I haven’t written a lot about Timmy and how we are progressing with his cribbing recently. This is because nothing was needed until today, and all that was needed today was a conversation that has given both of us something to process. When I say process it could mean any or all of these:
- Something to mull over
- Something to think about
- Something to find a solution for
- Something to put an action plan in place for
But, the first step of the process is always acknowledgement. Acknowledgement is all that is needed to start a process, and acknowledgement may be all that is needed by us as a human, to enable a change of thinking, behaviour, or emotional reactive habit in another being. And this can work both ways. Another being can also enable us to acknowledge something within ourselves, and just acknowledging that can help us change our own perspective on something, our way of thinking about something, or our way of responding to something.
This conversation happened while I was having a cup of coffee, listening to the silence, and putting energetic feelers out asking how each of the horses were today. Often times at this time of year we go outside to ‘do’ not to ‘be’. But we should always find time to ‘be’, to have a conversation. We don’t have to do this standing next to our animal. Its like making a telephone call, but without all the tools we are told we need.
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The conversation
When I asked Timmy how he felt today I got a sense of two separate beings, two Timmys. One was him, his soul I suppose, who he is. One was his body. And it was like one was watching the other. He was looking at himself.
I could sense his body as well, like we were watching his body together.
I then got a feeling of being hungry, quickly followed by a feeling of needing to purge (nausea I suppose in humans but the word ‘purge’ came to me rather than sickness). I felt this was the current sense of his cribbing. I acknowledged this feeling or sensation. Acknowledgement is the ‘OKAY’. Its all okay. Its okay to feel like this. This is listening rather than doing, fixing, or finding answers.
We quickly moved away from watching the body, and the conversation changed. I was asked a question. Timmy asked me “If I become whole what are your expectations?”
A serious question. Something I felt into within myself and my answer was this.
“I will do my best to have no expectations”.
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The process
A short conversation and a lot to process…
For Timmy I sense he is making a decision to come more into himself, to become more whole. But he is wary. When he has been ‘whole’ his sensitivity has been knocked about by me wanting to do stuff: brush him, saddle him, do groundwork, ride him, and so forth, without first checking in and asking him if that was okay. Because he internalised his feelings there were assumptions that it was okay. Now I know better, but the wariness is still there until he releases it. This is a big step for him.
To become whole would be to become vulnerable to a human again. Something he has spent his life keeping outside of himself where it can be protected from the insensitivities of humans.
For me, this is about being more sensitive to his feelings, but also not tiptoeing around him. Being respectful but not becoming wary of making a mistake with him. Being vulnerable to him and listening, and if I don’t understand what he is telling me, having the patience to wait. It is also about forgiving myself if I do make a mistake.
There is a secondary (or is it the primary part) to this as well. We humans have many parts to us too. We can be one person with ourselves, one person with our animals, a different person with our family, somebody else again with our friends, and then there is our career persona, work persona, and so on.
Can we reject the parts of us that are not our true selves and show our truest self all the time? Can we be vulnerable?
Can we become whole?
