Maria Olofsdotter Jonsson
To quote Michael Bevilacqua telling his story in the book Beyond the Dream Horse, “In short, I have ended up where I wanted to start. There was just years in between where I was sidetracked by existing norms in the horse world, which is, really, a human world using horses.”
I started my journey with horses some 20 years ago. Even though I went to the riding school as a child I don’t consider that time as a time where I was looking for a true relationship with a horse, it was more like a period in my life of trying to find friends.
My parents were constantly moving from one city to another, either due to my father’s career or my mother’s depression so I did never get the chance to make friends for long. However, the friends I found at school liked horses so I joined them at the riding school. I learned to ride, not very well, to take basic care of a horse and that horses can really hurt your feet.
My real connection with horses started long after that. My mother’s depression finally killed her and after years of trying to hide my grief under loads of work in the financial business, I found myself burnt out. I couldn’t cope with much so I spent my days sleeping and walking the dog, hour after hour. I found myself dragged to a certain walk where I passed a stable. In the pasture there was an absolutely beautiful black Friesian stallion. He was almost magnetic to watch. I felt like he was waiting for me and my dog to come by and admire him and I most willingly did. It was a long walk but still I went there several times a week.
At the time, my daughter had started riding at the riding school and like any other 10 year old girl she wanted her own pony. It was out of the question but one day the there was an ad in the paper – a woman wanted to rent out her horses a couple of days a week. And the horses were stabled at the same stable where the Friesian was. That’s where it all started. It turned out that she had a pony and a skinny, malnourished trotter. My daughter immediately became friends with the woman’s daughter and was very eager to become part time caretaker of the pony, so I decided to rent them both, even though the trotter was in really bad shape.
I started to go to the stable every day. The beautiful Friesian stallion soon moved away but he wasn’t that magnetic anymore as I had a horse of “my own” to attend to. I took the little trotter, Lucky Stub, into the stable at feeding time to make sure the others wouldn’t drive him away from the food. I sat beside him in the manger watching him eat his hay and I got some super yummy extra everything mash to ensure he got minerals and vitamins. He seemed to enjoy my company and soon enough he ran to the gate neighing as soon as he saw me coming to the table. After a couple of weeks I realized I needed a vet to check on him and I decided to pay for it myself as the owner had no interest. The vet was really concerned. She assumed I wanted to put him down as he had no value, had a lot of parasites and was in bad shape due to malnutrition. When she realized that was not an option she was very helpful giving me a recovery plan and I gave an offer to the owner to buy him. I paid way too much but he was worth every penny.
We developed a very deep relationship. When he was strong enough to ride we explored every corner of the area, and he trusted me enough to follow me everywhere. At one time he heard my voice outside the stable as the stable guy was taking him inside with a halter and lead. He pulled himself away from the guy and run outside to great me. In that moment I realized that he didn’t only mean something to me – I meant something to him too.
And still…
As my daughter became a more advanced rider, the little trotter wasn’t good enough so we bought another horse. And another horse. And another… She rode for different instructors, I got instructors to learn how to deal with horses that couldn’t cope with walking on the lead, mounting, being ridden… For years we tried different methods for making our horses quit saying no. My daughter quit before I did. She told me she had become scared and as she now was a mother herself she didn’t want to jeopardize her health. I kept the horses but under the new circumstances there was no longer a need to perform. I started to hear them saying – this is not what we want to do. It started to become hard to motivate myself to ride and train my horses, who was it good for anyway?
The last horse we bought was a little Irish pony to be a riding pony for my granddaughters. Just as Lucky Stub, we borrowed him and then bought him as we didn’t want him to return to the owner as he needed a lot of care and attention. He was completely mentally shut down, traumatized with ulcers and physical issues. We gave him time to recover and then I aimed to start with some basic training to make him a bomb proof pony for the kids. The little pony was the one telling me for real. He told me there was no way in this world that he could deal with the way humans handle him. He wouldn’t try to flee, fight or freeze. He would just give in, in a way that made me realize that I was about to kill his soul. After half a session I never used my old methods on any horse ever again.
I haven’t saddled up for the last two years. It was a lonely and confusing time after stepping out of the traditional equestrian world but there was no turning back. I found comfort in nature, spending almost all my time outdoors, the same way I did during my burn out period. I the forest, in my garden and in the pasture with the horses there was no question that I was on the right path – united with everything around me just as it was. I searched to find others, all around the world, who shared my new perspective. There were a lot of them, all with different experiences but with the same wish to find another way for humans to relate to horses, nature and all beings. Together with Stormy May, I investigated and questioned my old beliefs that in the past had made me make decisions founded on fear and dominance. Stormy taught me how to create a safe space within myself where I can find peace at all times and stay in a compassionate dialog with the world around me. I don’t do any deliberate training with any of my horses. I spend several hours with them everyday, sharing space, I doing my thing and they doing theirs. Sometimes they are playing games – if they initiate a game and want me to participate, for example, exploring and investigating the environment, I will often join in. But I don’t consider myself having the right to take control over their bodies or their mind, I don’t own their will and I am grateful for every moment they want to share their world with me. We have a relationship without stress, anxiety or prestige. I respect them for having their own will and their own voice and it’s not a personal defeat if they choose to say no. We have a relationship where I can love and appreciate them, perfect as they are.
