Pas de Cheval 8. Riding

When Relationship Comes Before the Ride

Whenever someone learns that I have horses, one question seems to arrive almost immediately:

“Do you ride?”

It is such an ordinary question that most of us never stop to consider what lies beneath it.

Mention a horse, and riding is almost automatically assumed. The horse, in the human imagination, has become inseparable from what we do with the horse.

And I find that worth questioning.

We don't ordinarily meet someone's cat and ask, “What are you going to do with that cat?” We don't look at a beloved dog and immediately wonder what useful purpose that dog will serve.

Yet with certain animals, society has created an almost automatic utilitarian identity.

The horse is for riding.

The cow becomes beef.

The pig becomes pork.

The chicken becomes meat or eggs.

Somewhere in that language, the being can disappear behind the purpose humanity has assigned to them.

I understand this conditioning because I once lived within it myself.

Before I Had the Word Sovereignty

My first horses, Stary and Sinbad—and later Sackett and Sophia—came into my life during a time when, of course, riding was part of what I imagined having horses would mean.

I wanted to ride.

But riding was never the reason I loved them.

I wanted them to be my best friends. They were like children to me, but they were also my gurus, my sages, my wisdom keepers. I revered them long before I fully understood what that reverence was asking of me.

I may not have understood horses then at the level I do today, and I did not yet have the language of sovereignty, but something in me already knew there was far more to these beings than what we could do with them.

Interestingly, it was cows that eventually forced me to look much more deeply at this.

At one point in our lives, we brought cows onto our property because we intended to raise our own beef.

That was simply what people did.

I had eaten meat all my life. I knew intellectually that beef came from a cow and chicken came from a chicken, yet somehow I had never truly followed that knowledge all the way back to the living being.

There was a disconnect.

Then one of our cows became the beef in our freezer.

And I was devastated.

I couldn't eat it.

Suddenly there was no abstraction left. I had participated in the killing of a living, sentient being.

At the time, I still didn't have the language I have today. I didn't think, This is a sovereign being.

I simply knew something about it felt profoundly wrong.

And a question began forming:

What does the animal think about all of this?

Does the chicken willingly surrender her life for us?

Does the cow?

Does the pig?

Where, in all our assumptions about what animals are for, did we ever stop to ask them?

Those questions eventually led me to veganism. But something even more important was happening: I was beginning to step outside societal conditioning and examine my relationship with all animals.

And inevitably, that question came home to the horse.

Does the horse want to be ridden?

Riding Is a Human Idea

A horse does not enter this world thinking:

I hope someday somebody climbs onto my back.

Riding is our idea.

That doesn't mean I have concluded that every horse rejects being ridden. My own horses have prevented me from making that assumption as well.

Some of my Spanish horses seem to genuinely enjoy that aspect of our relationship.

My Friesians have seemed perfectly happy not being ridden.

And that matters.

Every horse is an individual.

No breed determines the personality of the horse before us, and no training system, discipline, tradition or human ambition can answer for that individual.

The horse must be allowed to answer.

And there is an enormous difference between a horse who is willing and a horse who has learned to comply.

A horse can be exceptionally obedient and still not be willing.

A horse can perform everything we ask and still be saying something entirely different through his body.

Compliance is not necessarily consent.

Obedience is not necessarily relationship.

I am interested in willingness.

I want participation.

I want the horse to remain a sovereign being even when I am sitting on his back.

And that means:

The relationship must always come before my agenda to ride.

If riding requires sacrificing the relationship, then I should not ride.

If the physical, emotional or spiritual well-being of the horse must be sacrificed so that I can ride, then I should not ride.

No ride is worth that price.

Begin Again on the Ground

Even when a horse comes to me with years of riding experience, I prefer to begin as though riding doesn't exist.

Start over.

Meet the horse.

Spend time together.

Observe.

Work at liberty.

Watch how the horse moves naturally.

See how he explores his environment. Notice his breathing, expression, curiosity, tension, rhythm and willingness to engage.

When people have asked me to help them find a horse, I have often requested videos before I ever meet the horse—not merely videos under saddle, but anything I can see of the groundwork and the horse's interaction with his current guardian.

I want to see the horse, not simply his résumé.

When I meet him, I do my groundwork. I spend some time simply being with him. I may work at liberty and observe his movement and physical, mental and emotional state.

There have been circumstances in which I have been expected to get on a horse relatively quickly because I was assessing that horse for somebody else.

I don't particularly like doing that.

Sometimes, internally, I find myself almost apologizing:

This isn't how I would normally meet you. I would like to know you first.

If circumstances require it, I keep the ride extremely short and the asking extremely gentle.

Because a horse having carried riders before does not mean that my first conversation with that horse should occur from his back.

Relationship begins on the ground.

I Have Changed

There was a time when I rode extensively.

I rode my Arabians through the mountains for hours, often three or four days a week.

Later, as I became increasingly interested in refining my balance, position and communication, I moved toward classical dressage in the arena with my Spanish stallions, my Friesian stallions and my Friesian mares.

I became fascinated with the older classical traditions and particularly with Nuno Oliveira.

When I watch footage of Oliveira riding, there are moments that, to me, look almost like centaurism—horse and human moving in such extraordinary communion that the boundary between them seems to soften.

But I have also learned not to accept a method simply because somebody attaches a respected name to it.

I have observed trainers who say they come from particular classical traditions, yet when I watch the horse, I sometimes see a different story.

I see stress.

I see tension.

I see a horse whose body seems to be saying something very different from what the human is saying.

That taught me something important:

The horse is the barometer.

The pedigree of the training method doesn't ultimately tell me whether something is working.

The horse does.

Over the years, I began riding less.

I stopped riding Stary relatively early in her life. I have stopped riding my older stallions. And I have not ridden my PRE Spanish stallion, who is now twenty-six, for the past few years.

And I am perfectly content with that.

My relationship with a horse does not become lesser because I am no longer sitting upon him.

In many ways, it has become infinitely greater.

The Questions Anatomy Confirmed

My questioning about riding did not begin because I discovered the work of equine anatomist and researcher Dr. Sharon May-Davis.

I was already questioning it.

Her work helped confirm that the questions I was asking deserved serious consideration.

May-Davis has spent decades examining equine anatomy and biomechanics, including extensive postmortem study of horses from different breeds, disciplines and backgrounds. Her anatomical work has explored variations and abnormalities that can affect how horses move and their capacity to perform the work humans ask of them.

Her work matters to me because anatomy does not disappear simply because riding is traditional.

The horse's body still has the final word.

And I believe we need to be willing to ask uncomfortable questions.

Can this particular horse comfortably carry a rider?

For how long?

At what intensity?

What is the relationship between the size and weight of the rider and the size, conformation, conditioning and health of the individual horse?

What does the horse's body look like before we ride?

And what does it look like after years of being ridden?

I am still examining these questions myself.

I rarely ride now. And when I do, I prefer shorter periods.

I believe rider size and weight in relation to the individual horse deserve serious consideration. I am particularly cautious about ponies and smaller horses carrying disproportionately large riders. If a pony is ridden, I believe the rider should be an appropriately light child, and smaller horses should have appropriately small, light riders.

My own daughters and I are petite, and our ridden horses have generally been substantial horses—often sixteen or seventeen hands and sometimes over seventeen hands.

But height alone is not the answer either.

The entire horse has to be considered.

Why I Wait

I am also extremely conservative about when I begin preparing a horse to carry a rider.

Personally, I do not want to begin the actual process of putting a rider onto a horse until approximately seven years of age.

And there are two things I am considering:

physical maturity and emotional maturity.

This is where my background in dance gives me an analogy that makes perfect sense to me.

You do not take an inadequately developed young ballet dancer and simply put her into pointe shoes.

Before pointe work, the dancer needs adequate physical development, strength, balance, alignment and control. One of the considerations in training young dancers is skeletal maturity, including the developing bones and growth plates of the feet and ankles.

The growth plates matter because the young dancer's body is still developing. The extraordinary demands of pointe work should not simply be imposed on immature feet because a teacher or dancer is impatient to reach the next stage.

The pointe shoe is not the beginning of the training.

It comes after the body has been prepared for the demand.

I look at the young horse through a similar lens.

A young horse's skeleton is still developing. Different growth plates throughout the equine skeleton mature on different timelines; there is not one magical birthday on which every growth plate in every horse suddenly closes. Development also varies with the individual horse.

That is precisely why I prefer to err on the side of patience rather than rush the process.

For me, waiting until around seven is a conservative personal practice—not because every horse's final growth plate universally closes on his seventh birthday, but because I want to give the whole horse substantially more time to mature before asking him to repeatedly carry human weight.

And skeletal development is only one consideration.

There is musculature.

There is balance.

There is the core.

There is the topline.

There is coordination.

And there is emotional maturity.

Before the horse carries me, I want him physically conditioned to carry himself.

The rider should never be responsible for manufacturing balance that the horse does not yet possess.

Find Your Riding Position Before You Ever Sit on the Horse

And now something beautiful happens.

The work we have already done at liberty and on the line begins to reveal its relationship to riding.

Your position on the line prepared you for where you will eventually be in relation to the horse when you are astride him.

But before you ever try to find that position on a horse, find it standing on your own two feet.

Stand with your feet approximately shoulder-width apart.

Stand tall.

Soften your knees.

Now allow yourself to come slightly downward through those soft knees without collapsing your body.

Your pelvis remains neutral.

Your spine remains tall.

Your chest is lifted.

Your shoulders are back and down.

Your head is balanced above your spine.

I sometimes describe the chin and head as having the bearing of royalty passing through a parade—not stiff, not arrogant, but beautifully upright.

Now soften your hips.

This is critical.

The hips cannot be rigid because they must be able to receive and move with the horse.

Stillness does not mean stiffness.

Your upper body can remain beautifully tall and quiet while the hips and lower body remain supple enough to follow movement.

Now imagine that instead of standing upon the earth, the horse simply comes underneath you.

That is how I want you to think about your riding position.

I use the word sitting lightly because I don't want you collapsing your weight down onto the horse.

You are standing astride the horse.

There should be a vertical line from the crown of your head, through your neck and spine, through your body and down into your heels.

Your legs remain long.

Your knees remain soft.

Your hips remain supple.

Your heels remain down.

And your weight settles through those heels rather than pitching forward into the toes.

That is also important for safety. If your weight moves excessively forward and the foot slides too deeply through the stirrup, you can create a dangerous situation should you need to dismount unexpectedly.

The toes ideally point primarily forward rather than dramatically outward—although as a dancer, turnout is something I have personally had to remain aware of.

The most important thing is not forcing the foot into an artificial position.

It is the integrity of the entire body.

The Hands

Allow the upper arms to fall naturally.

The shoulders remain back and down.

The elbows remain quietly near the sides of the body—perhaps fractionally forward depending upon the horse and moment—but they remain soft.

The reins pass through soft fingers with the thumbs uppermost.

And now:

follow.

At the walk, the horse's head and neck naturally move.

Your elbows, forearms and hands must be able to accommodate that movement without causing your entire upper body to move backward and forward.

Your shoulders remain quiet.

Your body remains tall.

But below the shoulders there is softness.

At the trot, the relationship changes because the horse's head is relatively quieter, and therefore your hands should become quieter as well.

The principle remains the same:

Follow what the horse gives you rather than forcing the horse to accommodate your hands.

The Reins Are Not Brakes

This is one of the most important things I can say about riding.

The reins are not the brakes of the horse.

And they should not be the steering wheel either.

The reins are a connection.

They are one small part of a much larger conversation.

When refinement is needed, I prefer the fingers to softly close and release.

Not pull.

Close. Release.

The elbows remain soft.

The shoulders remain quiet.

The horse should never have to defend himself against the rider's hand.

And for me, this naturally led to riding bitless.

The Day We Forgot the Bridles

My transition toward bitless riding happened through one of those wonderful accidents that becomes a teacher.

Years ago, I trailered Stary and Sinbad up to a mountain trail.

We arrived, began getting everything ready—and realized we had forgotten their bridles.

At that time, we were using French snaffles.

We could have packed everything up and gone home.

Instead, we looked at their halters and lead ropes.

So we improvised.

We used the halters and lead ropes and essentially created our own simple bitless arrangement.

And off we went.

We rode through the mountains.

We moved out.

We ran.

My Arabians had tremendous energy and endurance.

And nothing essential was missing.

The communication was still there.

Because I had already begun developing communication through my body and my breath.

It was almost like a light switched on:

Oh my gosh. We don't need the bit to do this.

And I found the experience even more enjoyable.

From there, bitless riding became increasingly important to me.

Some of the horses who came into my life had previously been ridden in bits. My Spanish stallion had experience with more traditional equipment, including the double bridle. Some of my other horses initially worked in French snaffles.

But very quickly, I moved toward bitless riding.

Today I prefer a hackamore or another appropriately fitted bitless system.

I simply do not see the need to place a substantial piece of metal over the tongue and sensitive structures of the horse's mouth in order to communicate.

And when strong hands are combined with increasingly severe equipment, what is sometimes called refinement can become something entirely different.

A horse may become extremely obedient because resisting the equipment is uncomfortable or painful.

And there again we encounter the question:

Is this willingness—or obedience?

Where does sovereignty go when the horse becomes afraid to say no?

Removing the Bit Is Not Necessarily Bitless Horsemanship

There is another distinction I think is important.

I sometimes see horses competing bitless where, from what I observe, the underlying training appears very similar to conventional bit-based training.

A horse can be trained extensively in a bit and then have the bit removed for a performance.

The equipment is now bitless.

But has the language become bitless?

Those are two different things.

For me, true bitless riding requires reconsidering where communication actually originates.

And that brings us right back to everything we learned on the longe line.

The Longe Line Has Become the Rein

On the line, we learned that the line itself was never supposed to become the conversation.

Now, when we ride, that line has effectively become the rein.

And once again:

The rein is not the conversation.

The deeper communication is:

Presence.

Feeling.

Imagination.

Breath.

Core.

Position.

To me, these aren't weaker aids than the hands and legs.

They are more important than the hands and legs.

The horse feels your body before you consciously move it.

He feels when you are tense.

He feels when you are frightened.

He feels when you are distracted.

He feels when you are impatient.

He feels when your mind has left the present moment.

Which is why correct position alone isn't enough.

You must understand the energetic resonance you are bringing to the horse.

Enter the Field

When I say field, I do not mean a beautiful green pasture with rolling hills.

I mean the energetic field of the present moment.

Imagine yourself always within that field.

Be still within it.

Feel.

Feel.

Feel.

Feel.

Before you ask the horse anything, become aware of what you are communicating.

What are you bringing into this moment?

Tension?

Expectation?

Fear?

Agenda?

Or presence?

The horse is already reading it.

This is why imagination matters too.

Where are you going?

Can you feel the movement before you mechanically ask for it?

Can you hold the geometry of the movement within your awareness?

Can the horse feel your intention before your leg or hand ever needs to clarify it?

This is where riding begins to become something other than technique.

The Half-Halt Begins With Breath

The half-halt should not begin with pulling on the reins.

It begins within you.

Breath.

Core.

Balance.

Intention.

There is a triangle created through the pelvis and the two hip bones. Becoming aware of this triangle gives us an extraordinary sensitivity to our center.

A subtle adjustment of that center can change what the horse feels beneath us.

For a downward transition, the breath changes.

The core changes.

A very slight alteration of the pelvis and balance can invite the horse to reorganize underneath you and slow.

Then, if necessary, the fingers softly close and release.

This is very different from pulling the horse backward into a transition.

Western riders sometimes use a dramatically exaggerated shift backward during sliding stops, often in combination with rein aids. But exaggeration can obscure the subtle principle underneath it.

The pelvis and center of gravity matter.

The horse feels them.

The goal is not to manipulate the front end while forgetting the rest of the horse.

Because the horse isn't a front end.

What About the Legs—and the Hands Through a Turn?

The legs absolutely have a language.

But they should not be shouting.

I do not want a horse who must constantly be kicked to continue moving.

Forward movement should primarily arise from intention, presence, breath, imagination and the conversation already established between horse and human.

If clarification is necessary, a soft squeeze of the leg can reinforce the invitation.

Remember something incredibly simple:

A horse can feel a fly land on his body.

He knows exactly where your leg is.

You weigh considerably more than a fly.

There is no reason for the leg to shout when a whisper will do.

The legs also become part of the geometry of movement.

Suppose I am asking the horse to turn.

As my upper body and pelvis softly orient into the turn, I do not want to twist myself apart. My shoulders and hips remain aligned with one another. The entire body follows the geometry of the movement.

Because my body is turning as a coordinated whole, something very natural happens to my legs.

The outside leg comes slightly forward, while the inside leg moves slightly back.

These are not dramatic movements.

They are almost caresses.

The inside leg moving slightly back does not need to apply pressure. In this context, I think of it as opening a door. I am no longer closing off that part of the horse's body.

Meanwhile, the outside leg, coming softly forward, can gently communicate with the horse's outside front area and help guide the direction of the forehand through the turn.

And now the hands can quietly support that same conversation.

Particularly with a young or inexperienced horse who is still learning what our body is asking, I may open the inside rein slightly.

Not pull.

Not drag the head around.

Simply open the hand gently toward the direction of travel.

It becomes another open door:

This way.

At the same time, my outside hand remains quiet and supportive. I can softly close my fingers on the outside rein, creating a gentle boundary.

I think of that outside rein almost like the wall of the arena during line lunging.

The wall didn't pull the horse around the circle.

It simply provided a boundary that helped make the pathway understandable.

The outside rein can offer that same quiet support.

The inside rein opens the door.

The outside rein softly defines the wall.

And the body—through the shoulders, hips, pelvis, legs, breath, intention and direction of focus—provides the larger invitation.

The reins should never become forceful.

There should be no hauling the horse's head toward the inside, no pulling the horse around a corner and no attempt to manufacture the turn through the mouth or face.

The hand merely clarifies what the entire body is already saying.

And as the horse becomes increasingly sensitive to our position, presence and intention, even those rein aids can become smaller and smaller.

The goal is always less, not more.

Now suppose the horse is traveling on an arc and begins allowing the hindquarters to drift outward.

The conversation changes.

The outside leg can move farther back, toward the hindquarter.

Again, I am not talking about kicking or driving.

I mean placing the leg there.

A touch.

A caress.

A reminder:

I feel where your hindquarters are. Can you bring them back into the conversation?

This is where riding becomes increasingly subtle.

The placement of the leg changes according to which part of the horse we are communicating with and the geometry we are asking the horse to follow.

There is far more to explore here—inside leg, outside leg, rein relationships, lateral movements, bending, straightness and the endless nuances of geometry—and those deserve their own teachings.

But the essential principle is simple:

The leg communicates. It does not nag.

The hand communicates. It does not dominate.

And neither should ever become louder than the rider's presence.

Getting Out of the Horse's Way

Ultimately, much of what I consider good riding comes down to something deceptively simple:

Can I get out of the horse's way?

That means my body.

My hands.

My legs.

My tension.

My expectations.

And my equipment.

Saddle fit is enormously important.

There are conventional treed saddles, treeless saddles, bareback pads and many other possibilities.

Personally, I enjoy riding in a bareback pad because I believe an appropriately chosen pad can offer additional comfort to the horse while maintaining closeness.

If I were riding outside, I would probably choose my dressage saddle.

I began years ago in a Western barrel-racing saddle with my Arabians. As I refined my riding, balance and position, I transitioned toward classical dressage and preferred the close relationship I could have with the horse through a dressage saddle.

I have used Trilogy saddles with my horses.

But personal preference and brand come second.

The saddle must fit the horse.

And it must fit the rider without compromising the horse.

A knowledgeable saddle fitter can evaluate the tree, balance, contact, flocking and padding and help ensure that the horse isn't being pinched or restricted.

Because the saddle cannot interfere with the horse's ability to use his back.

Before You Ride, Look at the Topline

Before I consider riding a horse, I want to see a healthy, strong topline.

By topline, I am referring broadly to the muscular chain and development visible along the upper body—from the neck through the back and toward the hindquarters.

I want strength.

But I don't want rigidity.

I want muscle that is developed and capable, but still supple.

Because the horse's back must be able to lift.

The core must be able to engage.

The hindquarters must be able to participate.

If the saddle restricts the back, or the rider's position continually interferes with movement, the horse may begin compensating.

Over time, poor patterns of movement and muscular development can become visible.

And once you learn to really see a horse, you begin to recognize those patterns.

You can look at a body and begin asking questions about its history.

What has this horse been asked to do?

How has he been carrying himself?

Where is he strong?

Where is he hollow?

Where is he tense?

Where has he learned to brace?

The horse's body tells a story.

Self-Carriage: One Horse, Not Three Pieces

There is a beautiful book, Art de l'École, that depicts horses demonstrating the classical ideal of what is often called collection.

I frequently think of it first as self-carriage.

This subject deserves an entire blog of its own, because true collection and self-carriage are much deeper than simply creating a particular shape.

But the principle belongs here.

The horse should not move as though he were three separate pieces:

a front end,

a middle,

and a hind end.

The horse is one being.

The hindquarters, core, back, neck and forehand should work together in coordinated movement.

The core is vital.

The back must be able to lift.

The hindquarters must be able to come underneath the body appropriately.

And the rider should not manufacture a superficial appearance of collection by manipulating the head and neck with the reins.

Because if we control only the head and front end, we have forgotten most of the horse.

Self-carriage comes from the whole horse.

And a properly ridden horse should maintain—or ideally develop—the healthy musculature and functional topline necessary to carry himself.

The work should not gradually dismantle the horse's body.

The horse should become more capable within the work, not less.

This is another reason I believe the horse himself must remain our greatest teacher.

Not the trainer.

Not the discipline.

Not the equipment.

Not the ribbon.

Not even tradition.

The horse.

His body.

His breath.

His willingness.

His movement.

His expression.

His answer.

Perhaps the Question Isn't “Do You Ride?”

So now, when someone learns that I have horses and asks:

“Do you ride?”

The answer isn't quite as simple as yes or no anymore.

Yes, I have ridden.

I have ridden thousands of miles.

I have ridden through mountains and across trails. I have studied and practiced classical dressage. I have ridden Arabians, Friesian mares and stallions, and Spanish stallions. Some of the most beautiful experiences of my life have happened from the back of a horse.

And yet today, I rarely ride.

Not because my relationship with horses has diminished.

Because it has deepened.

I have become increasingly interested in another question:

What does the horse want our relationship to become?

Maybe riding belongs within that relationship.

Maybe it doesn't.

Maybe it belongs there for a season and then ends.

Maybe a horse who once willingly carried us reaches an age when the answer changes.

Maybe the answer changes because his body changes.

Maybe it changes because we change.

The horse should be allowed to change his answer.

And we should be willing to hear it.

Because the horse was never born to fulfill our agenda.

He was born as himself.

A sentient being.

A sovereign being.

A life with intrinsic value entirely apart from what he can provide for us.

The Courage to Listen

Perhaps the greatest invitation in all of this is not to judge where we have been, but to become curious about where the horse might lead us now.

Many of us have done things differently in the past.

I certainly have.

We acted from what we understood at the time, from what we had been taught, and from traditions so deeply woven into our culture that we may never have thought to question them.

But when a new question arrives, we have a choice.

We can turn away because the question makes us uncomfortable.

We can defend what we have always done.

We can refuse to look because looking might ask something of us.

Or we can become still enough to listen.

What if there is more?

What if relinquishing some of our assumptions about the horse does not diminish what we can experience with them, but opens the doorway to something infinitely greater?

This is the invitation of Chevalia—the Way of the Horse.

It asks us to become courageous enough to meet the horse without first deciding who the horse must be for us.

To put down, even temporarily, the agenda.

To observe.

To listen.

To feel.

To become curious again.

And then something remarkable can happen.

When the horse realizes that we are listening, the relationship changes.

The smallest things become extraordinary.

A horse choosing to walk toward you carries new meaning.

A breath shared in stillness becomes communication.

A movement offered freely becomes more beautiful than one extracted through obedience.

And the moment the horse realizes that he can say no may be the very moment his yes begins to mean something.

There is wonder in that.

There is wonder in discovering who a horse becomes when we stop continually telling him who he must be.

This is where Pas de Cheval—the Dance of the Horse—begins to reveal itself.

It is a pas de deux between two sovereign beings.

Sometimes that dance may happen beneath a saddle.

Sometimes it happens at liberty.

Sometimes it happens while walking together.

Sometimes it happens standing quietly beneath a tree with no agenda whatsoever.

And sometimes the dance doesn't look like a dance at all.

Sometimes it looks like standing outside in below-zero weather, the wind howling around a shelter, because your horse isn't feeling well and your presence gives him strength.

You are cold, tired and emotionally spent.

But none of that is the point anymore.

You stay.

Not because there is something to accomplish.

Not because the horse will perform for you tomorrow.

Not because anybody will see what you have done.

You stay because his well-being has somehow become part of your own oxygen.

His welfare is no longer separate from your relationship with him.

And perhaps that is when we begin to understand what putting the horse before our ego actually means.

It means his needs can come before our convenience.

His body can come before our ambition.

His answer can come before our expectation.

His well-being can come before our agenda.

And his sovereignty can matter more than our desire to possess the experience we imagined having with him.

That is not sacrifice to me.

That is relationship.

The communion is the dance.

The Courage to Discover What Lies Beyond Control

Perhaps this path ultimately asks something more of us than curiosity.

It asks for courage.

The courage to question what we have been taught.

The courage to step outside what everyone else is doing.

The courage to relinquish control long enough to discover whether something greater might take its place.

Because domination is a struggle.

Control is a struggle.

We can spend our lives learning increasingly sophisticated ways to control the horse and call that mastery.

But perhaps the horse has been quietly inviting us toward an entirely different kind of mastery.

The Tao Te Ching expressed this more than two thousand years ago:

“Mastering others requires strength; mastering yourself is true power.” — Tao Te Ching, Chapter 33

Perhaps that is one of the deepest lessons of the horse.

The horse does not need us to become more powerful over him.

He invites us to become more present within ourselves.

To master our fear.

Our impatience.

Our need to control.

Our need to be right.

Our need to accomplish.

Our need to make another being conform to our expectations.

And perhaps when we finally have the courage to loosen our grip on all of that, we discover something extraordinary:

There was never less waiting for us on the other side of control. There was more.

More relationship.

More communication.

More freedom.

More wonder.

More of the horse.

And perhaps an entirely new world begins to reveal itself.

Not a world we conquer, but one the horse invites us to enter—a world that returns us to something we have forgotten.

Our own sovereignty.

Our belonging to the natural world.

Our kinship with animals, with the earth, with all beings and all souls.

And ultimately, our remembrance of the Divine moving through all of it—and within ourselves.

Perhaps this is why the Way of the Horse requires courage.

Because the horse may take us beyond everything we thought we knew, only to return us to something we have always known.

That is Chevalia.

The Way of the Horse.

That is Pas de Cheval.

And perhaps the greatest adventure with the horse begins when we find the courage to loosen our hold on what we already know—and allow the horse to show us just how much more there is to remember.