Humans Healing Humans

Chapter 10

In 1997, even though I had built a successful career in the film business, I found myself spending every second I could with horses. Being and interacting with them, understanding what they were saying with their body language and having relationships much like the way I would with another person. I loved the way I felt with horses. It was actually therapeutic.

However, even though I found being with horses therapeutic, I knew I needed some human help. Unlike a horse, only another man or women with the knowledge of our unique human mind, emotions, ego and self-awareness could thoroughly help me identify my faulty belief systems, ineffective coping skills and the origins of my feeling inadequate.

In September of that year I began to see a psychotherapist named Gail. During one session Gail said to me: “Tim, do you love yourself?” I remember feeling completely baffled. I didn’t know what she meant or what she was talking about. The very idea felt uncomfortable and seemed egotistical and self-centered. It turned out to be one of the most important questions I have ever been asked.

Gail explained that to love myself simply meant that I didn’t need to rely on any person or thing outside myself to feel happy and content. Although another person or thing, e.g. money, job, career or peer recognition, is important and could add a great deal to my feelings of success or contentment, they were not the source of what was necessary to love myself. She said to actually love myself required having feelings of self-worth, self-respect and knowing and believing that I alone was important and that I mattered.

When a child grows up hearing affirmations that tell him or her they’re wonderful without needing to do anything, they feel loved, lovable, worthy and that they matter. They learn to love themselves solely for who they are and not for what they have or do. This is one definition of unconditional love. It is the expression of this unconditional love that a child must feel from his or her parents in order to grow up with love for themselves.

In my final session with Gail she made it very clear that I should not blame my parents for not teaching me how to love myself. She said my parents like many other parents probably didn’t know how to express or model what she called healthy loving parenting because their parents probably didn’t know. If growing up and being parented with healthy love was something I missed but was necessary to love myself, feel worthy and that I mattered, I needed to know what was meant by healthy loving parenting. I began to read every book I could find on children, love, relationships, and what some called healthy loving parenting. And as I began to learn about the love being expressed with healthy loving parenting, it quickly became apparent it was identical to the same Love I had witnessed in the Herd Dynamics of horses.