It always feel so good to return home after being away. It feels great to be back in my own bed, getting to love on my animals, spending time with my family, and feeling back into the groove of things.
Being at the ranch in California once again was life changing. It always amazes me what the horses are able to teach me about myself. One of my greatest takeaways from this trip was gaining awareness in trusting myself and knowing when to ask for help. Prior to this trip, if anyone would have asked me if I trusted myself, with no hesitation I would have said yes! I thought I did, anyways. However, during two different exercises, on two different days, the lack of trusting myself kept showing up. To share with you what that means I’ll explain where it was most present during one of the exercises.
I chose to pick a horse named Ms. Nikki. She was anxious from the time I haltered her, to placing her in the stall, and as she awaited our turn. I sensed this, but tried to tell myself she was just missing her herd mates or perhaps my energy was up (horses mirror back to us how we’re feeling inside).
When it was my turn to enter the round pen, I went to get Nikki, and saw that she was still excited. I truly tried so hard to remember to take deep breaths, feel my feet on the ground, connect with myself and be present. I tried EVERYTHING I could think of to calm my energy so in turn she would calm down. -Wasn’t happening!
As soon as I took her halter off she pranced around the round pen, raring up, and charging at me. I tried to remain in my body rather than going into my head, but the truth was I felt unsafe. There were a few seconds when she wanted to come stand next to me and my first thought was, how quick before she reacts in the manner she did earlier?
The coach who was working with me did an amazing job of recognizing that I didn’t feel safe and she asked about it. I told her how I was feeling, and all that I was trying to do internally, and it just wasn’t working. As I continued to try to get both myself and Nikki to calm down, the feeling of fear continued to escalate in my body. I kept having the thought of “I need to get the hell out of here” but then another thought of “no, you ‘should’ be able to calm yourself and calm this horse down. You aren’t doing it right.”
I was fighting with my own thoughts and not trusting my instinct of leaving the ring. I was totally battling the “shoulds” game in my head, which I know from what I’ve been taught–that’s not the right thing to do.
So I asked for help. One of the main program facilitators ended up getting in the round pen with me (as coaches, that’s what we do for our clients) and after a few deep breaths and holding on to him, I felt safe again. Nikki calmed and came in to be with us. It ended up being a beautiful experience.
At first, I doubted myself and wanted so badly to feel that I was safe in the pen and that I should be able to calm this situation. After all, the horse was mirroring my feelings and I “should” be able to calm myself, right? When in reality, had I trusted my initial feeling of being unsafe I could have asked for someone to come in with me even if it was just in the beginning and likely could have prevented the experience from being one of fear.
In the end there was a great lesson learned, and that’s what’s so magical about these experiences with horses. Nikki was very excited at the beginning of our session together (as was I) and by the end she was much calmer. She was essentially two different horses from the beginning to the end, and it was okay that I felt fearful in the beginning. My lesson was not only to trust myself and ask for help when I need it, but to also trust my discernment. That feeling in my body never lies.
How do you know when you’re not trusting yourself? Can you feel it in your gut?
How do you know when to ask for help? Is there a time when looking back on things you can see where you could have changed the outcome of something by asking for a little support? Let me know in the comments.
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