Reciprocity – Just an Idea.

Last Friday night I stood with my class, the Mid Pack, at our graduation ceremony!! Whew!! Almost two years of studying, practicing, and working through our own “stuff” … and we are now certified in the Equine Gestalt Coaching Method !!  The range, depth and potential of this work is awesome.

But I would like to take a moment and acknowledge those who came before me.  Among many other things, the Mid Pack had the outstanding privilege of learning from the Genesis group how to accept new members into this marvelous herd. We learned from their generous example.  It may not have been easy for them to let us in, to transition into a larger herd, but I never once felt that.  Not once. They were outstandingly gracious and accepting of us.

I have been thinking about the rumblings I have heard from new students as we each face our fears and our doubts about this program.  How large is this program going to get? Will there be enough work for me?  I confess that I have had my own doubts, my own dark fears.

I am reminded of a lesson I leaned fifteen years ago in South America. I was studying with a Peruvian shaman and one day he told us a story of his idea of reciprocity. To him and his fellow shamans, if anyone came forward and said they wanted to learn the ancient sacred ways, that teacher had to take them on as a student.  Because it was their understanding that not until each and every human stepped into their highest potential, could any of us ascend to the higher realms.  No one could move forward until every got it!  This idea was new to me and the hugeness of that statement stayed with me ever since. Every time you reach out and help someone up, you are supporting a larger cause.  Plain and simple, we are all in this together.

Then there is the sentiment that my dear friend Patricia offered up one day. She said, “If everyone on the earth was a healer, we would still have tons of work to do!” I don’t even know what she meant, but I know on a cellular level that the words are true.

And so I keep reminding myself of these two little stories. I totally believe that for each one of us to reach our highest potential we need to champion the successes of one another.  By supporting each other with grace and authenticity, we will each find our place.  There are thousands of horses waiting for us to step up to the plate and there are millions of folks who need us when they are ready.

If I had any words of wisdom for those coming into the program it would be this. If you need to compete, as is in my nature, compete with yourself.  Set your goals, keep an open mind, ask questions until you “get it”  and know that you are in a loving herd whose survival depends on your strength of character. We are in this together and it is so outrageously rewarding!!  There is room for all of us. I welcome you to a marvelous adventure.  It will be what you make it to be.

And I know for me this is just the beginning.  I look forward to many more years of studying, practicing, and working through my own “stuff” as I move forward as a practitioner of the Equine Gestalt Coaching Method !! 

Namaste.

The Beginning

I remember standing in front of my kitchen window staring out on the cold January morning. I could see my reflection in the window;  looking out ~ yet looking in.  It was a bright beginning to a new year. My mind was racing with thoughts of the Melisa Pearce’s Touched By A Horse Certification Program.TM   What if this program was the answer to the riddle that had presented itself over and over to me for the past five years. Reading after reading after reading, I had been told that I could work with horses if I wanted to. Wanted To? It is what i wanted to do most in the world! But I could not see what it looked like. I could not visualize it and the women giving me the reading could not answer that for me. They all said, “I don’t know what it means. This is just the information I am receiving.”  

One of my ego’s strongest arguments was the cost. It was pricey and I was having trouble paying my mortgage. That was the most evident problem on this physical plane.  I am not a horse trainer even though my dear sweet horse, Lakota, and I have spent hours and hours in various clinics studying Natural Horsemanship and how to be better partners to one another.  On the other hand, I did truly want to work with people. The last 15 years of running my own appraisal shop has become more and more unsatisfying, financially, mentally, and spiritually. I am ready for a change. But my “Doubting Thomas’ voice is loud in my inner debate. “What if we sign up and spend all this money and then we can’t make a living at it? What if we find out we’re not good enough? What if this is not the answer? What if? What if? What if?”

But a part of me knew. This is an answer. Here is a teacher right in my own back yard. “What if she moved up here from Arizona to be my teacher? What about that…huh?” I asked my Doubting Thomas self. “What if this IS the answer and I’m too scared to go for it?”

The part of me that “knows” smiled at the reflection in the frosty window and whispered, “It will be what you make it to be.  It is up to you, dear one.”  I walked to the phone and left a message with Melisa’s office. That was January 1, 2010.

Today, June 10, 2011, I will graduate with four of my fellow classmates. I would be lying if I said the journey has not been extremely challenging at times. But with help I have walked through my fears; I have acknowledged and moved beyond the nagging doubts ~ and there have been many along the way.  But in every cell of my body I KNOW that this was the answer. I am proud of myself for staying in the program, looking the “what-ifs” square in the face and finding the funds, finding the courage, and finding the stamina to move forward.  With Lakota’s help, and with the horses I sense will be joining us ~ we will make it glorious!!

Once again ~ we are at the beginning!

 

Happy June 1st

I made it!!  Ya hooo!
I wrote a three page essay this morning on how badly May sucked, but I decided I won’t subject you to it. Take my word for it, it was a difficult month. I was presented with daily challenges, most around my computer crashing and now my dear old friend of a Honda is not doing well. In between times I bought the funniet graduation cards only to get home and realize they were birthday cards, the check was “not in the mail”,  I stepped in melted used chewing gum and then stepped into my new car and got it all over the clutch, the brake pedal, the carpet and me and……

I have watched myself fight and resist every new twist in the story. Fear of the unknown.  Forced to spend more money than I am making wasn’t too much fun.  Computer-technology-ignorance is certainly one situation where ignorance is not bliss! I rarely entered into the change gracefully, no, I watched myself resist wildly, either inwardly or outwardly. It took a lot of energy to be me last month. Whew! I am exhausted.

I called a good friend of mine yesterday and told her I was really concerned about how angry I had been this past month. And she said, “Well, I don’t know if I would call it angry, but you were certainly irritable.”  I apologized for those times when I called her and vented and she said, “Don’t worry, I didn’t take it personally. It will probably be me next time and you always listen to me.”  That is a good friend. She didn’t sugar coat my “irritability” but she kept open the door to a rewarding friendship.

I was up at the crack of dawn this morning and the sunrise colors were incredible; fuchsia, deep oranges, hot rose pink, it was a promise of a new day, a new month, a new ......  !

Happy June!