Welcome to Day 2
Yesterday we experienced the healing from the meditation and the mantra sung by Deva Premal and Miten. Today the focus is on Quietening the Mind as you take a variation of Day 1’s meditation out to your horse to gently expand the relaxation and inner awareness that you developed yesterday.
The HeartMath Institute released some research that told us what horse people have known since the Ages of Ancient Time – that being around horses makes us feel better.
What we may not be as aware of, is that being around a RELAXED horse increases our mental, emotional and physical benefits – we reduce our Heart Rate Variability, our heart rate drops and becomes more even, our blood pressure drops, our breathing slows down. The reverse is also true – horses feel better around US when WE have a low Heart Rate Variability and that, of course, is one of our goals over this 21 Days. (You can learn more about this work using the HeartMath link in your Lesson Resources – you have to sign up, but it’s free.
1. Horses help people best, when people help horses too. We escalate each other into feeling good and a place of peacefulness and healing. When you systematically help your horse to live the routine of their life without fear, then their heart rate is lowered and their positive effect on us is greater – not to mention the positive effect this has on your horse’s well being too.
2. Our horse may stay with us while we meditate – or they may need to be further away. There are all kinds of good reasons for our horse to not visibly join in with our meditation and stand close by – none of which are about rejecting us. Sometimes they have something of their own going on that means they need us to bring the Quieter Mind to them – later. Sometimes our energy is so high as we work out some of our layers to a Quiet Mind, that they need a bit of distance to cope. Whether they stay close to us or need a bit of distance, all of that is absolutely perfect.
3. Releasing emotions is a good deal – understanding them is even better and creates opportunities for ongoing inner peace. Get in touch with me if you feel you need any extra support with this.
4. That decision you made yesterday to be kind to yourself is a big deal. Right now, pause again for a moment and decide that you will be kind to yourself today and always.
5. Sit with your horse for as long or as little as is comfortable today while you do the Quiet Mind practice at the end of the mediation audio. You may spend as little as 2 minutes or you may find yourself melting into two hours – whatever feels right is right for you and your horse.
6. Grounding. After you have finished your Quiet Mind practice with your horse, be sure to check if you need to do the short grounding feet exercise we did at the end of yesterday’s meditation – if in doubt, I suggest you do it. Here are the basic instructions:
Paying gentle attention to that outward breath, feel down to your feet and how they feel on the ground. Flex your toes and really feel the ground with them and take this relaxation and quieter mind out into the rest of your day.
7. Here’s the breathing information again from yesterday about the movement of our ribs as we gently focus on the outward breath. It’s a big deal for our health as well as for the relaxation of the lower back that makes for a better rider plus it can have a big and wonderful impact on our connection with our horse.
This Reverse Breathing can stimulate relaxation and can also be used as a trigger to enter a Quiet Mind state, which is one of the aims as we go through this program. In the meditation, I talk about noticing the lower part of your ribs kind of squishing the air out of your lungs. And although these pictures are not meant to be anatomically correct 🙂 they give you a visual feel of what I am talking about.
On your out breath (illustrated in the diagram above), the lower part of your ribs move inwards and squish the air out of your lungs. Feel that lower part of your ribs flexing inwards right now, as you look at the picture here.
Then feel the way that the lower part of your ribs flare outwards as you breathe – shown in the diagram above is a deliberate exaggeration of this to give you the visual idea. It’s important that you don’t try to make it happen, just notice how that lower part of your ribs open up ever so gently as you breathe in.
Meditation Day 2
Download today’s meditation (from the Lesson Resources below) onto your mobile device and take it out to your horse. Listen to the meditation whilst sitting with your horse – sit as close to your horse as feels comfortable for BOTH of you. You may need to be outside of the paddock, the field or the barn to start off with. Go with what feels comfortable and safe to be closing your eyes.
(Having trouble playing the audio? Click here)
Lesson Resources
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Meditation |
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| Download audio (MP3) | Right click (PC) or Cmd click (Mac) here and Save | |
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Additional Resources |
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| HeartMath Institute (link) | Click here | |
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Program Support |
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| Email Jenny | Click here |
Up next:
Is expanding on these 2 days with another horse day.