Tones and Frequencies
Relearning the Language of Connection
I might have a little habit of taking on too much at once. (It pains me to even write that.) I am ludicrously behind right now. If my to-do list was shaped into a topographical map, it would form a lumpy mountain range with peaks rising and shifting like tectonic plates under deadline pressure.
So I’m going to be as brief as I can this week and explore a few mysteries before I leave you with the launch of my conversation with Kim Walnes on Relatively Stable today — and tonight’s Subscriber Zoom.
In the middle of my rush to catch up, I’ve been thinking about how we hold space and move through the noise, the pressure, and the relentless urgency of lists and deadlines. Last week, in a workshop with
, she told us how her First Horse speaks to her in the space between breaths, between the inhale and the exhale.What if that moment of suspension is where their deeper communication lives? As Tamar shared her wisdom, I recognized that sense because I’ve felt it before. I know what she means about experiencing language without words.
Far beneath the surface of the ocean, baleen whales utilize the deep sound channel, also called the SOFAR channel. It’s an invisible highway of wave transmission where sound travels faster without disruptions. A fin whale’s voice can travel up to 6,000 km in this channel, carrying across entire ocean basins. Cold War scientists tapped into this space to speed communication between submarines. And yet, until the 1950s, we didn’t even know whales made sounds at all. Their voices had always been there but we just weren’t listening.
Now, we’ve discovered that humpback whale vocalizations share statistical patterns with human language. The way they structure their songs suggests a complexity we’re only beginning to grasp.
The abstract for a 2024 study on horses begins:
“Recently, horses and other domestic mammals have been shown to perceive and react to human emotional signals, with most studies focusing on joy and anger.”
The key word here is recently.
As if this were some new phenomenon rather than a truth that has been felt by horse people for centuries. The way horses adjust their breath to match ours, or how they seem to know when we are hurting, isn’t a scientific revelation — it’s an ancient, instinctive knowing.
We call it “new” because we’ve built a world that values proof over presence and study over sensation. But the horses don’t need science to validate what they already understand, what they just live.
We are only just starting to scratch the surface, only just beginning to rediscover what we have always known in our bones: communication isn’t limited to speech. It exists in resonance, in energy, in frequencies that stretch beyond the reach of our five human senses.
I’m fascinated by studies on the healing power of cat purrs—how the frequency of their vibration can promote tissue regeneration, reduce stress, and even help mend broken bones.
I think about the way horses shift their breathing to match ours, how they meet us in stillness when we let them. Maybe healing has always been tied to frequency and vibration, tapping into the harmonies between living things.
Maybe we’ve just forgotten how to hear it.
And yet, I’ve spent years unlearning the fear of the mysteries in the world that was instilled in me. Growing up in an ultra-fundamentalist religious environment, I was taught that animals had no souls, no deeper consciousness, no connection beyond their biological existence. To believe otherwise, I was told, was to risk hellfire.
The weight of that fear didn’t lift all at once because it was embedded too deep in my bones. It made me second-guess what I knew to be true. There are still moments when I feel the ghost of that belief still lingering but it no longer fits. The horses remind me of what is true.
I’ve felt it, the mysteries. I have spent my life immersed in the wordless, weightless conversations that happen in the place between breath and movement. I’ve felt a horse reading me before I had time to read myself.
There is no better person to help bridge the gap between traditional horsemanship and the unseen mysteries of connection than Kim Walnes. She built her career at the highest levels of equestrian sport but today her work isn’t about medals. It’s about the messages she receives from her equine partner, Gideon Goodheart, and the way his voice helps guide people through grief, healing, and transformation.
I hope you’ll listen to our conversation in Episode 4 of Relatively Stable, where we explore the spaces between science, instinct, and the unspoken.
Maybe we are not meant to discover these things at all.
Maybe we’re supposed to remember.
If you’d like to explore this conversation further, I’d love to invite you to this month’s Paid Subscriber Zoom Gathering. We’ll meet this evening at 7:00 PM EST, giving us a chance to reflect together on the themes of animal communication, connection beyond words, and the ways our own experiences mirror what science is only beginning to validate.
If you’ve ever had a moment with a horse, a dog, a cat — any creature — where you knew something passed between you without words, this is a space to share, listen, and wonder together.
Paid subscribers, check your inbox for the Zoom link — I can’t wait to talk with you.
Love,
Kim