Reaching the stillpoint of giving and receiving has been the process this week with the horses. It is so wondrous to look back at how one doorway opened to the next, and how the message came through so subtly and yet with such clarity. 

Sculpting With the Herd

Since Mother Willow helped to create some perspective, a purification of the process, I have been beginning to see my interactions with the herd as the creation of an energetic sculpture which is formed by everyone involved. Each horse has an offering to make, of any kind, perhaps a choice not to participate, and to express the magic of that. Others may take a more active role, manifesting a new form of behaviour, a new concept or energetic vibration.

Each offering is like a thread of the tapestry, or a note in the symphony. The knowledge I have of the bio-mechanical connection that is possible between us is simply a framework, a kind of format or theme. It offers the most basic procedure, yet is always aligned with the dialogue. The energetic dialogue is the path, and perhaps the old knowledge will be surpassed or evolve into something new. 

Inviting The Horses Into The Bridle

I am coming to the herd with the bridle and feeling that a new channel is opening. It involves sensing the doing and the being in the same moment. The presence of that.. being with doing. I follow this channel towards the herd. Marie comes first and then Quaramba and Cheyenne, they are diverting the focus into scratching, yet it feels good to invite them into the bridle. Honey came and invited herself in.. she is so forward and open. I put it on within the being-doing, and after a while I clip on the long line, still focusing on inviting her forward energetically, without any physical expression. She pauses then chooses to come. It felt significant not to oppose in any way her choice to graze or have scratches. Neither physically nor above all energetically.

Just to focus on opening the channel, to invite. So much energy she has, I could feel it pulsing, in potential. Then, only minutes later we were ready to take the bridle off.. she was still interested by it and returned to it a few times. Then I invited Quaramba in to the channel, and again she accepted the bridle. She chose to go away with it to graze. I could feel that she needed time with it.. space. Later on I invited her to let me take it off. The sense of being patient, waiting for the energetic space to open up was very strong.  Thoughts came to me about the situation.. was it was like threading little channels of open flow together to shift the herd purpose? to reform their motivation? I must follow where the channels are, and invite them to open. There is a sense of so much energy available, so much willingness…

Monday the 15th of June

Pledging Myself Into The Herd

Each Horse Sings Their Special Note

Today the herd are resting in summer barn.. I am invited inside, sitting, and begin to feel the symphony we are creating together. I am inviting them to join me, it is joyous, today is for energetically creating the space. The blissful state of ironing every tiny crease, aligning all energies, germinating, initiating gentle bursts of joy and long, profound infusion of love and inspiration. Joining as one.

I begin to feel each member of the herd and their own special note today: Aimee is Soaring, Totti is Waiting, Marie is Growing, Rafi is Being, Gorrion is Dancing,  Quaramba is Morphing, Cheyenne is Watching, Honey is Loving and me..I realise that I am Absorbing.

Now I am connecting with Quaramba and the bridle. Looking for the channel.. going deep..sensing her giving her body, how it feels, the intensity, the vulnerability, the delicacy. Now I am pledging my body, my Self, first to her, and then to the herd. Every part of me. After this magical meditation with Quaramba I begin to feel the ceremony of the bridle, sensing into the conversation, how does it work… is it giving myself, or am I inviting the horse? Giving myself feels more imposing.. do these two vibrations/directions need to align themselves? Become one? They are so different.

Tuesday The 16th June

The Circle of Giving And Receiving

Aimee begins to show me, I am feeling how inviting makes space, opens the channel. It is reassurance, in movement. Giving is my vulnerability, my faith in myself, my space for myself. They are a circle!! giving and inviting: giving the bridle – inviting to come – offering the bridle – inviting space. I am feeling the circle with Aimee, it is so perfectly aligned.. so beautiful. Exploring it now with Rafi.. wow, so different. I am not ready to go into it deeply with him, even though his behaviour seems perfect for the bridle, his energy is not ready, not aligned, neither with receiving nor accepting… 

Inspired to Create

The Universe conspired to allow us all some processing time after this session, and we didn’t get back together until the end of the week. Plenty of time to forget the storyline and come in again fresh and clear. I have learned to let myself forget whatever we were working on, whatever discoveries we made, and come in again without a script. It is so delightful how the path may take itself up exactly where we left off, or we might have leaped into a whole new place. 

Excitement is so high today! I am sitting at the mounting block, wondering about the next step of our sculpture.. revelling in the liberty, the perfect freedom to listen. I feel to go and connect physically with the horses and they all happen to enter the arena. They are moving quickly, full of energy. I go inside the arena invite them in energetically. It is a pure, expectation free invitation, which I believe is a new level for me. I am remembering to pledge myself and then wow!

I suddenly remember the circle, our beautiful circle of pledging and inviting. I begin focusing on this, becoming this, seeking the rhythm of inviting to pledging, how does it work? Cheyenne came past and gave me one brief little kiss on her way, this is so new for her, not to attach herself. Everyone is very animated – rolling and exploring – I am feeling that the rhythm is inside the horses themselves.. their personality, their horse-ness.. now I am ‘stuck’ ‘held’ in the inviting in part of the cycle.. I can feel the horses like the ocean.. wild, uncontrollable.. then they all go away fast to summer barn.

Becoming The Stillpoint

In the summer barn I go deeply into the circle, working with Aimée, I still feeling unable to go into the giving/offering/pledging part. She was putting her leg up over me, and I felt that it was important to become as defenceless as possible, it felt like she was helping me to find the giving part within somehow.. I focused on being vulnerable… and I began to sense the two sides becoming one.. there was a Stillpoint.

I was understanding more about the giving part, it is being exposed, doing, offering and entering all in one. It must be done in love and reverence, it is an offering of oneself, finding the stillpoint, it is so beautiful, so clear, so perfect. I began practicing being in the stillpoint with the bridle and only Aimee and Honey accepted it. The others all gently declined. I do not feel that I am in the wrong place, they just decline right now. They are resting. It was so easy to hear their voice, their voice has never been clearer… 

Reflecting on today I was feeling a touch of disappointment. To be in such a magical place and not all the horses were there with me. I began to see that I had a desire to illicit a particular response.. that somehow if I could be in a perfect place, it would always initiate a perfect answer. An answer I have decided is right or good.

What a wrinkle to have come across in myself! What a primitive expression of ego. The genuine magic was that reaching the stillpoint so perfectly, facilitated the clearest dialogue we have yet engaged in. That was the miracle, because there is no result or agenda outside of that.