25/11/2023
Until a person can find emotional stability, no horse or human can trust them.
I’ve been mulling this over quite a bit for a few weeks - how can we find the ability to process, accept and feel a full range of emotion, as a healthy human must, without becoming an emotional cyclone?
Both horses and humans interact with their world in the way that works for them. Horses and humans both can learn to shut down, or to escalate to threaten.
When emotions stir up, and people back down or back away, we train the horse or human to threaten more, to escalate to get what they want. We condition emotional instability.
When emotions stir up and we shut them down, we train horse or human to stop feeling to get through life.
A middle ground is necessary - feel the feelings but don’t live there. Don’t shut them out but don’t use them as a weapon either.
Every true horseman I’ve met in life has a way of accepting what’s in front of them without judgment, but shaping it with their calm. I see you, and understand your emotion, but you can’t threaten me with it- here is the place where you and I can safely interact together. They don’t escalate themselves while interacting, and they guide those around them to peace.
Emotional fitness - it is a rare treasure to find in someone. But it is the mark of a true horseman: see the emotion, they feel the emotion, but they don’t live there.
