I started riding horses a few months ago. It has always been something I have had a minor interest in, kind of a fleeting fantasy you might say. Going to college in Montana it turned into a legitimate desire, something I really wanted to learn about, but didn’t know how to go about getting started. Then after my last break up, I couldn’t come up with any good reason not to, decided it was a part of who I wanted to be, swallowed my nerves and signed up. And I love it. Each week I not only learn something new about how much work it really takes to ride a horse well, but I also learn something new about myself.
I have learned that I have to work in ways sometimes counter-intuitive to my natural instincts in order to get the horse to do what I would like him to. I can’t simply yank harder on the reins in the direction I want to turn, I have to tell him with my whole body, and give him the space in the reins to work with me. It’s scary. That means I have to have loose hands on this horse while he is barreling in circles around the arena. I have to keep my legs relaxed, and trust that with a gentle turn of my hips, he will go where I want him to go. Have I mentioned I have control issues? And yet somehow I have found it in myself to rely on communication instead of control, and learned how to ask a horse for something as opposed to physically attempting to force him to do it. Sometimes.
At the end of my lesson yesterday, I was rather frustrated. I have been riding a horse named Gunner who has been a new challenge every time I ride. He is young, full of energy, and responsive to EVERYTHING I do. Every sound that comes out of my mouth gets some reaction out of him, and every twitch of my legs gets him going. To get him into a canter, I have to tap him with my legs, get ready to start going faster (my instinct:brace myself) and give him room in the reins at the same time. But as it starts to happen, I tense up and pull back with my arms, tightening the reins and confusing Gunner, resulting in a half canter, awkward, trot-stop, mess of a horse ride. When he starts speeding up, I know what I need to do, I know I need to relax and enjoy the ride, communicate gently, and it will be a glorious flight of a canter around the arena. But I get scared. Everything makes sense in my head, everything seems so simple, like a step by step process, and I can’t put it into action. I let my fears and trust issues get in the way.
Walking around on our cool down lap, I realized this is exactly what I do in my spiritual life as well. I realize all these great things (see all posts below), they all make perfect sense, and seem to promise a beautiful result. I manage to get into a beautiful trot, changing small bits of my life, but then as soon as I am about to run with it, I get scared, tense up, pull back on the reins, and leave God carrying me in an awkward walk/run sort of way. Only unlike when I am on Gunner, I am the one left confused. I am the one who ends up back on my knees wondering what happened, why I am not gliding in a beautiful canter like the cowgirl on a trail ride in my favorite Canadian TV show?
If I would put my trust in Gunner, I would be fine. He knows what to do, he knows how to canter with me and once I am going I know how to roll my hips with his movement, relax, and have a glorious ride. God needs that affirmation of trust from me too. He will not run with me until I make it clear that I trust him, that not only does my head believe everything I am learning, but that my heart does too, until I quit pulling on the reins and holding Him back.
I would love to end this post with some magical formula for doing just that, some action or prayer that would force the hands of my heart to loosen their death grip, but I don’t know of one. All I know is if I keep praying, working on being as honest with God as possible, asking Mary and the saints for help, and never giving up, it will happen. Right now I just don’t know how.
~Beautiful Slavery~ 