Posted on Aug 17, 2017
By Ellie Laks, Founder of The Gentle Barn
When I was a child I often felt unseen. I have always had a sensitive heart and the people around me loved to tease me for it. My brothers would dangle spiders in front of me, threatening to harm them as I frantically tried to save them. That made them roar with laughter. When one of my beloved animals would pass away and I would come to school grieving, my classmates would laugh at me. When an animal was injured in real life or even on TV, my tears were always met with a "Don't be ridiculous" from mom. I have always had deep empathy for all living creatures and didn't understand why the people in my community didn't have it too. It always left me feeling like there was something wrong with me.
Many decades later, after finally starting my dream of The Gentle Barn I realized that there are so many people all over the world who feel the same way I do. Through the wonders of social media and the internet, we have found each other and helped one another feel not so alone. We've come together through our shared love and compassion for animals and have been able to celebrate life together. There are still times, though, when that old childhood ache of feeling unseen resurfaces.
Recently I’ve had an epiphany: the most unseen ones on this planet are the animals. They are pure, full of love and innocence, and yet our society cannot see them at all. They are encaged, treated as property, enslaved, and slaughtered. Their families are separated without a thought. Babies are torn away from their moms, and their cries of agony fall on deaf ears. Animals are killed by the millions each year and their wardens cannot see their pleading eyes nor acknowledge the light shining within them. It is through this that I realized that like in Star Wars, there are those that fight for the dark side, and those of us that live for the light. The ones on the dark side will never see clearly because they are consumed by their own darkness.
I used to take it personally when someone would say something cruel and untrue about us, but feeling unseen and realizing that the animals are unseen as well has fueled me like nothing else. I am renewed with a sense of urgency to help awaken as many people as possible and bring them over to the light. Those that live in darkness will only try to destroy. Those who live in light, operate from love, and are connected to all beings will change the world for all of us.
To the animals I say, I see you! I see your innocence and divinity. I see your intelligence and your affection. I will work till the day I die so that others may see you as well! I am honored to love you each and every day. I am privileged to work on your behalf. I am blessed to know what it feels like to be unseen as it ties me even stronger to you, to the cause, and to this work.
Once we raise our heads above the horizon we become targets. It is only when we raise our heads above the horizon that we can make a difference and change the world. As crazy as it is, even Mother Teresa and Martin Luther King had haters, and look what they accomplished in their life times. We do this work for love. Not to be seen, not to be accepted, not to be understood, but because it is right, it is good, and it is imbedded in every fiber of my being so that it would be impossible to do anything else! Seen or unseen, loved or hated, praised or slandered, I'll continue to do this work for the animals, so that one day they will be seen, loved, and valued!
May the force be with you!