Honoring Today's Horse

"He feels unbalanced, like he's limping! We need to stop," my student says.

"The tempo is too slow, he needs a greater stride. As soon as he can get the right tempo he will be more balanced."

My student goes into a kind of fetal mode, half urging the horse forward, half hauling the horse back. "It isn't working, she says."

"You need to let the reins out so he can go forward," I say.

She starts to cry. And this is where I realize the problem -

It's not really a riding lesson. This is so often the case - and I think back to my 20's, where I didn't have a clue about these inner workings. The horse needs to go forward to be safe internally and physically, and yet this is the human's greatest fear - and somehow the two of them have come together, and the human is the only one who can bridge this gap.

So we pause the riding and we talk. Logic is not the answer, I remind myself - where are these feelings coming from? It all stems back to a childhood bolt.

"If it's hysterical, it's historical," I remember to myself.

So what is missing here, and how can we go forward? First understanding the root - we are not riding in the now, we are riding in that childhood bolt. So we ground - how does your horse feel, sound, smell, look? What do you see around you?

And then, we discuss what skills we need to go forward. What the horse needs, and what she needs.

I say, I understand your fear, I really do - but it is imperative that you guide your horse. He is scared too. But we can find a way that you can stay mentally with him - in hand, at the walk, for now, but you have to stay here with him. He needs you.

I'm not a therapist, but it turns out I'm not really a riding instructor either. And so often, we are not riding today's horse - which is why the training, the logic, the reasoning, the lessons are not helping us get where we want.

The root, somewhere deep down is buried. Our real task is to find a way to ride today's horse: to be present with today's horse and learn to honor them. They need us, desperately. And only we can bridge the gap.

And so a choice has to be made at a certain point - what will you do to honor today's horse?