressed, because ifwe're stressed, then that
impacts our pets.
And we need to make sure thatwe have healthy exercise.
That's another thing that ourpets need is space to move
around and exercise and allthese kinds of things.
So these are primary needs thathave to be cared for before
(02:30):
anything else.
Now there are other needs thatwe humans have which are a
little bit more complex than ouranimals, and if we neglect
these more complex needs forsocial connection, for perhaps
(02:51):
spiritual practices, forcommunity, for having recreation
and hobbies, things that keepus active and our brains active
and our creative life alive, ourcareer, education.
There's a whole lot of needsthat the human side of the leash
needs to be cared for as well.
(03:12):
So when you come to needs, theykind of need to be
non-negotiable.
You need to make a realpriority to get everything in
place you can to have all of thefundamental primary needs of
your pets met, but also yours,and you have to find a balance
in that so that you and yourpets are getting everything you
(03:33):
need and no one's beingneglected.
The pets are much less likelyto be neglected than the human.
I find in this situation, nowwe always it's the human who
neglects themselves to care fortheir pets.
Now you really I really want toemphasize this that it's super
important that you care foryourself and look after yourself
(03:55):
as well as you look after yourpets.
And then that brings us todesire.
Now, all living creatures havedesire.
You know our pets.
Let's start with our beautifulpets.
You know my pet.
I've got Pavati here.
I'm going to disturb a littlebit so that those of you are
watching video can say hello.
You might be able to hear herpurring away if you're on just
(04:17):
the podcast, but Pavati has adesire to come and sit beside me
and video bomb everybody.
Whenever I'm doing doing thesekinds of presentations and
talking to you people out therein the internet world, mitzi has
a desire to be close to me.
Is that just a desire?
Is of need?
There can be kind of acrossover that all of us our
(04:40):
animals and ourselves have thesefeelings that we want what we
need, which is also a desire.
So there's a little bit ofoverlap.
But when it comes to desires,it's really really important to
understand that we have, and ourpets have, healthy desires and
unhealthy desires.
(05:01):
Now, healthy desires mightinclude a desire to exercise, to
get fit and well.
It might have a desire to wantconnection, healthy relationship
with your pets or with otherhumans.
Other healthy desires mightinclude a desire to grow and
evolve as a human being, tolearn more, to learn better how
(05:21):
to care for yourself and how tocare for your pets.
And healthy desires can includedesires.
But in our animals they mightdesire to hang out with their
best mates.
They might have a desire forparticular toy, they might love
to go for a drive.
In the case of cats, they mightlove to roam the streets at
night, which my cats desire verymuch and I'm not actually
(05:42):
allowing them to fulfill thatdesire, which has led to quite a
bit of grumpiness of cats inthe evening.
So that's a healthy desire forthe cat from the cat's
perspective, but it's anunhealthy desire for the cat
from my perspective due to thedanger of them being out and
about and also due to the factthat one of my cats got picked
up by the pound.
It cost me nearly 900 dollarsto get them back.
(06:06):
So there's all these differentthings that you have to balance
out to get to a point ofbalancing needs and desires for
your pets and for yourself.
Now you might have pets whohave an unhealthy desire to put
pressure on you they're human togive them all the food they
want whenever they want, and ifyou do that you'll get a really
(06:28):
fat, pudgy pet that will havehealthy shoes.
But that's not a healthy desirefor the animal, even though the
animal probably thinks it's ahealthy desire.
So you sometimes got to do whatyour pet doesn't want so that
they don't manipulate you intofeeding their unhealthy desires.
(06:50):
And we humans nearly alwayshave unhealthy desires as well,
which are, you know, perhapslike me, you like chocolate more
than you should and you eatmore of it than perhaps is
healthy for you.
And a lot of humans have desiresfor various substances or
activities which are actuallyharmful to them, but they don't
(07:15):
show up with the courage anddetermination that they need to
show up to to say right, I'm notgoing to do this harmful thing
even though I desire it anymore.
And that is really a hard now,easy later solution.
You do the hard thing now andthen your life will get easier
later, but it doesn't get easierimmediately.
So you have to then have ahealthy appetite for what I call
(07:36):
healthy discomfort, and youhave to also be willing to have
your animals go through healthydiscomfort at times, in that
perhaps you know your dog doesget a little bit overweight or
your cat does get a little bitoverweight and you need to put
them on a diet.
Now, when it comes todinnertime and they've had half
(07:57):
their normal amount of food andthey go, oh, I'm hungry.
Now you mean I'm not gettingany more food.
And they start you know, in thecase of a cat, maybe now and
complaining on the case of yourdog, giving you the sad puppy
dog eyes and I'm going to die ifI don't get any dinner.
If you then give in to youranimal, you're doing them a
(08:18):
disservice.
So not all desires should be met.
You should meet all the healthydesires you can for your
animals and all the healthydesires you can for yourself,
because that increases the grosshappiness of the household and
that's a benefit to everyone.
But if you meet unhealthydesires, it does seem to make
(08:41):
everyone happier, at leastinitially.
But there's a cost.
There's a cost of harm down thetrack.
So you could kind of define anunhealthy desire as something
that, while it might give shortterm pleasure, it causes long
term harm, whether that's a dogthat loves really unhealthy
treats like smacos or too muchfood.
(09:02):
Maybe it's a human who wants todrink, you know, three or four
glasses of alcoholic beveragesevery night, which will cause
harm over the long term.
There's all these differentthings that we have to balance
out.
So, in essence, you want towork out what the primary needs
are for the humans and theanimals in the family unit.
(09:23):
You want to make sure that youcan meet them in an equal and
balanced way for humans andanimals, not neglecting humans
in favor of the animals.
Super, super important.
Then it's a good idea to whenyou do have desires for things
to kind of sit back and go.
Well, is this a healthy desireor is this an unhealthy desire?
(09:45):
Do I have the resources, in thecase of desire for luxury
things, to actually indulge inthem, or will indulging in them
then mean that my financessuffer and the whole family
suffers as a result?
So it's really important tobalance this out, and I know
that a lot of the time when I'mtalking about how to help your
pets, I'm talking about moreabstract things.
(10:05):
I'm not talking about immediatepractical things that you can
do with your pets, like how tomake them walk on, lead without
pulling or whatever.
But these more abstract thingslike desires and needs are
incredibly important to get ahandle on in your life for the
benefit of your beautiful petsand of your beautiful selves.
So that's it for me this week.
(10:26):
I'll be back next week.
I don't know what the theme fornext week will be yet, but I
look forward to talking to youthen.
But in the meantime, make sureyou get stuck into getting needs
met for everybody and kind ofmaybe do a bit of a desires
audit and look at which ones arehealthy.
Give them lots of attention,make sure you feed them as much
(10:47):
as you can in the context ofyour life, and the unhealthy
ones maybe bite the bullet.
Embrace some healthy discomfortand stop feeding your unhealthy
desires for your pets and foryourself, and everyone will be
happier and healthier when youdo that.
Thank you so much.
Goodbye for now.
Have a beautiful week with yourpets and give them a pat from
(11:08):
me.
Bye for now.
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