Come What May

The horses have been in the process of teaching me a valuable lesson. It goes something along the lines of 'Have faith that everything will work out the way it is supposed to' with a little bit of 'just relax and appreciate it as it comes'. It's been a very interesting lesson indeed, and might I say, a real breath of fresh air! It's very freeing, going to barn, or going to work with these horses and not feeling like I have to get anything done, or have an agenda, or have expectations, I can just go and be me. And the horses can just be themselves. There is very little stress.
They have been showing me how much they are learning, all on their own, Like one client's horse, who has been learning to deal with his anxiety, and how to develop more emotional control. Last session I was basically along for the ride. He picked the pattern, he picked the speed. He picked the areas that he needed to work on, namely the in and out door to the arena. For a couple weeks we have been having major anxiety when we come close to the door, basically we would come up to it, relaxed and stretching and then we would get to a certain point and he would almost hold his breath and rush past it as fast as he could. When he got to the other side out of the 'danger zone' he would breath a big sigh and go back to working on his stretching, almost as if to say, "Phew okay, it missed me that time!" During this session, he decided that this is what he needed to work on, so he would work himself up to trotting past the door. I was getting very plainly that this was something he needed to do, and that I was not to interfere. (It went something along the lines of 'you're along for the ride now missy, so you'd better just accept that.' ) So away he went, working on working on his anxiety. He would work himself up and go for it, only to decide he couldn't do it at the last minute, then he would circle, bring his energy back down and then try again. (on a funny side note, I had been working with him the previous session on how to use circles to bring his energy level down) Eventually he got himself to the point where he could trot nice and quiet, and stretched down, right past the door as if it wasn't even there. It's amazing to me, just almost mind boggling, on how preceptive these horses are, and how much they WANT to change and help themselves. So much to the point that they are putting themselves out there to try and work through it. It's so so so cool to see that when the force comes out of it, the offer comes in.