Gallopy Gallop Gallump

With the thunder of a thousand hooves, 17 Feb heralds in the Year of the Fire Horse... read on or listen here.

Horse... wild and loose...

Horse... aghast at the loss of its marbles

The Horse can be a convivial animal, tame and placid, until it’s not, so too this year will be for all of us…perfectly content to trot along nice and sweet until something distasteful challenges you with the chance and choice of which way to go. It will be a stand and deliver moment and up to you to express your displeasure with a “neigh… not that way and not in my name…”

The Horse represents Spirit and Courage yet it’s best to start this year with a healthy dose of Dread. Take a good long look inside yourself. Find those fears. The worst there are. The blackest, darkest, aching moments of despair, the likes of which you could not recover from. The likes of which you’d charge into the Valley of Death (alongside the 600) rather than face alone.

Then understand that life is the same as in the stories. Where heroes, while seemingly cut from brave and daring cloth, seldom start that way. The best tales are told of those with humble, almost cowardly origins who via a call to adventure, meet a mentor, make allies and face those worst fears while being challenged past anything they imagined they’d be capable of. And we are the leads of our own lives. So search for the special within yourself, it’s the key to your life. For this year your Fears will leap into your path and … you have the reins and are as one with your mount. You cannot hide, you can only RIDE. So ride like the wind, trust yourself - your steed is your inner strength, your saddle your courage, your subconscious the reins and this wild strange world is a place to gallop free, filled with emotion and purpose! No fear faced is ever as dark as imagined even in the swamp of sorrows.

FEAR will gnaw at your saddle and reins. You may well bridle in the face of it, but friends will appear. Friends, also galloping the windswept hills, hell-bent on enjoying the ride and racing to achieve the dreams of a return to Normal... for Truth and Decency. For this year is conducive to that – a lot of exceptional yet individual acts of bravery to link together and find the way back to what all agree is acceptable . Remember - Normal is aspirational - Ordinary is not and Abnormal abhorrent. You CAN be Normal AND Extraordinary. Choose life, choose yes and if you’re riding through hell, not only don’t stop but spur yourself on and gallops like your Spirit depends upon it. The only way out is through. 

Photographed on the wall of a travel agent during a recent eastern adventure

This is a year that will either love you THAT much or not love you at all…

However from me Doctor Lobster… Much Love

Hope Dies Last and she’s still playing, neither blind nor down to the last string of her harp like this work by GF Watts. Doctor Lobster's previous adventures available here to cure your every ailment. And it would help to send me your email…