Reflection

I've started my graduate classes.  So far I'm loving them.  The classes encourage reflection.  What is leadership?  Can a leader be popular?  What qualities do you value in a leader?  What qualities do you have that you think would make you a good leader?

Tonight we discussed who we are as human beings.   It was a deep and intense conversation.  Lately I've been thinking a lot about who I am as a person.  Over the last five years I've been on a journey that has allowed me to become centered and in touch.  I like to think I know myself well.  I know my good qualities and recognize and work on the less desirable ones.  I know this from a professional, as well as personal perspective.  I work hard at seeing multiple points of view, even when I don't agree with them.

I've been thinking about direction.  How at times the direction my life takes in part defines who I am.  There are times over the last few weeks I've felt as though my identity is shifting.  Is how I perceive myself the same as the perception of the world?  Last week my principal (in effect my boss) told me I'm a force to be reckoned with.  This has bothered me.  I'm not entirely sure I want to be a force.  It certainly doesn't mesh with how I view myself in a professional or personal capacity.  Is this a positive or a negative?  It's made me think.

I've been thinking about the horses.  It's still surreal to me that Whiskey is no longer mine.  And Bacardi is.  I had had Bacardi listed and fielded a number of emails and calls.  I've even had people booked to come view her.  Unexpectedly something would happen and the person would no longer be coming.  It's become something of a pattern.  So I've decided to send the paperwork in the AQHA to transfer her into my name.  This is not the most comfortable decision for me.  I'm left feeling as though there's a gaping void in my life.  How I can I have a horse with no purpose?  I have no purpose for her.  I don't even know what to do with her.  She won't make a cutter which is where my heart lies.  I suppose I could rope off of her but that entails work, purchasing a rope saddle and time that I'm currently lacking.  Working cow horse?  Not my favorite thing to do but I could hypothetically put the training in her so that she'd make a passable working cow horse.  Put her in my close contact and start popping her over fences?  I don't know what I want to do.  I feel lost.  A boat with no rudder bobbing on a lake.  An English speaker in France.  You get the picture.  I wonder how not having an equine goal impacts who I am.  Or does it?  Does it make horses any less part of who I am?  Do I even know how to enjoy just riding?  Can I just ride?  Or will I self combust without a focal point?