April 4, 2025 • 47 mins
This episode of the podcast features chapters 4 and 5 of Dancing the Tightrope. If you haven’t listened to the first 3 chapters, I suggest listening to those first. It will help make sense of what’s coming in these next few chapters.
When I listened back to Chapter 3, where I read the sidebar blog “Where’s My Choice Here?”, it was somewhat stunning to me that many of the threads that I pulled together for Dancing the Tightrope started well before the accident that lays the foundation for the book. I was already onto the themes of dealing with fear, adrenaline, pressure and uncertainty. In some ways, I had been bumping up against the glass ceiling of my beliefs; the pivotal fall from the horse offer me a way to shatter those beliefs if I chose to open myself up to seeing things in a new way.
What’s standing out for me in this process of creating an audio version of the book are the pivotal moments, where a seemingly innocuous choice created huge change. The small choice to go trail riding could have just as easily been the choice to give up horseback riding for good. The small choice to call Bruce could have just as easily been something I never got around to doing.
The choice to go back for a second visit to Bruce was both a mystery and a big damn deal. In the world of the way I had done things up to this point, that second visit would not have happened. Yet it did - in this new world I was discovering.
Chapter 4 talks about our second visit to Camden to understand what this somewhat strange approach to life, horses and learning to live in nature’s world was all about. Chapter 5 shows you where I began to use what I was learning – somewhat naively at the time. In fact, reading it back now sometimes feels like I’m reading someone else’s story.
In Chapter 5, I’m still deciding if I should ever get back on a horse – something that’s difficult to grasp, given that I’m riding all the time these days. Think about a decision you’ve made that now seems so obvious – or a decision you are grappling with that may someday become obvious. Maybe these chapters will help you sort through the risks and rewards with an improving mindset.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
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Intro (00:02):
Lynn, Welcome to Creative spirits Unleashed, where we talk
about the dilemmas of balancingwork and life. And now here's
your host. Lynn Carnes,
Lynn (00:19):
Welcome to the Creative Spirits Unleash Podcast. I'm
Lynn Carnes, your host. Thisepisode of the podcast features
chapters four and five ofdancing the tightrope. If you
haven't listened to the firstthree chapters, I suggest
listening to those first it willhelp make sense of what's coming
in these next few chapters. Now,when I listened back to chapter
(00:42):
three, where I read the sidebarblog, where's my choice here, it
was somewhat stunning to me thatmany of the threads that I
pulled together for dancing thetightrope started well before
the accident that lays thefoundation for the book. I was
already onto the themes ofdealing with fear, adrenaline,
pressure and uncertainty. Insome ways, I had been bumping up
(01:05):
against a glass ceiling of mybeliefs. That pivotal fall from
that horse offered me a new wayto shatter those beliefs if I
chose to open myself up toseeing things in a new way.
What's standing out for me inthis process of creating an
audio version of the book. Arethe pivotal moments where a
seemingly innocuous choicecreated huge change. The small
(01:28):
choice to go trail riding couldhave just as easily been the
choice to give up horsebackriding for good. The small
choice to call Bruce could havejust as easily been something I
never got around to doing. Thechoice to go back for a second
visit to Bruce was both amystery and a big damn deal in
the world of the way I had donethings up to this point, that
(01:51):
second visit would not havehappened, yet it did somehow in
this new world that I wasdiscovering, Chapter Four talks
about our second visit to CamdenTo understand what this somewhat
strange approach to life, horsesand learning to live in nature's
world was all about. Chapterfive shows you where I began to
take what I was learning,somewhat naively at the time,
(02:14):
and turn it into what became thebook. In fact, reading it back
now sometimes feels like I'mreading someone else's story. In
Chapter Five, I'm still decidingif I should ever get back on a
horse, something that'sdifficult to grasp, given that,
if you know me, I'm riding allthe time these days, think about
a decision that you've made thatnow seems so obvious in
(02:38):
hindsight, or maybe a decisionyou're grappling with now that
you hope to feel obvious inhindsight. I'm hoping these
chapters help you sort throughthe risks and rewards with an
improving mindset rather than animproving mindset. And as
always, if you are enjoyingthis, please share it with your
friends. LIKE IT on the podcastplatform, even give me a comment
(03:01):
or two, this helps so much ingetting the word out, and I am
enjoying getting this word out,so I hope you will pass it on
and enjoy this episode ofchapters four and five, of
dancing the tightrope. ChapterFour, failure is not failure at
all. A pony opens the door Amonth later, Jen was skipping
along with a new pony in theround pen, saying, It makes me
(03:23):
so happy. Jen had come to thefarm, still carrying the
skepticism from our firstsession. In the ensuing month,
we had many conversations aboutour experience, and Jen had
thought enough to come for thenext session. What had bothered
her the most in the firstsession was watching Bruce
micromanage and pepper me withquestions. When she learned that
(03:46):
I was not nearly as bothered,but more curious, she let go of
some, but not all of herresistance. This time, I had
asked a close friend, Gail fromthe corporate world, to come be
a quote, unquote guinea pig fora session with Bruce Gail was
like a second mom to Jen. Weboth agreed it would be good for
Jen and me, for her to be there.
In some ways, Jen and Irepresented two opposite ends of
(04:09):
the spectrum. I was keen tolearn more, and Jen was in the
No way, no how camp. Having athird person might help
calibrate whether there wasanything to this work or not,
and we could approach anythingthat came up from different
perspectives. As soon as wepulled into Bruce's farm, Jen
spotted the new pony. He wastruly a small horse, more like
(04:31):
the size of a Great Dane. Jen isgood at hiding negative feelings
when something as cute as a ponyis around her, her delight
practically drips off her skin.
The session with Gail went for afew hours, and I noticed that
Bruce was repeating himself fromthe last couple of
conversations. He was saying thesame phrases over and over
(04:54):
again, like it's not the horse,it's the pressure created by the
horse, and when your mentaltools are not easy. Are greater
than the pressure of thesituation, then you over or
under react or it's not thething you are doing. It's the
mindset while you are doing thething that matters. It's not a
mistake, it's an opportunity.
It's not the work with the horsethat matters. It's in doing the
(05:17):
hard work with the horse. Youare recalibrating your mental
tools and becoming more of theyou. The round pen is a metaphor
for your life and the dreaded Idon't want the horse to do the
picture. Every time he saidthat, I remembered myself lying
on the ground, unable tobreathe, wondering what had
caused the horse to throw meinto the dirt at moments like
(05:40):
this, I thought, Bruce, I mostcertainly do want the horse to
do the picture, and my pictureis to stay on the horse. What
kind of horse trainer? Peopleleader trainer or doesn't want
to get the job done? My firstinkling of an answer to that
question came the day after ourfirst session. Bruce and I spoke
as promised. I didn't shareJen's reservations what she had
(06:04):
listed in exhaustive detail overthe drive home. I did mention
one small moment when we pulledoff the highway and found
ourselves behind a line of carsat the exit. I made some comment
like, wish I had my James Bondcar with a weapon that would
move all these cars aside,something made me tell Bruce
about this exchange with Jen,and he said, matter of factly,
(06:27):
good opportunity to work onpatience. This seemingly small
moment in an otherwise eventfulday was like a little miracle,
one that I would understand onlymuch, much later. Hmm, one of
the things I had oftenexperienced after leaving
countless meditation retreatswas that my good feelings seemed
to evaporate on the drive home.
(06:50):
A truck would cut me off, awreck would backup traffic, or
any number of other everydayoccurrences would take me from
cool headed meditator to roadrage, mad woman in the blink of
an eye. It had never occurred tome to use these things to make
myself better. Instead, I wouldjust beat myself up for being so
bad at staying grounded. Perhapsthe horse not doing the picture
(07:14):
offered a good opportunity towork on myself. Nothing changed
in that moment, but a seed wasplanted. Resistance melts during
the day as Bruce worked withGail, Jen had her eye on that
pony. When Gail and Brucefinished, Gail left, and we
decided the three of us woulddebrief in what I would later
come to call a porch session.
The porch overlooked the roundpen and the pasture where the
(07:37):
horses grazed. It was a gorgeousspring day, and everything was
just starting to turn green.
Chickens were running around, apeacock occasionally spread his
magnificent tail, andhummingbirds started in and out
of the feeder. I made note of aLariat, or was it a noose
hanging in the nearby tree, butwe didn't have the courage to
(08:00):
ask about it until many porchsessions later, we took our
seats and began discussing theevents of the day. Before I knew
it, Bruce had asked Jen if shewanted to give it another try. I
thought, Wait, give one anothertry. Jen's not heading for the
car. She's carrying a halter.
She's heading for the round pen.
Oh, of course, not the round penshe's heading for the pony, even
(08:24):
though our intention in thedebrief was to focus on the
session we had just completed,the conversation had somehow
come around to the prior month.
In what seemed like a flash,Bruce said something, and Jen
was ready to try again, lookingback on it, that pony catalyzed
another miracle moment. He wasonly going to be there for a
short time while Bruce, quote,unquote, babysat him for a
(08:47):
friend. His cuteness factor washigh enough to override Jen's
wall of resistance. Had we comeanother time, the pony wouldn't
have been there, and I might nothave ever gone back
as Jen skipped around in theround pen, the pony opened her
heart. She was having fun andwas putting herself in danger in
(09:08):
ways she did not recognize.
Quickly, Bruce saw that Jen wasnot respecting the pony the same
way she would have a full sizedhorse. He would give her a task,
a picture, and she would try touse force to move him around.
Though small, this pony stillweighed well over 200 pounds. At
one point, he said, What makesyou think this pony can't hurt
you? He's got teeth, he's gothooves. He pointed out that she
(09:31):
was under reacting to thepressure of the pony, a sure
sign that she was in tyrantmindset. Bruce's tyrant mindset
was still somewhat of a mysteryto me. He mentioned the past
interfering, as happened before,I recognized that he and I were
often talking about the same orsimilar ideas with different
language. In my language, what Iwas seeing was both Kid Mode and
(09:54):
history mode in action on thekid mode. Tightrope. Jen was
falling off both sides child andparent from the child power
underside. I saw Jen wanted thepony to like her. She was naive
to the danger in front of herfrom the parent oversight. I saw
Jen letting the pony get awaywith doing whatever it wanted.
(10:16):
She was overly helpful when shedecided it was time for the pony
to do the picture, attempting touse force when being helpful
didn't work. Rather than thegive and take of adult power
with she was following a commonpattern, feel powerless, then
try to grab power, overshoot themark, try to make up for the
(10:38):
pushy moves and then continuallyporpoise back and forth without
ever really finding the balanceon the tightrope again. I was
reminded that this patternplayed out the day of my
accident. First I wanted thehorse to like me, then I started
to recognize the danger, so Itried to find a way to get
power. Then he started to run. Icompletely overreacted, and the
(10:59):
consequence was a big splat.
Seeing my own pattern play outin my daughter right in front of
my eyes evoked a strongrecognition of history mode.
Where else would she havelearned such a pattern, other
than to watch her mother do ithundreds of times over her
lifetime, in all my years ofworking on myself through
(11:20):
journaling, reflections,meditations, grounding, and
every other method I tied triedto break my long standing
patterns I had never found a wayout that stood the test of
pressure. Something told me Iwas about to learn something
big. So I grabbed my phone andstarted the video. The round pen
(11:40):
as a metaphor for life. The 15minutes that followed were pure
magic. I was no longer anoutsider trying to see if this
fellow Bruce had something thatwould work for clients.
Suddenly, I was a mom filming asJennifer reached point after
point of trying and failing andlearning repeatedly, instead of
resistance in covering up, as Ihad shown the month before, she
(12:03):
was open hearted and smilingeven when she was making
mistakes. Perhaps the mostpowerful exchange occurred when
Bruce asked her, were you doingtyrant mindset? Yeah, I think
so. Bruce says definitely,because you weren't applying the
pressure the pony was tellingyou to, because you were so
(12:24):
engrossed in the excitement ofworking with the pony. Yes, Jen
said, smiling from ear to ear.
And you were like, Bruce f you Idon't care what your picture is,
because I'm just having too muchfun. And Jen says, because I
just love the pony, giddinessexuding from her pores. But
where else in the job place areyou doing that? Can you do that?
(12:44):
You understand you can't bedoing that shit in the job
place. You can't let the pastinterfere. Oh yeah, Jen, had a
light bulb moment. Just thatexchange busted so many
assumptions. Tyrant mindset doesnot necessarily feel bad. It can
be exciting. Laughing doesn'tmake everything okay. The
(13:06):
sensation of excitement can bemisinterpreted, just as the
sensation of anxiety can bemisinterpreted back to the
exchange on the video. So whatI'm showing you here, the nice
thing about the pony was, didyou ever feel in danger? Jen
says, No, but by him being sosmall, were you having a hard
time getting your picture donelaughing? Jen says, yes. Then
(13:27):
Bruce said, at the same time,you think he's small. And Jen
says, I wasn't being as cautiousand as demanding, because you
assume because he was small. Jenjumps down. I thought I had more
control than I really did. Yeah,but who was the one lacking
control? You are the pony. Deadsilence. Jen had not really
(13:49):
thought of herself as lackingcontrol, neither had I. She had
been dancing around, laughing,having fun, trying to move the
pony, even though the pony wasnot going where she was
directing, it all seemed likefun and games. Bruce pointed out
that her desire to help wasactually putting her in danger,
and she was not aware of exactlyhow painful a kick or bite could
(14:13):
be. He pointed out that havingthe pony run wild was not
beneficial to him. There he wasusing that terminology again,
his words echoed back to me. I'mhere to help the horse, to help
himself to live in the world wehave created. The modern world
is the world we have created.
(14:36):
Horses are of the natural world,but a horse who is allowed to
succumb fully to his wild naturewould be way too dangerous for
humans to work with, day in andday out. Bruce was saying out
loud what Jen was learning,believing that she could control
the pony was a faultyassumption, without me knowing
it at the time, Bruce had justrevealed a core point, perhaps
(14:57):
the core point in his method,in. Jen had lost her power by
believing she had power whereshe didn't. It would take me
many years and even more horsesto begin to grasp the depth of
this lesson. She could choose towork with the horse by using
domination and force or form arelationship of trust and
connection in the dominancegame, it's all about power over
(15:20):
and power under. This was thegame I had played my whole
corporate life. Kid Mode reignedsupreme. Bruce was showing
another way to dance thetightrope. Instead of using
force, fear and intimidation,the hallmarks of dominance, he
was showing Jen how to dancebetween applying too much and
(15:40):
too little pressure with theintention to push the horse's
negative pole up, doing soallows the horse to choose how
to balance his negative positivepole. Using dominance, can get
things done, but with a cost. Itcreates compliance out of fear a
horse might freeze or run away.
People do the same thing, butthe horse could also fight. As
(16:03):
Bruce pointed out, the horse hasteeth and it has hooves, a kick
or a bite can be devastating andeven fatal. However, Bruce's
main focus was not on what Jenwas doing. Instead, it was on
where it came from. Bruce said,Yes, but notice your emotion,
how the past was interfering,and how you were trying to fill
(16:25):
a void you understand. Andtherefore, by doing that, you're
actually saying to the pony,it's okay to do what it's doing
when it's not okay, youunderstand what I'm saying. Bam,
there it was. Jen was caught ina pattern. She was feeling
emotion, lots of emotion, inorder to address the feeling.
Jen was filling a void. She wasallowing the cuteness of the
(16:49):
pony to override her owninsecurities. We all have
insecurities, and we havestrategies for filling the void
they create. Jen was operatingon invisible rules. She might as
well have been a robot, albeit ahappy one. Bruce was here to
show her her way out of therules that much I could see this
very type of rule breaking hadbeen at the root of my coaching
(17:14):
work for years, but somethingwas different here. Now I had
seen Bruce debrief differentsituations in the round pen, and
in every case, there was aparallel with life. When he said
the round pen is a metaphor foryour life, he was able to back
it up with lessons like thisone. Let the situation tell you
how much pressure to apply.
(17:36):
After Bruce revealed what wasreally going on, Jen got very
clear on her picture with somecoaching on reaching for her
tools, like listening, hearing,patience, problem solving, Jen
helped the pony to help himselfmove with ease around the
perimeter of the round penseveral times. Bruce pointed out
that Jen had found her Alphamindset, meaning she was letting
(17:59):
the pony tell her what to do andhow much pressure to apply. The
pony didn't talk any more thanthe rope had. However, the pony
did show her what worked andwhat didn't. Bruce's approach
interrupted some of my bigassumptions and looked very
different than what I expected.
I thought, Where were theinstructions for how to move a
pony or a horse around. How doesone apply pressure if you can't
(18:22):
touch the animal? Why does Brucekeep handing us a Lariat without
telling us how to use it? Surelywe missed a training session in
horse school about everythingone needs to know.
Instead, Bruce kept sayingthings like, pay attention to
what the horse is telling youuse your mental tools,
(18:42):
listening, hearing, patience,timing, feel problem solving,
discipline, outside ofmaintaining safety. He was
giving us no rules, just tools.
It was an empowering message,both for Jen and for the pony.
Remember he said the pony willtell you how much pressure to
apply. Let him tell you what todo, when to do, how to do.
(19:04):
Eventually, those words wouldcome to mean freedom. In context
far beyond the horses. In thismoment, they were still creating
dissonance in my head. I'mlooking for Bruce to give some
answers. Share his rule book,educate us on the ways of
horses. I'm also sensing that ifI could just get out of my own
way, and the incessant desire tobe perfect, there is something
(19:27):
to this idea of letting thesituation tell me what to do,
the two thoughts felt like amajor contradiction, yet they
also seem to go together liketwo rhyming words in a poem
seeking a way to resolve thedissonance, I remembered using
that principle outside oftraining with horses. Just the
week before I had a conversationwith Scott, a client who had
(19:50):
been trying to avoid firing oneof his most trusted team
members, Bob, his company wasgrowing at an astronaut.
Economical rate, and Bob hadbeen struggling to keep pace.
Instead, he had been missingdeadlines and showing up late
for work. Scott had been veryclear on his expectations, yet
Bob was only making mattersworse. Finally, Scott realized
(20:12):
he had to fire him and call mein hopes that I would offer
another alternative. I askedScott what was making him so
concerned. He simply said, he'sbeen great until the last few
months. I just don't want tofire him. And I said, What makes
you think you are the one firinghim? Does he not know what you
expect? You've been very clear.
(20:34):
He's firing himself. Bob hadtold Scott How much pressure to
apply. If Scott had notlistened, Bob would have caused
even more damage than he alreadyhad, rather than creating
dissonance for Scott, the ideathat Bob was firing himself gave
Scott some peace of mind.
Letting him go was the exactlyright move for both the company
and for Bob. Later, Scottrehired him because Bob needed
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that level of pressure as a wakeup call and was able to get back
to where he needed to be. I wasstarting to see that what Bruce
was teaching went far beyond theround pen. My perceptions were
coming from standing outside thefence for the whole day. Being
outside was my safe vantagepoint. But not for long, Bruce
invited me to join Jen in theround pen. Our task was to
(21:22):
contain the pony in a six footsquare with nothing but our
energy. I really would haveloved to have had that halter
and wrote back I wanted morecontrol. More than once, Bruce
had to remind us that wecouldn't touch him. Otherwise he
gave no other specific steps totake. Rather, he kept talking
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about letting the pony tell uswhat to do, when to do, how to
do. This was incrediblyfrustrating, to say the least.
The pony was doing whatever hepleased while we ran around
trying to contain him. Not onlydid we look like the Keystone
Cops, but it also felt likemistake, piled upon mistake,
piled upon more mistakes. Tryone thing and it's too much. Try
(22:05):
another thing and it's toolittle, back and forth, never
quite getting the hang of it. Wewere feeling the frustration
build the thoughts behind. Mythoughts started to make me feel
like a failure. My directthoughts were things like, why
isn't Bruce helping us? Where isthat pony going? Now? What
should I do next? My indirectthoughts didn't have words. They
had energy, and the energyweighed me down. It was that
(22:29):
energy that the pony wasresponding to. If they did have
words, it would be things suchas, I'm going to get in trouble.
Why can't I get this? What'swrong with me? How bad do I
look? I wanted to get thepicture right. My very identity
was resting on this. Brucewanted us to use the pressure
(22:49):
created by the pony to build ourmental tools. I wanted
perfection. Bruce was showing apath to progress. It went
something like this, thepressure wasn't there to crush
me. I could choose to allow itto elevate me. The uncertainty
and not knowing what to do arean essential part of creativity.
(23:11):
Failure is not failure at all.
In this path, I was learning norelearning a principle that
would serve me deeply. Let thesituation tell me the best
response my past can inform, butbe mindful when it interferes or
(23:34):
interferes, e n t, e R F, E, A RS, when we stopped feeling like
we were making mistakes andstarted listening to the pony,
it became easy to contain him inthe six foot square. The answers
were not in the scene thing.
They were in the invisible partof the equation. I didn't know
it yet, but this work wouldeventually teach me that most of
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my assumptions about balance,pressure, uncertainty and
failure were upside down orbackwards. My assumptions about
trail riding were just asinverted. Chapter Five,
assessing risk horses andsurvival mode. After my first
two sessions with Bruce, I begantaking a variety of individual
(24:21):
clients, not the leadershipteam, to work with him. Over the
next several months, I wasn'teven remotely ready to consider
getting back on a horse again,but I was still hanging out with
my friends who had horses alsoTammy Tappan, owner of
equestrian artist at Tryoninternational Equestrian Center
had asked me to include mypottery in her gallery. Her
(24:43):
horse paintings had stopped mein my tracks the first time I
saw them. Every time I walkedinto her gallery, I could feel
the familiar tug of wanting tobe with horses. Trips to the
gallery offered me more excusesfor going to the center more
than once. Tammy offered to takeme on a trail ride with her
horses, and more than once, Itold her I was not ready. The
(25:03):
more I was exposed to the horseworld, the more I heard from
lifetime horsemen and womenabout life with horses. Perhaps
the most common phrase I heardin this phase of my recovery was
this, I've been injured moretimes than I can count, while
feeling somewhat vindicatedabout my own accident, this
(25:24):
dawning awareness did little tobuild my confidence about ever
riding again. Instead, I startedlearning more about horses,
trail rides, and the risk Iinadvertently took to take the
lead on a trail ride. Myinverted assumptions about trail
riding, albeit innocent, startedwith ignorance around the mind
of a horse and ended withnaivety about the complications
(25:45):
of taking a fight, flight freezeanimal out for a stroll through
the woods. It's never just astroll for the horse. Riding
horses has been done by humansfor 1000s of years, yet when you
stop to think about it, ridinghorses should not be possible.
We are getting on the back of ahuge animal and asking it to
give its body over to ourdirection in the pecking order
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of life, horses are prey. Humansare predators. So the prey
animal is allowing a predator toget on its back, usually after
throwing a saddle up there,which is made of a dead animal,
an animal we have alreadykilled, yet somehow, mankind has
learned to work with thesemagnificent animals over the
(26:29):
centuries. Seeing the worldthrough the eyes of a horse has
helped me understand thesurvival instincts of life while
humans are predators in the bigpicture pecking order, we are
both prey and predator in ourown lives. Anyone who has ever
felt the hair on their neckprickle while walking in a big
city or felt the glare of anangry boss knows the feeling of
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being prey. Learning to developtrust with a horse has helped me
understand myself so muchbetter, and it's transformed my
understanding of the humansurvival brain because of who
they are. Horses are profoundteachers, if we are willing to
give ourselves over to learn tovent from them, as Dr Alan J
Hamilton, MD, says, In Zen Mind,send horse the science of
(27:15):
spirituality and working withhorses,
the reason the horse can becomesuch a gifted teacher for us is
because he does not need aninner voice. He doesn't think in
words at all. He feels heexperiences the simple energy of
his emotional state of being.
More than 30 million years ofevolutionary pressure have
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turned the horse into thequintessential prey animal,
rather than using words orvocalization to communicate
sounds that help the predator,predator pinpoint his prey,
horses learn instead how not totalk, to make sounds and how to
make sense of being notthinking, horses infuse
emotional meaning into bodymovement. They pour this vital
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emotional energy, chi into everygesture and glance, lending them
the nuances of tone, accent andvalue by sensitizing themselves
to Qi, horses can not onlyconvey the meaning of what they
want to share with other membersof the herd, but can also feel
the palpably sharp energyemitting from A stalking
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predators eyes locked intentlyon its prey. Evolution has
driven equids to the farthestlimits of non verbal right sided
brain function out on the trail.
These sensitive sensitivitiesare amplified. Now you have a
prey animal carrying a predatorinto the wilderness. The lead
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horse has the mostresponsibility its large eyes
and huge nostrils are always onguard for danger out in front
and from the sides. The horse inthe back tunes in for threats
from the rear, the horses in themiddle just focus on what the
lead and trailing horsescommunicate the pressure is
high, especially for the flightanimal. Should an event happen,
(28:59):
and events often happen. It'sentirely possible for both human
and horse to be scared,unexpected gunfire, a snake
slithering, or a pack of dogschallenging the path might or
might not send chills down ahuman spine. However, the horse
will always have his survivalinstincts on high alert. The
horse might take off running, hemight rear up, he might decide
(29:22):
to suddenly roll back, the otherway, he might buck. He might
just jump to the side. He mightstand still. It's best if he
stands still. Yet even when he'sstanding still, a fearful horse
radiates with energy. A ridercan feel that Moreover, any
sudden dancing or prancing of anervous horse can elevate the
(29:44):
unprepared riders fear toextreme levels. Now, the horse
has to contend with whatever ishappening out there and what is
happening up there on its back,the place where a cougar might
drop in an ambush. Here's theone thing a horse will never
conclude. That he's the cause ofthe fear on the in the predator
on his back. It's our job as hisrider and leader to be the
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responsible one and manage nothide and not pretend away our
fear. Horses are masters atreading incongruity, hiding
feelings of any sort, telegraphsnothing but trouble for an
animal who stays alive byreading intent? Remember my
story of coiling the Lariat thehorse began running and then
kicking and then bucking becauseI was trying to look calm, cool
(30:30):
and collected while my innerturmoil escalated, the horse
felt the mismatch. She stoppedher antics when I quit
pretending, when I startedworking through the problem,
step by step, moment by moment,my inner turmoil melted away,
and the horse turned and calmlywatched me coil the rope when I
decided to go out on the trailin the lead on a horse I had
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ridden only once. My startingassumption was that trail riding
was nothing compared to gettinga horse to perform something far
more advanced. My otherassumption was that getting on
the horse mattered more thananything else more on that
later, growing up going to therodeo, I watched horses do all
kinds of specialized activities,such as exploding out of a gate
(31:13):
to catch a calf or runningaround the barrels. The 2018
World Equestrian Games were hellnear where I live, and I watched
people with their horses do allkinds of advanced skills, such
as jumping over six foot fences,dressage, which looks like horse
dancing to me, and racing withcarts. It all looked dangerous
and thrilling at the same time,I was both impressed and keenly
(31:36):
aware that I knew nothing abouthow to get a horse to do any of
those things, however, trailriding that I could do, or so I
thought, on the surface, itlooks like anyone can do it.
However, any true horse personwill tell you nothing could be
further from the truth. Unlikeworking in an arena where
there's a defined space and aclear job for the horse to do,
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the trail offers pressure anduncertainty whether the
unexpected will be unmanageableor not is yet to be seen. In
fact, in many ways, trail ridingis the most dangerous of horse
activities, especially if thehorse and human are not
prepared. Remember, anything canhappen out there, deer crashing
through the trees, pigs rollingin the mud, snakes crossing the
(32:18):
path, bicycles and motorcyclessharing the trail, crossing
streams, uncertain footing,loggers cutting down trees,
going out on the trail caneither be a house of horrors or
a series of opportunities tolearn and grow. Later, I would
come to realize what Bruce wassaying. At this point, I just
wanted to avoid the House ofHorrors. Many people who own
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horses share the same belief Idid about the difference between
performance riding and trailriding. They say it's just trail
riding, followed by the deadlythought, how hard can it be?
Warwick Schiller, professionalhorse trainer, compared trail
riding to having the right toolsto fix a blown tire on the horse
trailer in this Facebook post,it's fixing the bone tire, quite
(33:02):
a simple process, provided thatyou, before you left home, you
had the right size socketbreaker bar, a jiffy jack and a
fully inflated spare. I oftenget asked, What would you do
when out riding on a narrowtrail and your horse gets upset
and there's no place to circlehim to get under control? My
answer is, usually just put alittle bend in his body. And if
(33:24):
all of the training I have doneat home is solid, he will come
back down and relax. Most times.
The reply I get after that isthat wouldn't work with my
horse. He won't even relax whenI do that at home. About this
time, I usually suggest theytalk to the guy with the gun,
the guy with the gun, they ask,yes, the guy with the gun
pointed at you Who forced you totake an unprepared horse out on
a narrow trail, usually aboutthis time they start to figure
(33:46):
out that maybe that wasn't thebest situation to put their
horse in. I've sometimes feltbad for pointing out that maybe
their horse isn't ready fortrail riding. There's a buck
brendam quote that gets aroundsocial media that goes something
along the lines of some trailriders say they don't need that
fancy arena stuff. They justwant to trail ride. They just
want to die out among the trees.
(34:09):
Trail riding is like going outon a freeway with your car. It
may be okay to drive around thepasture or panic at home in a
car that's not safe. Maybe thebrakes are iffy or the steering
is not so good, but when you getout where you may have to take
some evasive action tocircumvent situations that are
out of control, it's a reallygood idea to be prepared.
Clearly, trail riding is no walkin the park. Both humans and
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horses must prepare themselvesfor the pressure and uncertainty
they will face. Yet, with allthis survival instinct in play,
horses do learn to be safe onthe trail. The folks who offer
public trail rides prepare theirhorses with the mental tools to
handle the unexpected while theunexpected can happen and it
does, they've developed thetools to handle the pressures,
uncertainty and fear. They don'tjust put any rider on any horse
(34:57):
in the leaf. We have. Survivalmode too. So it was here in the
lead where I discovered that Iwas the one lacking mental
tools. Survival Mode took over.
Fear flooded my system. I wasnow the predator on the back of
a horse. It never dawned on thehorse that he was the source of
my fear. As with any endeavor,horseback riding has two tracks,
(35:18):
the skills of the activity, andthe ability to bring those
skills to bear under pressure, Iwas completely unaware of the
gap between my skills and thesituation I had gotten myself
into. I was also unconsciouslyoperating on two false sets of
beliefs, one about the safety oftrail riding, and the other
(35:40):
about the nature of horses. Themodern world, with all its
progress, has divested us fromnature and the nature of horses.
It's taken us away from our ownnature. For most of human
history, horses were our primarymode of transportation. Knowing
how to care for them,communicate with them and work
with them was an essential partof life. With the advent of the
(36:02):
car, horses hadn't gone away.
However, for most people today,it's possible to live a full
life without ever encountering ahorse. Today, we interact more
with machines than we do nature.
Machines are logical. They haverules and procedures that ensure
they work as we want them, wepush a button and get an
immediate response. Not so withnature and not so with horses.
(36:25):
When I pulled back on the reinsthat day, I expected it to be
like hitting the brake on my caror my bicycle. He should stop.
He went faster when he did theopposite of what my rule said he
should do. I had no other way tomeet the moment I lost my
balance, both literally andinternally. As I shared my story
with many people, my basicpremise for the accident was I
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didn't know how to stop a horse.
Most riders agreed, and they allhad a method to stop a horse, do
this, that or the other thing,with the reins and with your
legs and the horse will stop.
There is a skill to stopping ahorse, especially one that is
running faster than the riderwants. Bruce's diagnosis was
differentin his way of thinking. The
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pressure of the situation wasgreater than my mental tools.
The question was not whether Ihad the skill to stop the horse.
The question was whether I coulduse the skill under pressure. Of
course, as he shared thistheory, I kept thinking, but
seriously, how do you stop ahorse? My controlling mindset
(37:30):
was sure the answer was in thereins. What I did not know yet
was that you can stop a horsewith nothing more than a clear
mental picture and energyfinding the heat, growing up, we
cooked hot dogs and s'mores overthe campfire almost every
weekend. Getting too close tothe fire taught me about getting
(37:51):
burned. There was a just rightplace to stand where I could
cook a hot dog or marshmallowwithout cooking myself. Get too
far away, and nothing gotcooked. Get too close, and it
was me that got cooked,depending on the wind, that just
right place could change andmove. Finding the safe zone was
a constant balancing act thatrequired my attention. Getting
(38:12):
burned can be a metaphor formore than touching a hot stove
or getting too close to a realfire. We humans have well
developed systems to keep usaway from things that hurt. In
my year of recovery after myhorse fall, I tried to find the
just right place to stand. Mymind provided both the fire and
the solace. Sometimes it fed mesensible thoughts. More often it
(38:36):
fired noisy thoughts likebullets from a gun. You were
overconfident, you will neverget it. It was a freak accident
that will never happen again.
You just need better skills. Youwould be crazy to write again.
Notice how those thoughtscareened between both extremes.
(38:56):
They either pulled me into thefire or kept me outside of the
fire. Productive learning andgrowth could not happen when
there was no heat or too muchheat. None of these thoughts
chose the path of productivediscomfort. Nowhere did I ask,
How can I use the heat to gaintraction? Instead, my thoughts
kept me spinning my wheelsrushing to land on an answer
(39:19):
that would stop the heat andtake away my discomfort. What
was most unsettling was the gapbetween what I believed I could
do and what my accidentrevealed. Like a dog with a
bone, my mind gnawed at the gap,wondering what moves I should
have made with my hands, myseat, my legs, to completely mix
my metaphors, I was barking upthe wrong tree. The problem was
(39:40):
not in my skills, although myskills needed improvement. The
problem was in my relationshipwith pressure. What I've been
uncovering is the pressure gap,much richer and scarier
territory, the tangibleterritory of the skill gap is so
alluring Sports. Offersexcellent illustrations of the
(40:02):
skill gap in basketball, aplayer might hit a certain
percentage of shots in scrimmagegames and not even come close to
the same rate in a big game. Aswimmer might get a certain time
every day in practice and fallshort under the pressure of the
meet. A tennis player might beable to ace every serve in
practice and yet end up doublefaulting in the tournament in
(40:23):
every case, they have the skillsto perform in the low level
situations, increase thepressure and they can't perform
at the same level. In otherwords, they are not bringing
their level of skills to bearwhen it counts. For me, it's as
if my skills go offline when Ineed the most in the heat of the
fire, there's no time to readthe rule book. The only thing
(40:46):
that matters is the mental toolsI bring to the situation. Those
tools are the gateway toeffectively managing my skills
and embracing the discomfort ofpressure. If my tools are not up
to the task, my skills liebehind a wall of fear
considering my choices, thegroundwork with the horses
introduced a novel perspectiveon what was needed to get back
(41:08):
on the horse. With this newvantage point, it wasn't just a
matter of getting back on ornot, there were three options.
Number one, I could choose tonever ride again, a logical
choice, as I was now 60 and Ididn't want to risk another
injury. Number two, I could takewriting lessons, the mainstream
(41:30):
choice, which would educate meon the rules and skills of
acquitation. And number three, Icould work on my mental tools,
the messy choice guaranteed tobe full of pressure, uncertainty
and failure. Choices one and twooffer two sides of the risk
tight rope when assessing risk,one side is risk avoidant. The
(41:52):
other side is risk dismissive.
In my credit training program,we had to teach aspiring bankers
to see the full picture of risk.
Those with risk avoidanttendency had a difficult time
making lending decisions. Theyfelt much safer leaving the
bank's money in the bank, andthey may very well have had some
of their own money stuffed inmattresses like their
(42:12):
grandparents had. Those with arisk dismissive tendency
minimized the genuine risks inthe deal. Every deal looked good
to them because they only sawthe money making potential while
being blind to the many ways theloan could go sour. And these
same trainees seemed toconsistently have the story of
the one that got away. We wantedour bankers to walk the
(42:34):
tightrope, which meant trainingthem to see and mitigate risk
while recognizing when that riskwas too much for the bank to
take, to walk away would put mein the risk avoidant camp, for
which there were plenty of goodreasons. However, I knew myself
well enough to know I would feellike I let my fears win.
(42:54):
Choosing to take riding lessonsthat focused strictly on riding
skills seemed to minimize thegenuine danger I was beginning
to see in horseback riding,while I would become a more
skilled rider, what good wouldmy skills have been if I could
not access them under pressureof a horse that was choosing to
act like a horse rather thanlike a machine? I couldn't
decide while working with horseson the ground was slightly
(43:18):
intriguing. I still carried thebelief that getting on was the
only interesting part the day ofmy accident, I remember going
through the motions of brushingthe horse, putting on the saddle
and putting on the bridle,focusing almost strictly on the
goal of riding the horse. Infact, I was so excited about
being on a horse again, Istopped and took a picture
looking down on his head. Thatwas about 15 minutes before my
(43:41):
faithful thought this is sort ofboring. In my two sessions with
Bruce, I was shown the messyalternative to truly change. I
would have to feel the pressureand go deep to my core. A part
of me knew it would be likeshaking up my internal snow
globe. There was no tellingwhere things would land. What I
(44:03):
wanted instead was a set ofrules and steps. Bruce kept
talking about my tools,listening, hearing, patience,
timing, feel, problem solvingand other actions in the unseen
territory. My beliefs wereacting like a heat shield,
keeping his methods at bay. Iwas speaking one set of beliefs
while showing a contradictoryset of beliefs. Went under
(44:26):
pressure while I espoused givingup perfection. I was totally
seeking perfection while I coachpeople and myself that beating
ourselves up avoids change.
Under pressure of getting itright with the horses, I beat
myself up while I wrote eloquentarticles about the value of
mistakes, I still cringed when Imade a mistake, these old
(44:47):
beliefs were not living in myhead. They were living in my
bones. They were like computercode, the rules running my every
action at. Extricating myselffrom them was not merely a
matter of changing my mind, onlythe heat of pressure would burn
them out of my cells, I hadlittle or no ability to apply my
(45:09):
knowledge under pressure, whilemy head was attempting to apply
its knowledge, the beliefs in mybones were directing my actions.
Yet in that first year, I keptcoming back to Bruce with
clients, me on the outside, themin the fire, looking back on it,
I believe it was to help themlearn what I thought I already
knew. Yes, I had knowledge ofthe concepts Bruce was sharing.
(45:32):
I had been teaching many of themfor years. Plus, I was thrilled
with the experiential aspect ofworking with live animals in a
somewhat unpredictableenvironment, but my old belief
still helped me in their prison.
I was still thinking of the workas a finite set of lessons
rather than infinitepossibilities. Remember the
(45:53):
example with the pressure gap.
Just because we can walk on a 12inch beam on the ground doesn't
mean we can walk the same pathwhen the beam is elevated, even
four or five feet off theground, just because we can talk
doesn't mean we can be coherentwhen we are in front of people
whose opinions matter to us andthe stakes are high,
the consequences are higher. Ihad been walking on a 12 inch
(46:16):
beam on the ground. It was safedistance. My pressure threshold
was about 12 inches high. Atthis distance, I could throw
logs on the fire of knowledgewithout ever truly feeling the
heat. I spent a little more thana year skipping along my safe 12
inch beam away from danger, butno closer to deciding whether to
get back on a horse. Thank youfor listening to the creative
(46:37):
spirits unleash podcast. Istarted this podcast because I
was having these greatconversations, and I wanted to
share them with others. I'malways learning in these
conversations, and I wanted toshare that kind of learning with
you. Now, what I need to hearfrom you is what you want more
of and what you want less of. Ireally want these podcasts to be
of value for the listeners.
Also, if you happen to knowsomeone who you think might love
(47:00):
them, please share the podcastand, of course, subscribe and
rate it on the different appsthat you're using, because
that's how others will find it.
Now, I hope you go and dosomething very fun today. You.
Lynn, Welcome to Creative spirits Unleashed, where we talk
about the dilemmas of balancingwork and life. And now here's
your host. Lynn Carnes,
Lynn (00:19):
Welcome to the Creative Spirits Unleash Podcast. I'm
Lynn Carnes, your host. Thisepisode of the podcast features
chapters four and five ofdancing the tightrope. If you
haven't listened to the firstthree chapters, I suggest
listening to those first it willhelp make sense of what's coming
in these next few chapters. Now,when I listened back to chapter
(00:42):
three, where I read the sidebarblog, where's my choice here, it
was somewhat stunning to me thatmany of the threads that I
pulled together for dancing thetightrope started well before
the accident that lays thefoundation for the book. I was
already onto the themes ofdealing with fear, adrenaline,
pressure and uncertainty. Insome ways, I had been bumping up
(01:05):
against a glass ceiling of mybeliefs. That pivotal fall from
that horse offered me a new wayto shatter those beliefs if I
chose to open myself up toseeing things in a new way.
What's standing out for me inthis process of creating an
audio version of the book. Arethe pivotal moments where a
seemingly innocuous choicecreated huge change. The small
(01:28):
choice to go trail riding couldhave just as easily been the
choice to give up horsebackriding for good. The small
choice to call Bruce could havejust as easily been something I
never got around to doing. Thechoice to go back for a second
visit to Bruce was both amystery and a big damn deal in
the world of the way I had donethings up to this point, that
(01:51):
second visit would not havehappened, yet it did somehow in
this new world that I wasdiscovering, Chapter Four talks
about our second visit to CamdenTo understand what this somewhat
strange approach to life, horsesand learning to live in nature's
world was all about. Chapterfive shows you where I began to
take what I was learning,somewhat naively at the time,
(02:14):
and turn it into what became thebook. In fact, reading it back
now sometimes feels like I'mreading someone else's story. In
Chapter Five, I'm still decidingif I should ever get back on a
horse, something that'sdifficult to grasp, given that,
if you know me, I'm riding allthe time these days, think about
a decision that you've made thatnow seems so obvious in
(02:38):
hindsight, or maybe a decisionyou're grappling with now that
you hope to feel obvious inhindsight. I'm hoping these
chapters help you sort throughthe risks and rewards with an
improving mindset rather than animproving mindset. And as
always, if you are enjoyingthis, please share it with your
friends. LIKE IT on the podcastplatform, even give me a comment
(03:01):
or two, this helps so much ingetting the word out, and I am
enjoying getting this word out,so I hope you will pass it on
and enjoy this episode ofchapters four and five, of
dancing the tightrope. ChapterFour, failure is not failure at
all. A pony opens the door Amonth later, Jen was skipping
along with a new pony in theround pen, saying, It makes me
(03:23):
so happy. Jen had come to thefarm, still carrying the
skepticism from our firstsession. In the ensuing month,
we had many conversations aboutour experience, and Jen had
thought enough to come for thenext session. What had bothered
her the most in the firstsession was watching Bruce
micromanage and pepper me withquestions. When she learned that
(03:46):
I was not nearly as bothered,but more curious, she let go of
some, but not all of herresistance. This time, I had
asked a close friend, Gail fromthe corporate world, to come be
a quote, unquote guinea pig fora session with Bruce Gail was
like a second mom to Jen. Weboth agreed it would be good for
Jen and me, for her to be there.
In some ways, Jen and Irepresented two opposite ends of
(04:09):
the spectrum. I was keen tolearn more, and Jen was in the
No way, no how camp. Having athird person might help
calibrate whether there wasanything to this work or not,
and we could approach anythingthat came up from different
perspectives. As soon as wepulled into Bruce's farm, Jen
spotted the new pony. He wastruly a small horse, more like
(04:31):
the size of a Great Dane. Jen isgood at hiding negative feelings
when something as cute as a ponyis around her, her delight
practically drips off her skin.
The session with Gail went for afew hours, and I noticed that
Bruce was repeating himself fromthe last couple of
conversations. He was saying thesame phrases over and over
(04:54):
again, like it's not the horse,it's the pressure created by the
horse, and when your mentaltools are not easy. Are greater
than the pressure of thesituation, then you over or
under react or it's not thething you are doing. It's the
mindset while you are doing thething that matters. It's not a
mistake, it's an opportunity.
It's not the work with the horsethat matters. It's in doing the
(05:17):
hard work with the horse. Youare recalibrating your mental
tools and becoming more of theyou. The round pen is a metaphor
for your life and the dreaded Idon't want the horse to do the
picture. Every time he saidthat, I remembered myself lying
on the ground, unable tobreathe, wondering what had
caused the horse to throw meinto the dirt at moments like
(05:40):
this, I thought, Bruce, I mostcertainly do want the horse to
do the picture, and my pictureis to stay on the horse. What
kind of horse trainer? Peopleleader trainer or doesn't want
to get the job done? My firstinkling of an answer to that
question came the day after ourfirst session. Bruce and I spoke
as promised. I didn't shareJen's reservations what she had
(06:04):
listed in exhaustive detail overthe drive home. I did mention
one small moment when we pulledoff the highway and found
ourselves behind a line of carsat the exit. I made some comment
like, wish I had my James Bondcar with a weapon that would
move all these cars aside,something made me tell Bruce
about this exchange with Jen,and he said, matter of factly,
(06:27):
good opportunity to work onpatience. This seemingly small
moment in an otherwise eventfulday was like a little miracle,
one that I would understand onlymuch, much later. Hmm, one of
the things I had oftenexperienced after leaving
countless meditation retreatswas that my good feelings seemed
to evaporate on the drive home.
(06:50):
A truck would cut me off, awreck would backup traffic, or
any number of other everydayoccurrences would take me from
cool headed meditator to roadrage, mad woman in the blink of
an eye. It had never occurred tome to use these things to make
myself better. Instead, I wouldjust beat myself up for being so
bad at staying grounded. Perhapsthe horse not doing the picture
(07:14):
offered a good opportunity towork on myself. Nothing changed
in that moment, but a seed wasplanted. Resistance melts during
the day as Bruce worked withGail, Jen had her eye on that
pony. When Gail and Brucefinished, Gail left, and we
decided the three of us woulddebrief in what I would later
come to call a porch session.
The porch overlooked the roundpen and the pasture where the
(07:37):
horses grazed. It was a gorgeousspring day, and everything was
just starting to turn green.
Chickens were running around, apeacock occasionally spread his
magnificent tail, andhummingbirds started in and out
of the feeder. I made note of aLariat, or was it a noose
hanging in the nearby tree, butwe didn't have the courage to
(08:00):
ask about it until many porchsessions later, we took our
seats and began discussing theevents of the day. Before I knew
it, Bruce had asked Jen if shewanted to give it another try. I
thought, Wait, give one anothertry. Jen's not heading for the
car. She's carrying a halter.
She's heading for the round pen.
Oh, of course, not the round penshe's heading for the pony, even
(08:24):
though our intention in thedebrief was to focus on the
session we had just completed,the conversation had somehow
come around to the prior month.
In what seemed like a flash,Bruce said something, and Jen
was ready to try again, lookingback on it, that pony catalyzed
another miracle moment. He wasonly going to be there for a
short time while Bruce, quote,unquote, babysat him for a
(08:47):
friend. His cuteness factor washigh enough to override Jen's
wall of resistance. Had we comeanother time, the pony wouldn't
have been there, and I might nothave ever gone back
as Jen skipped around in theround pen, the pony opened her
heart. She was having fun andwas putting herself in danger in
(09:08):
ways she did not recognize.
Quickly, Bruce saw that Jen wasnot respecting the pony the same
way she would have a full sizedhorse. He would give her a task,
a picture, and she would try touse force to move him around.
Though small, this pony stillweighed well over 200 pounds. At
one point, he said, What makesyou think this pony can't hurt
you? He's got teeth, he's gothooves. He pointed out that she
(09:31):
was under reacting to thepressure of the pony, a sure
sign that she was in tyrantmindset. Bruce's tyrant mindset
was still somewhat of a mysteryto me. He mentioned the past
interfering, as happened before,I recognized that he and I were
often talking about the same orsimilar ideas with different
language. In my language, what Iwas seeing was both Kid Mode and
(09:54):
history mode in action on thekid mode. Tightrope. Jen was
falling off both sides child andparent from the child power
underside. I saw Jen wanted thepony to like her. She was naive
to the danger in front of herfrom the parent oversight. I saw
Jen letting the pony get awaywith doing whatever it wanted.
(10:16):
She was overly helpful when shedecided it was time for the pony
to do the picture, attempting touse force when being helpful
didn't work. Rather than thegive and take of adult power
with she was following a commonpattern, feel powerless, then
try to grab power, overshoot themark, try to make up for the
(10:38):
pushy moves and then continuallyporpoise back and forth without
ever really finding the balanceon the tightrope again. I was
reminded that this patternplayed out the day of my
accident. First I wanted thehorse to like me, then I started
to recognize the danger, so Itried to find a way to get
power. Then he started to run. Icompletely overreacted, and the
(10:59):
consequence was a big splat.
Seeing my own pattern play outin my daughter right in front of
my eyes evoked a strongrecognition of history mode.
Where else would she havelearned such a pattern, other
than to watch her mother do ithundreds of times over her
lifetime, in all my years ofworking on myself through
(11:20):
journaling, reflections,meditations, grounding, and
every other method I tied triedto break my long standing
patterns I had never found a wayout that stood the test of
pressure. Something told me Iwas about to learn something
big. So I grabbed my phone andstarted the video. The round pen
(11:40):
as a metaphor for life. The 15minutes that followed were pure
magic. I was no longer anoutsider trying to see if this
fellow Bruce had something thatwould work for clients.
Suddenly, I was a mom filming asJennifer reached point after
point of trying and failing andlearning repeatedly, instead of
resistance in covering up, as Ihad shown the month before, she
(12:03):
was open hearted and smilingeven when she was making
mistakes. Perhaps the mostpowerful exchange occurred when
Bruce asked her, were you doingtyrant mindset? Yeah, I think
so. Bruce says definitely,because you weren't applying the
pressure the pony was tellingyou to, because you were so
(12:24):
engrossed in the excitement ofworking with the pony. Yes, Jen
said, smiling from ear to ear.
And you were like, Bruce f you Idon't care what your picture is,
because I'm just having too muchfun. And Jen says, because I
just love the pony, giddinessexuding from her pores. But
where else in the job place areyou doing that? Can you do that?
(12:44):
You understand you can't bedoing that shit in the job
place. You can't let the pastinterfere. Oh yeah, Jen, had a
light bulb moment. Just thatexchange busted so many
assumptions. Tyrant mindset doesnot necessarily feel bad. It can
be exciting. Laughing doesn'tmake everything okay. The
(13:06):
sensation of excitement can bemisinterpreted, just as the
sensation of anxiety can bemisinterpreted back to the
exchange on the video. So whatI'm showing you here, the nice
thing about the pony was, didyou ever feel in danger? Jen
says, No, but by him being sosmall, were you having a hard
time getting your picture donelaughing? Jen says, yes. Then
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Bruce said, at the same time,you think he's small. And Jen
says, I wasn't being as cautiousand as demanding, because you
assume because he was small. Jenjumps down. I thought I had more
control than I really did. Yeah,but who was the one lacking
control? You are the pony. Deadsilence. Jen had not really
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thought of herself as lackingcontrol, neither had I. She had
been dancing around, laughing,having fun, trying to move the
pony, even though the pony wasnot going where she was
directing, it all seemed likefun and games. Bruce pointed out
that her desire to help wasactually putting her in danger,
and she was not aware of exactlyhow painful a kick or bite could
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be. He pointed out that havingthe pony run wild was not
beneficial to him. There he wasusing that terminology again,
his words echoed back to me. I'mhere to help the horse, to help
himself to live in the world wehave created. The modern world
is the world we have created.
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Horses are of the natural world,but a horse who is allowed to
succumb fully to his wild naturewould be way too dangerous for
humans to work with, day in andday out. Bruce was saying out
loud what Jen was learning,believing that she could control
the pony was a faultyassumption, without me knowing
it at the time, Bruce had justrevealed a core point, perhaps
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the core point in his method,in. Jen had lost her power by
believing she had power whereshe didn't. It would take me
many years and even more horsesto begin to grasp the depth of
this lesson. She could choose towork with the horse by using
domination and force or form arelationship of trust and
connection in the dominancegame, it's all about power over
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and power under. This was thegame I had played my whole
corporate life. Kid Mode reignedsupreme. Bruce was showing
another way to dance thetightrope. Instead of using
force, fear and intimidation,the hallmarks of dominance, he
was showing Jen how to dancebetween applying too much and
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too little pressure with theintention to push the horse's
negative pole up, doing soallows the horse to choose how
to balance his negative positivepole. Using dominance, can get
things done, but with a cost. Itcreates compliance out of fear a
horse might freeze or run away.
People do the same thing, butthe horse could also fight. As
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Bruce pointed out, the horse hasteeth and it has hooves, a kick
or a bite can be devastating andeven fatal. However, Bruce's
main focus was not on what Jenwas doing. Instead, it was on
where it came from. Bruce said,Yes, but notice your emotion,
how the past was interfering,and how you were trying to fill
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a void you understand. Andtherefore, by doing that, you're
actually saying to the pony,it's okay to do what it's doing
when it's not okay, youunderstand what I'm saying. Bam,
there it was. Jen was caught ina pattern. She was feeling
emotion, lots of emotion, inorder to address the feeling.
Jen was filling a void. She wasallowing the cuteness of the
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pony to override her owninsecurities. We all have
insecurities, and we havestrategies for filling the void
they create. Jen was operatingon invisible rules. She might as
well have been a robot, albeit ahappy one. Bruce was here to
show her her way out of therules that much I could see this
very type of rule breaking hadbeen at the root of my coaching
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work for years, but somethingwas different here. Now I had
seen Bruce debrief differentsituations in the round pen, and
in every case, there was aparallel with life. When he said
the round pen is a metaphor foryour life, he was able to back
it up with lessons like thisone. Let the situation tell you
how much pressure to apply.
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After Bruce revealed what wasreally going on, Jen got very
clear on her picture with somecoaching on reaching for her
tools, like listening, hearing,patience, problem solving, Jen
helped the pony to help himselfmove with ease around the
perimeter of the round penseveral times. Bruce pointed out
that Jen had found her Alphamindset, meaning she was letting
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the pony tell her what to do andhow much pressure to apply. The
pony didn't talk any more thanthe rope had. However, the pony
did show her what worked andwhat didn't. Bruce's approach
interrupted some of my bigassumptions and looked very
different than what I expected.
I thought, Where were theinstructions for how to move a
pony or a horse around. How doesone apply pressure if you can't
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touch the animal? Why does Brucekeep handing us a Lariat without
telling us how to use it? Surelywe missed a training session in
horse school about everythingone needs to know.
Instead, Bruce kept sayingthings like, pay attention to
what the horse is telling youuse your mental tools,
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listening, hearing, patience,timing, feel problem solving,
discipline, outside ofmaintaining safety. He was
giving us no rules, just tools.
It was an empowering message,both for Jen and for the pony.
Remember he said the pony willtell you how much pressure to
apply. Let him tell you what todo, when to do, how to do.
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Eventually, those words wouldcome to mean freedom. In context
far beyond the horses. In thismoment, they were still creating
dissonance in my head. I'mlooking for Bruce to give some
answers. Share his rule book,educate us on the ways of
horses. I'm also sensing that ifI could just get out of my own
way, and the incessant desire tobe perfect, there is something
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to this idea of letting thesituation tell me what to do,
the two thoughts felt like amajor contradiction, yet they
also seem to go together liketwo rhyming words in a poem
seeking a way to resolve thedissonance, I remembered using
that principle outside oftraining with horses. Just the
week before I had a conversationwith Scott, a client who had
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been trying to avoid firing oneof his most trusted team
members, Bob, his company wasgrowing at an astronaut.
Economical rate, and Bob hadbeen struggling to keep pace.
Instead, he had been missingdeadlines and showing up late
for work. Scott had been veryclear on his expectations, yet
Bob was only making mattersworse. Finally, Scott realized
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he had to fire him and call mein hopes that I would offer
another alternative. I askedScott what was making him so
concerned. He simply said, he'sbeen great until the last few
months. I just don't want tofire him. And I said, What makes
you think you are the one firinghim? Does he not know what you
expect? You've been very clear.
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He's firing himself. Bob hadtold Scott How much pressure to
apply. If Scott had notlistened, Bob would have caused
even more damage than he alreadyhad, rather than creating
dissonance for Scott, the ideathat Bob was firing himself gave
Scott some peace of mind.
Letting him go was the exactlyright move for both the company
and for Bob. Later, Scottrehired him because Bob needed
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that level of pressure as a wakeup call and was able to get back
to where he needed to be. I wasstarting to see that what Bruce
was teaching went far beyond theround pen. My perceptions were
coming from standing outside thefence for the whole day. Being
outside was my safe vantagepoint. But not for long, Bruce
invited me to join Jen in theround pen. Our task was to
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contain the pony in a six footsquare with nothing but our
energy. I really would haveloved to have had that halter
and wrote back I wanted morecontrol. More than once, Bruce
had to remind us that wecouldn't touch him. Otherwise he
gave no other specific steps totake. Rather, he kept talking
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about letting the pony tell uswhat to do, when to do, how to
do. This was incrediblyfrustrating, to say the least.
The pony was doing whatever hepleased while we ran around
trying to contain him. Not onlydid we look like the Keystone
Cops, but it also felt likemistake, piled upon mistake,
piled upon more mistakes. Tryone thing and it's too much. Try
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another thing and it's toolittle, back and forth, never
quite getting the hang of it. Wewere feeling the frustration
build the thoughts behind. Mythoughts started to make me feel
like a failure. My directthoughts were things like, why
isn't Bruce helping us? Where isthat pony going? Now? What
should I do next? My indirectthoughts didn't have words. They
had energy, and the energyweighed me down. It was that
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energy that the pony wasresponding to. If they did have
words, it would be things suchas, I'm going to get in trouble.
Why can't I get this? What'swrong with me? How bad do I
look? I wanted to get thepicture right. My very identity
was resting on this. Brucewanted us to use the pressure
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created by the pony to build ourmental tools. I wanted
perfection. Bruce was showing apath to progress. It went
something like this, thepressure wasn't there to crush
me. I could choose to allow itto elevate me. The uncertainty
and not knowing what to do arean essential part of creativity.
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Failure is not failure at all.
In this path, I was learning norelearning a principle that
would serve me deeply. Let thesituation tell me the best
response my past can inform, butbe mindful when it interferes or
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interferes, e n t, e R F, E, A RS, when we stopped feeling like
we were making mistakes andstarted listening to the pony,
it became easy to contain him inthe six foot square. The answers
were not in the scene thing.
They were in the invisible partof the equation. I didn't know
it yet, but this work wouldeventually teach me that most of
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my assumptions about balance,pressure, uncertainty and
failure were upside down orbackwards. My assumptions about
trail riding were just asinverted. Chapter Five,
assessing risk horses andsurvival mode. After my first
two sessions with Bruce, I begantaking a variety of individual
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clients, not the leadershipteam, to work with him. Over the
next several months, I wasn'teven remotely ready to consider
getting back on a horse again,but I was still hanging out with
my friends who had horses alsoTammy Tappan, owner of
equestrian artist at Tryoninternational Equestrian Center
had asked me to include mypottery in her gallery. Her
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horse paintings had stopped mein my tracks the first time I
saw them. Every time I walkedinto her gallery, I could feel
the familiar tug of wanting tobe with horses. Trips to the
gallery offered me more excusesfor going to the center more
than once. Tammy offered to takeme on a trail ride with her
horses, and more than once, Itold her I was not ready. The
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more I was exposed to the horseworld, the more I heard from
lifetime horsemen and womenabout life with horses. Perhaps
the most common phrase I heardin this phase of my recovery was
this, I've been injured moretimes than I can count, while
feeling somewhat vindicatedabout my own accident, this
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dawning awareness did little tobuild my confidence about ever
riding again. Instead, I startedlearning more about horses,
trail rides, and the risk Iinadvertently took to take the
lead on a trail ride. Myinverted assumptions about trail
riding, albeit innocent, startedwith ignorance around the mind
of a horse and ended withnaivety about the complications
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of taking a fight, flight freezeanimal out for a stroll through
the woods. It's never just astroll for the horse. Riding
horses has been done by humansfor 1000s of years, yet when you
stop to think about it, ridinghorses should not be possible.
We are getting on the back of ahuge animal and asking it to
give its body over to ourdirection in the pecking order
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of life, horses are prey. Humansare predators. So the prey
animal is allowing a predator toget on its back, usually after
throwing a saddle up there,which is made of a dead animal,
an animal we have alreadykilled, yet somehow, mankind has
learned to work with thesemagnificent animals over the
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centuries. Seeing the worldthrough the eyes of a horse has
helped me understand thesurvival instincts of life while
humans are predators in the bigpicture pecking order, we are
both prey and predator in ourown lives. Anyone who has ever
felt the hair on their neckprickle while walking in a big
city or felt the glare of anangry boss knows the feeling of
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being prey. Learning to developtrust with a horse has helped me
understand myself so muchbetter, and it's transformed my
understanding of the humansurvival brain because of who
they are. Horses are profoundteachers, if we are willing to
give ourselves over to learn tovent from them, as Dr Alan J
Hamilton, MD, says, In Zen Mind,send horse the science of
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spirituality and working withhorses,
the reason the horse can becomesuch a gifted teacher for us is
because he does not need aninner voice. He doesn't think in
words at all. He feels heexperiences the simple energy of
his emotional state of being.
More than 30 million years ofevolutionary pressure have
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turned the horse into thequintessential prey animal,
rather than using words orvocalization to communicate
sounds that help the predator,predator pinpoint his prey,
horses learn instead how not totalk, to make sounds and how to
make sense of being notthinking, horses infuse
emotional meaning into bodymovement. They pour this vital
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emotional energy, chi into everygesture and glance, lending them
the nuances of tone, accent andvalue by sensitizing themselves
to Qi, horses can not onlyconvey the meaning of what they
want to share with other membersof the herd, but can also feel
the palpably sharp energyemitting from A stalking
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predators eyes locked intentlyon its prey. Evolution has
driven equids to the farthestlimits of non verbal right sided
brain function out on the trail.
These sensitive sensitivitiesare amplified. Now you have a
prey animal carrying a predatorinto the wilderness. The lead
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horse has the mostresponsibility its large eyes
and huge nostrils are always onguard for danger out in front
and from the sides. The horse inthe back tunes in for threats
from the rear, the horses in themiddle just focus on what the
lead and trailing horsescommunicate the pressure is
high, especially for the flightanimal. Should an event happen,
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and events often happen. It'sentirely possible for both human
and horse to be scared,unexpected gunfire, a snake
slithering, or a pack of dogschallenging the path might or
might not send chills down ahuman spine. However, the horse
will always have his survivalinstincts on high alert. The
horse might take off running, hemight rear up, he might decide
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to suddenly roll back, the otherway, he might buck. He might
just jump to the side. He mightstand still. It's best if he
stands still. Yet even when he'sstanding still, a fearful horse
radiates with energy. A ridercan feel that Moreover, any
sudden dancing or prancing of anervous horse can elevate the
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unprepared riders fear toextreme levels. Now, the horse
has to contend with whatever ishappening out there and what is
happening up there on its back,the place where a cougar might
drop in an ambush. Here's theone thing a horse will never
conclude. That he's the cause ofthe fear on the in the predator
on his back. It's our job as hisrider and leader to be the
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responsible one and manage nothide and not pretend away our
fear. Horses are masters atreading incongruity, hiding
feelings of any sort, telegraphsnothing but trouble for an
animal who stays alive byreading intent? Remember my
story of coiling the Lariat thehorse began running and then
kicking and then bucking becauseI was trying to look calm, cool
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and collected while my innerturmoil escalated, the horse
felt the mismatch. She stoppedher antics when I quit
pretending, when I startedworking through the problem,
step by step, moment by moment,my inner turmoil melted away,
and the horse turned and calmlywatched me coil the rope when I
decided to go out on the trailin the lead on a horse I had
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ridden only once. My startingassumption was that trail riding
was nothing compared to gettinga horse to perform something far
more advanced. My otherassumption was that getting on
the horse mattered more thananything else more on that
later, growing up going to therodeo, I watched horses do all
kinds of specialized activities,such as exploding out of a gate
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to catch a calf or runningaround the barrels. The 2018
World Equestrian Games were hellnear where I live, and I watched
people with their horses do allkinds of advanced skills, such
as jumping over six foot fences,dressage, which looks like horse
dancing to me, and racing withcarts. It all looked dangerous
and thrilling at the same time,I was both impressed and keenly
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aware that I knew nothing abouthow to get a horse to do any of
those things, however, trailriding that I could do, or so I
thought, on the surface, itlooks like anyone can do it.
However, any true horse personwill tell you nothing could be
further from the truth. Unlikeworking in an arena where
there's a defined space and aclear job for the horse to do,
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the trail offers pressure anduncertainty whether the
unexpected will be unmanageableor not is yet to be seen. In
fact, in many ways, trail ridingis the most dangerous of horse
activities, especially if thehorse and human are not
prepared. Remember, anything canhappen out there, deer crashing
through the trees, pigs rollingin the mud, snakes crossing the
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path, bicycles and motorcyclessharing the trail, crossing
streams, uncertain footing,loggers cutting down trees,
going out on the trail caneither be a house of horrors or
a series of opportunities tolearn and grow. Later, I would
come to realize what Bruce wassaying. At this point, I just
wanted to avoid the House ofHorrors. Many people who own
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horses share the same belief Idid about the difference between
performance riding and trailriding. They say it's just trail
riding, followed by the deadlythought, how hard can it be?
Warwick Schiller, professionalhorse trainer, compared trail
riding to having the right toolsto fix a blown tire on the horse
trailer in this Facebook post,it's fixing the bone tire, quite
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a simple process, provided thatyou, before you left home, you
had the right size socketbreaker bar, a jiffy jack and a
fully inflated spare. I oftenget asked, What would you do
when out riding on a narrowtrail and your horse gets upset
and there's no place to circlehim to get under control? My
answer is, usually just put alittle bend in his body. And if
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all of the training I have doneat home is solid, he will come
back down and relax. Most times.
The reply I get after that isthat wouldn't work with my
horse. He won't even relax whenI do that at home. About this
time, I usually suggest theytalk to the guy with the gun,
the guy with the gun, they ask,yes, the guy with the gun
pointed at you Who forced you totake an unprepared horse out on
a narrow trail, usually aboutthis time they start to figure
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out that maybe that wasn't thebest situation to put their
horse in. I've sometimes feltbad for pointing out that maybe
their horse isn't ready fortrail riding. There's a buck
brendam quote that gets aroundsocial media that goes something
along the lines of some trailriders say they don't need that
fancy arena stuff. They justwant to trail ride. They just
want to die out among the trees.
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Trail riding is like going outon a freeway with your car. It
may be okay to drive around thepasture or panic at home in a
car that's not safe. Maybe thebrakes are iffy or the steering
is not so good, but when you getout where you may have to take
some evasive action tocircumvent situations that are
out of control, it's a reallygood idea to be prepared.
Clearly, trail riding is no walkin the park. Both humans and
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horses must prepare themselvesfor the pressure and uncertainty
they will face. Yet, with allthis survival instinct in play,
horses do learn to be safe onthe trail. The folks who offer
public trail rides prepare theirhorses with the mental tools to
handle the unexpected while theunexpected can happen and it
does, they've developed thetools to handle the pressures,
uncertainty and fear. They don'tjust put any rider on any horse
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in the leaf. We have. Survivalmode too. So it was here in the
lead where I discovered that Iwas the one lacking mental
tools. Survival Mode took over.
Fear flooded my system. I wasnow the predator on the back of
a horse. It never dawned on thehorse that he was the source of
my fear. As with any endeavor,horseback riding has two tracks,
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the skills of the activity, andthe ability to bring those
skills to bear under pressure, Iwas completely unaware of the
gap between my skills and thesituation I had gotten myself
into. I was also unconsciouslyoperating on two false sets of
beliefs, one about the safety oftrail riding, and the other
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about the nature of horses. Themodern world, with all its
progress, has divested us fromnature and the nature of horses.
It's taken us away from our ownnature. For most of human
history, horses were our primarymode of transportation. Knowing
how to care for them,communicate with them and work
with them was an essential partof life. With the advent of the
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car, horses hadn't gone away.
However, for most people today,it's possible to live a full
life without ever encountering ahorse. Today, we interact more
with machines than we do nature.
Machines are logical. They haverules and procedures that ensure
they work as we want them, wepush a button and get an
immediate response. Not so withnature and not so with horses.
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When I pulled back on the reinsthat day, I expected it to be
like hitting the brake on my caror my bicycle. He should stop.
He went faster when he did theopposite of what my rule said he
should do. I had no other way tomeet the moment I lost my
balance, both literally andinternally. As I shared my story
with many people, my basicpremise for the accident was I
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didn't know how to stop a horse.
Most riders agreed, and they allhad a method to stop a horse, do
this, that or the other thing,with the reins and with your
legs and the horse will stop.
There is a skill to stopping ahorse, especially one that is
running faster than the riderwants. Bruce's diagnosis was
differentin his way of thinking. The
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pressure of the situation wasgreater than my mental tools.
The question was not whether Ihad the skill to stop the horse.
The question was whether I coulduse the skill under pressure. Of
course, as he shared thistheory, I kept thinking, but
seriously, how do you stop ahorse? My controlling mindset
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was sure the answer was in thereins. What I did not know yet
was that you can stop a horsewith nothing more than a clear
mental picture and energyfinding the heat, growing up, we
cooked hot dogs and s'mores overthe campfire almost every
weekend. Getting too close tothe fire taught me about getting
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burned. There was a just rightplace to stand where I could
cook a hot dog or marshmallowwithout cooking myself. Get too
far away, and nothing gotcooked. Get too close, and it
was me that got cooked,depending on the wind, that just
right place could change andmove. Finding the safe zone was
a constant balancing act thatrequired my attention. Getting
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burned can be a metaphor formore than touching a hot stove
or getting too close to a realfire. We humans have well
developed systems to keep usaway from things that hurt. In
my year of recovery after myhorse fall, I tried to find the
just right place to stand. Mymind provided both the fire and
the solace. Sometimes it fed mesensible thoughts. More often it
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fired noisy thoughts likebullets from a gun. You were
overconfident, you will neverget it. It was a freak accident
that will never happen again.
You just need better skills. Youwould be crazy to write again.
Notice how those thoughtscareened between both extremes.
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They either pulled me into thefire or kept me outside of the
fire. Productive learning andgrowth could not happen when
there was no heat or too muchheat. None of these thoughts
chose the path of productivediscomfort. Nowhere did I ask,
How can I use the heat to gaintraction? Instead, my thoughts
kept me spinning my wheelsrushing to land on an answer
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that would stop the heat andtake away my discomfort. What
was most unsettling was the gapbetween what I believed I could
do and what my accidentrevealed. Like a dog with a
bone, my mind gnawed at the gap,wondering what moves I should
have made with my hands, myseat, my legs, to completely mix
my metaphors, I was barking upthe wrong tree. The problem was
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not in my skills, although myskills needed improvement. The
problem was in my relationshipwith pressure. What I've been
uncovering is the pressure gap,much richer and scarier
territory, the tangibleterritory of the skill gap is so
alluring Sports. Offersexcellent illustrations of the
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skill gap in basketball, aplayer might hit a certain
percentage of shots in scrimmagegames and not even come close to
the same rate in a big game. Aswimmer might get a certain time
every day in practice and fallshort under the pressure of the
meet. A tennis player might beable to ace every serve in
practice and yet end up doublefaulting in the tournament in
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every case, they have the skillsto perform in the low level
situations, increase thepressure and they can't perform
at the same level. In otherwords, they are not bringing
their level of skills to bearwhen it counts. For me, it's as
if my skills go offline when Ineed the most in the heat of the
fire, there's no time to readthe rule book. The only thing
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that matters is the mental toolsI bring to the situation. Those
tools are the gateway toeffectively managing my skills
and embracing the discomfort ofpressure. If my tools are not up
to the task, my skills liebehind a wall of fear
considering my choices, thegroundwork with the horses
introduced a novel perspectiveon what was needed to get back
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on the horse. With this newvantage point, it wasn't just a
matter of getting back on ornot, there were three options.
Number one, I could choose tonever ride again, a logical
choice, as I was now 60 and Ididn't want to risk another
injury. Number two, I could takewriting lessons, the mainstream
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choice, which would educate meon the rules and skills of
acquitation. And number three, Icould work on my mental tools,
the messy choice guaranteed tobe full of pressure, uncertainty
and failure. Choices one and twooffer two sides of the risk
tight rope when assessing risk,one side is risk avoidant. The
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other side is risk dismissive.
In my credit training program,we had to teach aspiring bankers
to see the full picture of risk.
Those with risk avoidanttendency had a difficult time
making lending decisions. Theyfelt much safer leaving the
bank's money in the bank, andthey may very well have had some
of their own money stuffed inmattresses like their
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grandparents had. Those with arisk dismissive tendency
minimized the genuine risks inthe deal. Every deal looked good
to them because they only sawthe money making potential while
being blind to the many ways theloan could go sour. And these
same trainees seemed toconsistently have the story of
the one that got away. We wantedour bankers to walk the
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tightrope, which meant trainingthem to see and mitigate risk
while recognizing when that riskwas too much for the bank to
take, to walk away would put mein the risk avoidant camp, for
which there were plenty of goodreasons. However, I knew myself
well enough to know I would feellike I let my fears win.
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Choosing to take riding lessonsthat focused strictly on riding
skills seemed to minimize thegenuine danger I was beginning
to see in horseback riding,while I would become a more
skilled rider, what good wouldmy skills have been if I could
not access them under pressureof a horse that was choosing to
act like a horse rather thanlike a machine? I couldn't
decide while working with horseson the ground was slightly
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intriguing. I still carried thebelief that getting on was the
only interesting part the day ofmy accident, I remember going
through the motions of brushingthe horse, putting on the saddle
and putting on the bridle,focusing almost strictly on the
goal of riding the horse. Infact, I was so excited about
being on a horse again, Istopped and took a picture
looking down on his head. Thatwas about 15 minutes before my
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faithful thought this is sort ofboring. In my two sessions with
Bruce, I was shown the messyalternative to truly change. I
would have to feel the pressureand go deep to my core. A part
of me knew it would be likeshaking up my internal snow
globe. There was no tellingwhere things would land. What I
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wanted instead was a set ofrules and steps. Bruce kept
talking about my tools,listening, hearing, patience,
timing, feel, problem solvingand other actions in the unseen
territory. My beliefs wereacting like a heat shield,
keeping his methods at bay. Iwas speaking one set of beliefs
while showing a contradictoryset of beliefs. Went under
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pressure while I espoused givingup perfection. I was totally
seeking perfection while I coachpeople and myself that beating
ourselves up avoids change.
Under pressure of getting itright with the horses, I beat
myself up while I wrote eloquentarticles about the value of
mistakes, I still cringed when Imade a mistake, these old
(44:47):
beliefs were not living in myhead. They were living in my
bones. They were like computercode, the rules running my every
action at. Extricating myselffrom them was not merely a
matter of changing my mind, onlythe heat of pressure would burn
them out of my cells, I hadlittle or no ability to apply my
(45:09):
knowledge under pressure, whilemy head was attempting to apply
its knowledge, the beliefs in mybones were directing my actions.
Yet in that first year, I keptcoming back to Bruce with
clients, me on the outside, themin the fire, looking back on it,
I believe it was to help themlearn what I thought I already
knew. Yes, I had knowledge ofthe concepts Bruce was sharing.
(45:32):
I had been teaching many of themfor years. Plus, I was thrilled
with the experiential aspect ofworking with live animals in a
somewhat unpredictableenvironment, but my old belief
still helped me in their prison.
I was still thinking of the workas a finite set of lessons
rather than infinitepossibilities. Remember the
(45:53):
example with the pressure gap.
Just because we can walk on a 12inch beam on the ground doesn't
mean we can walk the same pathwhen the beam is elevated, even
four or five feet off theground, just because we can talk
doesn't mean we can be coherentwhen we are in front of people
whose opinions matter to us andthe stakes are high,
the consequences are higher. Ihad been walking on a 12 inch
(46:16):
beam on the ground. It was safedistance. My pressure threshold
was about 12 inches high. Atthis distance, I could throw
logs on the fire of knowledgewithout ever truly feeling the
heat. I spent a little more thana year skipping along my safe 12
inch beam away from danger, butno closer to deciding whether to
get back on a horse. Thank youfor listening to the creative
(46:37):
spirits unleash podcast. Istarted this podcast because I
was having these greatconversations, and I wanted to
share them with others. I'malways learning in these
conversations, and I wanted toshare that kind of learning with
you. Now, what I need to hearfrom you is what you want more
of and what you want less of. Ireally want these podcasts to be
of value for the listeners.
Also, if you happen to knowsomeone who you think might love
(47:00):
them, please share the podcastand, of course, subscribe and
rate it on the different appsthat you're using, because
that's how others will find it.
Now, I hope you go and dosomething very fun today. You.
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