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Tuesday, February 2, 2010

The Bottomless Pleasure of Horse Addiction

Dick Francis, horse lover and one of my favorite mystery writers, wrote this about horses in his book "Proof":

"Money down the drain, sure, but a bottomless pleasure in return ..."

He was so right! Horses provide bottomless pleasure to humans, regardless of the money down the drain required to keep them in good nick.

Horse feed, horse health care, horse management ... all of these are costly in terms of time and money. And yet, to a horse addict, the bottomless pleasure gained from our equine friends is like food for the soul.

Don't you get endless pleasure from such mundane horsey things as:
  • watching your horse learn something new
  • being with your horses out in pasture, nothing doing, just being
  • sitting with your horses as they eat (they so love it)
  • observing a young horse change and shift as he grows
  • exchanging scent and breath with your horse, a wordless communication
  • bringing a chronically ill horse back to health
  • being amazed at the physical changes in a horse from regular bodywork
  • knowing you are giving a horse a home in times when horses are being dumped
  • watching the personality of each horse as he expresses it in his special way
  • remembering the crazy times, like when your horse broke loose from the sapling to which he was tied and ran about the campground being "chased" by a tree
And then, of course, there is the achievement of harmony between human and horse, that perfect jumper round where every "spot" was perfect, every jump effortless. The blue ribbons don't matter there, but the perfection of communication does.

The Horse Addiction
If I'm going to be addicted to anything in life, I choose horses. Like any addiction, they can be expensive, but so gratifying as well. No single person needs five horses, and yet that is the size of my herd, the size of my addiction.

Luckily, my addiction is legal. Also, I've built, over time, a passive income stream that pays for my horse addiction, month in and month out. I've known very few horse trainers who thrive financially because horses are expensive to keep, regardless. Yet I do know quite a few amateur owners like myself who do thrive, thanks to passive income.

I'm all for people having horse addictions. I hate seeing people struggle financially with their addiction. I'd like to help. If you, like me, are addicted to horses but struggle financially, would you drop me a line? I'll tell you in five minutes what and how I pay for my herd's needs, and what it would take for you to do the same.

Is being able to easily afford your horse addiction worth 5 minutes of your time? If so, here's where I'm at.

If you enjoyed this post, please consider leaving a comment or subscribing to the feed to have future articles delivered to your feed reader. Also, check out my ebook for wacky horses and humans, or holler at me if you want to know how I fund my horse addiction ... and you can, too!

1 comment:

  1. Stephanie,
    What you say is so true both about the pleasure and addiction. I also pay for my horses through passive income. That way I also have more time to enjoy them. Madalyn

    ReplyDelete