I'm sure horses can tell a novice at first glance. You can almost sense their
sneer. My only goes at horse-riding were as an adolescent and the horses always
completely ignored my requests and goads. If a horse I was on wanted to stop
and munch away at a hedge then that was what it would do. My instructor would
have to come to my aid to get the damned beast (sorry - charming animal) keep
up with the rest of the riders.
Horses are also damned scary - they're a lot bigger than you imagine when you
watch a cowboy movie and don't suffer fools gladly. Still, astonishingly
beautiful and graceful creatures for all that.
On a side issue: as race-horse jockeys are specifically chosen because they
weigh so little why aren't women (or even girl) riders preferred over men for
events where serious amounts of money are changing hands?
From your recent posts I get the strong impression you prefer animals to
humans! Is that (understandably) a correct impression?
---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, <awoelflebater@...> wrote :
---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, <curtisdeltablues@...> wrote :
I am fascinated by animal intelligence and am always curious if I can breach
the rapport barrier and connect with their intelligence enough to understand a
little bit of what is going on in there. Although I know this may be verging on
an idiotic question Ann, I will ask it anyway. Can you describe at all what
your impression is of what is going in in a horse's mind enough to describe
some qualities of it?
This is not hard to do, my safety depends upon it. When you are intimately
connected to a horse's body (as a good rider inevitably is) then you have
access to many things. First, without getting too complicated here, you have a
literal feel of the horses mouth and lips in both hands, you ass is sitting on
its back which is where all the movement happens, and your legs are embracing
his lungs and heart area. With this kind of touching you'd have to be an
insensitive cretin not to have some idea what is going on in the actual brain
of the horse. (Unfortunately, the horse world is filled with insensitive
cretins but that is another story.)
Basically horses can be a little like cats. One minute they are calm and
sedate and the next moment they are running sideways down the arena. They can
appear aloof and untouched by your presence and at other times can't get in
your pocket fast enough. There is a whole lot of wild still in there as well.
And they are total pushovers for the hand that feeds them but only if you have
the actual bucket in your hand at the time - otherwise you're just another
schlep. But then there are those times when you can be convinced that the horse
is actually glad to see you, just you with no bucket. But, I digress.
So, basically when you're all in touch with the horse, in that saddle and
riding along asking him to do all sorts of natural and unnatural things and he
is happy to do so that is because you are asking for the right thing at the
right moment and then allowing it to happen. In order to know what to ask and
when to ask and how to ask and then when to stop asking means you have to know
the mind of the horse to a certain extent. You have to know what he knows, you
have to know if you prepared him in the moments before asking and then you have
to know how much to ask and when it is too much or not enough and then you have
to figure out if his resistance is mental or physical. There are so many
calculations to make in order to do just one movement that it transcends
thinking. You don't have time to think all those things. So then what? It means
you feel it. In order to feel it you have to know something about yourself and
also something about the horse. And you end up making mistakes all the time.
You end up betraying the horse or causing them resentment toward you. You can
give them ulcers or hurt their bodies by breaking them - literally. They are
very, very delicate. They basically die of only two things - intestinal issues
and leg issues. Many of these things are brought about by people's
insensitivity and by forcing. When you climb on the back of these animals you
have a real responsibility because for as strong and willing and giving as
these animals are, all of that can be destroyed by selfishness or greed or ego.
I don't think I answered your question after all that.
I have had profound connections with a squirrel monkey, cats dogs and ferrets.
(I am excluding gerbils because the obvious jokes would just write themselves.)
In my interactions with them I have come to some conclusions about how they are
processing the world differently from each other, and from me. It is all
borderline fantasy, but if you interact enough you kind of get a sense, like
feeling some object in the dark and drawing conclusions.
I hope that serves as a writing prompt because I love when you write about
horses here.
---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, <awoelflebater@...> wrote :
---In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, <fleetwood_macncheese@...> wrote :
This is an interesting experience that always happens when I practice TM with
my wife. I can feel my nearly pure awareness contact hers, and then the
boundary is gone, and it is simply oneness, without boundary or ownership. I
always flinch mentally, just as the boundary dissolves. It is as if I am
suspended in an empty room, dimly lit by blue lights, and I sense another room,
this one also empty, but dimly lit by purple lights. Then, suddenly the divider
between the two is gone, and it is one room. This is probably more common that
it sounds, especially given Share's experience in the dome ("ovals of light").
I only get this riding my horse! The athletic movement of the horse and
finding the way in which my body can work and move with his back is the goal.
Couple that with the mental partnership of asking and responding and you can
start to appreciate why this sport is so amazing. You take an animal with its
own free will, its own ideas and you take its strong body and you sit on that
body and communicate through touch what you would like to do and lo and behold,
the horse responds and then your responsibility is to find a way to stay out of
the horse's way, to integrate yourself with its mind and its physicality in
order to become one thing moving as dynamically and effortlessly as possible
through space. It really is all that!
