You may not know it: horses can help you improve your ability to focus. Gerard, from Cavalls de Calma, tells us about his experience.
Tomorrow I have an important exam
My master plan: I'm going to lock myself in to study and won't come out until I know everything.
My execution: The first two hours I have tidied up my whole room, because we already know that to study you need to have a well-organized space. Then I had a snack. The brain needs energy to perform! What a disappointment, no matter how much I visit it, there is always the same thing in the fridge... And the dog? Poor thing, maybe I should walk it...
My result: It's 12 o'clock at night and I still haven't started studying... it looks like I'm going to stay up late again... What a hard life as a student is!
If I were to add up all the hours I have dedicated to study throughout my life, it would result in several years of my life. Too bad that they were just that, hours dedicated to study, but not to study.
With hindsight, I can confirm that I was a genius of absent-mindedness. I would start studying and my head would start to create thousands of thoughts, all focused on a single goal: to stop studying.
Both my parents and my teachers told me that I had to plan better, but the reality is that I was already organized. I even scheduled the days and times I would study each subject... but my execution failed me.
Everyone told me that I needed to focus. But no one would explain to me how to do it.
Years later, a coach told me: "Focus is being there for the task at hand". In that phrase there was a new component for me, that of responsibility. Be there for what you have to be there for. So it wasn't enough to plan and sit in the chair, I had the responsibility to do what I had to do: study.
But unfortunately that didn't work out either, my mind always found excuses to evade and escape from responsibility. And so the years passed, with great difficulty I managed to finish the race, more by will than by method.
My turning point: The day I started to interact with horses
Did you know that horses notice everything? Their extreme sensitivity allows them to notice any change in their environment, no matter how subtle. The slightest noise, movement or energetic change in their environment can alter them. So, if you are not present and attentive, you may be in for more than one surprise.
Throughout their evolution, horses have developed the ability to sense the slightest change in their environment, their survival depends on it. They are affected by your body language, the energy you give off, where you look... Absolutely everything you do and think will have an effect on them. So, if you want to relate to horses in a positive way, it is essential to be very conscious of everything you do, how you do it and when you do it. And to do that you have to focus. As my trainer used to say, you have to be about what you do.
Horses live in the present, they are in the here and now. And they demand the same from us. As soon as we start to disconnect and project ourselves into a different timeline, they sense it. Our body is there, but not our mind. We start doing things mechanically, without soul, without sensitivity, and we lose the ability to be aware of the energy we are projecting. The only effective way to connect with them is to enter their vibrational field, and for this it is essential to focus on being in the present.
And if we also demand that they do things for us, we have a responsibility to them. We must focus on what we are doing, because everything we do and think will have a consequence on their state of mind. That's the thing about working with such sensitive beings. And as you advance in self-awareness, out of responsibility, security, and love, your focus also improves. Your focus. Because you know the importance of being for what you touch.
My conclusion
During my childhood and youth I wasted a lot of time, because when you don't do what you have to do, but you know you have to do it, you don't enjoy the alternative activity either, because you are weighed down by conscience and guilt. If I were born again, I would ask my parents to take me to interact with horses from an early age, I would have learned to focus much earlier, I would have used my time much better, and without a doubt, I would have gotten better grades.
Now I interact with horses and have achieved a better balance in my life.
