I was asked by my mom to do a session for my sister’s new horse. She had an accident: ran through barbed wire and had to spend some time in the stable to completely heal. When I gave her a healing and talked about how she would soon be able to join the herd again, I felt fear. I was quite surprised, because I have this idea that horses want to live in a herd.

How weaning can go wrong; a group of youngsters

The herd of my sister consists only of four horses including this mare. But still it is a herd. So when I looked into this further I saw that she was afraid of one of the other horses. This surprised me too, because that gelding is quite a social horse, although he has a certain dominance around food… So I tuned in further and found out it was not him per se that she was afraid of, but the horse he reminded her off.

When she was little she was taken away from her mom way too early (2 months old) and placed in a herd of young horses and foals. She felt sad and abandoned, but like faith abandons you. She was not able to eat enough, because other horses were a lot stronger than her. She came out of that herd in a very bad condition, with starvation… This is how she developed a fear of the herd.

So now when she came into this herd and the grass on the pasture was all eaten and the horses got hay instead, she projected this experience of her past onto her present situation. This is how trauma works…

Fear comes up through a trigger and intercepts itself through that trigger and brings old fear into the presence and completely transforms a situation.

I removed that old trauma and with this current situation of her stay inside a stable, she can completely heal her past. I affirmed this to her by saying: that she is now in a good place and that she will have enough food. That she has, since she is now in a stable, a chance to peacefully eat and regain her strength.

It is very important to do more than energetic work, especially when you are healing traumas. Also additionally alter a situation in this physical reality to completely heal something. This helps to remove old thought patterns and make new ones. So an old fear isn’t projected anymore into the current situation. Through a repetition of positive experiences in the psychical realm, your horse will be able to shift his fear into trust…

The advantages of a mixed aged group

Some people think it is good for their foal to grow up in a group of youngsters, but the thing is that this can really damage your horse. Youngsters need older horses to teach them about respect and they need these older horses to take care of them. I have noticed that a horse is only somewhat ready for the world around 1,5 years old. And even now at the age of three I see how my two youngsters still rely on my mare.

I have also noticed that older horses help us humans with intermediating in the communication with foals. It is like foals need time to learn to develop the language with humans. That language is a different language than horses have amongst themselves. And that language encompasses more than inner communication.

An example of this is that when I feed my horses I ask them to go in the stable and when they are ready I bring their food. My foal Amal when he was little did not understand at all what I wanted from him… So my mare went before him to show him the way and our gelding Billy pushed him (with his nose on Amal’s butt) inside the stable, I just had to wait…

My horses helped me so much with raising my two foals and teaching them basic agreements with humans. I cannot even imagine that people want to do this on their own. You complicate things immensely not only for yourself, but also for your foal.

Around the age of 1,5 they have learned this in between language with us humans, but before that they remain in some kind of bubble of horse speech. This is why it is beneficial to have older horses around to help both you and your foal.