I often remember asking this kind of question as a child. I really wanted to know. Did my beloved pet think and feel like I did?

Over the years, I have come to the conclusion that the answer is, "yes, they do."

While animals may not have the physical brain capacity of humans to be able to do things like talk, understand language or read, they absolutely feel things like fear and love. They can learn and always try their best. And of course, most of us know from watching a dog sleep, they do dream.

I've been around cats and dogs most of my life. I love animals. Recently, I've been exposed to a totally new kind of animal for me, horses. My husband is a horse whisperer and he's working toward turning his love of horses into a career. We now have five horses living with us on our property and only two of them are actually ours.

It's very interesting to observe new horses that come to stay with us. At first, they are very frightened and unsure. In most cases, they don't really want to have anything to do with us humans.

My husband would tell you it's because they are prey animals. Their evolutionary conditioning has taught them to be very afraid. In the wild, if they spot the danger early enough and react, they might be able to survive. It sounds crazy that something so big could be such a scaredy cat, but it's true. I've seen them get freaked out by a bit of paper blowing by in the breeze. Tiny little chipmunks are enough to send some horses running for their lives. They really think everything wants to eat them.

So a new horse is timid to say the least and a scared horse is a dangerous horse. We must be very careful about how we approach him. We don't rush in, we go in slowly, with the same manner a prey animal would, so as not to frighten him. We give him a chance to get used to us and show him that we have no intention of hurting him. And we keep at it. We don't expect that just because a horse has met us once they will feel totally comfortable with us from now on. We'll go in every day to pet him, teach him about communication, and hang out with him a little bit to show him that we really are OK.

Before long, the same horse that was so afraid, actually comes to greet us when we bring food or water. He wants us to pet him and will even rub up against us. He will move when we gently ask him to and even stay much more calm in stressful situations when his human is with him. It's an incredibly beautiful transformation to behold.

The key, as with so many other things in life, is communication and understanding. By putting ourselves into the horse's place and learning how to speak to him in a way he can understand, we have opened up brand new lines of communication that actually make a win-win situation possible. Now instead of having a frustrated horse owner (why won't he do what I want him to do!) and a frightened horse (what does she want from me?!), we have a relaxed and confident horse who is happy to do what we ask, so long as he understands the instructions.

And, it goes to show that just because something is wild, doesn't mean it can't think or feel or learn. Just because another creature is not receiving the message you're trying to convey doesn't mean they're stupid, you may not be communicating in a way that can be understood. Every creature deserves respect and understanding. No body is less than any other.