Bucking Radar

One of the stranger things that  has happened to me was a kind of psychic ability to know when a horse would buck.  The last time I was bucked off, however, I had no premonition of it.  So, again, not sure what makes it kick in, but there it is.

A few years back a horse trainer I was apprenticed with took me to see a client with a horse she wanted us to ride for her.  The  horse was half Andalusian/Lipizzaner or some similar cross.  This really excited me, being into dressage, and I asked if I could ride her.  The trainer, who I'll call Billie, told me she thought the horse would be very good as she had done the original breaking.  She told me the horse had never bucked or done anything difficult and she thought I would have an uneventful ride.  We arrived and the owner got the horse out and I began to lunge her.  She was fine, but I kept getting this really strong feeling that she would buck.  She never bucked on the lunge line, but the feeling stayed with me. 

I whispered my premonition to Billie and she told me to put it in the back of my mind.  She told me to prepare but not to let it overpower me.  I mounted up and rode the horse for a good 45 minutes without incident.  The owner got on her other horse and we started to canter laps around the pasture.  Nothing happened.  I felt totally relaxed and had by then forgotten my premonition.  Suddenly, the horse stopped dead and bucked hard once.  I came off onto my back.  I laughed and laughed though in the fall I had popped a tendon in my hip and it killed me to walk. 
Billie came over to help me up and we just looked at each other.  If I hadn't told her my premonition she wouldn't have believed it. 

Another time, I was riding horses across from where I boarded my own horse Bella.  I also trained some of the horses over at that place too, and I had planned on riding one of them after I finished the one I was on.  He was a draft horse who tended to buck on occasion, but in such a way that you never fell off.  Once I had the thought to go over to ride him, I got a strong premonition that a horse would buck.  I couldn't shake this feeling, and after my last experience I figured I should pay attention to it.  So, instead of riding the draft horse, I decided to ride Bella.  That way I could have a nice, enjoying ride.

We began our ride with some easy warming up exercises and then moved on to ground poles.  She was doing well, so I raised the ground poles a little to do some cavaletti and small jumps.  The jumps were made out of plastic tubes about 4" across and were very light.  They wouldn't hurt the horse if they knocked one.  We went over a small jump, barely a foot high which Bella could have stepped over, she got her feet caught in the pole and in order to get it clear of her legs, she bucked and kicked out in back.  I flew right over her head, landing stunned in the sand. 

My premonition had come true!

Psychic Phenomena- Bella Speaks

 I wanted to write about weird things that have happened to me personally and how it fits in with what I have learned about the "unseen" world.  I know that weird things have happened to others as well and would like to hear about people's experiences.  I think it's all fascinating and even more so to discover that others have also had the same experience. 

Since my other writings have been about horses I wanted to share some of my psychic horse experiences first.  My most cherished experience was with my horse Bella.  We have communicated on rare occasions and I am not sure why it doesn't happen more often, only that it happens at times when there is a lot of emotion tied to what's happening...I think.  Before I say any more, let me mention the fact that I have read quite a few books about people who can communicate with animals or horses.  I have also read a few books on training where the author mentioned that they were sure that the horse could read their mind.  This idea was already planted in my mind when the event happened that I am about to relate. 

Bella is a mustang gathered off the range by the BLM.  She was 8 when they collected her, so a bit past her prime training years.  She remained skittish especially towards human stuff like vehicles and equipment, and anything not natural.  I spent nearly every day with her, though, and eventually was able to ride her (my other blog tells the story).   However she had a strong fear of hay stacking machines, a kind of vehicle that can be driven on the road that picks up bales out of the pasture, holds them in a stack and can set the stack where ever you want it. 

One day I was riding her in the arena at the place she was boarded at.  The arena sat next to a fairly busy road, and low and behold a hay stacker was coming down the road.  She took off as soon as she saw it, galloping for her pen.  I hung on, thinking she would stop at the pen, and most embarrassingly, I did not take control of her.  Instead of stopping at the gate to her pen, she whirled back around 180 degrees and I came off pretty hard right into the gate post.  My helmet was dented, my shirt torn off, my back injured.  I had a concussion. 

It took me several weeks to recover enough to ride again.  I was afraid of her and riding in the arena.  But I had wanted a horse for so long there was no way I would give up.  I had to get over the fear.  So I saddled up Bella and took her to the round pen to feel things out before going back to the arena.  I decided to practice emergency dismounts, which entails hugging the horse's neck and sliding to the ground.  I rode Bella for awhile, sensing that she was nervous too, but she gamely did everything I requested of her.  And then I did my first emergency dismount, on the off (right hand) side of her.  This is not the side one normally mounts and dismounts from, and it's the same side I had fallen off of her.

As soon as I hit the ground, she began to shake and sweat with fear!  I stood there and stroked her neck and started to cry.  I wondered why she was so upset.  The answer glided into my mind but was not my thought.  It came quickly, almost all at once so that I had to untangle it in a manner of speaking. The answer was, "I didn't want to hurt you, I don't know how you fell off!  I am sorry, don't want to hurt you!" 

Had she just spoken to me?  Yes, yes, I could see how she was physically showing me and telling me in my mind at the same time.  I tried to communicate back to her that I forgave her, and that she should forgive me too for being a bad rider.  Bella gives hugs, so we stood there hugging each other.   

After that I would like to say that we communicated many other times, but there were only two other times - the first time I had to leave her for two weeks for a trip.  I could feel her missing me very strongly.  The second time I will discuss later as it falls in to a different category.  The funny thing is, Bella won't get into a trailer (also another story, a LONG story) and I have asked her and begged her and nearly had to put her down because I couldn't move her away from where she was.  I have never received a communication from her as to why she won't get in, what bothers her, etc.  If you are a horse trainer, I KNOW what you are thinking ("did you do such-and-such?" and yes, you name it  I have done it!  I promise I will write down the entire episode for future reference). 

I had a communication one other time from a horse I was working with, and again it was a very fast kind of stream of words.  She had something to say about why she wasn't learning what I was trying to teach her.  I was able to have a short, one-time conversation with her, but again that was it.  We never spoke again although I rode her for several years.  

I have no doubt that I "spoke" to those horses, or heard them.  I know it wasn't my thoughts, I know it came from somewhere else.  I am not sure why it works so sporadically.  Sometimes I get strong impressions or feelings but have heard no words in a long time.  If anyone else has had similar experiences, I would love to hear about them.  Please comment or drop me an email.