Float House Victoria: My review!

Curious about floating and immersion therapy? I did it yesterday and I’m here to tell you all about it!

My pod!

First off, let me assuage your fears about immersion therapy (I know because I kind of had them too, but curiosity won out!)

The tank can be lit, and you choose to be in absolute darkness or not- the buttons are big and easy to press if you want lights back on. The darkness is absolute, meaning you won’t really know if your eyes are open or closed! The tank is easy to climb out of and you won’t get trapped in it. It’s total privacy- each tank has its own room with a shower. They start the session with light music, and then usher you out with ‘wake up’ music and the light gradually changes.

The sessions are 90 minutes long, and if you’re anything like me, that seemed like a LOOONG time to be stewing in a salt pod with your own poisonous thoughts marinating your brain. But…I’m also here to tell you that as someone that has a difficult time with ‘stillness’, it’s totally cool and you will fidget and move a bit, but then you’ll just…settle and won’t even think about anything. Trust me. I have many hamster-treadmill bad thoughts running my brain daily (also known as ‘life’) but in the tank? Absolutely nothing.

Also- they warn you a few times not to make too many ripples in the water because splashing your face & eyes STINGS like a motherfucker and of course I did that immediately. Ouch. And you shower before you get in the tank to remove makeup, lotion and shampoo, and then shower afterwards to clean salt out of your hair & body. I would recommend ear plugs-that they provide- because I still feel like I have salt water sloshing in my ears, and I did use a neck support floaty, because my head had a hard time dealing with floating on my puny stalk of a neck.

I even sort of fell asleep- as someone with stress related insomnia that is a very unusual thing for me! It also didn’t really feel like sleep? It felt more like my brain was allowed to go quiet. I did love the suspended-in-air feeling too, it’s so neat. The 90 minutes goes SO fast- I know what you’re thinking but it’s true, it goes amazingly fast and I’m generally an impatient person but wow…time’s up already? Getting up and hatching myself out of the pod and into the world felt like a cruel joke- so many noises and lights.

I would recommend you try a session in a float tank. It’s pricey (mine was a gift, it is around $75/session) but the gift of stillness for a busy mind is SO valuable.

Is this love? Or the love of the chase

Funny, two songs I’ve been hearing lately have this refrain in them:

“You never loved me, you love the chase.” From ‘The Stars’ newest album, ‘No one is lost’

-and-

“Is this love? Or the love of the chase…” From ‘Future Islands’ newest album as well.

So, there is obviously a theme. Why are they resonating with me so strongly?

I’ve been struggling with connections lately. Last year’s showing season with Oats had a lot of ups and downs (I fell off almost every show! what the heck!) and I couldn’t figure out why this was happening. I know how to ride, Oats knows how to jump so…???

I have been making progress on this by committing to dressage lessons and that has been good but tough. I want to make even more progress, want to go into jump lessons and horse shows ‘eager’ not backpedalling and wanting to get off, or freezing when we step foot in the show ring.

I even decided not to show at the Appy club shows this year because I wasn’t looking forward to it!  Showing costs way too much $$$ to not have fun with it. At all.

So, my trainer Karen set me up with an equine wellness facilitator, to figure out what is going on in my head. And as it turns out, a lot of anxiety.

Anxiety- So, this seems appropriate.

The rushing, too-fast, speedy feeling I have all the time is my brain not connecting well with my body. I tend to have ‘out of body’ feelings when I step into the show ring, and I feel like I am ‘watching myself’ instead of doing it- riding, experiencing, anything. I don’t hear my trainer when I am like this, I hold my breath and end up gasping, and I rush rush rush through a course- my brain is moving too fast for me to keep up!

It’s funny- the facilitator ran me through a meditation exercise, and all I could think was how much I wanted it to speed up!!? That’s NOT the point, silly me!

Taking the time to align my poor brain with my body is a process. I am going to try and see how it goes. I’m trying to manage my anxiety, something I most likely have been cultivating for years through work, family issues, horse issues, etc.

And I felt like, last year at this time, I was ready to try dressage lessons. Oats and I could take that next step.

Oats at Sooke Saddle Club dressage: Photo courtesy of Eila

This year, I am ready to manage my anxiety, and work to strengthen my relationship with Oats.

So, this is a positive progression (even if the other side of my brain is like horses aren’t rocket science, why are you so worried? Anxious? What are you so afraid of?). I guess I’m not always sure- I’m afraid of getting hurt (see- the recent accident with my mom), and I’m afraid of looking stupid and screwing up my horse.

I’m not sure how I got to this point, but I do feel like it is manageable, and the next logical step I can take to have a more positive relationship with my horse, and my trainers (maybe my husband, family, and my work? Better not get too greeeeedy)…

Run wild

I am still doing positive jump course visualizations every day while I walk to work- I pick my most recent jumping lesson and try to ‘see’ how I rode it. I think it is helping as well.

My rides on Oats this weekend were fine, Saturday was better than Sunday (was a bit distracted Sunday, had friends visiting so was chatting instead of paying attention! bad me!).

Other than that, this week started with a real BANG of bad vibes. Sick bunny (he is doing better already, pheww) Work flying off the handle……eeeek!

Don’t tell me what you are going to do. Tell me what you’ve done.

In a nutshell, my blog.

There’s a reason this blog posts recaps, not ‘pre-event’ details. I don’t love sharing what I am planning to do, primarily because I haven’t done it yet and it is not a guarantee I will do it!

I find there is an inherent risk in telling everyone your plans (want to make God laugh? Tell him your plans…or something like that, given I do not believe in any gods).

That’s why my horse shows are recaps, my races are recaps and my riding lessons are details after they happen. Because, there is always the risk they won’t. And I am not the type of person who makes grand plans, tells everyone about them, and then just…doesn’t follow through. I am the person who makes those plans, doesn’t necessarily need to share them, and then follows through – and provides a recap! 🙂

I don’t like telling people what I am going to do. I tell them what I’ve done.

Obviously, I do plan things out (signing up for races and horse shows definitely requires advance notice with my trainer, husband, friends, etc). But, there is a difference between planning things out, and kind of staying on the down-low, and bragging. The bragging can happen after the fun event! Hahah and of course there is always bragging- I try to keep humble but hey we are only human. Usually I am no superstar at either horse shows OR running, so the bragging is limited to a ‘hey I completed this event! Yay!’.

I’m finding these days, that I’m even *gasp* looking forward to running? How odd! I feel twitchy and needy when I don’t do it. Last week, I was edgy and kind of wanting to get a longer run in (who is this person??) because it felt like ages since I had run. Ages eh?

I ran a 10k race on Mother’s Day! It hadn’t even been a week?!

Funny how that happens, eh?

Hold me, Kiss me, Thrill me, Miss me, Tell me

Reading a very interesting sort of ‘noir’ mystery about a shady businessman who goes missing, and his lover who ends up dead (that’s where the title is from).

After I’m Gone by Laura Lippman is a good read, more of a thorough investigation into family dynamics than a hard-boiled mystery but nonetheless quite intriguing.

The story starts with a lovely epigraph from the poet Edna St. Vincent Millay:

Where you used to be, there is a hole in the

world, which I find myself constantly walking

around in the daytime, and falling in at night

And how are things in general? Well, I was riding a high from Tuesday, and on Wednesday I had scheduled my friend to ride Oats, do a bit of a schooling ride, and see how he went for her. A younger rider was considering half-leasing Oats, and I wanted to make sure he was on his best behaviour, so she didn’t get scared or anything if he was a brat.

He went wonderfully! I was very pleased with his behaviour. He was a good boy, and boy it looked nice to see someone riding him well (turns out we’re not exactly the best judges of our own riding, apparently!) so it was a real treat to see him go nicely with another rider, who was well capable of getting the kind of work I ‘feel’ I am getting out of him.

The younger rider hopped on and was fine as well- she didn’t get enough ‘motor’ out of him, which was fine and generally tends to happen with less experienced riders, or riders who just aren’t used to newer horses who need one foot on the gas pedal! haha

Overall I was quite anxious about how he would behave, and he made me feel proud of him. Phew!

Anxiety or me all the time

Now Wait For Last Year

Another year, another graduation. It feels like only last fall I was finishing up my Master’s degree, and now husband is finished his.

I like convocations to come at the end of the semester, because it feels like a natural bookend, a closure-event.

And this was no exception- it’s a time to move on, to put things behind and see what the future holds.

At the banquet offered by his school of business, one of his professors stood up and spoke. While I was mostly tuning out the other speakers (I want to write ‘talkers’ because that’s kind of what the day felt like), this professor was different. I agreed with what he was saying, and it was really engaging. He was interesting. What did he say, that so resonated with me?

We can’t mark time by years passing- we just get older. The Greeks had two definitions of time: Kronos (normal time marked by seconds/minutes/hours) and Kathos (I think that’s how it is spelled?) which is time marked by events in which you, for that period of time, are true to yourself. You are glorious, you encompass all, you are yourself in that moment. And the beauty of Kathos-time, is that as you age- you have many experiences in that time. So, growing older is a good thing, it means you have enjoyed many moments of Kathos time in which you were truly yourself.

That did resonate with me. He also spoke of our many ‘selves’ and how conflict can come about when our ‘selves’ do not match up or align. Sometimes they are a bit off- hell, always, but in the major cases? That’s when relationships end, new relationships start, jobs end, new jobs start, and you move houses/states/countries. Change is hard.

I think for the most part my ‘selves’ are aligned – who I see myself as, how others see me, and how I want to be seen.

I struggle sometimes with who I see myself as, and how I actually am. I want to be a writer and publish a book, I want to be a great hunter/jumper rider who soars confidently over fences. In reality? I have NOT published a book- nor have the inclination to right now- but am still jealous about others who have. And I struggle DAILY with fear- fear of jumping, embarrassment, horse show pressures.

So, no, I am not wholly aligned. But the beauty of that is that in my experiences (riding, writing, even work sometimes), is that I am experiencing Kathos-time. Time when I am most MYSELF!