Beasts with Burdens: Introduction
I started writing about my experience with Dorian, because the journey we’ve taken together is so different from how many of the trainers, equine-assisted learning experts, and riders I know relate to horses.
Many people still don’t understand horses as emotional, wise beings and that to get anywhere with them, a relationship is essential. Trust, respect, genuine communication, even love, I think, is the basis of any real connection, no matter the species.
Most essential to that relationship is that we come to them in our own, most authentic selves. And sometimes, that’s no easy task.
I was surprised at how my changes happened. Rather than me teaching Dorian (though certainly we’ve engaged in that process), my growth came mostly from my relationship to him and what he’s communicated to me and taught me. He reads me much more clearly than I read myself, and has shown me my need for deep changes.
And always, his communication has been honest, straightforward, gentle, and clear.
"When you take the halter and lead rope off, all that’s left is the truth.” Pat Parelli
But our progress hasn't been along any straight path or defined by rules; it’s been more me flying by the seat of my pants, to be honest. And mostly about listening to him.
I haven’t always been a good listener. It’s taken me a long time to get an inner quietness and a willingness to be present that’s enabled me to understand the feedback he is always providing me.
Any of you who’ve been in the horse world for even the shortest amount of time know that everyone has an opinion. I certainly have mine. Though I know there are as many ways of relating to horses as there are individual horses and their humans, there are some activities I do take a stand on as flat-out wrong.
When I worked in rescue, we'd occasionally have a young rider and parent come to adopt a Thoroughbred; their interest was in an "upgrade" from the horse the rider had grown out of. These potential adopters didn't consider the horses we showed them as anything other than a machine to take the rider to the next stage of competition. Those folks never left with one of our horses.
As I write this, there's a large effort in horse racing to create national oversight for drug use in Thoroughbred racing. I support those efforts and especially the Water, Hay, Oats Alliance (WHOA) which has worked so hard on behalf of the welfare of these magnificent animals. I anticipate such legislation will be passed in Congress. I hope it will, at any rate.
In my opinion, horses that have become little more than flesh and blood machines are not able to offer us the wisdom they have. Over the centuries, I think we’ve switched roles—we’ve become the “beasts of burden”—or as I like to think of it “beasts with burdens” and horses—if we let them—have become our wise leaders.
Working with Dorian helped me find a path to a deep authenticity and centeredness I didn’t know I possessed. We talk together all the time, but neither of us says anything out loud.
I can be in the worst possible mood, but going out to the pasture and being with Dorian allows me to find a place inside where a deep serenity resides.
But as my good friend Glenn says “The slow way is the fast way with horses,” and I’ve found that to also be true. What formed through Dorian and my groundwork, our communing time, our rides, is a partnership, a bond that I don’t think there are words to completely articulate. Anyone who has a deep relationship with a horse will know exactly what I’m referring to—it’s a relationship that resides at the level of “being,” not at the level of “thinking.”
In a profound sense, I haven’t really taught him anything. I’ve known for him and with him that he has everything he needs to be simply and perfectly himself, and we’ve gone forward from that.
We ride trails together all the time and now he might stop at something new, but he’s able to work through his fear and, trusting me and trusting himself, walk on by. We’ve traversed obstacles, waded into streams, trotted and cantered and galloped through woods, jumped a few Xs, and had a staring contest with deer in the deep woods.
I would love to know what he was thinking that early spring day so many years ago as he lie there, legs tucked under him, surveying his domain. I wonder if he knew we’d become what we have—it wouldn’t surprise me a bit if that were true.
Along the way, somehow Dorian has restored me. That’s part of their power, I think—horses help us reclaim ourselves . . . if we let them.
It’s as simple, and sometimes as difficult to do, as that.