The fear of falling

It is strange how some fears sneak up on you over the years. As a child I was never afraid to fall, I climbed trees and on occasion would fall out of one, but I would never climb a tree or on a rooftop with any fear. I have practiced the art of falling for over twenty years in Aikido and there I came across the fear more than once. The way you practice falling in Aikido is to slowly build up skills and courage and it results in spectacular falls and a lot of fun.

I remember falling off my bike once in the middle of a crowded street, one of those strange accidents when you try to avoid one, I rolled off my bike onto the street and onto my bike again in a very controlled fashion. When I turned around to see if no one got hurt I only saw stunned faces and a big smile appeared on my face as I rode off. 

When you have practiced falling, or any art like that, the body just takes over, leaving mind to watch the whole thing in slow motion and do the commentaries. So one part of me is very confident when it comes to falling, fearless in fact, it trusts itself completely to know what to do and to step up as I need it.  Then there is another part of me that fears falling, that tells me how bad it all can become when I would fall. When I’m quiet and try to find that part  in me I find something as big as a marble and just as smooth, I can rationalize it away with ease if I wanted to, but I suspect it has a function.

This smooth marble like fear can explode within a split second and like an ink capsule spread through my body in no time at all, I feel my muscles tens, my heart skips a beat, and my mind start racing and in the over excited voice of a sports commentator starts telling me what could go wrong. When I’m alone and fear strikes it is easy to have it subside, just step away from the ledge and you´ll be fine. But when you are on a horse you know in the same split second that your fear will become her fear in the next split second. The same is true when your horse gets struck by fear, it’s like lightning and will strike you too.

I think the trick is not to deny fear, the risk of falling is real and even superman did get into serious trouble,  nor try to contain it, containing it will make it jump around like a box of frogs. But instead let it pass through you like lighting through a lightning rod, in one end, out the other, trust yourself to take appropriate action based on skill and circumstances and relax. Now this is easier said than done, but it is like any skill practice makes perfect  and a little awareness goes a long way.

Feet First

Before I even bought a horse I knew one thing for sure, I need to be able to do her feet. In school I had learned how to clip sheep’s feet and trim cows hooves so horses hoofs seemed doable. The plan was to move to rural France to be as self-sufficient as possible and knowing that a good farrier are hard to come by, being able to maintain healthy horses hoofs was a must.

I looked into the whole discussion on horseshoes or no horseshoes and came to the conclusion that going bare-feet was best, after all wild hoses go barefoot without much trouble and as I child I ran barefoot through shrubs and on stony beaches without even thinking about it, but now after years of wearing shoes my feet had gotten lazy. Besides that, I could not see myself become a blacksmith any time soon, an almost lost art I have great respect for, so barefoot it was.

On the other side of Holland there was a course in natural hoof trimming and of I went, joyfully thinking it must be like school once was and I´ll meet a bunch of horses today. The day started off with theory on hoofs and instruction on how to sharpen your knives and a lot of horrible before pictures of mismanaged horses feet and the stunning result after a good trim.  I hoped that we would not see any horses that had to walk on painful feet today for I would not feel able at all to help them out.

After lunch the teacher guided us to a barn in which a circle of chairs and in the middle a big plastic bag. We all sat down and he reached in to the bag and handed each of us a frozen hoof with still enough leg attached so you could clamp it between your legs. I was struck by the matter of fact-ness with which he handed out these tokens of lost lives and the coldness of the limb against my thigh.  We set to work and I cut and scraped, looked and learned a lot and all the while I could not help but think of the live this now frozen leg must have had, the painful feet and the fear of going to the slaughter and I cursed the humans that had made it so.

Now, years later, whenever I pick up my alive and thriving horses foot I silently thank the horse that lost its live and became my first barefoot teacher.

The name of the game

When I got back into horse riding after 25 years I did not want to go back in to formal dressage, it´s just not me, so I looked around for a place where they taught Western riding. While strolling through the internet I came across all kinds of new and interesting new things about horses, I had kept myself away from horses for a long time and had not kept up with new developments at all. Of course I had heard about the great shift in thinking brought on by Monty Roberts and I did see the Horse Whisperer movie but that was about it. So seeing all these articles about Natural Horsemanship and Centered Riding wetted my appetite for horses even more. I knew that was my path, after training Aikido for some twenty years I found great similarities is this new way of being with horses.

But first I had to find a place to ride again and be among horses and I was lucky to find a place nearby. The teacher was not at all what I remembered from horse girly girls, she was short, like me, looked more like a boy, like me and was a little on the heavy side, like me so we hit it of well. My first lesson was on a big Friesian named Henk and if she would have said all you can do today is groom I would have been in heaven too. The feeling of being near a horse again, the warmth and strength of horses body, the subtle movements of ears, the instant connection you have through touch and the smell made me hungry for more.

After bouncing around for an hour on his big black back made me realize two things:

1. I need to know more about this path through books and video
2. My bum has forgotten how to relax on a horses back while we trot

The second realization was the start of a whole new journey in discovering my body and blockage.

The first lead me to a book on which I base the title of the blog, a book by  Gawani Pony Boy, Horse follow closely. Besides having the most beautiful photo’s that made you wish you could step into them and be as free, he said somewhere, just watch your horse for a day, without interfering, watch how it interacts with the world, with other horses, just watch and do nothing but absorb. That made so much sense to me and it became the basis of the journey with my horse from the moment she came into my live.

Body & Mind

I start this story today because of the adventure this afternoon.

I won´t start at the beginning, because this story has no beginning and no end. It is a story about learning and love. This blog will skip and jump through time and tell the tale of what my horse taught me.

She is now free, after the few years I had to put her in a stable back in Holland she now roams the land in France. I did not ride her all through winter and I longed to feel her changed body under me. The months of living in the mountains has made her strong, lean and flexible, the hard work of seeing her through winter has made me stronger but I did not gain any flexibility.

Where she now lives we used to camp out and I am happy that the picnic table is still standing there. I climbed on it so I could climb on her back, as it was a spur of the moment thing and I can never find her halter anyway she was free to do as she pleased and I was just happy to feel her new body under me.

We have a new dog in the pack she is barely used to horses and she is not used to seeing me on a horse at all. The dog got restless and started barking and jumping around and the body under me started to pick up speed and before I knew it she was galloping up the hill.

When you will get to know us you will know that she used to be a lazy horse and me a novice rider as I still am.

In the short gallop up the hill without saddle or reins there was a much longer conversation going on in my head:

I will fall off – No you won’t
I need to jump off – No you don’t
Me and my stupid plans – But you are doing great
She is in a panic – No she is not
I should panic – No you shouldn’t
I wish I was a better rider – Feel how good you are riding now
This is scary – No it’s a thrill

At the top of the hill she stopped, bowed her head and started to eat as if nothing happened. But a lot had happened, I again faced some of my fears and I stared right back at them. There is no denying the two sides in me, like there is no denying that I made it safely up the hill on a galloping horse. My head did the talking but my body rode hers and we were a perfect match. My head was silent while my body was enjoying the adrenalin pumping through my veins and I felt proud we came this far.