Like so many others, I have struggled with my body image for as long as I can remember. I have religiously straightened my naturally curly hair. I see certain pictures of me on my horse and I hate how large I feel. I have meticulously tracked my food intake and exercise so my body would take up less space. I have cried in front of the mirror on more than one occasion no matter what number was on the scale.
Society waffles back and forth between telling us that we should be thin, but not too thin. Be healthy, but not obsessive. Accept larger bodies, but not if they are too large. Be fit, but not too muscular.
And I don't think that being a horse girl makes any of this any easier to navigate.
While it has come a long way, the equine industry still pedestals women and girls who are in smaller bodies fueling the gamut of eating disorders and body dysmorphia. Equestrian marketing still typically features slim women with flawless hair, skin, nails, clothes, makeup, etc (and don't even get me started on how many still glamorize the product or service without actually evaluating the horse being used as a prop for signs of stress and/or pain). It seems like every single social media equestrian fitness coach is already naturally built like a Thoroughbred, making them feel totally unrelatable to the women built like Clydesdales. Equestrian physical therapists drill down on the endless list of rider weaknesses and their harm to the horse. The black and white rules about a horse's weightbearing capacity are applied only to women, almost never to men.
Comment section arguments over what is the appropriate rider weight, unrealistic marketing campaigns that don't reflect the everyday equestrian, and posts about how your body's asymmetry is ruining your horse flood our feeds every dang day. This constant barrage of comparison fodder feeds the shame that I know so many horse girls already feel about not being enough. Not having enough money, not having enough time, not having enough will power, not seeing the "right" number on the scale, the list goes on.
I am absolutely not immune to this either. To be fully transparent, there are plenty of days when I struggle to tack up and ride Annie because I am overcome by the guilt of feeling too big for her despite still falling into the 20% rule range. I tell myself that I will ride when I weigh less, but in the meantime I feel like I am missing out on so much despite all of the other amazing work and play we engage in on the ground.
Despite all of this, though, I know that I am also strong AF. But we'll come back to this.
Just as we have been conditioned by society to feel like our bodies are things to be picked apart and corrected to fit some impossible idea of perfection, I believe we are starting to unfairly apply this to horses.
Over the years, I learned more about dysfunction in the equine body and it quickly became all that I saw. Poor posture, over and underdevelopment of muscles, fascial tension lines, hoof angles, the list goes on. I started seeing a horse's body similarly to how I often see my own - as a thing to be fixed.
I'm not saying we should not address tension, discomfort, and compensation patterns in ourselves and our horses. What I am saying, however, is that while we work to make healthy, sustainable changes for the individual, we must also acknowledge and celebrate the body's innate power, strength, and desire to heal.
It's easy to look at yourself in the mirror and point out all of your self-proclaimed flaws because you have an idea of what "negative" traits to look for. It is a heck of a lot harder to look at yourself and take note of everything that you do like about your body, or to at least acknowledge its ability to keep going even if you don't love it.
Once you know what to look for in your horse, it is just as easy to take stock of the areas where they need improvement, too. This tends to takes us away from marveling at their strength and beauty, even in the face of imperfect muscling and posture.
It is so easy to pick apart our own and our horses bodies looking for even the smallest imperfections, and yet so hard to praise our bodies for all of the amazing things they do to allow us to simply get through the day. We take so many of the body's "normal" functions (like breathing, digesting, and moving) for granted in ourselves and in our horses that we forget to even thank them once in a while.
The concept that the horse is our mirror is far from new, but I believe that many of us need to learn to hold our body image of ourselves and of our horses with more balance. Allowing ourselves to fall into the habit of constant manipulation keeps us fixated on the future that may or may not materialize. Allowing ourselves to ignore major areas of physical tension or weakness sets both our own and our horses bodies up to fail in the long term. We must find the balance between recognizing the beauty in what currently exists with our unique visions of what could be with no timeline or attachment to the outcome.
We can, and in all sincerity, we must, absolutely address areas of tension and overall condition of the physical, emotional, and spiritual bodies of each human and horse to move us closer to our goals while also honoring our intrinsic vitality that lives in the here and now. So please, take a moment to thank your body and your horse's body for all that they do - neither needs to be perfect to be miraculous.