REALIZATIONS

The journey never ends.  Continual lessons to be learned.  Many times in my life I have come to forks in the road where the path forward has not been clear.  Places where I struggle to find my way, frustrated and a tad hopeless.  Each time, I have to dig deep to find a path forward.  Sometimes it’s personal but many times it’s in my path as a horse woman and most of the time they overlap.  (Horses are the best teachers.)  Finding a way to deal with emotions in animals and myself has been one of the tasks that has been a life cross to bear.  I’ve always gotten along with sensitive animals so they flock to me.  Only to present with a gap in my understanding where I need to learn more.  This year was another milestone. 

I had just come from the sadness of having a horse neglected by the hands of another trainer and the long journey of trying to find out what was wrong with him.  It was both an emotionally exhausting place and financially exhausting place.  Copious amounts of vet work.  Training and re-training.  Career switches and all.  I was encouraged to push him so that his underlying issues would become more apparent but that only got us into horrible frustration.  Him trying to tell me what was wrong, me trying to interpret.  Us both knowing we were missing each other. No one had any answers.  It was sad.  It was disheartening.  Almost two years later, I now understand.  The piece missing was emotions felt by him from the experience, the emotions felt by me and the shared emotions by both of us.  If only I knew then what I have learned now.  

To help my path along and to help me learn that which I do not know, my current horse starting getting emotional this fall.  It seemed to come on suddenly and so we assumed that it was physical in nature.  We checked that all out and couldn’t find anything.  So back to the drawing board.  It started this late summer just after his layup for a respiratory infection he contracted in his travels.  Sadly, it hit him quite hard and he had a lot of medical care.  Scoping, flushes, chest x-rays.  And some of this I wasn’t allowed to be present for because of Covid.  Now, I am not blaming the vets, or implying that they did anything wrong but apparently my horse took offense to the procedures.  And this all piggy backed on an emotional winter.  My two horses went to Florida and the barn arrangements had them alone.  They got extremely herd bound and the older horse was frantic whenever the other one left.  The two horses started to share this state of anxiety.  It was quite the management issue and we all were stressed about it.  Looking back, this set us up for the perfect storm in the fall.  When my horses health finally allowed clinics and shows, the emotional turmoil was already setup.  It took me awhile to recognize exactly what was going on but I started to put two and two together.  His acting up at the shows and clinics was due to an insecurity about being alone.  He was experiencing fear brought on from the herd bound anxiety in winter and then the fear of traveling to vet appointments.  So every time we traveled he was on edge.  Nervous.  Anxious.  Looking for the perceived threat.  It was something he wasn’t able to let go.  It sat underneath the surface only to present itself in the most inappropriate times like when the horse before him left the arena.   

This all has brought to mind, that many years ago while riding a particularly sensitive horse, my trainer kept insisting that proper riding would ultimately allow me to influence the horse’s body in a way that his emotions would subside.  And while I agree with this notion, it unfortunately, is not always the case.  While great riding can help a horse to overcome their anxiety about being ridden and can lead to a successful career, and should always be addressed when dealing with emotions, we now know that we can go even further to help heal the emotions of an horse and allow them to “let go” of past experiences. Horses will do for us out of fear but having animals do things with us through cooperation is so much sweeter.   Sometimes these past experiences are ones we can recognize as being abusive, over-facing, pushing to hard etc (as in rescue cases or in the hands of brutal trainers) but there are also instances where the perception of the horse was that the experience was horrible and past their threshold without abuse being present.  

I think of shows, especially chaotic shows.  Even when taking the time to get the horse to adjust to the environment, they can easily be over-faced and the experience somewhat traumatic.  Think of a horse who was ok at shows until a horse got loose and galloped around endlessly and all chaos ensued.  What if, from then on out they are nervous at shows?  I also think of veterinary work that can also be viewed from the horses perspective as invasive, scary, life-threatening.  We know it was necessary to save the horses life, it doesn’t mean the horse understands that.  What about environmental trauma.  I once had a horse so scared to go on a particular part of his field because he experienced the “murder” of a neighbors chicken by a wild fox.  Carcass parts and feathers were everywhere.  So even when we are trying to train with the horses perspective in mind, and strive to not over-face, stress out or push our horses, things happen.  And we end up with a horse that becomes uncooperative due to stress, fear, anxiety and the like.  It’s easy at that point to become anxious, stressed, worried and even fearful ourselves.  Not including the pressure we put on ourselves to find the solution.  This only adds to the emotional mix.  And our horses feel that.  We all have experienced how hard it is to maintain composure when our horse is losing his mind. And I have struggled just like many others.  Emotions are shared between horses and between horses and people whether it’s intended or not.  In fact, the Heart Math Institute studies this exact phenomenon and how our physiological and emotional body can influence those around us.  

ILLUMUNATIONS

To find answers, I have discovered many pathways.  I turned to bodywork.  From my experience in working with horses as an acupuncturist and cranio-sacral therapist, I know the body stores emotions in the body.  Using techniques like somato-emotional release,  we can get the body to “let go” of these patterns.  

I have also turned to training methods like desensitization and conditioning to slowly show the horse that they can be secure in new environments and with scary objects.  I have done copious amounts of ground work and natural horsemanship.

I have turned to reward based training to make training more enjoyable, rewarding and fun. 

But sometimes these have not always fully worked to the extent that I have hoped.  Training more did not solve the problem.  Really good proper training did not erase the past.  

So now what do you do?

How do we deal with emotional state of the animal?  What if the horses emotional state has expanded to be about everything?  Besides desensitization and habituation and positive reinforcement, how can we address the emotions residing within?  In and of itself?

Enter the field of emotional releases brought on by mindfulness and fostering peace.  Combine this with reward based training, segmented training methods and going at the horses pace, there is a clear set way to help horses let go of emotional states in their training.  No matter why or where they are presenting.  

It takes a clear intention to not “accomplish a task” but to truly help the horse express and heal their emotions.  It takes a state of admiration for the horses process and “mindful regard” as James French teaches, so that the horse is telling us when he/she is ready to move to the next step.  It takes the desire to see the situation from the horses perspective and to listen to the subtle cues they are giving in body language.  It takes a state of being in-tune with the horse desires and attempts at communication in a way that fosters their connection and trust in you, their advocate.  It takes breaking the process down into easy small steps or chunks that the horse can integrate and it takes a keen eye to keep to the horses pace. 

TIMING 

Often we have a goal and we push to accomplish it.  Too often it’s above the horses pace.  We think it’s the fastest way but actually because we have to re-visit and re-visit, it actually becomes the slowest pace.  When we go at the horses pace, while it seems to be very slow, they horse then can make leaps and jumps in learning and truly step past the emotions that caused the problem to begin with.  It is the only way to get healing, change and finally true connection with our horse in training.  This is the kind of connection that will forever change the future for that horse.  

When we slow down and  train from a place of peace and mindfulness, horses will begin to speak to us and we will be able to listen.  We will start to see how to inspire the horse’s response.  When the horses mind is quiet, they can hear our softest whisper.  They crave peace just like us and we can be the one to bring it to them.  

Do these ideas inspire you? 

Are you hungry for more information?