Hey Claire and Tlove, I will try to give you some idea about the clinic, it realy was so cool
Eileen, that sounds wonderful, it realy does seem to be the case with these hot stallions that you stay realy calm, and they seem to follow. And it would appear that the groundedness, and the relaxed body language does pay off. Well done you.
Well here goes for all that I can remember, there was so much. First of all Klaus is a very interesting person, I loved his attitude to life. He explained how his parents disowned him at a very young age, so he was brought up by his grandparents. They died when he was thirteen or maybe fourteen. He then resorted to playing instruments on the streets to get enough money to eat. He was a survivor. He says he started watching people as he sat in busy shopping malls, and noticed how much they were like robots. He felt there was no richness to their lives, they were disconnected from source, and so were lost.
He said that humans were very much like the snake, low to the ground, always stuck to the ground, and they also had a forked tongue, meaning they always lied. The horse on the other hand is like a hawk, able to rise up to the sky and being close to purity, hence Pegasus.
Stay with me here as all this is very interesting, even if it does sound odd. He spoke of this material world that humans are tied to, the one of solid objects you could touch and said that horses, while here in this solid material world are also able to pass to the 'dream world' he said they are borderline, meaning that they can drift from dreamtime to solid material world. He said this world was also visited by most native tribes accross the world when they meditated or journeyed. But we are just trapped in the material world. This stops us from connecting with our horses. We are snakes, and we want to connect with our horses as we do realise they could take us to the heights that they fly to, but we are unable to while we are firmly rooted to the low ground, so our connection with them is nearly always one of control, us trying to dominate the beauty of nature, as the horse is pure nature, that which we crave, but no longer know how to do.
He said that when he is with horses, he always goes borderline, going to the dreamworld and bringing the imformation he recieves there back to this realm to help the horses he works with. This way he can see there issues, he understands what they need, and in a very short period of time, he is able to take them from being small abused animals, back to big proud horses, all of the horses issues are placed there by humans, they have none to start with, as they are just pure nature. He spoke for a long time and we were all transfixed, I can honestly say I never got bored once. Interestingly, he stated that he has no time for people who say that can talk to horses, he said if a horse ever spoke to him he'd run a mile, he said the same for ghosts etc, he has no interest in any of that sort of stuff, which seemed odd considering his very spiritual approach to horses.
The first horse to come into the Picadero was a beautiful Arab Stallion. It really upset me how stressed he was. The girl who owned him brought him in a horrible bit, she said it was all she could lead him in, he couldn't shut his mouth, it was constantly gaping open. When she put him in the picadero Klaus asked her to remove it. He ran around and around, neighing and biting at the bars, it was horrible. He swung his head over and over again, reared, bucked, and Klaus just stood calmly chating to us all, but always sizing up the horse. The girl said he was uncontrolable, always explosive, always biteing, and hated having his head touched, she said that in one of his fits he had run into a brick wall and realy hurt his head. She had owned him for three years, he was five.
I noticed immediatly that every time Klaus moved to towards the picadero, as the horse was in there by himself at this stage, the horse would come and stand next to him, and as Klaus walked up and down the chap followed him. It's quite hard to explain, but when Klaus went in with him, the horse wanted to be with him, but Klaus said that he wasn't ready, so would gently, I mean very gently, just with his body language, standing very square, with shoulders down and relaxed, and feet apart and very grounded, breathing properly, and keeping his heartbeat very slow, especialy when the horse became very excited. He then started to claim his corner and another one, by throwing his rope into the corner ahead of him, so the horse only had half the picadero to move in, again he threw the rope into this corner so gently, and through all this he never looked at the horse, you could tell all the time that the horse desperatly wanted to be with him, not beacause he was submitting like in joinup, I'm only saying this how I saw it, of course others may have noticed something different, but for me, it was all very gentle. The only time Klaus did bring his energy up was when he started to let the horse in to him, and if the horse was calm, he gently stroked him, or just stood with him, very calmly, but when the horse went back to chaos as he put it, he went down on his haunches and drove him around speaking realy loudly in his own language, as soon as the horse calmed down, he let him in and stood calmly with him again. He said that the horse wanted to be near him as he recognized the strength and honesty of this human, something he'd probably not seen in other humans he had encountered.
He also worked with two other horses, a very strong minded colt foal, and a stunning grey mare. The woman who came in with the grey mare was talking to Klaus about the horses issues. Klaus stood rubbing his chin listening intently to her as she said that the horse outwardly seemed very calm, but would without warning panic over the smallest thing. This woman too was very quietly spoken, and I got the imppresion that all that she was saying about the horse she could of been saying about herself. Klaus worked with the mare and found her perfect, desperatly willing to please and no signs of nervousness at all, she moved beautifuly. When he finished with her, he looked at the owner and said, 'It's no coincidance that the horse came to you, I'm sorry to say this, but you do have some issues too do you not, she became quite emotional, and agreed. He also came out with some imformation from the horses past, saying that it had had an accident at some time, and issues when it was a foal. The woman said that when she bought the horse over from Spain, it had fallen off the ramp of the lorry, or something like that, and had had to have stiches, so she was on box rest for a while just after she had bought her, Klaus, also asked her to see if she could find out from the breeder what had happened to this horse as a foal when it was with it's mother, he said that he was able when working with the mare to see all of this by going over the borderline, and bringing the imformation back.
On the Sunday we did lots of grounding work, breathing, and learning to relax from the shoulders, we also did some chanting, whilst Klaus sang in a beautiful Native American style chant, I loved it, it felt like we all entered his dreamworld breifly.
We then all went into the arena and got a partner and took it in turns to hold our partners head very gently in our hands. Our partner had to close there eyes and we had to go all around the arena steering them as gently as possible, all to teach us how to communicate as gently as possible to our horses in riding, it was agreat excercise, especialy when our human horses had to run with eyes shut, and just our gentle hands to guide them. I've never laughed so much!! We also did hip rotating work, moving the hips as they should in both trot and canter, Klaus has the most supple hips I have ever seen on a man!!!!
We pretty much ended with the young Arab stallion. He was alot calmer when he came in. The young girl who owned him was asked once again by Klaus to remove the awfuly uncomfortable bit he was wearing. She then sat to watch. Klaus worked with him for quite a long time, and once again, the only time he ever pushed the horse was when he went into chaos, and then it was only with his body language and voice, his energy was always down. The horse became so calm, and like Klaus said, he was caarying himself more proudly, more like a stallion, he seemed bigger. He lunged him gently around the pen. The saddest part was the fact that he was telling the audience how this chap had lost his pride, had been down trodden and was just very angry with the world and humans. I could see the young girl who owned him crying as she listened to Klaus. I felt so sorry for her, she seemed to shrink in her chair. Klaus asked her what method she had been traing him with, when she said Parelli, he just said, 'My god, no wonder he's like this' He said Parelli made alot of horses flighty and panicy like this because of the pressure inflicted on them. He said that it was so sad that so many people turned to these various training methods that were so damaging to horses, when they could learn to do it themselves. He did say that he still doesn't know his method, it just happens naturaly with each individual horse he works with, he just flows with nature. He says that people can learn this too. He very quickly managed to let the stallion accept touching on his head, and put a halter on him and led him out the picadero and around the arena, occasionaly the boy did fight with him, trying to bite, but he just gently pushed the head away. He calmly stood holding him while he hit the fence realy hard with the string of his whip, the horse paniced a few times, but soon realised he didn't need to, it was an amazing change. He asked the owner to promise not to put that bit back in his mouth. He then got her out to teach her how to lead her boy. It was very emotional, she had very round shoulders, and lacked confidance with him. Klaus told her to stop crying, and start to move forward with her lovely boy, she was sobbing and hugging him, and I don't think there was a dry eye in the house. She started leading him with Klaus constantly shouting to her to bring her shoulders level and lift her head. It took some time, but soon she was leading him confidantly and the beaming smile on her face was just wonderful. Klaus even asked us to all clap while she was holding him, and she did a wonderful job of keeping him calm, I was so pleased for her and her lovely stallion.
Sorry this is so long, just wanted to share as I do know some others here have seen Klaus in a different light. All I can say is what I saw with my eyes, and I thought he did nothing but help those horses, the change in them was amazing. And the owners, he's a human healer too. He did say a couple of things I didn't agree with, but then like he said, we are all on our own journeys with our horses, journeys that will take us a life time. I can't reccomend his clinics highly enough or his interesting approach to life, and his unique way with horses and humans. Just wonderful.