Ahhh massage bliss....

It is Tuesday night, and I was the first official recipient of our apartment's "Massage Schedule". I received a 90 minute relaxation massage from Heidi. I am quite relaxed which is why I decided to write this blog post, so I could share the bliss. :) (I'd post a picture of my post-massage hair, but I wouldn't want to take over Jess' role in posting incriminating pictures of me.)

The past three days have been quite interesting.....Sunday, we hosted the class potluck. It was quite fun to have 12 people (including us) gathered in our apartment to eat things a delicious as homemade salsa, bruscetta, salmon ball, veggie noodle soup, tuna-rice-Gouda-veggie salad, veggie lasagne, turkey curry, Reese's ice cream pie drinks and spinach salad (which came a bit late so was enjoyed for lunch the next day). Of course, the potluck wrapped up with a fashion show of the new boots from Saturday, and Heidi showing people how to access the blogs. Overall, a nice opportunity to connect outside of talking about horses' clavicles (or not), intrinsic muscles, target markets and being on our the leading learning edge regarding equine massage.

Monday was a day of Anatomy and Equine Massage, it was great to be back working with the horses. They seem to really appreciate us being there -- and I really appreciate them, too. This week we are learning techniques that free up parts of the horse to help him (mostly geldings, it seems) move better. It is fun to watch the reactions we get, as the horse stands (most of the time) and we are working on them. Here is an image of Partner flipping his tounge around as Laura worked on his shoulder. She and I worked on Richochette first, who was very friendly but hard to keep his attention, at first, and then Partner -- who was really ready for a massage!

Today we continued working with the horses, and practicing these and other techniques to free up the front end. Although we didn't get to work on as many horses, it was great to have Sarah and Casey's feedback as we were doing the work. This picture that Heidi of me working on Pawnee shows how we are working all around the horse's front end. Gradually, are putting techniques into our "tool box" so that we can use them at appropriate times on appropriate clients (horses.) After the massage, when they got back to their paddock, most of the horses practiced good self-care, by drinking lots of water. :) This picture just seemed so peaceful and relaxed -- for both the horses and the therapists.

In the afternoon, we worked with Rick at his ranch, and continued to work on ground work. We are using both direct and indirect feel, and he showed us some of the work that he is doing with one of his horses -- to ask him to step on the first step, but not the second. Rick is really an excellent horseman and teacher. It is great when he shares parts of his experience as it relates to the content that we are also studying. He seems to walk the talk about learning -- as both a teacher and a learner, with people and with horses.

Tomorrow I may not post, as there won't be many pictures -- we will be in the classroom for both morning and afternoon. That will give us a break from the sunscreen slathering, and time to think and learn about lots of other interesting things. In the meantime, I have been thinking alot about the phrase, "...the release is the reward...." That is what I keep in mind as I handle many different horses, and am trying to get better at consider the horse's perspective, and reward him for doing what I ask, before he goes on to the next thought. Are there times and places that this applies to you? How and when? I'd love to read your responses!

(By the way, thanks for voting in the poll! If you haven't voted, it is open for a few more days!)

Learning to come

Today was the beginning for Week 2 -- Anatomy and Massage classes. Beautiful day and lots of learning. My head is full with all of this new information, need to sleep instead of blog. Will post reflections and some photos in a day or two.

Don't forget to vote in my poll, so I get a sense of how often you are looking for new content. :)

Discipline

What do you think about when you hear the word "discipline"? The past couple of days I have been thinking about this, as part of the adventure in Colorado.

I am writing this on Saturday night, around midnight -- perhaps discipline is about not staying up until all hours of the night to write a blog, or about studying first before blogging or.... But, before I get into those musings, this is a picture of Sue on Thursday, the first of May 2008. Yes, that is snow -- it was kind of cold, but the sun of the previous days had warmed the ground enough that it didn't stick around for long. But, the weather stayed cool, so that our schedule was adjusted to be inside -- so both Thursday and Friday were classroom days, and the work with horses will be rescheduled.

Which is what got me thinking about "discipline" and its many uses:

• A general area of study, such as the discipline of anatomy or the discipline of business development;
• Specific diciplines of equestrian practice, such as English or Western, or even more specific sub-disciplines such as jumping and eventing or roping and barrel racing;
• A commitment to an on-going practice, such as a daily practice of meditation, exercise or journalling.

Funny, in ruminating about this list for the past couple of days, I didn't seriously consider "discipline" as a structure of punishment or reinforcement. Wikipedia suggests that this would fall under the definition as "to instruct a person or animal to follow a particular code of conduct, or to adhere to a certain "order." .....and this is frequently reinforced with punishment."

During the past few days, we have been considering information (lots of it) from the discipline of equine anatomy, equine massage as well as business development as it relates to the practice of equine massage. This also includes the reflections on the equestrian disciplines and my on-going reflections of my place in this field. This, of course, then brings up the personal discipline, or "daily practice". This intersection represents the nugget of my ruminations.

With the question of equestrian discipline, I find my self increasingly drawn to the Western discipline and interested in those events -- this is my history, my body type and it seems like my pragmatic, practical perspectives push me in this direction. And, based on my preliminary research, most of the market in southwestern Ontario will be in the English/Dressage discipline. So, as a good business person, this would be a better market to target for access for customers and clients.

Then, I am again, faced with the discpline of my daily practice and how I connect and listen. There have been days and times in my life when daily practice, whether it be practicing Qigong, drawing Cards of the Day or going for a morning dog walk, these practices provide a space in the busy-ness for finding quiet. And yet, this daily/spiritual practice seems elusive. Each day I must choose to say "Yes" or "No" to it, and the momentum is toward the "No". This is a process, and even in the writing of this blog, I am learning more about myself in relationship to my spiritual daily practice. I realized this morning that most consistent spiritual daily practice is probably "taking a shower"....which can be a time for listening and quieting, if one is not too caught up in the planning and preparing for the day. This is not to say that I am satisfied with where I am on this journey, but only that I continue to reflect and consider how I can choose the "Yes" which will help me find the quiet and feel more centred throughout each day.

Speaking of days, today was the Saturday that marked one week since I met my roommates, that I have been spending about 23 hours/day since then. (That is if you count sleeping time, when I am not aware of the chatting and laughing that is happening much of the rest of the day.) Today we spent the morning around the apartment (e.g., cleaning, doing laundry, making phone calls (I talked to Lora who was in the midst of reclaiming the sidewalk beside their house, and had great weather for outside spring work!)) and then went down to Denver, introduced Heidi to another American restraunt chain, compared prices at another boot store and then visited the Colorado Horse Park. By the time we got down there, the events of the day were over, but we watched a couple of people working their horses over jumps with instruction from their coaches.
It was interesting to practice identifying gaits and leads, as the horses moved around the arena. I also found myself watching the ways that the riders were communicating with their horses, and wondering if there were other techniques that might be more "cooperative", working more with the horse and its "feel" and less with the reins. I don't know much about jumping, so it was really good to watch even this informal practice. This is just one of the images that Heidi captured with her great digital camera.

This evening included some anatomy studying, more connecting with loved ones, preparations for the potluck we are hosting tomorrow and of course blogs. I consented to being recorded the one phrase I learned in Dutch, to share with her friends for a good laugh! She is running a contest to see if they can interpret what I said..... Funny, I haven't grabbed too many incriminating photos of my roommates, but there seem to be ample opportunities for them to capture me!

Well, it is time for me to wrap this up -- I expect that I'll make shorter posts more frequently. And, if you vote in the poll that I have placed on this blog (top of the right-hand column) it will give me a better idea if that matters to you, or not :). Thanks for reading!

Horses: Listening and Learning (ok, and silliness)

This morning we started class at a local ranch where we were warmly welcomed. It was a beautiful day, and we walked down to one of their pastures for the 7 horses that we worked on, in pairs. The goal of the class was to use our hands to listen to what the horse's body was saying. Here is a picture of me listening to Boogie, and one of Kimi listening to Leo. I was amazed by the relaxation responses from the horses, even just as we started to put our hands lightly on them and just "be". The "softness" in their eyes looks very much like the expression on someone's face who is very relaxed. We needed to keep their attention, and watching their ears was one way to assess if they were paying attention to us as we were working.

We were all working in a round pen, 14 students, 7 horses, 3 faculty, and Tessa the school mascot (actually Sara and Michael's Pug x Chihuaua). Here is a shot of Laura working on Baroness, Michael staying hydrated while sharing some tips, and Tessa staying cool in the shade!

After lunch, we had our first formal Anatomy class. It was an opportunity for me to start making more concrete connections between the Regional Anatomy from CCMH and equine anatomy. The primary focus of this course is on "anatomy as it relates to movement" so we are not going to be comprehensive, but will be learning the 80 most relelvant muscles in the horse's body.

I have to admit that I prefer active learning, so when an opportunity arose for volunteers to demonstrate the footfall sequences for each of the primary gaits of the horse (walk, trot, canter and gallop) I raised my hand. It was much easier performing the gaits with two people (one person's feet representing the front legs and the other person's feet representing the hind legs). But, by this time in the day, I also thought I would try to demonstrate the gallop myself, to get the full-value of the opportunity. Needless to say, perhaps it had more of a humor-factor than an learning factor.

After class and dinner, my classmates and I went to a Western clothing store. I was interested in looking at some boots, and it was a fun adventure. We have a few photos to document the experience -- and I have a pair of boots that I am going to wear inside until I am sure that I want to keep them. Jessica was very helpful, especially when it came to frank opinions and taking off a boot; Heidi tried out a swagger with a pair of boots (video footage recorded live, is not currently uploading -- I'll try to add it later). See if you can find the other photo that was taken as part of our shopping expedition - consider it a little added "Where's Waldo?" fun.

"... I don't DO massage..."

This morning Sara started our discussion of Equine massage by explaining that she "...listens a massage..." instead of "doing" it. I thought that this was quite a powerful distinction, and is in-line with my objectives of "Finding quiet". Although she has been trained in traditional Swedish massage, she lives and uses her training in Shiatsu and Myo-fascial release. We then did some work on each other, putting our hands on our partners' shoulders and listening. Initially, this was a challenge, and a situation where I could see my training (albeit limited) in Swedish massage to potentially be in conflict. It reminded me a bit of my training in Theraputic Touch, except with touch. :)

This practice of listening, and doing body work based on intuition and my hands will be great. I feel very fortunate to be able to do this work, and additionally excited to be doing it with horses!


This picture is of the Devil's Backbone rock formation (and a little extra anatomy lesson) which is one of the landmarks that we navigated by on our way out to Glade Farm, Rick Noffsiger's training facility for our Quieting and Handling class. We discussed some concepts of horsemanship [sic] which we are studying and then did some groundwork in small groups.

This is Baloo, a 30-something year-old Welsh pony gelding. And, just so you can be assured that I am learning horsemanship, here are a couple of other pictures of me working with him on "approach" and "leading" (and leading in reverse.)He knew the difference between one of us (students) working with him or Crystal (who works with Rick), but it was very interesting to work with him:

• Getting his attention and approaching him as he waited for me;
• Gently putting on the rope halter, including softly turning his nose toward me;
• Asking him to lead, and sending energy down the rope to make sure he didn't get too close;
• Asking him to stop, either with the rope or body language;
• Getting him to back up with communication through the rope and body language.

I expect that it wasn't too exciting for him (especially since he went through it with all 5 of us in the group), but it was a great place to start for me. Learning, learning, learning!

Finally, I'd like to emphasize, one more time, that I appreciate the fact that my roomates and I get along very well. We enjoy cooking, eating and even grocery shopping together.....

Living in Loveland - and School!

Most of the time yesterday (Sunday) and today (Monday) has been spent in Loveland. Yesterday, we walked out of the apartment to the view of the Colorado Rockies (I left the roof, so you can get a better feel for the context).

Our Orientation Session, where all 14 students (7 from USA, 4 from Canada, 1 from Belgium, 1 from Australia and 1 from Italy) met, along with 5 of the faculty from the Equine Massage Therapy College.

The focus of the Orientation session was on questions like:

• Introductions, including horse experience and "Why are you here?"
• Using breath for focusing, scan and notice what is going on internally
• What does it mean to be a "Learner"?
• Being aware of different levels of listening and their effects
  
• Taking responsibilty for our choices and actions

Today we had a full day of school (8-5pm), and our classroom. Here is a view (courtesy of Jessica's camera) -- you can see Kimi as the ever attentive student, while I am a bit distracted.)

This morning we worked on "movement" -- considering what we are learning as "movement therapy", or working to achieve efficient and/or optimal movement from our clients. Kind of neat idea that can be applicable with maintaining a "problem solving" and outcome-oriented approach to massage.

Then we had a lunch break and although I have taken some pictures of the landscape (which is so striking!) I thought that the picture below was a bit more interesting way to show you our "lunch room" (thanks, again, to Jessica). Sue, in the foreground is another Canadian, from Halifax. She drove down (!) so that she could bring her dog Barrymore - a German Sheperd who is having some hip troubles.

This afternoon's class was more on communication including tools to working on quality inquiry and advocacy. Definitely useful tools for working with new and repeating clients -- not to mention within other relationships.

Tomorrow afternoon we have our first "Handling and Quieting" class -- so will get to see and watch (maybe work with) horses! Yeah!

I am going to publish this, and send out the link -- I hope to keep lots of people up-dated. So, feel free to check back in a couple of days for more pics and more rambling.

Beginning an adventure

Today I arrived in Loveland, Colorado -- which will be my homebase for the next 8 weeks. It really feels like this is a beginning of an adventure that started 29 years ago, or more. As I think about and read my assignments for the Equine Massage course that I'll be starting tomorrow -- I believe that this adventure started with my dad and my Grandpa Alvin. Or even before......

Today, I drove from North Platte, Nebraska, where I had a great visit with my Aunt Debbie (my dad's sister). Here is a photo from the road -- when I first spotted the Rocky Mountains (really, there are there!)


Upon arrival in Loveland, I found the apartment and met my roommates. Heidi and Kimi had been here for two and one days, respectively -- and dinner was already in the crock pot! Jessica arrived (after 3 days on the road) at the end of the afternoon, and we sat down to eat. My contribution was the Corona and Sundance Amber Ale (from the Boulder Brewery)!