The Sixth Secret of Perfect Horsemanship

Don Blazer
copyright©2009

          You know that you have the power within to achieve your dreams.

          Your heart always tells you the truth so you can trust it.

          When you practice non-judgment you can accept all things for what they are.   And when you give instead of take, you gain.

          You may choose how you respond to all things, so when you are told the sixth secret you can make choices.

          To those watching, training horses is obviously the most wonderful way to spend your time. I’ve been told ten thousand times, how lucky I am to be able to work with horses all day.

          Of course I’m lucky; I’m doing the work I have chosen to do.

          But work was not what they saw. They saw recreation, fun, and an escape from work.   Work for so many is unpleasant, filled with frustrations, difficulties and endless problems.

          Work, if it is not your heart’s desire, is stressful.

          But training horses, writing about horses, learning about horses is my work.   And sometimes it is not all blue sky and champion horses. Sometimes it is hot or cold or wet or dry. It’s one mistake after another, one difficulty after another, one problem on top of another. There are injuries to deal with, and sickness, and horses which simply don’t have the talent to achieve the goals. There are a thousand big and little irritating things that go wrong.....there are frustrations if you choose to see them that way and if you are judgmental.

          Whatever a person’s perception of a event, in reality it is no more, nor any less, than what exists for everyone in every endeavor.

          It is what it is. It is what you choose it to be.

          And it is the Sixth Secret: Everything is exactly as it should be.

          Nothing you are doing or are involved in is by accident. All of what you are and what you are doing is the result of your choices. You are where you are supposed to be at this moment by your choice.

          Of course your first reaction to the statement “everything is exactly as it should be” is both surprise and disgust. How can war and sickness and torture and pain and a thousand other sufferings be exactly as they should be?

          They are as they should be because they are the results of our collective actions…all human actions.

          Until we all change our thoughts and all change our actions we can’t change all that exists.

          But you can change your thoughts and actions to change what exists in the singular—what exists for you.

          So, when things go wrong or mistakes are made, or you lose a competition, things are exactly as they are supposed to be? Yes!

          Every event, every action, every thought is exactly what it must be in order for you to arrive at your chosen destiny: perfect horsemanship. For every event, every action, every thought has a lesson for you to learn.

          While we may never understand it, the smallest molecule to the largest galaxy has a purpose, a direction, a function. Everything is of equal importance to all things and while all things are different, they are always interdependent.

          Whatever is happening in your relationship with horses, wishing it were different accomplishes nothing.

          Accept things as they are. Know things are exactly as they should be and get on with learning the lessons they teach.

          The answers to changing what is to what you want it to be are in the events themselves.

          When you accept the fact that things are exactly as they should be, you can apply the third element of training: compliance through non-resistance.

          Anything less than the acceptance of what is becomes a resistance on your part or by the horse, or by both! Compliance through non-resistance should be the goal of every training session. When the rider or trainer is giving, there can be no resistance on the part of the horse.

          Accepting the Sixth Secret will change everything in your relationship with horses. You can focus your attention on learning and understanding instead of wasting time and energy trying to resist what already is.

          Don Blazer is the author of Nine Secrets of Perfect Horsemanship, a book he wrote for his granddaughter who won an AQHA World Championship in Youth Trail (2008).

To read about the first five secrets, please visit the Archives Page.

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