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Vivor’s Sanctuary

I created a space for the tender souls whose homes were stolen. I created a sanctuary for survivors. I created a refuge free from exploitation and oppression. I hold a vibration of love and harmony for the world we can choose to walk into at any point in time. I see into the hearts of my beloved animals, and I share it through every medium I can. This is a sanctuary. A place of peace. A place to be free. For me, for you, for us. May we all in live in harmony.

My Story

Hi beautiful, I’m Madeleine. I’m as tough as nails, as tender as a tadpole, and as bright as the sun. I spend most of my days with my animals, and am happiest when I can loose myself in endless moment with them. My childhood was spent on a farm with animals as my best friends. Hour-less, adventure-filled days immersed in nature. Cornfields, creeks, barns, and coops. I can still see my animals from that time vividly to this day, in moments that live in my heart forever. Their eyes twinkling in the sun. Their beaming hearts. The warmth of the barn sheltering us on rainy and snowy days. The cold creek water on my feet and sand between my toes. The smell of springtime in the grass. We sold our farm and moved to a suburban neighborhood when I was in middle school. The day we left was the day I subconsciously started figuring out how to get it all back again.

The Horses That Changed Everything

In a fit of unbearable angst, I quit my coffee shop job and was hired as a “mucker” at a mental health facility. Their website boasted a horse therapy program. I was excited for this new part-time job working with my hands in nature and with no customers. I was shocked to find out this facility had adopted six senior rescue horses from a shelter, put them in an old cattle pen, and left them there for a year and a half with no care other than the nursing staff who threw hay over the fence—when there was hay available to throw.

It turns out they had adopted these horses only to get client numbers up, with no plan to properly care for them or manage costs, and with no actual therapy program. One of the horses had already died due to neglect. But that wasn’t why I was hired. I was hired because the manure was piling up, and they were concerned about the upcoming visit from the owner. Hence, the job title “mucker.”

I quickly realized these horses were not okay. For a year and a half, I fought tirelessly to get their baseline needs met. I’m talking things like daily feeding, fresh water, farrier work, dental and veterinary care, and shelter. My whole life changed the day I stepped into their pen. I can proudly say I was an absolute explosive pain in the ass for this company from day one through the entire time I worked there.

I watched these five horses endure two winters sliding around in thick mud. Some of the staff began to help me fight, calling animals services, getting extra supplies approved that I needed, and keeping a close eye on them on the days I could not be there. One spring day the facility told me that they were going to put one of the horses, Mandu, down as a precaution for the upcoming winter because they didn’t want him to suffer again. In reality, they didn’t want to pay any vet bills, implement necessary facility upgrades, or have staff and clients calling animal services again since he could barely walk at times due to his hoof condition. I asked if I could adopt him instead, and they said YES! They then said I could actually adopt all five of them if I’d like to, under the condition that I kept them on the property. It was immediately clear that they were trying to find a way to have horses on the property without the expenses. They tried to sneak into the ownership agreement a clause that would require me to keep a minimum of three horses in the pen regardless of their safety to maintain aesthetic value. Yup, I have that in writing. I went back and forth with the company for two months negotiating the change of ownership. With each month continuing to cost them more than what they felt was ‘in the budget’, I finally got them to agree that I could take ownership under the terms that I could leave with all of the horses with a 30 day notice for any reason. Of course, they hoped I’d stay long term. We signed the papers, and you better believe I immediately sent my 30 day notice and got us all the heck out of there.

The journey since has been steep and challenging. I’ve been thrown major curve balls and it’s taken everything I have. Every resource, favor, line of support, ounce of strength, and shred of trust. It’s required me to grow in tremendous ways. I wouldn’t change it for the world. Soon after I found a space for us to all live together, I expanded my animal family to include my beautiful chickens. My rescue kitties love their supervised outdoor nature time, and my old rescue pittie pup is living her never ending camping trip dreams. I have put blood, sweat, and tears into this and I am eternally grateful that I was able to say yes to my assignment and carry out my earthly mission. I named this website and our space “Vivor’s Sanctuary” because of the meaning and power held within that. Vivor is my dog’s name. It’s short for survivor. I’ve created a safe resting place, or a place of sanctuary for my brave, strong, and irresistibly sweet, survivors. Beings who have survived the horrid thrashes of the unaligned chaos that recklessly bounces around the world. It’s spring here now as I write this. The air as fresh as fresh can be, with cleansing streams flowing through seasonal creeks. The breeze moves through the mountains rustling the leaves on the oak trees that umbrella me in their love. The birds zoom around. The sun shines on my chest. The stars twinkle right at me at night. The sounds of wildlife provide ever giving harmonious melodies. I looked up and found that I had indeed finally gotten it all back, including myself.



I’ve had the incredible honor of getting to know many animals intimately in my lifetime. I believe that everyone has the capacity and actually, the desire, even if it’s unrealized, to experience animals in the most Divinely intended way. And I believe that if we all tapped into that capacity, world peace, harmony, limitless love, and absolute bliss would be our collective reality.

On my commute to work as the mucker, I had to drive past an awful property. It looked like a junk yard that also had a makeshift mare motel with about 10 horses, a tiny pen for goats, and chickens in cages. There were four horses that were most visible from the road. They stood in their 12×12 pens day in and day out. Their manes long and matted, their heads down, underweight, lifeless. Just standing there in a prison cell being deprived of all the things it means to be a horse. One of the most disappointing facts that I came across is that a 12×12′ pen is actually a legal amount of space to keep a horse in. I started to work with animal services attempting to get someone to come out and inspect since it was safe to assume farrier and vet care was likely being neglected. I learned that there’s a process when it comes to this stuff. Once animal services come out to look at the situation, they give the owners a set amount of time to provide the horse’s necessary care. If the owners can’t comply, the horses are taken from the owners to a shelter. That is, if the shelter has space. Unfortunately the shelters around were at maximum capacity so the horses could not be relocated. And even if the horses did get to the shelter, what’s next for them? Hopefully they get adopted… but if they are older, unrideable, or have any behavioral trauma, the chances are increasingly low. They spend the rest of their days in another prison cell and that’s after they’ve been rescued by animal services. And then even if they do get adopted from the shelter, they could end up under the ownership of a company like the one my horses were adopted by.

A few weeks passed by and on my drive to work I noticed that the horses on that property had been moved to a bigger pen. It would have been a step in the right direction, except for this pen was the junk yard pen where there was no visible water source and no access to shade in the middle of summer. I called animal services again to report what I saw. A week later there was another change. This time the property put tarps up to cover the 10′ chain link fencing that enclosed the property. That way, whoever the pain in the ass was that kept calling animal services couldn’t see in anymore. And that was that.

I don’t have the systematic solutions to this, but I know it’s absolutely wrong and out of alignment. Ever since I was a little girl the sight of a hurt animal or witnessing an animal pass would send me into fits of tears and rage. My dad would tell me that I couldn’t save them all, and while my fierce heart deeply rebelled against that, the experience with having to let those horses go made me see that I truly can’t. So I started to question, why would people do this? Why have these creatures been left to rot in a prison cell. How do people feel okay walking past them every day? I realized that the only way they could, is if they didn’t see what they were doing. If they were absolutely blind to what a horse is. They only way to be blind to what a horse or any animal is, is to be blind to yourself. They were okay keeping their horses like that, because they were totally desensitized to what it is to be alive themselves. They are in the same 12×12 enclosure missing out on every thing it means to be human, and they don’t even know it.

The only way people will ever completely stop mistreating animals and depriving them of their right to live, is if we come alive to ourselves. I say Alive in the Highest sense of the word. It becomes impossible to do harm, because it is absolutely against our Divine nature to do so. The only way we would do harm, is if we are denying ourselves our own Divine nature.

I believe we, as humans, are here to be sacred caretakers of all living beings in earthly form. We have been gifted with a unique ability to create and navigate our existence in a very special way. Being immersed in nature for major portions of my life, I’ve seen the seemingly brutal force that is woven into nature’s existence. Why are beings designed to eat other beings? And if they must, why must those beings feel pain and fear? Why must they hunt with so much malice. Why must they fight with so much aggression? We have long justified our actions by coining the fact that we are nature. We are primal. We too fight, and hunt, and kill. We must. It’s who we are. Or on the other end of the justification spectrum, we are Godly, we are higher. Therefore, other beings were put here for our use and consumption. God gave us these beings for our disposal. Both are unfinished realizations that reside in a lower level of consciousness. Yes, we absolutely are nature. And yes, we absolutely are Godly. We will have truly stepped into our highest calling and potential as a human whole when both of those are simultaneously awakened in us in the vibration of harmony. When the two are merged in the highest form, we naturally reside in our role as sacred caretakers. Since we do have the wonderful privilege of choosing our actions based on the world we wish to create, we can choose to step out of a primal reactive way of existing, and into our natural observing and guardianship roles. We were meant to tread as lightly as possible, while we bear witness to the beauty and the ways of nature unfolding within and around us. For allowing what we see to teach us and grow us towards the profound and Divine direction of absolute Goodness.

The rainbow has been a long time symbol of hope for me. It’s easy to get stuck in the overwhelming wrongness of the world. To become discouraged because there is no one clear answer or path to sorting it out. Many believe we will destroy ourselves before we reach world peace. That may very well be the case, but even then, the vibration of Love then prevails. Within the present moment we have access to the power that creates Universes. This force is beyond sense and logic. It can find miraculous ways to change everything in the name of infinite goodness and harmony, and it can do so in an instant. It wants us to be a channel for it to fiercely move us all into harmony. So even though world peace can seem like an impossible naive fantasy, all it really takes is for enough of us to tap into the Limitless, and the rest would work itself out. My deepest work and highest north star is living in that, as much as I possibly can, every single day. Creating that reality in my little section of the world for all the beings under my care and for myself. I know that by doing so, I am part of a Divine and powerful change.

Spending the amount of time I have with animals, I know for a fact that we speak the same language. It’s not a matter of some people having a God given talent that allows them access to a mysterious channel, it is simply our nature. Each one of us has the innate ability to telepathically hold constant conversation with every soul essence of every form. I have not mastered this skill yet, but I experience it more and more. I know that the very fact that we are not tapped into that as a whole, indicates and huge blockage of our divine capacities. Animals speak. Clearly. Loudly. Constantly. Lovingly. It’s direct. It is real. It is a gift. And it is a portal.

Horses Without The Ride

I grew up riding horses. That was what I was most excited about in having horses, actually. After spending so much time with my horses now and not riding them, I have come to to know horses in a much different way. It turned out to be a much deeper way. If you need a saddle or restrictive gear to ride a horse, you can not ride a horse. Too many hop on a horse before ever hoping on the ride within themselves. Pulling and tugging. Prodding and kicking. It is abuse. Even if you do know a thing or two about horsemanship, the question is why must you ride? And if it is not a must, the answer is that your ride is stolen from the back of your captive. There is an undeniable sacred energy that is as old as time itself that I sometimes sense between a couple of my horses and I. It’s the feeling to ride in the name of sacred union. It’s a spiritual calling. I think that if one becomes enlightened enough in earthly form, and is truly connected in a Godly way with their horse, and there is no restrictive gear, a portal can open up for man and horse to commune in sacred riding. If you reached that level of awareness and communion, you would actually be able to ask the horse if you may ride together or not. Just as you can practice asking the earth if you may pick a beautiful flower you see. Sometimes the answer is yes, and sometimes the answer is no. Once you can feel the level of sacredness that a horse really is without riding them, you are on the right path. It is a worthy path and it is a thrilling path. We rode horses into the society we know today. We built our civilization off the backbones of our horses. We should be worshiping them. Instead they have become a spectacle. Forgotten, enslaved, and thrown away as trash on a daily basis and by the thousands. Most of us need to accept that we are more or less kinder-gardeners on the path of enlightenment. Kindergardeners start with basic activities. We have not earned the right or graduated with the qualification to ride horses yet. This is not an opinion, it is truth, and I say it with absolute conviction.

Unplanned Change

I’ve been eating a plant based diet since 2019. I now eat my hen’s eggs, which I share back with them and my pup 50/50. You can watch this unfolding and all of the love that goes into that exchange in my chicken film, Uncaged, featured on this website. My grandparents on my dads side were hog farmers. My dad has shared memories of going out to the middle of the fields to be with the hogs all day. He felt a tug in his heart when they were sent to slaughter, but in that circumstance, there wasn’t change on the horizon. He went on to have a career in a different field, but his love for nature and animals remained and drove him to start a family in the country with animals around. Although we were still a meat eating family, we didn’t eat the animals we kept, so to me, they were our pets. The exposure to our farm animals as companions rather than profit was enough to plant a seed that germinated when I was 25, into the realization that when I ate meat, I was eating my friends, and with that I entered into a plant based diet. It took me 25 years of existence to reach that point, and that was with direct exposure to these animals living along side me as my best friends. That is why I don’t often preach about being vegan to those who have not yet made that change, because I do believe everyone is in the process of a deep transformation and we all do what we can in the areas we feel most ready and connected to. I share this because I see it as a testament to how fast things can change for the better. How they will change, even without conscious effort towards that change, as long as we are in pursuit of our purest heart. The ripple affect that takes place from even the most opposite circumstances and how it can bloom in the direction of our overall goodness and evolution. Within three generations this progress naturally unfolded, and although many animals are still in the situation of being born, raised, and produced for our consumption, and in many cases glutenous enjoyment rather than survival, I see this as a beacon of hope. That even when we aren’t planning it, or working towards it, Goodness finds it’s way, and Love wins. I see this as a rainbow.

Tossing Out Tradition

My Japanese grandmother on my momma’s side has a plethora of stories from her time growing up in Japan. She’s taught me mouthwatering Japanese countryside dishes to make. I grew up with Sushi as my top favorite food and worked at a Japanese restaurant all through high school that I had been eating at since I was four. When I switched to a plant based diet I knew I’d be saying goodbye to all of that. The warm and connecting sukiyaki, the sashimi, chicken karaage, the chirashi. My Obasan can’t quite wrap her head around it, but she still does her best to make sure I’m stuffed with cucumber rolls.

I felt like I was saying goodbye to some of my defining roots when I was deciding to go vegan. As a human whole, we celebrate our families histories, lineages, and cultures through food, as well as our countrie’s history, with extravaganzas such as Thanksgiving and our Forth of July BBQs. I often see that we hold on to lower vibrational activities and justify them for the sake of tradition. The pull in my heart to move forwards became strong enough to trust that my inherited ancient tree is beyond the dishes on my plate and that I’d survive without my Fourth of July hot dogs, Christmas hams, milky matchas, tempura udons, and immaculate sushi spreads. I found there are countless ways to still celebrate what my Obasan built and where we came from.

One of my favorite things I have on display is a mini 4″x4″ mock traditional Japanese sushi table set that my aunt made by hand and gifted me when we visited Japan. She spotted me eyeing it. I was totally mesmerized by the tiny realistic details. The tea cups, the place settings, the arrangements. I can honestly say that it brings me just as much joy to admire as eating the real thing did, and that the joy now hits different. It’s a wider joy. A deeper joy. A kinder joy. That joy didn’t overwhelm me right away. It didn’t stimulate my taste senses and satisfy my cravings. It was a subtle joy that I started to feel a few years after I shifted. A joy that I didn’t have any promise of, but once I experienced it, it was ten times more filling than all the dishes I could have eaten in that time.

I excitedly invite you to find your mini table of commemoration, and then out with the old as soon as you can release it in a way that feels safe to you, as you walk boldly into the new world calling you forth. Thank you to everyone who came before. May we now start new traditions as it is our right in this world just as those who started the ones before us. And may the generations to come release ours and move on with their own as soon as ours no longer serve their highest good.