Revelations and breakthroughs come with a choice: you can either enter the Labyrinth and fight your monster, or you can return home to your safe, ordinary life.
When I’ve taught riding lessons, I’ve had student breakthroughs that were suddenly shut down by those who chose the latter path. They didn’t want to do the work involved (examining their life, changing old patterns, thinking through their relationships with loved ones, understanding the need for boundaries) and put up a wall composed of disbelief, concealed their inner selves to their own awareness.
As a teacher, these students were the ones who needed the most help, but couldn’t open themselves up to what was happening. Their fear held them back from fighting that monster and the joys of victory. These are the needy students at clinics, who suddenly freeze, drop the class midway through, or take the class with tears. In the end, they remain needy, clingy and with unresolved turbulent emotions that can’t be put back into the bottle.
Another type of student are those so deep in denial that they are impatient with the sobbing ones. They mutter stuff like: “pull yourself up by your bootstraps”, “stop whining and just get it done” and “what’s your problem?”
Horses, both as physical animals weighing over a 1,000 pounds with a flight response, and as an Archetype (sexuality, dark desires, the Unconscious, the animal that delivers us to the Underworld, a symbol of power) are both fearsome and heady stuff. It takes courage to be a Rider. The horse is not a steed for the weak. It’s why statues have rulers on horses, not peasants.
In Hempflings’ Dancing with Horses, all of the horses he dealt with in this book were stallions. All of them had rage issues related to human treatment. Hempfling’s message thoughout is not to face these horses with equal anger to “tame” or subliminate them but to match them with a calm energy that neither demands or gives in. This is the role of the just, compassionate ruler who, without instigating action, brings calmness to a violatable situation.
You can not be a shrinking violet when faced with the aggressive horse; nor can you be the tyrannical ruler. We must seek a balance in our nature, realizing that nature itself unbalances us. We must continually strive to be back in center. Few of us are at this point in our life so we must walk the Labyrinth, slaying – or perhaps embracing – our own personal monsters and coming to terms with ourselves as best we can. Sometimes that means monster-slaying takes up your entire week!
This weekend has given me some revelations about Z which, after 30 years, I am ready to understand (due to much monster slaying) and provide the support she needs. These revelations came about with the slow Masterson Method work, which required that I really take my time (I’m a Now kinda girl) and wait for Z’s feedback, and through the Reiki work husband did at another session.
As I’ve already posted, it became evident she was reluctant to release tension during the MM bodywork. You could tell she was hovering on the diving board, trying to make a decision whether to jump in and enjoy the water or climb back down that ladder.
It’s important that you understand that her hesitation was not due to fear. This horse fears little and she has absolutely no history of abuse. Instead, hesitation came from a deep survival need of never showing vulnerability. Her very, competitive and aggressive nature finds being soft abhorent!
I completely understand this on a visceral level and I have to admit, that discovering this in Z came as a surprise to me. It was a huge LIGHTBULB moment! Horses have so much within them to reveal it is astoinishing! This is where the real Magic is – not in some Big Name Trainers’ overpriced vegetable stick.
During husband’s Reiki session with Z, he touched her Brachial chakra and her head suddenly came up from eating grass. This happened three times – he touched, sent energy, and head came up! He said he got a feeling of surprise from her, which is not uncommon with horses when first given energy by a human. Which goes to show how smart horses are and how dumb they consider humans!
While I was watching, I always give feedback without looking at what he is doing. At one point, I said, “yes, there she goes” and he answered at the same time, “yes, she just accepted and gave a huge release.” What did I see? I saw a horse who stopped eating green grass, whose eye glazed over and became inward thinking to the point that I likened it to a horse who just received a major dose of Ace.
Went he went to the Sacral and later Root Chakras, he said he could feel her hesitation. She had something to release, wanted to release it, but it would take husband’s patience and guidance for her to let it go. It didn’t come out as a pain sensation but just very tingly. Who knows what it was? Most times you won’t.
After all this work happened, I had a lot to process. It now makes sense why Rugby Guy’s way of riding it out with applying more pressure and demands will not work with Z. It makes sense why RH’s training of overstimulation did not work with Z.
Faced with tension she will become more tense because this alerts her very base survival core. A survival core that finds it difficult to release even in a calm, supportive, slow atmosphere with people she explicity trusts.
I know now, in a deep way, that I am doing the right thing by stopping RG’s rides and taking Z under my own tutelage. She needs time and attention that only I understand. This is very exciting and opens an entirely new chapter!
