On being here and now

Presence. That’s what she told me.

All week I’ve been searching for these famous last words Cynthia offered at the very end of our latest lesson. In fact, it started with a question: “So what’s your take-away life lesson this week?” As I recall, my answer was something very, very clever. Something along the lines of “Duh?”…

Being her calm self, she put on her roguish smile and simply said “Be present”. She said I needed to always be there for what was going on in me, around me and last but not least, under me, in order to always be prepared to react, or better yet… avoid mishaps altogether. At the time, this sounded like such evidence that I quickly brushed it under the carpet without giving it a second thought. In my head, it sounded like: “Note to self: be more aware of the horse’s movements…Ok, next?

Clearly, at the time, I hardly considered her well-intentioned comment as a “life lesson”. But it so happens that my unconscious mind keeps track of all these little “evidences” that I discard and processes them in the background, often to serve them to me again when I am more receptive, humble and…present.

So a week has gone by, I’m walking the streets on my way to work and this loyal and reliable unconscious mind of mine popped Cynthia’s words right there, in the middle of the “today’s featured concerns” trailer playing in my head. The thing is, there have been cart loads of changes in my life in the past few months and juggling with everything seems to have left my brain stuck in high gear. And this has been very, very uncomfortable…to say the least. It’s been taking a toll on my sleep, my patience with the kids and my overall well-being. The “present” has recently been the last thing on my now ever-racing mind.

Being in a drastic life transition, I seem to always be in a “post-mortem” (Should I have done this or that otherwise? Was this or that a mistake?) or “intense planning” mode (How am I going to tackle this? Am I going to be able to pull that off?). And these otherwise very interesting exercises involve a lot of past issues, future challenges, but hardly ever the infamous “here and now”. So instead of being present therefore focused, confident and calm, I was all over the place and ridden with fear, guilt and anxiety. And that, I now realize, has been the precise source of my recent disquiet. What more can I say?

So there on the sidewalk, I had a tremendous “Ah! Ah! moment”. A life lesson IT WAS after all. One that I will certainly apply to riding, as best I can, but also one that I absolutely need to bring along with me outside of the arena, where “nature” is actually a lot wilder than in our generally peaceful barns.

Thank you so very much C.