A Healthy Hoof Grows From a Healthy Horse
Healthy in Body, Mind, Spirit and Environment. Part 2 of 4
Now we move to the Direction of the North, which is the Mental or Mind. This is the direction of learning and sharing from a place of “calm” or in the minds eye. The mental aspect of a person, or horse, is considered as being an integral part of the physical aspect of a person, or horse. In my work, the person and the horse almost always go together. There are times where I do not meet the person who “owns” the horse, but the one who is the trainer, rider or caregiver who owns the facility where the horse lives. There is an ever moving balance within each as separate beings, and one of horse and person together. The thing about Mental energy is that it is not seen as much as it is felt. Respect to everything in Nature helps us to connect with it. The healing path in this direction needs to be do-able, for both the horse and the person as individuals as well as in their relationship. It’s always an adventure for me to see where what is unseen takes us in learning and sharing. I not only share lessons I have learned, but look forward to the new ones I will learn that will help me or someone else in the future.
This is where complimentary modalities like essential oils and photonic light therapy I utilize comes in. I also consult with other Practitioners for Dentistry, Chiropractic, Acupuncture, Massage, Body Work and at times Communicators. I also work with a Naturopath who does Energy Medicine with Qest Frequency scans. Not only for people, but for animals. I have not read a single scan where the horse was not challenged emotionally in some way in this Direction of the Mind. After reading many of these scans, my mind goes back to my trips to the Current and Jack’s Fork Rivers in Shannon County, Missouri in April 2008 to learn from the wild horses there at the Equine Sciences Academy Orientation week, and the Spring Mountains National Recreation Area to visit the Cold Creek Mustangs just north of Las Vegas, NV during the 2012 American Hoof Association Conference. These protected wild horses and Mustangs lived in herds and family bands in the seemingly endless landscape. I literally felt like a piece of dust out there. Watching them run together through this rough terrain, moving in silent oneness really touched my core. It is the expression of Nature without words. You can go here to my website to see more pictures and read about that experience in more depth.
In this direction of the Mind, I am also taken back many years to the days when I worked in Mental Health at the Wassaic Developmental Center and the Regional Behavior Treatment Unit in upstate NY. When I see horses in boarding facilities in stalls lining both sides of the barn for more hours than not, it brings to mind all the doors down the long hallways where the patients rooms were. Most of them were mildly to profoundly mentally retarded. Some were born that way or became that way for various reasons and some, through no fault of their own wound up there and became institutionalized. I saw self destructive and coping behaviors, like rocking, pacing and physical self abuse. I have seen many horses expressing similar energies or coping mechanisms like cribbing, pacing and chewing. One could also make this analogy to inmates in a prison or Native American children in Boarding Schools that has recently been brought to a greater light. It is confinement by the will (sometimes by force) of another. The majority of domesticated horses are confined by the will of those who “own” or care for them.
Another teaching I learned at Full Circle is “The Rule of Opposites”. The essence of this Rule is to learn how to train yourself to recognize and use energy and to understand that whatever we think or do, there is the opposite of that. Harmony and Balance is found somewhere between the opposites, and doesn’t always stay the same. There are many things in life that influence where that is at any give time. I have found that I need to be very flexible in finding the healing path, so we have something to build on, and a goal to look forward to. Our “opposites” here are obviously Freedom in nature in a family band and Confinement to a large or small facility with or without equine companions that are generally not family. I look for just one change we can make in a positive direction. It almost always leads to another in it’s own time.
Being present with horses in their natural environment is being a witness to their harmony and balance in Nature. I am grateful for what I have learned from them. Teaching clients and others in Workshop and Clinic settings about “Paddock Paradise” or a “Track System”, which mimics a more natural way of keeping horses. I have kept my own horses in this system for many years. You can see how my horses live here. Since they are fully domesticated and under our care, we need to give them the opportunity to express who they are by living in a herd. It is then that they become the teachers and we the students of who they really are. As I continue to write future articles, I will share some of the stories where they brought healing, harmony and balance to me so I could carry that forward.
So, if the Mental aspect is directly considered as being an integral part of the Physical aspect of a horse, as I have learned in Indian Medicine, we must acknowledge that when they become a part of our lives, that we also give them the opportunity to express their true nature as much as possible, even in domestication. What shows up in the Physical, can very well have its source in the Mental. It’s when we make changes that this can come to light.
A great book for further reading is Horsonality, by Andy Beck. It was course material when I was studying for my Degree and Certification at the Equine Sciences Academy. I also had the awesome privilege of Meeting Andy and spending a day in a small group with him at The Whole Horse Symposium in 2011.
In Part 3, we will look at the Direction of the East, which is the Spiritual.