“I think, therefore I am.” This quote is possibly one of the strongest arguments for human consciousness. Yet, in order to understand what consciousness really is, or how it separates us from other animal with which we inhabit the earth, we need to look to what it is we really think about, and further, just how these thoughts separate us from what is otherwise known as consciousness. Because the reality is, the two are separate — this is also what is known as a “bicameral mind”. We are comprised of both an experiencing self, and then a self that has thoughts about that experience. And just as any person knows, the two are not at all the same. Even worse, there is a tremendous amount of confusion around where the truth lies. After all, is a person comprised of his/her experience, or is he/she defined by the thoughts about the experience? And how would a person know what his/her experience really is, if the thoughts about it dominate his/her existence? Well, in order to answer this question, we need a way to learn about what it is to simply experience, without thinking, judging, planning, or assuming. And so we look to the horse.

The horse does not have a bicameral mind, meaning that he only experiences; he does not think about the experience itself. Sure, he may remember something that happened from yesterday, or even many years back, but he is not able to make judgments on that occurrence. What, of course, this alleviates for the horse is the presence of self-consciousness, and illuminates the fact that a horse is made up of a perceiving, sensing self, that lives in the present experience.

Now let’s compare this to a human who encounters a new experience, such as attending a dinner party. While he/she may actually be experiencing trepidation, his sense of self is rooted in the thoughts about wanting to be liked, and what he/she should do to facilitate this. Never is there ever an acknowledgement of fear. And yet, one might wonder how can a person act or behave in a way that pleases others if he/she is not even aware of what is happening under the surface? And so what does a person do? Well he/she may revert to what is considered “right” and “good” in social contexts. Maybe he/she remembers social custom, religion, or perhaps even family values. Now are these tenets of his own experience (i.e.: what he/she feels), or are they constructed from thoughts? And where does the real identity lie?

Yet if this person we to meet a horse, the four legged animal would only know one thing — that is what is happening now. Not what should happen, did happen, or may happen, but simply what is. In this way, horses call upon us to abandon, if only temporarily, that which removes us from our experience. They ask us to be what we are, not what we want to be, or should be, but simply as we are. And in doing so, they ask us to find ourselves there.