My fears confronted me just recently

My fears confronted me just recently

Have you ever been afraid of something? Like I mean where you’re heart’s in your mouth and you kind of find yourself doing this weird step one way then the other and actually end up not moving?  A massive amount of indecision whilst you try to work out what to do – or not do (I actually find myself in this situation often ... crowds in supermarkets, the mere mention of the word “snake”).
Well, my fears confronted me just recently.

So imagine this. My real fear, my worse than being on reality TV and having to eat live maggots fear, is horses. How ridiculous, right? Ah, not ridiculous at all - very, very real. Anyway, I was away with my partner, and we had spent a wonderful night at a very “romantic” – as the strange man who owned the B&B said with a leering grin and a wink (it was oddly disturbing) – cottage by the river as we travelled home. The plan was, I would drop man to horse to play polo, and be on my way home to have the candle lit dinner ready for our Sunday night roast. A perfect plan and direct path to domestic goddess!

I can tell you know what’s going to happen. It’s like the horror movies where you want to scream out “don’t go into the basement”!  Unwittingly, I stopped the car to let him out rather than slow to a speed where he wouldn’t seriously hurt himself jumping from a moving vehicle. First mistake.  The minute we stopped and got out, he ascertained he was running late and there was no groom in sight and suddenly it became my problem that there were four horses that needed to be ready for polo in 10 minutes.

It’s amazing what love (pride) can make you do. I swallowed my fear and watched him race to get ready from inside the fence. I even took the reigns of a very nice pony (having checked it was the nice one) and held it whilst he did everything else. I was the perfect girlfriend (not).  But you need to understand I just couldn’t get close to the horses, no matter how much I wanted to be “horse loving” girlfriend.

With the game underway, I returned to my car parked by the three horses tied to the fence. With absolute horror, I realised one horse was standing on its reigns, it was not tied to the fence at all ... and this was the one that I was told was scary, he was the one that was “fresh” (code for psycho), the one I had been warned would kick and buck. The one they said to stay away from! I just stood there. The reigns were in reach, but I was frozen to the spot.

The horse looked at me and just KNEW I was terrified. In that instant, that horse seemed bigger than ever before. I thought about asking for help but no one was there, I couldn’t just leave, but I couldn’t do anything! I was doing the crazy lady move from one leg to another, I was cursing my partner in my mind for leaving me in this situation, as well as praying that I would survive it ... when I just reached out and slowly took the reigns, and tied him up.

I realised that the worst part of fear is anticipation of the event, that it is rarely as bad as it seems (unless we’re talking about the basement scene in the horror, then it’s usually worse!). And I also realised the best way to overcome a fear, is confidence. Not a heap of confidence, but just enough to get you moving. To give it a shot.

Fake it till you make it if you have to, but if you can just imagine you are capable of overcoming your fears, then you’re half way there. And you know what else? I did it on my own. Sometimes our bravest moments occur when no one is watching. But I know I did it, and only I know how much strength it took.

What a woman wants is to be protected from all things scary, but when a woman realises she is capable of overcoming her fears on her own, she is capable of anything.

Have a great month,  

Abby x

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