Dreadless: Everything Is a Dance

If you are new to this blog series, please begin here: Dreadless: An Introduction.

A man rides a black horse out in the middle of a verdant field. The horse dances, crossing her feet, gliding gracefully backward, then forward again, moving as if gravity cannot touch her. The man’s seat atop her is elegant and effortless. His touch on the reins is light. He is in control yet not controlling. His body moves with hers as if they are one animal.

A haunting country melody that brings to mind stand-offs at sunset on dusty small town streets rises above the image, prelude to the voice-over.

“Everything you do with a horse . . . is a dance.” It is the voice of a cowboy, strong and kind.

This is from the documentary Buck, about Buck Brannaman, Horse Whisperer. If you haven’t seen it, I highly recommend you watch it. Be warned–you will probably cry multiple times. But for all that it’s a tear-jerker, this movie is uplifting and hopeful. Buck was severely abused as a child, but he overcame his past to become one of the most gentle and effective horse trainers of this century.

When I first watched this movie, I almost but didn’t quite make the connection it had to my own life and experiences. To be clear, I have never been abused, nor have I ever trained horses. But in the process of trying to train my own body to drive, I was making the same mistake made by a lot of the trainers who Buck re-trained. I was pushing my “animal” into a fearful situation without any compassion, and when I reacted in fear, I was punishing myself for that fear with the voice of self-hatred.

When I made the final push before getting my license, I knew I would need to change my approach in order to finally succeed. I thought about Buck and the parallels between his methods and what I needed to change in myself. I decided to re-watch the movie and take notes. Buck had a very specific way of talking to his horses, and my goal was to come up with a set of language that could replace the voice of self-hatred, as well as reminders for me of how to treat my “frightened animal” with compassion.

After the tears had dried, I looked over my notes and re-worked them into twelve guiding principles, a sort of personal statement.

Here is the text of the statement I came up with. Some of this is paraphrased and some may still be the direct wording Buck used in the film, so credit is due to Buck Brannaman for anything that resembles a quote. That being said, much of this is my interpretation of his meanings. In several places I have replaced the word “horse” with the word “body.”

Everything is a Dance

I will develop a seamless connection between my mind and my body using the principles laid out below. The body is the horse; the mind is the trainer. The body includes physical actions and emotional reactions. The mind is the purpose driving the body (the mental construct we are asking the body to conform to, eg. driving, sitting, juggling, etc).

1. Be gentle in what you do and firm in how you do it.

2. Patience, trust, respect, kindness, leadership, compassion, firmness, and commitment form the basis of the relationship between mind and body.

3. Trust: What seems normal to the mind is not normal to the body. You’re asking a lot of the body, and in order for it to be able to do what you want it to do, you have to establish trust. The body must trust and believe in the mind, and vice versa.

4. Compassion: Don’t have contempt for the body. When the body resists or acts out, it is only afraid and trying to protect itself. Why make the body live in fear?

5. Kindness: When pain and inhumane pressure are used on the body to get results, the body learns to contort itself to avoid the pain. If violence is used rather than slow, gentle pressure, the body braces itself against the violence, creating resistance.

Instead, let the body relax into a position of balance—not pushing against you, not dragging you. When the body gives, give back. When the body softens, soften your grip.

6. Use positive language to help relax the body and reinforce relaxation.

When the body is afraid: “Nobody’s here to hurt you.”

When the body relaxes: “There was a nice change.” “Attaboy.” “Good job.”

7. Respect: Don’t be overly critical. If the body feels you are angry, it will shut down. Respect isn’t fear, it is acceptance.

8. Firmness: Be strict but not unfair. Don’t take the resistance of the body personally. Allow the body to make mistakes in order to learn from the mistakes. Don’t let the body dread making mistakes for fear of what will happen.

9. Patience: Don’t rush the body or you will build a fear unnecessarily. Give the body a chance. Don’t discourage, rather encourage when the body reacts well. Build on the body’s pride and make it feel good about itself.

10. Leadership: Give the body a job. When the action has meaning to the body there is greater joy in the exercise. Make the purpose of the action clear to the body.

11. Commitment: Don’t blame anyone else for your actions. No matter where you are coming from, you still make your own choices.

12. Quit on a good note.

I read this personal statement before I started each driving practice in the weeks before I went to take the test. The effect was almost magical. It took awhile, but slowly the cascade of negative thoughts became replaced or overwhelmed by this positive language. Even when I didn’t feel like I was doing great, I would say to myself, “You’re doing great! Keep trying.” That was so different from the barrage of “You suck, you’re a loser, you’ll never do this.”

Even though it felt unnatural to tell myself “good job!” it became an automatic reaction. To this day, when I get stressed out while I’m driving, the first thought that pops into my head is a gentle, “it’s ok, you’ve been doing a great job of driving and you can handle this.”

In a way, I think this was the key to my final success at learning how to drive and getting my license. Everything else I’ve mentioned in this blog was important, but this personal statement was the clincher. Because finally, after fighting it for so long, I had language on my side.

Changing my internal dialog was the final piece in the driving puzzle. But there was one more element that had been there all along, that I couldn’t have done without. I’m going to talk about it in the next post: Dreadless: Support Systems.

In case you want to take something away from these posts other than just my story and some advice, here are a couple of activities you can use to apply the strategies I learned while overcoming my fear of driving. Please refer to the disclaimer in Dreadless: An Introduction.

Storytelling: One of the things that the documentary Buck revealed to me was how clearly someone’s language, their way of speaking, can convey their character. To this end, dialog in a piece of writing becomes crucial, not just in showing communication between characters but in showing how each of the characters is different. Also, characters might use different language in different situations and with different people. For example, the way a person speaks to their boss might be different from the way they speak to their kids. 

Take a moment to assess the dialog in the story you are currently working on. Does it reflect and bring to life your character’s personality? Close your eyes and imagine your character speaking, as if the scene is a movie. What does their voice sound like? Make some notes and then revise the scene with more life to the dialog.

Personal Growth: The power of stories to reflect our own lives and struggles back to us is incredible. When I heard Buck’s story, I immediately related to it, even though his life was much different than mine. The story still connected on an emotional level and gave me the language I needed to overcome my issues. For this exercise, I want you to find a story that has the same connection for you as Buck’s story had for me. It could be Buck the documentary, or it could be something entirely different. It might be a book, or a blog post, or a radio interview, or even a reality TV show. Whatever it is, take notes and create a personal statement from your notes, with an emphasis on positivity and replacing the negative or abusing parts of your own language with positive language.