Celtic Proverbs

"An làmb a bheir, 's i a gheibh."

The hand that gives is the hand that gets.

Celtic Proverb

I have had a few people ask me why I have Celtic sayings on my site and pages. The Celtic's were gifted horseman who had a bond with their mounts, ancient world of people who saw meaning in everything. Our hobby farm is in a Celtic name which means wild horse acres, because of my Belladonna. We started focusing more on donkey care and abuse and not so much on horses, even though I owned my mare. That is when I first realized how much I truly enjoyed being around a bunch of wild asses (pun intended) and how a person can gentle and build a bond with them using their own methods and styles. There is no book on ways to gentle and train donkeys because of how different and smart they are. This started to make me think about my mare, how traditional methods had cause us more issues then resolved issues. Why is it okay to be a free spirit in donkey gentling and training but not in wild horses? Why do we have to go by a set of rules? Why must we run them, force and drown them in methods that keep causing more issues then solving?

"Cha chòir an t-each glan a chur uige."

(The willing horse should not be spurred.)

-Old Gaelic proverb-

This saying is on the front page of my site, it is a saying that I look at every day. What does it mean? Have we as horseman ever thought what some proverbs or old sayings really mean? Do we as people expect too much for all things? I believe one of our faults is we expect way too much over things, we rush through life and when our journey in life is over we wonder what our lives were about? Was it a good life or did we just auto pilot ourselves for the last 20 plus years? WE as people set ourselves with rules and by the book plays and I have played by the book for years with my mare.

I have called different trainers and explained her issues and I have had the same repeat response, she a useless cause. Once they do this and that, you can't help them.

WHAT?

All these trainers have methods that run by methods set by today's way of training. WE FORCE AND MAKE animals to do our bidding and when they don't do what we ask we punish them by breaking them down even more.

THERE LIES THE ISSUE WITH BELLADONNA!

I can force her all I want and guess what, we FIGHT. She isn't a horse that takes abuse, heavy handed ways or forcing.

She will try things if you play with her and ask, turn it into her thought and idea. Yet I have tried all the normal methods that have been recommended to me and we have fought for 3 years, to overcome her baggage which she welds damn good.

Can I force her? Yes, but I will not have the results or the effect I want. I will have a pissed off mare who is not retaining any of our training but if I do it how I have trained my donkeys people tell me what I am doing is dangerous and not truly training her, I am just painting over the issue.

So what is correct and not correct? Why do I need to go by rules and be judged when it been clear fact over thousands of years that different methods were used to gentle horses? Why do I as a person need to follow the horse book of training?

Why can't I have a willing horse that is my partner and we have a bond? Is that a silly fantasy?

What fills the eye fills the heart.
Gaelic: An rud a líonas an tsúil líonann sé an croí.

Another Celtic saying that I dearly love. What we put before ourselves in plain view we love and want. We have dreams because of what we have seen and witness in our lives. My dream is to be able to help horses and donkeys, take away their pain and fears and replace it with peace and happiness. To have a partnership that equals out to both man and animal, a willingness to do and live. I don't want to live as a robot in this life and neither do I want my animals to be robotic either. All animals have personalities, why should we take and break that? It is not okay to verbally and physically break a human this way but it is okay to that to a horse? Many people take horses and break them down and we get to see these beautiful empty shells walking around in circles, on auto pilot. They stumble through life as is because what they have had has now been broken and taken.

If you put a horse out he'll always find grass.
Gaelic: Mar capall agus gheogaigh tú féar.

As horseman's what do we dream to Achieve?