Riding into Your Mythic Life: Transformational Adventures with the Horse

by Patricia Broersma, Jean Houston (Foreword)

Anyone who has admired a horse galloping across a field has stepped into their mythic life, if only for a moment. Horses are by nature mythic, representing in our collective imagination the human journey at its greatest. In Riding into Your Mythic Life, therapeutic riding instructor Patricia Broersma invites readers on a transformative trip with these powerful creatures, offering strategies to explore lifeâ s events as part of a personal mythic voyage. Broersma draws on more than 12 years of working with horses and adults, teenagers, and special-needs children, blending that experience with thoughtful mythological stories and a range of body-based modalities. Riding into Your Mythic Life teaches skills for developing intuition, compassion, and leadership, and ultimately for stepping into oneâ s greater life. The book encourages an awareness of subtle cues in oneself and others - both horses and people - and ways to orchestrate this awareness to overcome painful life events and lead a more joyful and fulfilling life.

Genres: Animals, Horses, Nonfiction

272 pages, Hardcover

First published October 28, 2007

About the author

Trish (Patricia) Broersma roams the hills and trails surrounding Ashland in southern Oregon on her horses, Mystic and Journey, and offers experiences for people and horses alike to explore new possibilities for their lives. She also enjoys bringing visual brilliance to the deeper vision of those whose work seeks to make a positive difference in our world. Her personal motto is Yii Haa. Since 2003, she has devoted her time to writing, riding, and teaching internationally. In June, 2013 she founded Riding Beyond in southern Oregon, a free program for women recovering from breast cancer treatment. She offers her skills as a graphic designer through her company Green Horse Graphics, where she specializes in print and web media in support of individuals, businesses and organizations making a positive difference in the well-being of our world.

Reviews

[Tami · Rating 5 out of 5]

The author of Riding into Your Mythic Life, Patricia Broersma, is a therapeutic riding instructor who founded Saddle Light Center. She is also an instructor with the North American Riding for the Handicapped and president of the Equine Facilitated Mental Health Association. In her work, this author has seen the healing connection that can occur between horse and human being. It's truly a magical transformation, not unlike that of the hero and his allies in Joseph Campbell's Journey of the Hero.

Riding into Your Mythic Life is an interesting work. The book is part philosophy, part self help, and part horse training guide. The author equates the bonding between a person and their horse in terms of a journey of self-knowledge. The resulting connection further serves to facilitate deep healing within both individuals.

The text itself is filled with touching stories showing the potential of such equine-human relationships. Chapters are organized by topic with each subject building upon the knowledge attained in the previous section. Each of these sections includes practical exercises that serve as a guide to the reader's own hero's quest and the strengthening of the connection between them and their ally.

[Marina · Rating 4 out of 5]

Excellent and accessible, this book outlines how to bring myth into your daily life, particularly a life with horses. Highly recommend to my myth and my horse buddies!

[Evelyn Walker · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book is hard for me to review. I didn't enjoy reading it at all, but in the end it gave me some great ideas for lessons with some of the students I work with through equine therapeutic riding. So I suppose it was worth the time and effort it took to read.

[Susan Miller · Rating 5 out of 5]

I love this book! It resonates strongly with me. I love the visualizations & thoughts on lesson plans. As a therapeutic riding instructor I thoroughly loved this book. I have read it twice & given it as gifts.

[Rena Sherwood · Rating 1 out of 5]

I have the hardback of this by New World Library 2007 ISBN-13 978-1-57731-574-2

This book meanders pointlessly from The Black Stallion to troubled teens staring at horses in paddocks. Broersma describes in excruciating detail "sessions" between people and horses -- and the horses must be equine saints, apparently. No normal horses would do.

Skip it and read The Black Stallion again.

[Amanda · Rating 3 out of 5]

An interesting combination of philosophy, horse training, and stories. I was with the author until she spoke about making her horse into a drum after she died. I understand the importance to the author however it strikes me as disrespectful to the work that Emerald did while alive. Let her rest in peace!