How To Connect With Your Horse’s Intelligence

How to connect with the intelligence of our horses?

A young woman sat in a wheelchair with a horse by her side. It was a super-hot summer day. It was the beginning of July.

It was a huge open field. We were gathered in this place to celebrate history, to celebrate horses.  The people who were gathered there were children, there was families, horse people, there were not horse people there, and city people.

There was an audience gathered in a circle around.  And there was my friend.  She motioned to me to come over to her. I went over to her and I lent down beside her and put my ear on her face and she said something to me...

What she said to me is what we teach in our Harmony For the Horse Online Program.

Horses are highly intelligent and sentiment beings, but how do we connect with that intelligence? 

How do we connect with that intelligence to get the results that we're looking for and to develop a deep bond that is everlasting?

It's time for us to change. It's time for us to look at our horses in a different way. Our horses have been waiting for this for a long time they want us to up level with them because I know if you're here watching this, this is what you're seeking to.

In the video my dog is watching this cat. He's using his very acute senses and his sense of awareness. And that's what I’d like to talk about first.

1. Trust that your horse knows

Trust that the horse knows trust  (that my dog knows) trust that he knows that his senses are telling him that there's something, and his job is to look after the farm.

So, he's going to let me know that there's something there. I could say "stop barking, don't be a disturbance right now".

But instead, I recognize that he is doing his job and he's using his acute senses to do that.

So, with regards to R.D. Lawrence and wolves, he noted:

Even if we don't understand ourselves. If we are not clear on ourselves, they have the most amazing ability to adapt.

You can find them saying to themselves, "She wants me to do this, so I’ll just do this."

Horses also have, just like my dog seeing that cat that I perhaps would not see in the distance, the most amazing awareness with their senses.

...the ability to detect changes in their environment.

The ability to see the slightest of movements and respond to that. And that's what we did on that day with the woman in the wheelchair and my horse Don ... we were there to give a presentation and a performance about how horses adapt to humans.

This woman was in her wheelchair, had Don my horse with her, and what she did was she circled around her at liberty with the audience, the people all around us making a circle. She brought Don in by backing up the wheelchair a little bit. She sent Don out.

She had just the slightest of cues, the slightest of conversation, that she used to communicate with Don. 

2. Educating ourselves on our movement

Horses are masters of movement. They are designed in the most amazing way to move.

We have put ourselves in front of computers using our hands all day, and we have conditioned ourselves and our nervous systems so that we do not function as a whole.

We're functioning in parts.

In order to be with the horse we need to:

... Not focus on our hands as we do for hours and hours and hours a day.

We need to know our bodies. We need to know our movement and find our Place of Power.

Once we know our Place of Power, then we are moving as a whole and we can play this instrument, which is our body, the way that our horses are able to listen to us.

This is basically understanding and knowledge about ourselves, not the aids, which is commonly taught in the horse world. It is not obedience to the aids.

It is not the perfection of the aids. It's not hauling our horses around.

It is setting up our body for success with our horses - access the intelligence of our horses because then our horses also have intelligence in movement.

Once we connect with ourselves in this way we can then connect with our horses, and we can guide our horses to find their best pure movement, to find where they are then able to work as a whole unit with us.

And so, we become a unit as the two of us dancing together.

I mentioned earlier about how humans put horses through so much trauma because they don't trust that the dog knows or they don't trust that the horse knows.

And so, our ignorance puts the animals through so much trauma.

Those traumas are stored in the body. They are stored, of course, in the mind, in the emotion, but they are also stored in our bodies and in our horse’s bodies.

I've rescued a lot of horses. I've found that the traumas express themselves continually throughout the entire life of the animal... in the movement, in the mental approach, in the emotions 

These stories of the human interaction and the traumas that have happened in the past are held, and this is affecting the movement, and hence it will affect the way that we ride.

3. Living in the moment

Horses are masters of living in the moment.

The don't look at the past. They don't look at the future.

So, do we really want to take all of our stuff, and our stories that we have, into our riding?

This is really important because once we connect with our horses, the horses connect back with us and they can tell us what's happening.

They show us where we need to heal. They can see our movement clearly. 

They perceive the slightest of movements, but they also perceive what's behind the movement.  What is the story behind that person's movement?

They can teach us how to heal if we're ready to listen to this.

So, transitioning to this different approach with our horse asks us to get absolutely crystal clear on ourselves, doesn't it?

The clearer you get for yourself, the more you can release your own subconscious patterns... ... your own guilt that's happened in the past... the more you can get in touch with your negative emotions that you're holding.

All the pain that you have, all the angst that you have, all the details that are behind your stories...

We help you to release that. 

We help you to find those stories and release them so that you can then communicate very clearly with your horses.

When we have learned how to be whole in our movement and have our Place of Power, then we're much more able to feel. Until then, it's just pieces and parts, which leads to overwhelm in riders and lack of ability to pick up and to receive and then lack of ability to give back.

We help you with all of those things that I’ve just discussed here.

If you'd like more information, I have a free webinar that you can watch. It describes all of what I’ve talked about here, in much more detail. You can watch that, see if it resonates with you and see if it's something that you would like to get support with.

Quick RECAP...

What exactly is the intelligence with your horse?

Trusting your horse, knowing how to connect with your horse, educating yourself on your movement, living in the moment.

So, to get back to the story that I told you about my horse and the woman in the wheelchair when I went down and put my ear beside her before she did her performance, what she said to me was, trust and connect, because we were there to trust and connect.  Don and the women in the wheelchair, we're at liberty.

There's nothing we could do, but trust and connect. We couldn't do anything different than that. 

She had approached me because she had a fear of horses because of her accident, and she had not been around horses for quite some time after the accident, and she loved horses deeply. She really wanted sincerely to get over the fear and get back into being with horses. And so that's what we did together.

We did this performance and we helped her overcome her fear. The biggest teacher there was Don, though, my horse Don helped her to learn to trust and connect.

Do you have any questions, any notes for me, feel free to put them below. And also if you're interested in my program, if this is valuable for you and you like this, then I have more for you... a program that supports you and leads you to find that transformation you’re looking for with your horse.  You are not alone... we are here for you.

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