Do you ever just stop in your tracks, look at your (insert your choice: horse, dog, child) and go blank? It’s like the music stopped halfway through the dance. It’s so quiet you could hear a clock ticking. You’re not sure what you were doing, but you have a feeling it was important. Of course, … Read more
Humans, aren’t we swell? Compared to horses, we have dim, frail senses, we’re seven times slower in our response time, and we have the focus of a toddler in a toy store. Horses might give us a paternalistic nod at this point, except for our biggest failing. We have that pesky prefrontal cortex. So, we … Read more
What are you afraid of? Maybe this question. Take a breath and check your shoulders. Are they down where they belong? Move your jaw and tilt your head. Walk an arc. It’s OK, give yourself any calming signal you want. It’s how horses and humans self-soothe and return to the present. Now, can we have … Read more
How many times a week do I tell a client some version of “When we know better, we do better”? It’s a Maya Angelou quote, we all know it. It has no big words, we understand it. And yet we cling to the past. We smear shame, guilt, and remorse all over ourselves as if … Read more
There was a time that I thought if I saw my horse curled to one side, itching his flank, I should run over and scratch the spot for him. That if I could acknowledge his itch and resolve it, in time I could teach him to show me where he had pain. My work with … Read more
My client and I were having an online meeting. We’d been working on a systematic process of getting her and Bradley, her gelding, back to riding. It’s a process that I’ve developed that has space for horses and riders to be individuals, and more than traditional training, we focus on listening to calming signals and … Read more
Ants in your pants. It was a childhood affliction constantly mentioned by adults when we couldn’t sit still in church or school or at the dinner table. Pervasive, chronic, and most of us didn’t grow out of it. I was certain that all the dull talk about patience was just a flimsy defense put out … Read more
Do you notice that it gets a little easier to be yourself every day? Public speaking wasn’t the sort of thing I was born being good at. My first lesson: Everyone thinks it’s a good idea if the person making the presentation breathes from time to time. I listened to podcasts about public speaking, and … Read more
She enters the barn, looking left to right. What does she think her horse might be afraid of? First, let’s adjust everything that is out of place, just tidy the barn aisle up. No pesky plastic is visible. Start with his saddle pad. She’d better let him smell it. Sure, she’d been riding him in … Read more
We would like consistent behavior from our horses. It would be good if they took each cue with light and immediate response. But some days we climb on and don’t feel like doing much. We don’t really have a plan, not that we care. We lollygag around slouching in the saddle and banging our legs … Read more