Energy & Horses

ENERGY & HORSES

Using Energy & Awareness to Groom Your Horse

Why is grooming a horse so important?

Grooming a horse before we work with them or doing it on a regular basis, whether we are working them or not, is very important to maintain their health but also for a variety of other reasons.

Horses that are in a herd regularly groom each other and themselves by scratching and nuzzling. Horses that groom each other enjoy the feeling of it as well as the emotional bonds that form from it. 

Grooming a horse on a regular basis is important for health reasons; such as removing debris that can irritate the coat, keeping matts out of the hair, checking for parasites and skin issues and stimulating the horses circulation to the muscles, ligaments, joints, tendons and coat. Grooming your horse physically using brushes, combs and equipment specially made for massaging will assist you in the process of grooming but more importantly it is your intention that you have while you are grooming that is the most important.

If you focus on proper intention/energy as your groom, you will become much more aware of what your horse is trying to tell you and the status of how your horse is feeling. Having empathy for the horse this way and using grooming to help you communicate, is the first step in your work, training or being with them. This is the time you truly can build a bond with your horse on a more spiritual level and the horses look at this as our way of showing gratitude to them and wanting to communicate with us.

How do we groom with good intention and energy?

The first thing is for us to release our stuff and ditch the cell phone! Before we start it is a good idea to take a few huge deep breaths and let go of our issues. These issues could be a hard day you have had or a fight with someone or your own thoughts of all the one thousand things you need to do still that day. Let that all go and live in the present moment. After all, you want to enjoy your time with the horse as much as they want to enjoy it with you. Once you have let stuff go and are ready to focus on your horse, then your intention and energy can be better shifted to helping the horse.

Many people say to me that they either do not believe in energy work or that they feel they are not capable of doing it. My answer to them is that everything is made up of energy and vibrates at different frequencies. The more negative we are the less we vibrate but the more positive we are the higher we vibrate. Whether you believe in energy or not, your energy always will affect the horse some how. Horses are extra sensitive to energy because they are prey animals and have to be on guard all of the time. Being sensitive to energy keeps them alive. This sensitivity is one reason why horses have been excelling in “helping/therapy” for people.

So your energy and intention is easy! Have empathy, focus, think positively and the most important thing is do it all out of LOVE. Love is what healing is about and we all are capable of doing that!

The Grooming with Energy Process

  1. Do a general assessment of your horse? Does your horse seem agitated, calm, excited or are they being respectful. If the horse is super excited, letting it blow off some steam first by doing some groundwork or lunging might keep them calmer while doing the grooming session. If they are being disrespectful to you then now is the time to establish your leadership through groundwork or appropriate leadership exercises.

  2. Once the horse is ready to start and you have let go of your own issues, you can use a soft rubber curry brush or grooming mitt to remove debris and gently go over the horse’s whole body, legs and face using small circular strokes. Pay close attention as you are working to how your horse is reacting to the areas you are grooming. The horse may be enjoying the area by leaning a bit into the brush, nuzzling their lips in the air, relaxing or yawning. If they are sore or not enjoying the areas your are grooming then they may try to bite, stiffen, twitch, move away, take short quick breaths, kick, paw or dance around. Lighten your touch and make a mental note of these area’s as they will need more work to help the muscle to release or for the horse to release tension on physical and emotional levels.

  3. Spray the horse’s tail, mane and body with a conditioning spray that contains essential oils that will benefit the horse. We use healing oils such as lavender, peppermint and calming oils such as peace and calming. This will help in stimulating the coat, muscles and emotional states of you and the horse! Take a very soft body brush and try to work in with the acupuncture meridian lines. Start at the inside corner of the eye and around the jaw, go up over the horses pole, down the neck, down the front legs, then over the withers, down the back, over the bum and back down the back legs. Always brushing all the way down the legs and past the hooves. This is a key distribution channel for energy and will open the bladder meridian line. Now take the same soft brush and brush upwards on the inside of all the legs and softly brush the belly. This will stimulate and further support the Ying-Yang meridians in their function of keeping the Chi of the horse flowing. Make sure you do both sides of the horse.

  4. Take a stiffer brush and vigorously stroke the coronet bands all they way around and on all four feet. The area around the coronet band is rich in acupuncture points called ting points. The coronet bands and areas around face are start or end points for all acupuncture meridians. Then take that stiffer brush or comb and comb out the mane and tail.

  5. Now is the time to address the areas on your horse that showed tension, soreness, or resistance. Start out very softly on these areas with just gentle massage, Touch work, essential oils or energy work. Laser, magnetic, micro current therapies all can assist these sore areas as well. Try not to move on (unless the horse is very uncomfortable) until you see or feel some releases. A release is an escape of trapped energy or tension from within the horse. Releases can be a softening of the tissue/muscle, yawning, relaxing, licking and chewing, deep breaths, breathing more regularly, releasing gas, pooping, peeing, pawing, softening the look in their eyes, or stretching. Listen to your intuition as well. You may take on some of what they are feeling or you may yawn and release as well for them. Make sure that you ground yourself and allow any negative energy you may feel to be released. Say thank you to these negative feelings, tension or negative energies, send loving healing energy back and ask for the horse and yourself to ground and release them.

  6. End the session with taking a moment to breath with your horse and truly connect. You may want to lightly rest your hands on your horse or just try to get your breath in tune with your horse’s breath. If your hands are on our horse you may want to move to another spot once you intuitively feel the horse has released or you see signs of release.

  7. Now you have a good understanding of where the horse is holding tension and you now can adjust your training sessions accordingly.

You may not have time to do this whole process every time you groom but always have the intention of love. Remember to breath yourself and relax and enjoy the bonding time you get to spend with a horse!

Equine Body Assessment

1. Observation In Normal Environment
  • Behavior
  • Posture
  • Movement
  • Presence 
2. General Distant Exam - Observe the horse from all angles and note blemishes, scars, angles, muscle formation, bulk, fat, asymmetry, hoof wear) 
  • Head & Face
  • Axial Skeleton (spine)
  • Appendicular Skeleton (limbs)
3. Hands-On Exam
 A) Head
  -Teeth
  -TMJ
  -Hyoid
  -Pole
 
B) Axial (feel trigger points, muscles tone & texture, swelling, fat deposits)
  -Neck
  -Withers
  -Shoulders
  -Back
  -Loin
  -SI/Hips/Gluteus
  -Tail/Anal Tone
  -Bladder Meridian
 
C) Appendicular (limbs, joint movement)
  -Evaluate supraspinatus/deltoid/rhomboid
  -Flex joints
  -Hoof Test
  -Pull splints/squeeze tendons/palpate sesamoids
  -Check hind bicepts/femors/TFL/Quads
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