co created rides//with intro

The rides I remember and cherish MOST are the ones where my horse/s were interactive.  I call those co-create rides. I would trade 20 everyday trail rides for one co creative ride, because they are magical ! This episode speaks to how co create rides got started for me.

For more information on names or materials referenced, or to contact Ishe- please email. iabel.hhc@gmail.com

Transcript

0:03

This is the Horse Human Connection, a captivating podcast where we extend into the world of equine assisted learning, horse training. and gentleness in working with these magnificent creatures. Captivating stories from the leading professionals and ordinary people alike unravel novel ideas in being with horses. The Horse Human Connection is an idea, a place, and a voice. The idea is to support the quiet revolution and recognize the intelligence and true nature of the horse. The place is a destination farm near the Umpqua Forest and River that slows down visitors and patrons enough to experience the shift. The Voice is this podcast. Welcome to today's episode.

Samson Q2U Microphone: 1:05

Hi, this is, is she able with the horse human connection? I'm starting this podcast because. I want to answer questions and I want to ask questions. And a lot of it centers around horses and it all started with cows. And there's some cow stories that I've told that. Leads you into some of what happened with the horses, but there was a shift. And it's a shift. I think a lot of people are experiencing. So it's very, very worth. Talking about. I rode at stables as a child. I can remember a couple of key points. From way back then. I remember. Someone put me on a horse. I was probably, I don't know, four or five or six. And we went on a trail ride. It was in the Sierra Nevada, and it was up a steep mountain trail. It was wide. It wasn't like a narrow deer trail. It was a three or four foot foot path. But I remember being afraid and someone telling me. That horse has four feet. You have two, you could walk on this easily. They can walk on it twice as easily. That helped me not to be afraid. I trusted that helped me trust the horse. It made perfect sense. It was logical. And I did feel safe. I remember another time I was taking a lesson maybe for the first time. And. It was a Western style in California and they explained that to me and how to hold the reins in your left hand. And keep the balance of the rains and your right hand on your leg. And they told me. Don't be afraid. Don't let the horse think. You're afraid. You're the boss. And as a child. I didn't know how I was going to convince the horse of that. Cause I was scared. It was a big animal. And much later years and years and years and years later. That moment has come back to me and I never want to teach children that. And I know now that horses don't. Tolerate in congruence very well. And in congruence has when we feel one way on the inside and show something else on the outside they are masters of knowing intention and they've had to be to survive. As a wild species. If there's a Cougar. Out there on the outskirts, the horses know of that Cougar had breakfast or not, or when it last ate. They have o. Yeah, horses can read your pulse and your heart rate from 60 feet away. And. The more we know about horses, the more we know about neuroscience and. And books like horse brain human brain. And what actually happens when we connect with them. The more interested. I am. Very fortunate to have had. A mentor and trainer. Who. Really understands horses and understands neuroscience because she's a human trauma therapist. And. Over about a three-year period about once a month, she would come. Either for the whole day or sometimes for the weekend. And I studied and I learned it. Wasn't always easy. In fact, it was often very difficult to open myself to the new learnings. But I did. And. I learned so so much. And I'm so grateful to have had all of the great teachers that I've had. In 2016, I set upon a quest to learn more about equine assisted learning and experiential learning. And I visited equanisity retreats in British Columbia. And Kamloops British Columbia with Liz mitten, Ryan and. When I got home from a week there. My entire relationship with the horses changed. My horse has changed, actually, it was me that had changed, not them, but, but we were, we were connected in different ways. And the reason I wanted to go to equanisity in the first place was I saw it on Facebook and there were people laying down, cuddling with horses, the way people cuddle with their dogs. And. This was just beyond anything I could imagine. I didn't even know if it was real. But it was real. And I came home excited to do 20 case studies. That involved me just taking notes and staying out of. it Having other people come to interact with the horses. In a, in a way where there was an intention that horses could help. Healing. With people. And that's a pretty broad category as I see it now. But as I saw, then that the mantra trust and allow was what was given to me. And take notes and stay out of it. And I did this, I had 20 different case studies. And amazing things happened. But when I came home with this excitement to tell my herd of three horses, that this is what I wanted to do. And scolded them for pinning ears and backing up to each other and having some what I would call now, unnecessary roughness in a, in a large penned area together. I said, if we're going to have people come in and do this, you guys cannot carry on like that. And my gelding laid down. Right next to me. He had never done that before. He just laid down. at Equinuisity when you really open your heart, sitting with the horses is when they will lay down with you. It's. Probably the intention there. It may have started very organically. It probably did. But it's a measure. Horses are so much more intelligent than people give them credit for. They are so much more empathetic than people know. And that's what I want to talk about. I call this the quiet revolution. Where. I've talked to a lot of people who studied equine-assisted learning who read the Dao of Equis, who. However familiar with EAGALA. And. and. A lot of other people. Opening up to different relationships with horses, something other than dominance. Something other even then benevolent leadership. Newer training methods. Higher consciousness, relationships and they're possible. And that's what I want to tell people and ask people and talk about. And why, why is it easier for some people than others? And things that feed into that are. Our clairvoyance. And telepathic communication. And even neurodivergence. And so those are topics too. I have a really special horse named Firefly. She came to us as the last horse that summer, I had a husband who is a bit OCD and he had this idea to get horses. And if he had all these horses, he could train them and. His family would come visit more because there'd be a horse for everybody to ride, or I don't know. The vision was something like that. And I remember during that time, there were a lot of horses on the market because feed had become expensive and the economy wasn't that good. And people even told stories of having to lock their horse trailers in our county when they went for rides at public places, because otherwise you come home, come back from a trail ride and somebody would have left an abandoned horse in your trailer. Because I thought a fancy trailer could take better care of that horse and they could. So there were free horses out there on Craigslist and lots of horse ads. And. I'm not sure exactly what happened, but I blinked and we had six horses. And. I kept wanting this one particular horse that I knew, the people that had raised her. And she was older. And the husband at that time kept saying, we don't want a 19 year old horse. That's too old and blah, blah, blah. So finally, I got a text from. Ah, the granddaughter of this, this woman who'd raised this horse who said, you know, Firefly. Has been dropped in in the beginning of the summer, she was advertised for 1200 and now she was 200 and she came with a brand new blanket. And the granddaughter was just terrified that this horse who'd belonged to her mother at one point was going to end up at the meat market. If somebody didn't go get her. So I said, okay, just go get her. Let's just go get her. So we went in. And. The original owner got on her and rode her. And she was a Fox Trotter and she remembered everything and she was sound and she was so happy to get in that trailer. And we brought her home. And she was my horse. And we bonded right away. I'd read this book by Moni Roberts, called life lessons with a ranch horse that just was magical and had this mystical relationship of this rancher who had this relationship with a horse who he learned to listen to because. It was a Bayer or it was a Cougar or the stream was washed something out or all of these things that this horse had known that or woven into this story. And that's the horse I want, I want a horse like that. So one of the first times I was writing Firefly. I'd been ridding this, other black horse who was younger. She was an appendix, she was hire strong and something spooked. Or you have to take her up off a hill, up a hill to calm her down, you know, and let her run it out a little bit. So I kind of expected, I was a pretty novice writer. And I kind of expected this Firefly to be the same way. So there was this cat hiding. In a culvert and there was a rock at the edge of the culvert to kind of mark it. So you could see it from the road and. And I said, watch out, there's a cat in there. To the horse and she turned around and she looked at me. And she put her head down and she knocked the rock. It was a sizable rock, the size of the horse's nose. And she knocked that rock. Right. Into the culvert where the cat had been in, of course the cat jumped out and, and left and she turned around and looked at me again. And I swear in my head. I heard her say, I don't like cats. And I thought, well, this is the kind of communication that book talked about. This is my horse. This is going to be wonderful. I've had that horse now for 10 years and she's been retired for, for six. She still helps out. Every time, there's an interaction. She is. Truly amazing. And wise and. Supportive. She's one of the most supportive people in my life and she's not a person. That's the kind of relationship that people can have with horses. Even when she's not being ridden, even though. She's let me know a long time ago, her arthritis was too bad and it just, she's afraid she'll go down with, with a person on her back and she doesn't want to hurt anybody. And it hurts her. I want people to know that. If you have a horse and you have a problem. Don't get rid of the horse. It's an invitation. To look deeper into yourself and into the relationship, which is almost always a metaphor for something else. I hope these are the kinds of things that interest people in this podcast. And. More things that happened with Firefly. I've just got to tell you more. I at one point, like I said, we had all of these horses. And so there was one that this one horse who was well-trained, she was English. Trained in English. She belonged to this boarding. School. And she was a character because they told us a story. When we, when we brought her home that. They thought some of the kids at the boarding school had been letting the horses out of the barn, opening the doors and letting them out. So they put up a camera. And what they found is that this particular horse, we ended up calling her gingerbread. was doing, was she was letting just the horses she liked, I guess there were a couple horses she didn't like, and she would let her friends out at night and they would all get out to the pasture. get out of the barn and it wasn't the kids at the school at all. It was this horse who'd figured out how to lip the lock. Anyways, there was something about gingerbread. Nobody really wanted to ride her anymore. I don't think she really wanted to be ridden anymore. She was older too. But I remember. Feeling bad, we'd go on these trail rides and we just leave her there. Like, she'd be the only horse then she'd get all anxious and upset and pace because she was only one left there and everybody else was off at the branch riding. And. One day. I had this idea, at least I thought it was my idea at the time. Now I know it was Firefly. But the idea was this, just open the gate and let her come with us. And I thought, well, that could be problematic. No, it'll be okay. So we opened the gate and she came with us just like the dogs came with us on the trail. Ride. And when she got distracted by grass and fell behind, we just kind of whistled like we did for the dogs and call her by name and she'd catch up. The ranch was perimeter fence. So she wasn't going to get off anywhere. But she always stayed with the group. And. At the time. I really wasn't that aware that I would have never had that idea. I know it was Firefly suggesting that she come at what we call at Liberty. Well, this led into a very natural consequence later on, especially after Firefly was retired she wouldgo for rides. With the adept point, there were three or four horses. And I would get on one and she wasn't trained very well. Like I'd spent a year on the ground with this horse had been mistreated when I got her because somebody decided they wanted a horse and they knew absolutely nothing. And I don't know what they did to her, but she was terrified of ropes and she checked out and she would just like, Freeze. But a year on the ground, developing a relationship with her. She started to trust and I could eventually ride her. That husband had just gotten himself a horse, a horse that he really liked, like he'd had gotten all the other horses. Right. So, but this horse was a cow horse that was trained in bread. And it was the first day we were riding. And I was at a point where I wanted to teach this horse that I had. Sipsy. That I'm up here. Like don't run me under branches. Don't run me into trees on the side. I want you to be aware of how tall I am on your back. And to be careful of me, that was my intention. And I was very clear about my intention because my, my trainer was teaching me about intention and how horses can read intention. And there's actually this whole thing that Dominic Barbara and Dr. Katz Manis talk about in there in their book. About how you can have an intention in the front of your head or the back of your head. And if you keep it in the front of your head, That the horses can read it. It is a form of telepathy. I had this clear intention. And he was on his horse and there were two other horses at Liberty and we were all at this pond getting a drink while the people weren't, but the horses were. And suddenly Firefly looked at me and said, okay, let's go. And she turned around and we went up this trail that I'd hiked on, but I'd never ridden on it because it was a very narrow little deer trail with lots of branches and trees. And things to navigate an obstacles and it led to the top of the knoll so she took off up the hill,at a trot and PI followed Firefly and Sipsy followed PI. So I'm third in line. And, of course. The husband and, and his brand new horse who really wasn't that experienced on a lot of trails were following us. And he was a little freaked out, not really wanting to go along with all this, but did. We wove in and out of trees and madrones that were curled over. And twigs and everything, and nothing came within an inch of me. I got close but nothing got within an inch of me and I was just riding in a bareback pad. We got to the top of that Knoll. And I realized that Firefly had shown me that I didn't need to teach Sipsy and train her. All I had to do was have the intention. And that was an incredible moment in the beginning of. Where we did several co-created rides. And even though Firefly was retired. She loved to lead us on these trail rides. And they often had a theme, like let's go visit all the water spots on the ranch. And they even showed me a couple of, of wet places where I might've been able to dig for another spring. Lit I didn't know about. And that's all with intention. I believe. That these interactions are possible for most people. If we slow down. Www the horse human connection. We offer events. I offer trainings mostly on the ground. And horse sitting. Where we come in, we just be with the horses and sometimes different, magical things will happen. Anyways. Thanks for listening.