Thursday, November 19, 2009

nuther day

Hey, how was the day for you? Anyone in the family get a deer yet? I have been having too much fun with my horses to take the time to hunt. I was out with Jake last night and tonite for an hour or so. He is getting really soft and responsive to me or I am just getting better at it myself. I have really been desensitizing him lately too. I am convinced this is a really good way to avoid a wreck. The other day Lou was riding Jake and we came back into the front yard. Jake had a long vine stuck in his tail and when Lou tried to do a one rein stop Jake saw the vine snake and about had a spastic fit. But Lou got out of it or off him ok. While I was riding him tonite I had my whip which has a long tail on so I can crack it, in my hand just moving around and twirling it cracking it while I was riding. Mind you he really didn't like it first and I had done all this from the ground earlier so I was confident I could get him over his fears. So by the time we were done I could let the tail drag behind me and do just about anything with it while I was riding. That is good. You know alot of us have fears too. Fear of heights, crowds, public speaking, death, etc. But God helps us over these things if we will do as he tells us. 2 Tim. 1:7 reminds us that fear is not from Him, but what is from Him is power, love and self control. That means that instead of becoming immobilized by my fears, like Jake or another horse does, (by the way a horse that stops when you are trying to despook him might just be going internal and shutting down, much the same way a person does when they will no longer leave the house or let anyone touch them) I need to face them and work through them. Case in point, in 2007 when I came off a horse I was training and had 15 stitches in my head I was afraid to get back on him. Obviously didn't want to get hurt more. However, I did get back on him, even that day within about an hour. The fear set in a day later. But now I get on horses all the time. The difference is my education. I have learned alot more about horses and how to work with them. So it has been a blast of late. Sometimes there is still fear, but if there is no fear sometimes I wonder if you are still breathing. Although that might also depend on where you are going after you stop breathing. So just as it is important to help your horse work through his fears, it is also important, moreso, for us to work through our own. And God is in the business of removing our fear of man by getting us to fear Him. But that will be in a later blog.

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