It's all about support...

It’s all about support.

IN THE COMPANY OF HORSES INC.·TUESDAY, JULY 5, 201622 Reads

In our everyday life as in our horsemanship, it’s the way we support our intended outcome that either gets us what we want or gets us something else. Let us look at two different examples, an example from life, and an example from horsemanship:

It’s 10 year old Johnny’s responsibility to take out the trash every Friday. How his family or caregiver supports him in getting the trash out, in the teaching phase, will sway Johnny’s attitude; our relationship to Johnny and his responsibility around taking out the trash and potentially other responsibilities as well.

With our horses, how we support our requests will shape their attitude and our relationship to our horse and his ability and attitude around taking responsibilities. Let’s say it’s Dobbin’s responsibility of standing in the barn isle while we groom him.

If we start reminding Johnny to take out the trash on Thursday morning, then again on Thursday night and come Friday morning, we are waiting to see if Johnny doesn’t take out the trash, what attitude from Johnny, do you think that will elicit. Back to Dobbin in the barn isle, if we start out by putting him on cross ties so he is not able to look around, move or share opinions or ideas about things, we will elicit a certain attitude from Dobbin.

If we put him in the barn isle and drop his lead rope on the floor in front of him and tell him exactly what we want, then allow him to take his responsibility, we may elicit a very different attitude from Dobbin. If we wait until Friday night or Saturday morning to see if the trash is out, and then support Johnny’s actions, either with praise or consequences, that could elicit other attitudes from Johnny.

Gratitude and Consequences. So what are the possible ways we could support Johnny and Dobbin in taking their responsibilities and being happy about it? Gratitude, natural consequences and positive reinforcement is one way to be while we support and distrust and punishment or negative reinforcement is certainly another way. Laying out natural expectations and natural consequences in advance is honest and forthright. Laying these things out ahead of time creates good will and clarity about what is to come. If we are to trust that they will respond to gratitude and good will, we need to let them make the mistake before we correct them. Come Saturday morning, if the trash is not out, then it is time for the natural consequences; If Dobbin wanders into the tack room, the natural consequence is to put him back in the barn isle.

Consider this: in a time where we do not need horses and they do not have actual responsibilities, like, carrying the families livelihood to and from the market or pulling the logs from the mountaintop to the homestead sight or to carry our warriors into battle, these animals who have been domesticated and employed into the service of human kind for centuries will make up stuff to do! Truly, a job or responsibility like stay where I put you or maintain gait or maintain direction or stand still while I get on is very little to ask of horses who are partly responsible for the advancement of human society as we know it!

Consider this story of Taylor Wilson, a 9 year old boy who was able to achieve nuclear fusion. There are less than 40 people in the entire world who have achieved this complicated reaction. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taylo... and you can read a piece of how his parents fostered his unique behavior http://tomclynes.com/the-boy-who-pl....

Even the most talented race horse, an elite member of his kind can manage multiple responsibilities like stand still when I ask and go fast when I ask. Self discipline is an important skill for all and the way a horse’s or human’s community supports them in being responsible shapes the behavior and attitude of the one being supported!

The things that are important to you are the things that will be important to your horse and the humans around you! Moreover, those little things are the things that make life with those around us happy and easy and create value for those in the future of our horses.

Look around to see where you are taking away opportunities for your horse to be responsible. How about self loading in the horse trailer? What about maintaining the walk on the lunge without constant encouragement? How about follow the rail or follow the trail without stopping to eat? The thing is, you want to be clear about what the desired behaviors are, then look for positive ways to reinforce them. Attitude and Time are great tools for teaching!

EAGALA Advanced Training~ The art of improvisation creates great partnerships!

In the Company of Horses Inc. just returned home from the bran new training created by Lynn Thomas, the co-founder of the international certifying body of the Equine Assisted Growth and Learning Association (EAGALA) .
We journeyed to Long Island to Pal O Mine Equestrian Center where we spent three days in the company of fourteen people who came to learn how to create even quicker results facilitating learning by way of the horses!

Any mental health professional who works both in the office and in the arena, knows clients find the solutions to life's problems much quicker in the company of a horse. The horses actually become the human client's  issues on a live storyboard and play out the solutions with them!

On this story board, this little one armed  wooden bunny became their metaphor for  their
"Higher Power"  The horse was labeled as the metaphor "us exploring." 

It's fascinating work and while working through our 'issues' can be challenging it can be lots of fun. What we spent three days practicing was how to be a better facilitator/team member/ listener/ sounding board through the actor's world of improv!

You've seen it on Saturday Night Live when an actor throws out a one liner and another just picks it up and runs with it, then they toss it back and forth until it flows into a whole story. Well, that's an art.  And when there are 14 people doing that on the first day, it's hard!  But by the third day when we were doing it in our own familiar facilitation teams, it was easy and fun and the best part is, it's all about the horses.  So the client gets to explore their own answers to their own questions through the activity of the horses in real time, in real life and the focus is not on them, making the client in the arena feel safer and more willing to map their AHA! moments onto their own lives.

Sometimes over our three day training the team from In the Company of Horses Inc. were the facilitators and sometimes we were the clients.  As clients,we took the opportunity to work out some of the things that seem to be patterns of stagnation in the effort to expand into our neighbors back yard so to speak.

 For twenty years our neighbors have been the Military bases of Ft. Dix and McGuire Air force base. Now merging into a super base including Lakehurst Naval Air Station with the new name JBMDL.  For the past 10 years, our nation has been at war and many of our neighbors have been deployed and returned home with new concerns within their families.

 In the arena back at Pal O Mine there were a herd of donkeys moving around looking very uniform and they reminded us of a regiment of military people.  One thing led to another and before we knew it, we found solutions to our stagnation problem and there were the whole herd of dark grey donkeys in our space!  Now we get to use those new found solutions to help our neighbors!

You have to qualify to do the advanced training, all the info is on the EAGALA site.  I highly recommend it!

As the herd leader; so goes the herd..........

We were traveling home to New Jersey from Tennessee on Friday night.  The rain held off since about noon but now it was dark, around 9:30 PM.  We had been traveling with the horses since 9:30 that morning.  Our overnight stabling place was just a half mile off highway 81 which made me very happy.  There is nothing fun about traversing the Virginia country side in the dark with a thirty foot horse trailer after ten hours on the road. We found the place just where the directions told us it would be.

The woman who answered the phone when we made the arrangements suggested we choose stalls instead of the paddock because there were severe storms predicted for the overnight hours and there are no outside shelters.  So we agreed.  These were the storms that devastated North Carolina over the weekend, so they were right. The stalls were 12x12 and in the large indoor arena.  We were able to have a bit of a play with the horses when we got there.

So many things to be grateful for, but I was miserable. I hate box stalls with three solid walls and no way for the horses to hang out the front to see other horses.  I felt like I was putting my horses in jail cells and slamming the doors closed! Valentine was running laps in her stall, kicking the walls and Sterling was crying out loud. I didn't want this experience for my young colt, I wanted him to be happy and feel safe.   My friend's horse was fine, quiet, eating.  My friend was reminiscing about her show days and her time at the horse center nearby where she went to school.  She offered me some Rescue Remedy for my horses, I took a big swig.  I couldn't get  near either of them with it.  I was so annoyed that I just gave up and leaned on Valentines stall cage while she paced.

In a moment or two, I was tired and just being there and I felt Valentine's nose pushed hard against the cage breathing in my hair, deep breaths.  It was so comforting that I didn't even notice that she left me until I heard her munching on hay.  Sterling was quiet ~ all was quiet.

My friend asked if it was ok if she went and turned off the lights. I was immediately annoyed again and said something sharply about the lights and like synchronicity,  Sterling started Crying and Valentine pacing.  Then I realized, the only problem was me!  My herd was going the way I was going and clearly they didn't like the way I was going, considering how hard Valentine was smelling my hair.  After this startling revelation; now around midnight,  I was able to be quiet again and then go out to my camper to sleep.  Sterling called some, but in the morning, every blade of Valentine's hay was gone, no sign of trampled hay or spilled water.  I was grateful that she managed to get herself together and eat and drink, Sterling did the same.

Traveling to and from Tennessee April 2011

In the end, I still don't like those kinds of stalls, but if I could just get my mind right about them, everyone would benefit! 

A family learns by way of the horse

A Mom and Son came to work out an issue they were having in the arena.  Mom teaches yoga and wants her son to have his own yoga practice, which at 10 years old, does not appeal to him.  Son is a football player and looks like one!  They tell us that they have agreed to just do 5 sun salutations every day together, but they never have.
So we send them on a task to use the things in the arena together to "create" a metaphoric place where they will do yoga.  They use all of the hula hoops and make a free standing sphere.  Then we asked them both to go get a horse of their choosing and bring the horse to the yoga place.
Son was doing a lot of talking and bribing and coaxing with the pony.  Mom seemed to just go over and then her horse followed her to the yoga place, then the pony came over to be with them!  The son asked, looking astonished, "How did you do that?"
So we (the facilitators) asked Mom, How did you get these horses to come with you to your yoga place?
She explained that she was taught to greet each being with an open heart, so she went over to the big chestnut thoroughbred opened her heart in a greeting and invited her to join with her heart and she accepted, then the pony just joined in with them.  
We asked Mom, "Where did you learn how to greet each being with an open heart?"  Mom replied that she learned  this from her long time yoga teacher.
This is what she wanted for her son.  While he did not readily agree to have his own yoga practice, he saw how his Mom's practice gave her something special that he wanted.

It was a simple session, but profound.