Sometimes Matters Must Be Taken In To Your Own Hands...Literally

I'd been waiting for one or more of the mares to help bring Whitty into balance.
Jet was in season when Whitty arrived, followed soon after by Venus, Trinity and more recently Sirius.
As of today's date March 18, 2014 we still have four mares in heat.
It's hard to say exactly where Whitty's energy imbalances stem from having very little information about him other than that he is a Hanoverian gelding born in 2002.
His dam is Dollar Girl and his sire Weltmeyer.
He came via Spruce Meadows, had been shown extensively over fences and developed a mystery lameness in his left hind thought to be a bone cyst in the fetlock joint.
He's had several owners... the last few he'd been given to.
Whitty was heading to an equine rescue in Pitt Meadows when he came to my attention.

There are so many reasons a horse can get out of harmony with nature and it usually begins at weaning time, something so far from their nature it truly is not funny.
In their natural world they remain in the herd for their lifetime unless or until they die.
Even stallions other then the herd sire remain nearby in groups of their own called bachelor groups.

Our domestic horses commonly have restrictions through the heart center stemming from separation from the mother.
We can count on Whitty being such a horse so we'll remind ourselves about this restriction as we go along...
We know he has passed through barns, people's hands in every which way you can imagine through care, training and riding...
He has made and lost friends and companions...
We know he has a restriction in flow to ground in at least one hind leg.....which displays as a lameness (although I have yet to see the lameness)

I was hoping to catch one of the mares working on Whitty's energy and did manage to capture photos of Venus doing so... in a somewhat 'unnatural' setting....through the bars of her stall.

I had noticed the femoral veins in his hind legs were enlarged, a sign of lack of flow through hock, fetlock to ground.
I also noticed that he had no 'give' to his flesh with touch and I find this hard to explain or describe except to say it is like touching a still warm dead animal.
There was no softness or response beneath the skin...anywhere.
Whitty had gone to a place horses go in order to save themselves from the reality of the world they live  in.

I noticed he had a 'spot' of EXTREME sensitivity along his spine line at the gonad or sacral chakra....even a light stroke sent him down an inch or two...

So here is the dynamic of the herd in energy terms..... four mares all in season over the course of the full moon....which speaks loud of gonad energy.
A new horse has arrived in their bubble.
He is a stallion in their world for there is no such thing as a gelding
This 'stallion' has an obvious restriction in flow and therefore a build up of energy through heart and gonad at the very least. Add to this an inability to take the energy to ground through the hind legs which then contributes to root energy being overstimulated. This speaks to irrational fear and survival instincts overriding rational thought processes.

I have been hoping Jet would go out of season. She is a good teacher but also an amazing herd balancer....a Medicine Horse.
All of these mares are incredibly adept at bringing balance...but not when their reproduction centers are screaming to do what they live to do...have a foal of their own.

Below are some images of young Trinity Red Star assisting her elder Jet through a strong heat cycle. Each movement is an expression of energy which balances and grounds thereby helping both beings feel better.

Luc was often called upon by 'the girls' to assist with the energy during heat cycles.
He did not react to it (gonad energy) since his personal flow to ground was always very effective for all beings near him. He did not match the energy by becoming stud like.

I'd been waiting for the mares to finish their cycles to allow 'nature' to work her magic, however watching Whitty and witnessing the amount of tension in his body was getting painful for me!

Sunday morning my young apprentice Ren Ashcroft arrived to help with morning chores. I'd finished up early as I had decided to use the opportunity to teach Ren how we can help in these situations through the use of Equine Harmonic Focal Point Therapy.

People likes names for things we do.

A method.

The horses don't have names for things...but they certainly have 'methods'....and so I named their method Equine Harmonic Focal Point Therapy.

We could simply call it The Way of The Medicine Horse because in fact that is what it is.

The method is what the Medicine Horse in the herd would use.

She (it is almost if not always a she) will keep the 'offender' at a distance from her herd to allow balance to rule.
This creates a circle or 'perimeter' outside of which the 'offender' must stay or she will attack.
As the 'offender's' energy 'entrains' or comes into balance with the herd she allows the circle to become smaller. Any sign of imbalance in her herd will cause her to push the offender out again....and so on until the 'offender' can be close enough for her to initiate body work.

The body work begins with a scan.
This to us looks like muzzle to muzzle, eye to eye breathing.. snorting.. blowing..
She will insist the 'offender' not engage in 'mutual' work or mutual grooming as humans seem to like to call it.
She will almost always begin at the shoulder and neck making scrapes with her teeth.
This opens pathways to allow the energy to have somewhere to flow to and through.
From time to time she'll drop her nose to the ground and either nibble grass or simply touch base and go back to work.
She'll make slow small circles with her muzzle on his wither, stopping from time to time to feel within her'self' for flow of force....and to be certain energy is flowing down the front legs to earth.

She continues along the system until the 'offender' is fully balanced and grounded.
The 'offender' will show this through licking, chewing, yawning and the body will  relax noticeably.
Usually a hip will drop and a back foot will rest sole facing up...which allows energy to flow to ground through all of the lower joints.

Whatever personality traits or behaviors the 'offender' had been exhibiting...will have disappeared.

And so on Sunday I became the Medicine Mare....as I have been doing most of my life....and decided to at least begin the work so that Whitty could have some relief from the tension.
I told Ren to watch Whitty but to also watch the changes in the mares as well.

I felt this would be an excellent time to show her the effect one has on them all.
I wanted to show how connected they are....how connected we are.

In very little time and with very little work Whitty began to lick and chew.
He started yawning big jaw cranking, eye rolling yawns.
His body softened and yielded to touch.
His wither and shoulders vibrated and shook as energy flowed through heart.
The veins in his hind legs reduced in tautness and size...
His head dropped low...and his eye softened.

Ren and I made note of the mares...all of them...heads dropped, hips dropped, eyes closed...relaxed.

Note the pair of eagles in the top of the tallest tree... always here...cheering us on.

We're getting there...there is much less anxiety. 

The three fillies and Whitty are fine together with or without the round pen.

Jet on the other hand is another story.

Her need to reproduce during this cycle is greater than her need to keep herself from getting injured or injuring one of the other horses.

Yesterday she was taken out of the picture and placed in a stall on the opposite side of the barn.

We'll try again soon though!

Keep cheering!

Then we all win.