20 years ago, when I first began shell reading, it was due to a comment from someone who saw my shell collection. He mentioned he had heard of a shell reader. It was as if fireworks exploded inside me. I had never heard of such a thing …but I felt an immediate desire to go for a reading. I was extremely shy, but I called this person for days trying to obtain the contact information for the reader. When his attempts to get me the information proved futile, in a desire to salvage something from this, he suggested I use my own shells. Having never thought about this, but having studied them all my life, my reply was to say “but everyone will know that Cone shells are deadly, and tusks have no heart, and Tiger Cowries connect with faith, etc. naming about 6 shells and what they meant. I honestly believed that this was common knowledge. He assured me that not everyone would know this. I hung up the phone, and wandered over to my collection wondering how to proceed. It was surprisingly easy. By the end of the week, I knew what every shell in my collection meant. I had over 200 at the time, but all I did was apply what I knew about the animal who created the shell, or its interaction with man throughout history, or its name. Based upon this criteria, you could find a unique meaning to assign to each shell, and that became its contribution to the language of the seashells.
When naming shells, they receive a common name and a scientific name. The scientific name is in Latin based upon genus and species and is identical all over the world. The common name varies with the location. Whoever first finds a shell can give it any common name they want. Often it is based upon their appearance. Helmet shells were so named because their shell’s appearance resembles helmets worn by ancient warriors. For this reason, in divination I always thought Helmet Conchs represented someone willing to fight for you. Years later, I received a book authored by an Australian malacologist named Neville Coleman. A malacologist studies the mollusks, the animals who create and inhabit shells. In his book, Shells Alive! Neville writes about this episode in great detail. I will try to do it justice by summarizing the events for you.
During his normal “recording functions underwater”, he came across three Helmet Conchs in a triangular formation each about “5 metres away” from the other two. Two were positioned properly to get around, but one was buried in the sand on its side. When I read this, I realized that Helmet Conchs have no operculum, or door, covering the opening to their shell, so not only was this conch stuck, it was exposed to any predator in the vicinity. Even if it somehow avoided that fate, being stuck prevents it from obtaining food, and it would waste away from malnutrition. Neville admits that it is only in hindsight that he tells this story because he barely noticed these conchs. It never occurred to him to turn this animal over because his mind was full of the recent observations from his swim, and he had to return to change film. The only thought he gave them when observing their position was to assume (as it turned out, correctly) that other divers gathered them on a boat and tossed them overboard after being informed that they belonged to a protected species. A few hours later, with fresh air tanks and new film he made his way back and he “nearly froze at what the torchlight revealed.” The two conchs who were correctly positioned had made their way closer to the one in trouble. Being a trained malacologist, he sat back and observed the action. The two conchs did approach the one buried in the sand. “They had furrowed out a depression around the immobile shell, having dug away the sand as efficiently as if they were a pair of miniature bulldozers.” He says: “I just didn’t believe what might be happening, but I took the pictures anyway.” As he watched in awe, after loosening the sand around the conch that was stuck, the two mobile conchs came around behind it, climbed up on the shell and toppled it over. Neville was nearly in tears as he witnessed two “dumb, unfeeling invertebrates without vision or any known form of communication, with pea-sized ‘brains’ and no reasoning mechanism that we are aware of combine their actions to assist another of their species in trouble.”
I recognized that these conchs had to know a comrade was in trouble, care enough to cooperate in figuring out a plan of action, then carry it out… and they did! This rescue mission demonstrated both intelligence and compassion. My first thought was how remarkably in synch this behavior was with the divination meaning of someone willing to fight for you. In quite dramatic contrast, after I read Neville’s account of the Helmet Conchs, the headline story in my newspaper that night was about a woman in New York who was mugged. Despite her screams for help, everyone ignored her because they didn’t want to get involved. I couldn’t help but think that a Helmet Conch would come to her rescue, so who is the more evolved species?
Neville also wrote of his spiritual challenge with what he witnessed. As he put it,”I hated what my brain would eventually do to that scene. I cursed every bit of cold calculating behavioral biology I’d ever learned…I hated beyond hate, science, myself, and the world in general because I knew in my heart that this, like a thousand other encounters in the animal world must fade into objectiveness.” He explains that science has exacting principles, “of which feelings play no part. One cannot evaluate animal behavior in terms of human experiences and emotions.”
As a scientist, I have faced a similar challenge to Neville’s when learning to translate seashells. I had to leave cold science and venture into the realm of feelings and intuition. I believe that animals are not some lower life forms that only operate upon instinct. Who says that we are ascribing human traits upon these animals? Maybe they so obviously possess traits that we aspire to, that the only way we allow ourselves to be comfortable with their capacity for unconditional love is to label this as instinct. Otherwise, if they possess this spiritual trait we desire, logic dictates that they are the more evolved beings. But, what if a dog does have a choice whether to run into a burning building, or to dive into freezing waters to rescue a family member? These acts of love could be the genuine article, and writing them off as instinct does us all a disservice. Wouldn’t it be wonderful if the animals were mirroring our own default settings…the loving beings we really are.
When I first posed the question, “Who is the more evolved species?” comparing the Helemt Conch to the people who ignored the mugging victim, I was leaning toward the conch. I have since come to believe that energetically we are all light beings. One of us comes to Earth and zips on a “human suit”, another a “dog suit”, another a “tree suit”, but underneath we are all the same light beings. At this energetic level, no being is above or below another on the evolutionary scale…we are all one. Instead of looking upon this demonstration of animal compassion as “less than” because it is only instinct, why not see the gift they offer us, teaching us who we are…even in the behavior of a snail?
I think Neville may share these thoughts because he ends his account with these words: “Regardless of how, or why, I saw two ‘lowly invertebrates’ spend several hours saving the life of another ‘lowly invertebrate’ and nobody on this planet is going to convince me otherwise.”
After such a powerful demonstration of their willingness to fight for their comrade, there is one more lesson Helmet Conch teaches. When I do readings, I always ask people to tell me what shells get their attention. It could be because they find them to be beautiful, or because they are bothered by them. It doesn’t matter…whatever it takes to get their attention counts. I mention this, because very often the Helmet Conch bothers people. When this shell is not liked, it means someone you thought you could count on, someone you thought was willing to fight for you, let you down. The pain of this shatters the capacity to trust.
When you can no longer trust those you love, you don’t trust anyone. This limits your ability to delegate tasks because you don’t want to give anyone the opportunity to let you down. Therefore, you don’t ask for help; you do everything yourself.
In addition, if anyone asks you to do anything, you will make an extra effort to fulfill obligations. You know the pain of being let down by others and you would not want to inflict that pain on anyone else. When Helmet Conch is disliked, it is teaching us about our capacity to trust. It reveals the toll it takes without our awareness when we have lost that precious ability.
I just realized that an important part of the rescue mission is the fact that it took two Helmet Conchs to save their comrade. This could not have been accomplished alone. They had to rely on each other...trust in a literal matter of life and death!
