Stillness Speaks

I've been rather quiet on the blog front recently because I've been well, rather quiet.

This has been building up for the last few months.  Despite the activity that's been happening on many fronts,  I've been feeling an increasing desire to hide away, to take stock and to meditate.  I hadn't been able to act on this instinct until a couple of weeks ago when Wish gave me a very special gift.

I had been hanging out with her in the field trying to help Wish to fall into a relaxed state.  The arrogance and irony in this sentence will become obvious as you read on.  I had grounded myself, (or so I thought), and was giving her a massage to help relieve some tension.  As I was doing this, I cleared my mind, slowed my breathing and imagined that we were both within a bubble of relaxation, warm and soft. 

Wish seemed to struggle to mirror my own altered state and the thought crossed my mind that she found it so hard to let go of her tension.  Then it happened.  As clear as anything, she said it.  'I cannot be still until you find stillness within yourself'.  Her words penetrated the silence and caused me to take a step back, open my eyes and to look at her.  She turned to face me and I asked her if she has just spoken to me.  She immediately bumped my hand with her nose as if to say, of course it was me, silly!  She then licked my hand as if to soften the blow to my ego and walked off to find some hay.  

I stood there for a moment taking in what she had said.  There was me thinking that I was helping her to relax when all the time she had been helping me.  I had to admit that I had experienced a rather tumultuous few months and continued to face significant challenges.  Perhaps my instinct to hide away and find some peace had been a reflection of this.  Certainly Wish hadn't been fooled by my attempts to put on a brave face and refused to be complicit in this facade.

As I walked out of the gate, I heard another voice behind me.  'It's in a book you have on the bookshelf'.  I turned around, starting to think I had finally gone mad only to see Skylark staring at me in her typically direct manner.  Her gaze was piercing and she marched over to make sure this half witted human had heard her message loud and clear.  I patted her and said I would look on the book shelf and she nudged me before walking off to join Wish.  Two black mares, two night mares, is it an accident we have two in our herd?  Do we need extra special help to navigate our way to the truth?

I went inside and across to the bookcase.  Magrit Coates' book 'Connecting with Horses' caught my eye and I slid it out from it's place on the shelf.  I opened it without much thought and it fell open on Chapter 7, 'Stillness Speaks'.  I felt a little sensation on the back of my neck as I realised that not only had I not imagined what Wish and Skylark had said to me, they had also guided me to find some answers.

I re-read this book and then Margit's book 'Horses Talking'.  I had read these books previously and although I thought I had absorbed the information, their message had failed to permeate my overactive mind. This time, it was as if  my instinct I had been developing about missing some important piece of information was finally vindicated.  For those of you who have read my previous blogs, you will be aware that I have recently stepped away from clicker training and been experimenting with SATS.  This was largely because of concerns with certain aspects of clicker but also because I recognised and wanted to work with the cognitive abilities of animals.  However, even with SATS, I had been feeling that there was a missing link.  Thanks to Wish, Skylark and Margrit Coates, here I was beginning to move into that hitherto consciously unknown but intuitively sensed dimension of communication and awareness.

One of the biggest realisations of this journey is that our animals can offer us so very much.  Even though I have always been at pains to put my horses first, to try and do my best for them, I now understand that has been done unidimensionally.  It has all been about what I can do for them, how I can help them, how I can train them to work with me in positive ways.  I have been striving to find out all I can about the best training methods, their ecology, learning theory etc.  There is nothing wrong with this other than the fact it demonstrates a huge omission and typical human arrogance.  None of this takes into account what my horses can do for me.  How much they can help me to develop self awareness and nuture me through difficult times.     How much they are able to comment upon those things which I would seek to inflict upon them, (even with the best of intentions).  

This leads me to a second major paradigm shift.  I thought that I had been observing, paying attention to body language and other clues.  I now realise I had been looking but not seeing.  I had been analysing but not listening; doing not being.  So much energy had been directed outwards and towards my horses that I had been unable to receive anything back.  So much time had been spent planning the next stage of training, worrying about whether I might have offended my horses or not, fearing I might be getting it wrong that my instincts were shrouded in a cloak of uncertainty.  I now know that listening is possibly the most important thing we can do for ourselves and our animals.  Really listening to ourselves, developing self awareness and then being in the right place to really listen to them.  

I'm currently working on achieving stillness within myself and this could form the subject of a separate blog so I won't go too far off on a tangent.  What I can say is how much I have learnt about the ponies in the last few weeks and of the valuable and individual roles they all play.  This has only been possible by learning about myself. I believe I have known this all along deep down but it took the catalyst of Wish and Skylark's pep talk to bring it to my conscious attention.

I believe that Dougal has a real gift for healing.  He has such a lovely balanced energy and a sense of dependability despite his own feeling sometimes of having been taken for granted for his good nature.  The other day Issie was in the field hobbling around trying to loosen off her joints.  She's really sore at the moment and in pain much of the time.   Dougal was busy with a huge pile of hay when suddenly he ambled over to Issie.  He met her face on and she buried her head in his forelock.  He closed his eyes and she hers and they stayed locked together like this for about twenty minutes.  It was such a beautiful sight and I would usually have rushed for a camera.  On this occasion, however, it seemed somehow disrespectful to get this exchange on film as if the very essence of what was occurring would be lost.  When Dougal finally stepped away, he went into a corner, closed his eyes again and slept for an hour or so.  When I went to check on him, he had smile on his face.  Issie also settled down under a tree and slept for a while, saying that she felt better when she arose.

Alf has a gift for healing emotions.  My friend Elaine once said that he is like a sentinel watching over us and I think she was right.  If anybody is sad or feeling vulnerable, Alfie comes over and with all his love licks the hurt away.  If you are happy then he loves to have fun and dance around but it seems that he always is concerned to ensure that everyone is in emotional equilibrium.

What I have over the years thought of as being Wish's biggest weakness I now realise is her biggest strength.  She is utterly sensitive, attuned to the smallest detail and possesses a highly attuned sense of danger.  This has frustrated me at times as we've gone out and she's been on edge despite all the work I'd been doing on de-sensitising her to scary objects and helping her to adopt a general sense of calmness.  What I now know is that she has been mirroring me all along and that her sensitivity means that she is unable to tolerate anything other than authenticity.  Her exquisite fine tuning results in raw honesty about whoever she interacts with, she doesn't possess sufficient security for deception.  This makes for what may sometimes be perceived by humans as a brutal conversation but if taken in the spirit with which it is meant may pave the way for the greatest enlightenment.

I am not sure entirely what Skylark's role is other than the fact that she is an excellent and forthright communicator that doesn't suffer fools gladly.  The herd often nominate her as spokesperson and shove her forward if anything needs addressing!  She feels like an old soul to me and I know she has much to tell us, I just haven't figured it out yet!  Knowing Skylark she will provide the answers as and when we are ready an I'm sure it will be a fascinating and informative process.

This awakening of my sixth sense and intuition has also been on my mind in relation to horses outside our herd.  We've been looking for a pony for Trinity, a 13.2hh kind and quiet pony, not too fast and not to slow. The pony doesn't have to be the prettiest or the fastest, the best jumper or the most daring, just a sweet soul who wants to be loved.  

We thought these requirements would be relatively easy to satisfy, after all, we weren't looking for great competition success.  What we have found has saddened and surprised us in equal measure.  Thus far we've looked at 14 ponies and all have in some way been greatly compromised.  Some are sad, some shut down, many are unsound and a few seem to have almost given up their soul and become resigned to their fate.  An overwhelming number have been completely different upon being ridden to what their owners have described with any variation from napping, bucking, bolting and refusing to move.  I was beginning to think that all these owners were terrible liars and also amazing actors from their feigned surprise.  Recently, however, I've started to think something different.  It seems to me that an unfortunately large number of horse owners remain oblivious to the signs their horses are trying to communicate to them in terms of discomfort, displeasure and unease.  We ourselves are not amazing animal communicators, but we take enough notice of horses to make them feel that they are being listened too.  Is it possible that when we go to view these ponies and introduce ourselves, letting them know that we are listening that they take the opportunity to communicate in the clearest fashion their dissatisfaction?  I would liken it to us being locked up in a foreign prison for a crime we didn't commit but unable to speak the local lingo in order to explain our way to freedom.  If one day we heard an English voice at the front desk, wouldn't we do everything within our power including behaving in an otherwise uncharacteristic fashion to attract the attention of this English voice that might hold the key to our freedom?  Wouldn't we rattle the bars, shout and kick in an effort to make ourselves known?  Is it so silly to think that the ponies we have visited weren't doing the same thing?

One mare that we saw might serve as a good example.  She was a beautifully marked strawberry roan and 15 years old.  Her owner said that she was excellent at hacking and jumping and a general pleasure to have around.  When we arrived at her field, we were struck by her distinct colouring but also by a sense of sadness.  We introduced ourselves, let her sniff our hands and I let her know silently that we just wanted to see if she would be right for our family and that it was ok to be herself.  As the owner went and got her tack, we were aware that her attitude changed from soft sadness to apprehension.  As the saddle came towards her, she flicked her ears, tightened her muzzle and her eyes widened slightly.  I patted her to let her know we'd seen those subtle signs and she sighed.  When the boy that owner her clambered on she fidgeted and tried to run backwards which was met by him digging his heels into her ribs.  As he rode her out into the field, she began shaking her head more and more vigorously and when he asked her to trot she let out a huge buck.  He exclaimed that she had never done that before, whipped her and urged her forward.  Again she bucked and the boy's mother looked genuinely shocked and confirmed that she had never done that before.  Looking at the mare, it was obvious to us that she was in pain so when we were asked if we wanted to ride her we declined.  I said to the lady as diplomatically as I could that I wouldn't want to put my child on a pony that seemed to be in pain and that perhaps it might be an idea that she get the pony checked out.  Whether or not she did go on to do this I don't know but as we left I went and said goodbye to the little mare.  I told her that we could see the pain that she was in and to have courage.  She looked at me for a heartbeat and seemed to summon some inner strength before being dragged away again by the boy.  It was if by having someone who understood this was sufficient empathy to be equipped to keep on keeping on.

I believe we all have the ability to develop our intuition it is just that the noise of everyday life creates a kind of static that makes it hard to tune to the correct frequency.  With patience and practice we can overcome our blocks and in the process learn some valuable lessons about ourselves and those around us.  In terms of our horses, it is not about what method, what thing we are trying to do on any given day.  It is not about business or even about trying to do the best we can for this in itself can create inconsistencies.  I believe that what really matters to our horses is being ourselves and presenting ourselves authentically before them.  This mean clearing our minds of all of the debris that accumulates over time and opening ourselves up to the possibility that our horses may well be able to offer us far more than we ever thought possible.