Balancing

Daniel stayed home from school today with a cold. I had a moment of panic, so much to get done and today would be spent on the couch! Gah! Washing the breakfast dishes, I looked over at Daniel curled up on the couch watching TV. He caught my eye and smiled—and it clicked. Oh. I see. Today I get to cuddle on the couch with my boy.

The day went on easily and included a wonderful, uplifting call with my student coach (thank you, thank you Caroline!!!) but by the late afternoon I had received a phone call that a dear friend’s dog had been diagnosed with kidney disease, Brad came home in a mood, and a text with my brother proved he was in the same mood. Goodness. I could feel my head click on and over-ride how my heart felt. A “mood” started creeping over me. I went downstairs to work on a few things. I was sitting at my computer starting to stew when Onya barreled down the stairs, nearly crashing into my desk in her hurry. She ruffed at me. I looked over at her, she bowed and ruffed again, tail in the air, “No! Don’t go there! Come on, let’s get outside. Remember to get out of your head and into your heart!” I continued to look at her and she stared into my eyes. “Okay, let’s go.”

The kids were quiet and content, watching a show. I called Midgie and out we went. We headed over to the rarely used railroad tracks and started walking. I kept telling myself to stay in my heart, what things made my heart sing this week? Seeing the printer's proof of my business cards, creating four new flavors of cupcakes and photographing them, finding out that a hospice patient had crossed peacefully during the night after we had a Reiki session, writing two blog posts, visiting Rayn and having her reach out with her nose wanting a kiss from me, and now: watching the dogs, tongues hanging, tails waving, joyful. Catching the last rays of sunshine, looking forward to daylight savings time this weekend, feeling spring in the air. My heart was full and I was thankful that my girlie got me out of the house.

I walked on the track and laughed as I lost my balance and fell off. I stepped back on and tried again. Off and on. Off and on. I thought about balance in my life. How I had been going a thousand miles an hour and would have continued at that pace but Daniel got sick. I needed a little balance. Take a breath, see my son, watch my dogs running and laughing together. There’s always enough time. Everything gets done. I’m always amazed by that. Everything always gets done.

The dogs and I headed back and I found heart rocks, I'm always on the lookout. Get out of your head and into your heart. Do what feels good. What makes your heart sing?

When I stepped into the house, there was Brad, smiling at me, the bad mood gone. I smiled back. He said, “Feel better? You walked up the front steps smiling!”

Today I was told, "Keep that inner pocket of joy, it's truly contagious!" I guess she was right!

"Get out of your head...and into your heart."

Left to right: Remi and his best friend Beatrice

A couple of weeks ago I headed out to the pasture to see Rayn and the herd.

I walked across the larger pasture to get to the smaller one and looked out toward the horses and found…every single one looking back at me. Huh. Well that was unusual. I stopped where I was and waited a moment. I turned around, nope, no one and nothing was behind me. So I continued on toward the waiting horses.

As I got closer four of them, including Rayn, peeled off the group and started walking to meet me at the gate. When I went in they all took turns checking me out. One would step forward and lay their muzzle somewhere on me, my heart, my feet, my hands and the other three would wait a moment. Then another would step forward, there would be a tiny flash of pinned ears, unnoticeable if I hadn’t been so curious as to what was going on, and the first horse moved out of the way. The rest of the herd watched from a short distance away. Once all four had checked me out it was apparently decided that Remi would stay with me. Remi is a 20 year old Thoroughbred Quarter horse cross, wise enough to be going grey around the muzzle and eyes.

I walked a ways out into the field with Remi at my shoulder. We had to stop three times as the other pasture horses came up and gave me the same once over. Remi let them each have a moment but flicked his ears when it was time for us to continue on. Apparently I was in his charge for the morning. Seven of the eleven horses had checked me out before the decision was final.

Once Remi and I were alone he went straight to work. I stood still and Remi stood facing me. I waited. He started on my left side and breathed softly into my ear for a few breaths. There is absolutely nothing more grounding than having a horse breathe into your body.

My breathing slowed to match his. I felt my flyaway energy sink into my body and my body sink into the earth…

Remi moved his muzzle to touch my heart and breathed. His eyes were half-mast.

My eyes were half-mast. He slowly worked his way down the left side of my body, stopping every so often to come back to my heart where he would rest his muzzle, breathing slowly.

Then the leaching started. Leaching is when a horse yawns. Repeatedly, ten, twenty times in a row. It’s not an, “I’m so sleepy.” yawn, it’s an energy-sucking yawn. Some horses do this to move unwanted energy off of another horse or a person. When a horse starts leaching with me I start to wonder, what are they pulling off of me, energetically?

  
















The energy balancing continued, down to my feet on my left side, all the way back up to my head and then he switched to my right side and did the same all over—stopping sporadically to rest his muzzle lightly on my heart or to leach.

I felt like I had spent a week at the beach. I was a wet noodle, completely relaxed, completely receptive. He knew what he was doing and he wasn’t done yet.

Finally he brought his muzzle back up and rested it on my shoulder, breathing slowly, peacefully and said:

“Get out of your head…” both of us: slow, deep breaths, eyes nearly closed…

He moved his muzzle to my heart, breathed for a few moments, and quietly said:

… “and into your heart.”

Ohhh…

Remi stepped back, looked at me, lowered his head and closed his eyes. Wow.

I thanked him for his wisdom.

It took me three days to figure out what was going on with me that caused the horses to quibble over who would work on me and to figure out why Remi had had such a long session (about thirty minutes!) with me. I had had a very productive week. So much had been accomplished in creating my business. However, my head said it wasn’t happening fast enough. My heart was excited and happy over all that I was creating but my head just wasn’t along for the ride. My own worst enemy, my head was worried that things would never get done, I would never make it, I would never be able to manage a career and raising a family. I couldn’t do both. It wasn’t possible. Remi reminded me to live by what my heart says, “This is so exciting! I’m creating what I’m meant to do with my life!” There is no doubt in those statements, no worry, just knowledge that I’m on the right path.

Abraham Hicks says, “Nobody else knows your reason for being. You do. Your bliss guides you to it. When you follow your bliss, when you follow your path to joy, your conversation is of joy, your feelings are of joy -- you're right on the path of that which you intended when you came forth into this physical body.”

"Live gently. Speak gently."

In the coaching program we’ve been working on our values—toward and away. Toward values are the things we live by, the things that are the most important to us. Away values are things you avoid feeling within yourself. My top two toward values are intuition and healing (in all ways, physically, emotionally, spiritually.) I live my life by my intuition and my need to help people find their healing. My top away value is rejection. I hate to feel rejection above all else.

Last Saturday Rayn asked that I bring the kids out to see her. Thursday after school we swung by the pasture and walked out to see her. Loreli ran up to her chattering away about school, “Guess what Rayn? Today at school I…” Daniel stayed next to me. Rayn put her head in Loreli’s hands, allowing her to pet her face. As Loreli talked to her I moved toward Rayn’s side. I reached out to lay my hand on Rayn’s back and at the same time Daniel moved toward her head (I didn’t realize that). When I touched her she pinned her ears and whipped her head around and Daniel was right there. I yelled, “HEY!” and smacked her shoulder--she stopped but Daniel was pretty shaken up. He looked up at me with big eyes, “Can we leave now Mom?” Loreli really wanted to go explore the adjoining pasture and Daniel decided to go with her instead.

Leaving me with her.

On a good day I recognize anger for what it really is, underlying fear. I wasn’t just angry though. I was furious. Not a good day. My fallback: berating. Not a proud moment for me.

“I cannot believe you could do such a thing! He’s just a little boy, he could have gotten hurt, what is wrong with you?!”

And the thought eased into my mind, “It wasn’t him, it was you.”

Rejection reared its ugly head: “Oh, okay, it was me. Fine. You didn’t want me touching you. This is becoming a really nasty habit of yours. Yes, damn it, a habit. You are not allowed to pin your ears at me just because I touch you! I can’t believe you think this is okay. Sometimes you have to suck it up and allow things you don’t necessarily want. Oh! I’m so mad at you! What if we were working and that was a client? Not okay!”

Rayn was methodically eating grass, looking at me out of one eye, calm. Titanium¹.

“This is just awful behavior! That is such a scary response to something so simple.”

I stood next to Rayn, quiet finally. She was grazing, took a step toward me and brushed her shoulder against me and pinned her ears again! “Are you kidding me? You did that to yourself!” All I could think was how were we going to work together if she continued like this? I worked myself up into, “What if this became so bad I had to sell her? I’ll have to really work hard on making her act correctly. Re-teaching correct behavior.”

The words I said started to sink in. “Sometimes you have to suck it up and allow things you don’t necessarily want.” Oh dear. 

Then the word “scary” popped up. I was scared. Deep breath. What was I scared of? Rejection. When I feel rejected I often go on the attack.

I continued to walk slowly next to her as she was grazing and realized a lesson: I can’t make others accept things.

Then Rayn said, “Live gently. Speak gently.”

That meant something very specific to me: Insisting Rayn let me pet her is like hugging a non-huggy friend every single time you see them. Like insisting your husband give you piggy back rides wherever you go. I’m such a visual person, I see myself yelling at Brad, “I don’t care! Sometimes you have to suck it up and allow things you don’t necessarily want! Give me a piggy back ride!” Haaaa! Can you imagine doing that to a fellow human being? We do though, don’t we? If I tell another about all the things I’m learning from the horses, even when it makes them uncomfortable, I’m making them experience something that is very distressing for them, I’m making them give me a piggy back ride. Their discomfort shows and triggers rejection in me. Then I really have to hammer at them, trying to get them to understand. Ugh.

It’s the same as shoving religion down someone’s throat.

Oh no, that is so galling to write! I grew up in a religious family but as I became an adult I started down another path (ha, obviously) that didn’t always mesh with family. I’ve always hated the feeling of being preached to.

Big lesson. I calmed down. I realized this is the horse that has earned her keep for a lifetime for the miracles she’s taught me. She’s never hurt me. She’s never led me astray.

Then, in one big download of information: “I ‘behave’ when I got to the barn with you. I ‘act correctly’, and do the things that are expected of me. When your friend who was emotionally hurting came out with you to the pasture last week I stood solidly with you to help her. You had your hand on my back and we worked together for her. When you come to my world, I expect the same. No pawing and petting. Watch where I am and where you are. Learn my expectations and the herd’s expectations and reach for them-just as I do in your world.”

Well damn. A fifty/fifty partnership is what I wanted from the beginning—I’ve not been holding up my end. When I truly take another’s thoughts and feelings into account and adjust my trajectory I will no longer feel rejection.

Upon my realization, Rayn turned, took a step toward me and touched my heart with her muzzle.

Acknowledgement.

I’m still at the beginning of my coaching program and have felt like I had no clue as to what this would all turn into. In talking to one of my coaches today I realized that I have very real, personal experience with the EGCM (Equine Gestalt Coaching Method) coaching. My horse coaches me. It’s my job as a coach to “Get out of my head and into my heart.” (A horse namedRemi recently told me that). That has a lot of applications but in this case I need to get out of my old patterns and get out of Rayn’s way and let her work.

We students often say to those who ask what we’ll be doing, “I’ll be a coach. My horse is my co-coach.” Rayn isn’t my co-coach. She’s the coach. It’s my job to interpret for her and to use the tools I learn in the program to help the client find their truth. I believe I may have to start saying exactly that when I explain what I will be doing.

The coaching program’s job is to hone my skills in working with healing horses, so I can be quick and clear in hearing and communicating their lessons. It’s like working with an angel. An eleven hundred pound angel.

And this is what an Equine Gestalt Coaching session can feel like. The horse’s wisdom is “titanium”: strong, patient, elegant, sophisticated, calm. They know themselves, they want to help us and they are clear in their interactions.

Our job? Be open to the truth no matter what it is and to “Live gently. Speak gently.”

¹“To be titanium means to be strong, to be patient, to be elegant, to be sophisticated, to be calm, to know yourself, to help others, to be clear.”--Shafiqah Othman  http://sfqomhz.wordpress.com/2012/07/31/i-want-to-be-titanium/