Life Lessons learned from Horses!

Life Lessons learned from Horses!

By Celie Weston

The False Comfort Zone - Be willing to fail in order to win!

Whenever I work with a horse, I'm always trying to figure out how much pressure he can handle, before we reach the breaking point. In other words, what is his comfort zone? What is he comfortable with and what is he uncomfortable with? It's like an invisible circle around the horse and once you go beyond that, you might find yourself in a potentially dangerous situation. Once I find this barrier, I try to break through it. Step by step I work through his fear, his unwillingness to accept and trust that everything will be okay.

His fear is based on the unknown. In his opinion, the unknown is a dangerous place. But through careful guidance, I convince him of the opposite, baby steps, expanding his comfort zone and thereby expanding his ability to deal with many different situations in life. Without fear we can do anything, anything at all. There really is "Nothing to fear except fear itself" ~ Theodore Roosevelt.

Living in fear is often much worse than working through the fear and arriving victorious on the other side.

The comfort zone is really not comfortable at all, that's why it is referred to as the "false comfort zone". It is actually the place where you are the most afraid. Some people's comfort zone is literally so small, that they live in a constant state of fear to such a degree that it renders them paralyzed. Time stands still as they try to avoid anything ever rocking their world. It's a desperate attempt to control the entire universe and of course completely impossible.

To avoid feeling what you feel is avoiding life. You're not living, you're surviving, and only barely at that. Sometimes addictions set in as an escape from reality. But as the saying goes: "You can run, but you cannot hide". At some point, preferably sooner than later, you won't be able to run any more - and then what happens? You surrender to the resistance. When you surrender, everything becomes possible, you gain knowledge from your fear as you gradually realize that this is not as hard as you thought. In fact, this is nothing, you can easily handle this, bring it on, try me - and so your confidence grows and your consciousness and ability to handle life expands. You are no longer afraid. You are now awakening from unconscious living.

Some scientists believe that our physical brain consists of so called neurons. These neurons are all connected and together they form the Neural Network. The neurons communicate with each other, and when a thought creates a spark between two neurons, they become closer connected to one another. The path between them gets stronger, more pronounced - like water carving through rock, eventually turning into a river where the current can flow freely. Theoretically this means, that if you pursue positive thoughts and actions that bring you joy, the neurons that produce "happiness chemicals" in your brain become closer connected. The same thing goes for if you pursue negative thoughts. The catch is that a river can be vey difficult to redirect if it is deep and the current is strong.

So, thoughts have immense power - be careful, they effect you even on a physical level. Make sure you choose the good ones…

Your attention is your most valuable asset. Is your attention on the positive or the negative? Is it on what you want in life - or what you don't want?

Whatever your attention is on, becomes reinforced time and time again. It grows stronger, more important to you, and if your attention is directed towards something negative (worries, concerns etc) you will be wasting crucial life energy. Energy that could be used on much more constructive things - such as your life's purpose.

If you are willing to accept that everything in your life is a consequence (good or bad) of a previous action you made, then you become the cause of your life, not the effect and definitely not the victim. At this point you can take responsibility for your choices and actions and the direction of your life. You can decide that from now on you will make conscious choices that bring you closer to your purpose, your goal and in harmony with who you are.

Live your purpose consciously every day in every single thing you do - thus making a difference in the world. When you surrender, the world is no longer a hard place to live, your perception of life has changed. It was your choice, if you haven't made it yet, then make it now. The universe wants to give you everything you ever wanted - just stop fighting the natural flow of things.

There is such a thing called the "Law of Attraction". Things come easy if you believe that it's easy. Think the positive thoughts, send out positive intentions that state what you want. Forget about what happens after that, forget about obstacles etc - they really don't exist if you simply detach or in other words stop caring about the outcome - let the universe do the work for you.

So just let go. Be willing to experience anything, even failure in order to win and I promise you - you will always win!

If you have questions for Celie's Q&A please send them to celiewestonhorsemanship@gmail.com