Foundations and signs

Mist wreathes the hills cloaking familiar places with mystery. I appreciate this, of course: the person who I am when I ride. That is the traveller in me, the one who rides from curiosity and joy and the love of a good horse. These rides are the outworking of a passion to discover roots: of the land and my own besides. This is a simple ancient activity on trails deep in history. It is how people travelled for millennia, in places where they travelled. The Archetypes are timeless: the core drivers of who we are. I ride and dream and begin to know myself: from these foundations upward.

I was going to write "my foundations" however the Archetypes are universal. I am discovering what makes me individual from the great mass of human experience formed through the ages. It is a unique combination from common ingredients: a personal colour or flavour. These rides, they are about personality. It's like a one-off building sprung from the rock of a mountain, something all of its own yet defined by foundations, material, altitude, gradient and climate. Like a good architect I depend upon vocation in the pursuit of this quest.

These rides are signposts. I know these chalk hills and have no need for the signposts. But others do need them, and so do I amidst confusing terrain. On this journey of discovery my rides are signposts. Sometimes Brena gives me a sign, reacting to my character that I may see it better. The thoughts that occur are signs, and so are the dreams that these rides stimulate. For the many trips with a horse have begotten dreams from my unconscious: they are a fine catalyst for liberating hints of the mystery within.

I wondered what came first: riding or dreaming. On reflection I don't recall a single dream from exile in Transylvania. But I rode plentifully. So riding came first. But I rode on a journey of self-discovery, even if I did not realise this at the time. The Archetypes came first and I rode in order to discover them within me, which also did not occur to me back then. So: foundations led to riding, and riding to dreaming. These dreams are enlightening so clearly riding has been more deeply therapeutic than I could have imagined. It was intuition well followed when I took my first lesson, bought my first horse, went into exile with horses, and acquired Brena from afar.

Comments

[The Equestrian Vagabond]

So poetic!