The nature of a bond: i still choose you

Yesterday morning, I spoke to a group of school counselors in Salem, VA. To be honest, I didn't want to be there. I'd spent 12 hours the day before driving and watching lacrosse. The whole clock-turn-back thing was messing with me as well. I just didn't feel on my game. And when you're speaking, a great starting place is never not feeling on your game.

I arrived at the event early. Early enough to sit in on a team meeting. I was going over my presentation, not paying much attention to the conversation, when a particular story one of the counselors started sharing sucked me in.

It was the story about a group of students with various challenges that the staff took to an equestrian facility. And as the counselor told the story, she focused on one young man who bonded with a horse.

The boy's mom noticed a difference in the young man that evening. He told her about the horse. She was a bit confused by this; she'd bought the boy a dog for that very purpose - bonding, but that bond never seemed to materialize.

When exploring why the difference, the boy told her " I loved the horse because the horse promised to keep my secrets."

I have a friend who has this kind of relationship with horses. I've never understood it, really, until recently. But she has a way of connecting people and horses in this sort of therapeutic way. She is convinced that horses can sense things in us that people often cannot.

Like the need to tell our secrets.

I found it interesting that when pressed about the nature of the bond, the boy didn't hesitate to define it as an avenue to share secrets. An avenue to tell things likely never told. A place to feel safe enough to say, this is me, all of me.

The nature of the bond wasn't defined by human or animal or object, it was defined by this freedom to express without fear of what might become of the expression. Without fear of being turned on with shame and guilt and hostility.

In a world experiencing what is often the unrelenting pain of living without bondedness, maybe we fail to heal much of that pain because we've decided what a bond should look like and not what a bond most should be, an invitation to come as we are.

I have come to believe that horses are good at that invitation. My friend says she loves horses so much because at the end of the day, no matter what, they always still choose her.

Don't we all, no matter what the secrets, just want a place that still chooses us?

No matter what.

I am thankful this boy found the horse.

I am hopeful that horses are not just great at invitations, but maybe they also serve as great teachers. Because there are not enough horses to fill the voids of those longing for invitations, but there are enough of us if we'll follow the horse's lead.

Wouldn't it be nice to live in a world where everyone had someone they could turn to and say, I love you, because no matter what, you still choose me.

We come into the world looking to be chosen. The search never ends. Well, maybe, that is, until a boy finds his horse.