Getting What You Need

Full disclaimer, this post was hard for me to write and yet I got home from the barn today, sat down and out it came.

At nearly 17, Soni's lived with his habits a long time. He is a FAR different horse than he used to be and has gotten to the point where he knows I will try and do right by him but experience has taught him that things don't always turn out okay, especially when the Worry Cup is quite full. On these days I feel like the risk of proving him right isn't worth it. He is a horse that demands every fiber of you show up and be in order; if I'm not feeling up to this, I don't feel it's fair to ask anything of him. 

And yet there are days, days much like today, where I feel like I am up to it. Days where I pull him from the pasture and can tell he's not feeling all that excellent. Days where I see all this and say "okay, we can make a little something of this."

And I'm proven absolutely and utterly wrong.

On these days I wonder if I get so focused on him I lose track of myself. I forget to check in with me because I'm so busy checking in with him. He's a sweet, sweet gelding: an old soul who just wants to do the right thing and feel okay, and in trying to help him get there I end up retreating within myself to hide from him all of the emotions bubbling below the surface: the frustration, my OWN worry, the poisonous feeling of inadequacy that I never seem to entirely shake. I do the very thing I am trying to help him not do.

I have been oddly fortunate to wind up owning horses that are exactly what I need but often not what I [think I] want. I adore Soni and he will have a home with me until his last breath but he's a tough horse to get close to. On his good days it's an absolute pleasure to even be in his presence and riding him is what I have always imagined a good working partnership would feel like. He and I share a connection in brain and body: it just feels easy as he moves with me and takes any correction to heart without getting worried. I feel calm, a sense of ease settling deep within that, to be honest, I don't feel all that often.

On the not-so-good days, I walk away feeling completely defeated as he manages to unearth every little shred of inadequacy I have worked so hard to bury. 

To be clear, Soni does nothing except show me how he feels in the moment (and perhaps call me out on my attempt to bluff him into believing I have myself handled). He is doing nothing wrong. It is I who end up realizing I haven't quite done all the work I apparently need to do. It is I who is reminded that the old negative belief I have about myself, the one I have spent my entire life trying to let go of, is still there. You aren't worthy. You aren't good enough. You never will be.

And this is where my old friend Trauma waltzes in, waves, smiles and says "it's been a while, hasn't it?"

Every horse I've owned has been a physical embodiment of The Rolling Stones Song "You Can't Always Get What You Want". Every horse I've owned has come with a a very large, very full junk drawer. I have been successful with all of them in some aspects and (quite) unsuccessful in others. But if you recall the chorus to that song, there is another piece that also ends up being true for every horse I've owned.

"But if you try sometimes, well, you just might find

You get what you need."

And this is where I always end up coming back to. I would not be where I am - WHO I am - were it not for these animals. The notion of an easy-going, uncomplicated mount always seems appealing when I get to this point. Surely I'd still learn plenty, heck, even progress a bit more and be able to start doing some of the things I'd like to play with on horseback, right? 

Maybe, maybe not. I could speculate 'till the end of days about how things *might* be and in all of it there will always end up being only one thing I know with 100% certainty: I am getting the education of a lifetime from these horses, something worth far more than the price tag on the most expensive, solid, well-educated animal on Earth. It is absolutely worth it.

That, friends, is what keeps me doing this.

So I'll allow myself a teaspoon of pity and a good cry. I'll acknowledge I still have a lot of work to do and that's okay. I'll tip my hat to Trauma, say "thanks for the reminder", pet my horse and thank him for his honesty - even in those moments where I'm not ready to face it.

At the end of the day, I know I'm getting something right at least some of the time to have this guy keep trying for me.