Synchronicity, again

I’ve been reading Linda Kohanov’s second book, Riding Between the Worlds, this morning. In order to be able to relax and focus on the reading in spite of an appointment at 11:30, I set a timer to let me know when I needed to quit and go get ready to leave.

In the chapter on “The Music of Connection,” Kohanov talks about how difficult, but how necessary, it is to let go of past patterns of behavior: old ways of being-in-the-world that kill off parts of the soul, or at least don’t allow those parts to grow and thrive. She notes how this kind of pattern leads to depression and sometimes even to suicidal thoughts as the person fails to recognize that it’s the “False Self” who has to die.

This resonates with my own experience. She goes on to describe how horses have helped her clients see how this operates. It made me realize the absolute importance of knowing myself as I move forward with this work.

Then, as I read her example of the woman who was completely unaware of her own fear, though the horse felt it and was badly spooked until the woman returned to her physical body (pp. 130-132), I burst into tears:

“Do you think [the horse] was acting out my hidden fear?” Jane asked.

“Maybe,” I said. “Maybe she was spooking for her own reasons, most likely a bit of both. Either way, you gained her respect, not by denying your fear and talking a good game, but simply by being present. And you showed everyone outside the arena what being present really means. It looks like nothing to the untrained eye, but it means everything to a horse.”

At that moment, just as I absorbed the import of that sentence for my own life and work, my timer went off, leaving me laughing and crying at the same time, marveling at the “synchronicity.” Such a blessing! So my “homework,” it seems, is to just be present with my horses, with no other agenda. Just be present. Which is, of course, much harder than it sounds.

[Cross-posted on The Alchemical Horse, my other blog.]

A healing memory....

The other day, out of the blue, I remembered something that happened a couple of months before my father died in 2004. I don't think I ever shared it; I didn't even write about it in my journal until months later. For some reason I wanted to share it now.

We all knew he was dying of pancreatic cancer. He had always said that when his time came, he wanted to go quickly, and not linger on in this life debilitated and unable to continue his active, independent life. The cancer claimed him within six months of the onset of symptoms, and even the night before his passing, thanks to his little scooter, he motored himself off to sit at dinner at the retirement center with his friends and family.

Here is the only entry in my journal at the time this particular incident happened:

7:30P. What a day! Dad called me about 9 last night to say he was in a lot of pain; he called again at 3A and I went over and took him to the ER at Barnes. They’re going to admit him, if they can ever find him a room. When I left at 4:30 this afternoon he was still in the ER, and I haven’t heard from him yet!

Nearly a year later, I was finally able to write about it more fully:

I was sitting in a curtained “room” in the ER, and Dad was dozing uncomfortably on a gurney. We’d been there since about 4 in the morning, and it was then mid-afternoon. The nurse had finally come to fix Dad’s IV once again and give him some more morphine.

I put my head down awkwardly on the chair and was dozing as best I could with all the noise and commotion. I found myself in that rare and strange place where my waking mind was mostly asleep but my consciousness was hyper-alert and receptive. Wish I could reach that state more often! I decided to do some Healing Touch with Dad, since I hadn’t been able to do it much at all since he got sick. There was just too much emotion.

I started the usual chakra connection sequence. His energy was quite strong and vital, and I had no trouble connecting. When I got to the hips and connected across them, I was instructed not to continue with the root and sacral chakras, as would normally happen, but rather to follow his spine upward. I did so, connecting each vertebra with the ones above and below as best I could.

I had absolutely no idea why this was necessary, but just went along with the instruction. I finished energetically connecting his spine, then quickly finished the chakra connection about the time the nurse came back in. I left shortly afterward to go home, still puzzling over it.

It was some time later when I realized, with a start and a flood of grateful tears, that what Dad had needed at that moment was courage: he needed to stand straight and tall to face his fears and the difficulties that he was enduring. That was what I was asked to do: help him keep his back straight and strong.

What a blessing to be able to help in this way, and an even greater blessing to understand it. I love you, Dad.

Early Summer

The First of May. Terrific storms in the area last night left no damage here, thank goodness. Today is cool, cloudy, clean; headed for the upper 70s, with more storms to move through late in the day. The Dame's Rocket and the iris are in full bloom, and the first rose opened during the night. The little wren once again sings, “Sweet! Sweet! Sweet! Sweet!”

May Day: Sumer is icumin in, lhude sing cuccu….