#47 Improving Your Seat & Aids with Dave Thind

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:00:02-00:00:13]
On this episode, we're talking with Dave Thind, founder of the Dave Thind Method, a breakthrough combination of Feldenkrais awareness through movement and the German classical training system.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:00:15-00:00:19]
Let's face it, no one's even. We're all a little crooked. Our horses are all a little crooked.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:00:20-00:02:16]
it's important to know what our patterns are it's not important to fix them but what we believe in the feldenkrais method is equal possibilities or range of movement or equal function with equal ease in both directions or both sides of the body.

Welcome to The Equestrian Connection podcast from wehorse. My name is Danielle Crowell and I'm your host. Dave Thind is the founder of the Dave Thind Method, otherwise known as DTM, which is the breakthrough combination of Feldenkrais awareness through movement and the German classical training system. DTM helps you improve your seat, feel what your horse is communicating, and improve the effectiveness and clarity of your aids. Originally from Canada, but now living in the U.S. and spending summers in Germany, Finn himself competed at the Grand Prix level in dressage and jumping. He is a noted equestrian biomechanics authority with several published articles and appearances as an expert judge or lecturer to his credit. He received his German Trainer A license in 2007 with a nearly perfect score awarded to him from the German National Federation. He holds an international training passport level three and is a Guild-certified Feldenkrais practitioner, which means he is able to teach both Feldenkrais awareness through movement and the hands-on work, functional integration. With DTM, you'll awaken your body's innate ability to ride softer with greater feel and better results. You'll also learn how to release the physical and mental tension as well as the, quote, over effort that blocks the full expression of your horse's talent. If you're ready to improve your riding, this episode is for you. So let's get started. Dave, welcome to the WeHorse podcast. I'm super excited to discuss all of the things that we're going to talk about today.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:02:17-00:02:25]
Thank you very much. I really appreciate the invite. I'm excited to be here with you today and to connect with your audience. So thank you again.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:02:26-00:02:33]
Awesome. Can you start by telling us a bit about yourself and how you came to where you are today?

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:02:34-00:05:39]
So that would be a very long-winded story, but to make it short, I've actively been a rider now for over 30 years, started back in Canada in the hunter-jumpers, took that, you know, equitation, hunters, jumpers, that normal North American route, but there was something about German classical riding. I guess even in the jumping was definitely very appealing to me. I couldn't place it. Was it the efficacy? Was it the system or the systematic approach? You know, the way the horses use themselves, the way the riders use themselves. But there was something that I loved. And it wasn't that I didn't like the North American style. I just felt that the two together was something that I wanted to study. So I knew from a young age I wanted to go to Germany and go study, which I ended up doing. But, you know, sidelined by several injuries and ended up not being able to ride. So that process led me to discover something called the Feldenkrais method. which is something that usually people with back aches or neck aches or elderly people come to in order to improve comfort levels and restore movement. But it's actually been applied to help Olympic athletes of various sports for decades. And coming to that was actually what led me on my life path, realizing that there is something to helping people, whether they're uncomfortable with pain or injury or just that they want to be better athletes for their horses, to help them through this neurological reset or learning method called the Feldenkrais method. Yeah. So again, to make it short, I went to Germany, did my trainer education, used a lot of the Feldenkrais principles for myself, for my teaching. Actually, I quite think they thought I was a better rider than I was because they were seeing the Feldenkrais already at this point. And I just kept going with that. And before I knew it, things were changing rapidly in my riding, my level of riding, the show results. I was competing in dressage by then, teaching dressage as well. And I went on to play with Feldenkrais for years within my teaching. So I did the trainer A, which is the third of three levels in Germany, and ran my own stable for over 10 years outside of Boston. And finally, I had the opportunity to take a four-year training in the Feldenkrais method to have that certification and extra knowledge. And from there, I've been having a lot of fun helping riders all over the world with this combination of training of sorts.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:05:40-00:07:16]
Are you feeling inspired to put as much focus on your end of the partnership as your horse's? Here at WeHorse.com, we have over 150 courses with top trainers from around the world, covering everything from dressage to starting young horses to jumping and cavaletti training to groundwork and horsemanship. And we also have courses designed to help you become more grounded and present with and without your horse. This includes courses like the Mindful Equestrian and Matwork for Equestrians with yoga teacher Kathy Woods. Check out WeHorse.com for a free seven-day trial to get started. And as a member, you get access to everything in our WeHorse library to watch whenever you want. And we also have an app, which means you can download a course or video to watch without Wi-Fi, which is perfect for those days at the bar when you just want a quick dose of training inspiration before your ride, or in this case, to ground in and feel a little bit more mindful and present before you meet your horse. So what are you waiting for? Go to WeHorse.com and check out our free seven day trial to access our WeHorse library. See if it's a good fit for you and start training with our amazing trainers today. We can't wait to see you in there. And now back to the episode. Awesome. And before we get into that, because we're obviously going to dive a lot in today with your specific method and like you said, how you've merged this combination. Let's talk a little bit about what Feldenkrais is. Like, how does it work? Can you give us an example?

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:07:18-00:18:26]
All right. So I think a fun way to find out more about it is let's actually all try it. So wherever you are right now, either standing or sitting, Make yourself comfortable. If you're sitting a bit slouchy, it won't work. So if you're on a chair, please sit somewhere on the edge of the chair. That's always a good place to try this. Or you can do it standing. So just take a brief moment to notice where you are in space. If you're sitting, feel your seat bones. Do you feel one more than the other? Make sure your feet are flat on the ground, whether you're sitting or standing. Which foot do you take more pressure on? Or would there be more pressure on if you were in the saddle, in your stirrups? Notice if one knee points in or out, if one knee is further away from you or one closer to you. The same question, just thinking another way. So the Feldenkrais method is very much about these types of questions that bring us internal and through awareness, through movement lessons, which this is a mini, I guess, a mini version. We'll do a two minute experiment. We've already begun to notice where we are in space and then we'll move from there rather than fix things and see if we can find a creative way to improve function. So the function that we'll use as a reference movement, I will ask everyone to please, I won't specify right or left, turn to look behind you slowly. Notice if you did that very fast because the teacher asked. So do it slowly, do it easily, turn to look behind you. If possible, turn only to the same direction three or four times. Notice the speed of the movement, notice the ease of movement. Can you make it smooth? Is there an abruptness somewhere or a roadblock of sorts? And what else in your system moves? Is it only the neck? Is it the eyes? the shoulders the spine the hips we talked about the knees the seat bones and now experiment to the other side do that three or four times notice all those small things that i've suggested i won't list them all because Going through the process much like we do as a rider checklist of sorts when we ride, it helps clarify or illuminate things within our self-image so that we can better use our bodies in space. Pause for a moment. which side was easier and by ease i mean comfortable smooth it doesn't have to be a larger range of motion so please do the experiment again a couple of times in both directions comparing and is it curious that most likely the side that you chose first was the easier one Perhaps, maybe not. But mostly we always go towards what is our preference because it is easier, smoother, comfortable, and to avoid discomfort. This is the same for the horses. And this is why classical training works because we want horses to feel comfortable mentally and physically. And it's the same for us. We'll always seek comfort and ease. all right so please choose one side that you would like to improve and now that you've thought about that most likely the standard process of thinking about improvement is that we want to repair or fix meaning if you found yourself more efficient turning to the right most likely you want to improve the left But Feldenkrais is very different. Again, we're very movement and easy or ease friendly approach where we don't push anything or correct. We will go more into the pattern of what is easy. Therefore, if the right was easy, we will do more to the right. If the left was easy, we'll do more to the left. So for the next few experiments, please only turn to one direction. So if, for example, right was easy, please turn one more time to that easy side. And how far can you look? Meaning, is there a reference point you can remember for our little experiment? Try that again one time just to make sure that we're clear on where our vision brings us easily. Good. Now what we'll do is place our hands if you're sitting on your thighs or if you're standing on your waist. Allow one hand to slide forward in space in sitting. or something like turning, like walking one arm forward if you're standing. And just slide one hand forward and one back. So I will teach the rest as if the right is your easy side, but if not, just switch. So slide your left arm forward across the thigh and the right hand backwards towards the hip. Notice what your elbows do, your shoulders, your shoulder blades, and does your head and neck respond to this movement in any way? What about your spine, your pelvis, your hip joints? Now please imagine that there's a string pulling your left kneecap forward in space and your right hip will come backwards in space. So it'll cause a turning towards the right via bringing one femur or thigh bone forward and one back. Now what we'll do is also feel that if there's any turning in the chest in that same direction. Think about the shoulder blades, the chest turning. If you had a necklace on, does it turn in space? Good. Now what we'll do is think about turning to that easy side. Allow for all of these other pieces, the thighs, the hips, the spine, the shoulders, but do not move the head or the eyes. If you need to block your head with one hand, you may. but perhaps just looking in the distance at one spot where you think about i will keep my head in the middle and i'll make a snapping sound because by now most of you are turning your heads a little so you might have to think about turning a bit in the opposite way so opposite way with the head and the eyes to end up in the middle turning the chest one hip forward one hip back So the question to the system is rotation. It's a riddle of sorts. The system is thinking, well, I want to turn, but I can't. So to clarify that, you can create a block with your hand so that you can actually try to push. If you put your palm on your temple and gently push against the palm, but the palm wins the fight and says, no, you can't turn. and try to turn your whole system, but the hand blocks the head and of course the eyes. Lower your arm, rest for a moment. And this time it will be even more awkward. We will turn everything but the eyes. So remind yourself, look in space, forward, or perhaps even think cross-eyed. Everything will turn as if you wanted to look behind you. You might use your nostrils to breathe in that direction. You might feel that the jaw wants to move in that direction. If you're an animal listening behind you, eyes in the opposite direction, gently. And if you were a fly that wanted to catch something with your tongue, so you can play with that. The tongue even wraps behind you. And please rest in the middle one more time. Now let's go back to our first reference movement of comparison. Please turn back to that easy side using everything, including the eyes. and see if you can go a little further smoother and if you can keep swiveling did your range of movement become larger easier check again just to be sure one hip forward one hip back one shoulder forward the spine and the thoracic spine the chest turns and swivels and come back Most likely you notice the small improvement or perhaps large. And now for the fun part, is it also easier to the other side? So for this experiment, we did not choose a reference point, but we remembered why we did this was that one side was easier, but is it equally easier or at least improved to the less efficient side? So that's more or less an experiment to feel how Feldenkrais works. It's a very different form of learning. It's very friendly to the nervous system. We never come with contradictions or even corrections. We learn about what it is that we're doing. Dr. Feldenkrais said, when you know what you're doing, you can do what you want, which is very simple. And we would love for that to be true. But most people's self-image, meaning the map of themselves in space, is not clear. And that can lead to writing difficulties. It can lead to balance issues. It can also lead to ineffective biomechanics, but also pain over time. So I hope you enjoyed that. Sorry it was longer than two minutes.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:18:27-00:18:58]
That's okay. I loved it. I actually was really enjoying it. I had a lot of trouble moving everything except my eyes. That one was tricky for me. But I definitely felt a difference in my spine. Like the turning, I felt a lot more openness and ability to turn. which is great for somebody who sits a lot and gets kind of stuck in their shape, it seems like. So it was really nice to feel a little bit more suppleness there.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:18:59-00:20:49]
Super. And if I can add some applications within that function. Yeah. We didn't do that as an experiment before doing the lesson, but most likely it would improve walking. I'm not talking about on a horse, but the fact that when we walk, one arm will go forward, one will go back. There's movement of the pelvis. actually a lot of riders in a thought about sitting square in the saddle, shoulders back, not turning, not rolling, all those things, we stiffen up our spine and we lose some of the normal biomechanics that I say normal, non-riding biomechanics, human biped on two legs. In order to walk, jog, there's a turning of the chest and turning of the pelvis of sorts so there's rotation and timing and weight shift which a lesson like this can very quickly restore and in the saddle often people have difficulty by turning so of course the the variation of this type of thing in the saddle depending what we want to do with the pelvis what we what do we want to do with the shoulder girdle And then sometimes, for example, if you learn how to churn well, then we have to remember classical writing teaches us inside hand forward, outside rein, gentle contact. And therefore, you might have to think about a counter flexion through the chest. And otherwise, if we turn too much to the inside, we know we end up possibly hanging on the inside ring. I hope that helps clarify some relevance of how this can apply to our daily lives as well as the writing.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:20:50-00:21:40]
Yeah, there's so much I want to get into here with this is like speaking to, you had mentioned like some common cues that we hear that we don't quite understand. And I know I don't want to jump the gun and start going so far into this because my brain is just spinning. My wheels are spinning. Can you explain to us? how you've integrated this Feldenkrais method and system with riding and, and how they've now merged beautifully together because, you know, like you had explained that it's, it's so good for people dealing with chronic pain and aches and this gluteal system. So as we age, maintaining our bone health and all of those different things, but how do we then apply this to our riding in the method that you've, you've created?

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:21:42-00:30:03]
Well, I think that's a great question. And if it's all right, I'll give you an example of a client that I just worked with before our call. I actually only just met her in person. So mostly, of course, unless people meet me through clinics, I first meet them in a way through my online prerecorded classes, which she did. And then she reached out for some online private writing lessons. Generally speaking, I prefer to work with people privately with these types of lessons, the Feldenkrais awareness through movement lessons, or if I meet them in person through hands-on. But as riders, we like to go straight to the point, how does this work for the riding? All right, so first we pause and we do these awareness through movement lessons. I've structured them in a way that they create most likely a specific result for classical riding. Therefore, there's not a lot of just do the lessons and see what happens. There's a lot of functions that we're directly improving that will just happen spontaneously by doing these lessons and, of course, the combination of lessons. But then again, the next step, for example, someone wants a private, somebody wants a writing lesson, I meet them in a clinic. That's where I have the opportunity to really help combine these things and clarify how we can very quickly access everything we've read in the books, everything our instructors have always told us, but to find an easy solution. whether it's a problem of sitting too much to one side or a little uneven in the contact. Because let's face it, no one's even. We're all a little crooked. Our horses are all a little crooked. It's important to know what our patterns are. It's not important to fix them. But what we believe in the Feldenkrais method is equal possibilities or range of movement or equal function with equal ease in both directions or both sides of the body. And therefore, we end up with symmetry, but without fixing. And the danger of trying to make it look as it should is that there's layers of compensation upon compensation in order to make it look like it's supposed to according to what we believe is right, what the books tell us, what the mirror tells us, what the trainer might want. And, you know, so it's not a free-for-all where you – Don't look towards correctness, but we find it through feeling and clarity of what we're doing, through ease, through correct building blocks. um but in my opinion there is no other way to do this other than first doing the awareness through movement lessons out of the saddle this way we're far away from our habits far away from gripping tightening tensing crooked whatever it is and we find a specific um clarity to major landmarks. So whether we talk about the spine as a landmark, the limbs, the head, the ankles, the arms. So we come to all of these piece by piece in order to clarify the whole 360 self image. as well as restoring some natural movement patterns. So by that, I mean, we're born with certain movement patterns that we were blessed with through not only genetics of humans, but ancestry, whether we're talking about fish movement, we're talking about, you know, compare a fish to a whale. So obviously, if you think of that in a horse, That's the trot movement is the fish movement or the and then you have the canter and all these biomechanics that are there for a specific function through evolution. there's a hierarchy of sorts. So if we improve something primitive or low on that hierarchy, everything above that will function better spontaneously. And other things developmental, such as the child learns to eventually be able to lift up its head. You know, us as babies, not like a horse, we stand up and just go. we're not very not very much made to survive as babies unless our parents look after us or someone's looking after us because the baby is more or less a limp noodle and has to learn to develop so that that movement stuff that's there is developmental primarily there'll be some patterns and for example the stages of crawling before walking But one of the things that has to happen early on is the activation of the back muscles. So imagine a baby on its belly and now learning to lift its head, has to send the abdomen or the spine towards the ground in order to coordinate eye movement with activation of the back, right? So if I say that again, eye movement with activation of the back, That then influences everything we do. So often in riding, we hair, use your back, right? So something like that is said, but the rider is staring down all the time. The staring down told the baby or enables the baby to round and curl and become fetal. Therefore, lower the tone of the spine. And doing that, if we have something that's not in sync, meaning, for example, the rider stares down at the horse's head but likes to try to sit up, there's extra work. It makes us rigid in our spine, makes us rigid within the contact. We maybe get grumpy because we're working hard, but to be smooth, to be easy, and also to stay in that place of the nervous system, which is opposite of flight, fight, freeze, so important for our horses that we come in a very neutral, inviting, safe place as their leader. And we can even say energetically, they have to sense that from us because all these things, whatever it is we do, On a primitive level, if the caveman is worried about a boulder hitting its head, the reflex is to slouch and cover the head. The caveman is worried about being bitten in the throat. We hide the throat latch. The caveman is worried about the reproductive organs. Again, we slouch. But inversely, the caveman is setting up camp. turning, looking around in the horizon. So there's a movement within our pole, if you will, whether it's a yes or no movement. If we're soft there, that will soften the jaw, soften the eyes, which goes with the whole pattern of being in what we call the parasympathetic part of the nervous system, which automatically tells us we are safe, we can sleep, we can digest. There's no tension around the throat. The abdominal wall has zero tension. And then we're safe. We feel grounded. Obviously, as a sport, there's a combination between a very nice interplay between these two automatic parts. of the nervous system, but it does not help any rider or any horse if the rider is at any point stuck knowingly or unknowingly in the sympathetic. We end up perhaps fetal, nervous, too strong in the mouth, The contact, gripping, tight, crooked, trying too hard, working against ourselves. And it can be really terrible if we're on a sensitive horse that this information is basically telling the horse, the leader is nervous, run. Yeah.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:30:04-00:30:46]
Yeah, absolutely. When you said that, the gripping, the overworking, basically, of the rider. So we have the strong engagement, all of the different cues that we generally hear, shoulders back, engage your core, all of those different things that then puts us, whether consciously or subconsciously, into kind of a state of gripping. What are some common riding cues that... people are getting wrong in their bodies. So is there a way that we can reword the riding cue from the instructor or another way to think about them so that we're not gripping in our bodies?

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:30:48-00:35:21]
That's wonderful. So I think the key word that you said was rewording. So words have so much power. This is why I think it's very interesting. I've made an effort to study writing terminology, both in German and in French, because I think listening to words, for example, the half halt, I think it's a terrible word or terrible expression. it has nothing to do with half stopping it makes people use their hands too much so um the half parade was i guess what it would translate to alparada or demi-parade in french whatever that means to you it doesn't matter so i think if we translate half parade or mentally think okay next time someone says half halt that's that strange parade expression um we just think of rebalancing so we know there's several types of rebalancing aids that we can use we know that they have to be forward thinking we know that we don't want it to be about hands or stopping the hind legs we know that we want to enable the horse to use its back or have activity from behind over the back to the front therefore perhaps it's something minute with our back The Germans often talk about using the back or specifically a word called the koiz, which translates to the cross back or the lower back, the small of the back. It's words that we don't really have in writing German. education in English. And I think trying to go study classical writing in Germany, for me, I was curious to know why are these writers all so good in general? There's so many factors. Of course, the accessibility, I think it starts with the standardized training of the trainers, whether you're in a local pony club or getting expert training, it's still the same system. And, you know, the accessibility of good school masters, competitions, all those things, but also the words used, you know, so if we talk about learning rising trot, not every barn will teach it that way, but the emphasis becomes about which hind leg do you sit on? as opposed to which foreleg do you stand up on, because it's a diagonal pair. So from the beginning, if the rider is more in tune of everything that's behind them in space, you know more about riding the hind legs, right? So I think those small differences make a huge change. So whether we talk about which diagonal do you sit on, which hind leg are you influencing to take weight versus which one are you pushing, instead of something about the neck or the shoulders. And in the same way, instead of something about half halting or half stopping, How do you reengage? How do you improve the top line? How do you, you know, so having a clearer picture of what we're trying to do enables our bodies to do what it needs to. So we have back to the eyes. We often talk about the eyes organize the movement. But another expression in Feldenkrais is let your intention organize the movement. So if our intention within the words is more clear, we'll have a better chance at creating what it is that we want. And I think that's one of the beautiful things about the German language is that it's very specific in what the intention or there's clarity to what we're trying to do. Therefore, a relatively standardized language. result that you would get from german classical training using the training scale the normal application of the aids the normal usage of the seat and i say that because you know then there's always variations to accommodate to each horse and rider but that agreed upon correct. And it's not something about opinions. It's about biomechanics. It's about how horses think, how horses learn, how people learn. Yeah. So I would say on that subject, I'll just touch a little bit on what you talked about the core.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:35:21-00:35:59]
Before you do, Dave, can I just stress the point that you made in saying that That when you're like the rising tribe focusing on what hind leg you're sitting on that to me when you said that I was like, Oh my gosh, I have never heard that explained before I have only been taught. And only ever focused on the shoulder I'm rising on. I've never considered the hind leg I'm sitting on. When you said that, it was like, oh, my gosh. Anyways, keep going. I'm soaking this all in like a sponge.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:36:00-00:39:21]
Thank you. Thank you. And if you notice, it's a bit similar to what I said earlier about one knee going forward and one hip coming back or vice versa. It's the same thing, but just looking at it from a different angle and then thinking about it in the you know, and now we're thinking about something simple like rising fraud. We can all remember when we were learning that. And I think we can all rationalize that just reversing that to add a bit influence. You know, I was lucky I had great trainers. There was always an importance of the hind legs. But still, I learned under the North American hunter jumper system where there was no focus on balancing the horse onto the hind legs. uh no focus on you know there's a lot of good things softness quietness all those things but definitely not working the horse in a gymnastic way according to the classical system of the three olympic sports and i say that because sure there is jumping in in North America, and nowadays it's much closer. But for me, the German classical system is a great book for any of you who are interested in the rider forms the horse. And that expression is so powerful. There's a book written very long ago by two veterinarians, early 1900s, I believe, but it's still very relevant today. The German Equestrian Federation has it available in English. I love it. And the basic gist of that title is, You can use that title to give the responsibility or remind riders of the responsibility that the horse that they create or have today is as a direct result of their riding. Whether each jump is gymnasticizing, whether each circle or corner or transition actually is gymnasticizing. So it's not to scare people that they either are improving or destroying the horse. But we want to improve our horses. We get them the best saddles, you know, fitting correctly. We try to improve our seat. But there has to be clarity in which direction we're trying to gymnasticize and supple. So, of course, there's variations you see or opinions. But for me, again, the German classical system, as approved, if you will, or suggested by by the german equestrian federation is the most clear form of classical writing that exists in the sense that it will help the biomechanics of the horse it'll it'll make sense for the horses and riders can easily learn it and apply it of course there's interesting things within the french classical school I've also had the luck to ride with Arthur Cotas from the Spanish Riding School, came to my farm many times. I've studied with some French classical trainers, some trainers from Spain. I'm interested in anything that's correct and classical, but as a standardized recommendation for anyone who really wants to learn, for most horses, for most riders, the German classical system will give them a super foundation.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:39:24-00:39:55]
Let's talk a little bit about some common issues that riders face and how your method could help them. So, um, so for example, you had mentioned a bit about, um, like the rounding of the shoulders. So we, we see that a lot where, um, a lot of riders are sort of rounded in their shoulders and, um, how in, in some ways can your method DTM, um, the David Thin method, um, help with that. We'll use that as the first example, and then we'll go through a couple others.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:39:58-00:45:49]
So for me, the shoulders rounding is probably a not important problem. I wouldn't start with that or nitpicking on that because if the horse is moving well and the rider is soft, I would first consider saddle fit, to be honest. And I'm trying to think of a very soft, gentle, mostly correct rider. Sometimes you see this because of personality, meaning are they shy? Do they drop their head and look down and therefore the shoulders round? So it would be my point to find out where it's coming from and enable the rider to do it. Meaning I wouldn't just say shoulders back because doing that would most likely cause destroy some of the good qualities of that rider, meaning the softness of the contact or even the top line of the horse would change. So once again, assuming that everything mostly looks good because I encounter that often, you know, mostly I meet riders that are very empathetic towards their horses. With their weight aids, with their seed aids, their hand, they know about the basics of creating a correct top line. So I'm not talking about other problems. I'm just specifically the shoulders. For me, that's a luxury problem to get to, to polish. But let's say two situations. One, it comes from something to do with feeling shy. So I would have to work with the rider in a way to give them the tools and the feelings to notice about flexion and extension, meaning are we looking down to roll and become round or arch to look up? The empowerment of using the back, what we call the extensors, which are also the anti-gravity muscles. So if we talk about the back muscles being the anti-gravity muscles, Perhaps overly tensing the abdominals is what the culprit of round shoulders is. Because it's not as simple as that, but imagine chopping wood, doing sit-ups. Rounding is when we use the front end and passively lengthen the back. Opposite of that would be leaning backwards, doing certain yoga movements, arching our back. Even if you think of, let's just say we were all in an ad agency today and discussing, how would we show that someone is celebrating? How would we show that someone is happy in a picture? Standing on the side of a cliff. arms up in the air, arching the back, wide arms. So these are normal human reflexes that go with an emotion. We have another saying in Feldenkrais that's very important, but I'll paraphrase it. More or less says that if you have an emotion and a posture, you can change the posture in order to change the emotion. So I think it's something about the emotion cannot exist without the coinciding posture. so our own version of something usually quite universal across the world with humans but our own personal version that we learned as a result of how we interact with people with life with horses situations as we learned as babies as toddlers as young adults and even today we learn and we get certain patterns of spasm contraction rotation Some are make more sense. Some are awkward. Some are contradictory. Right. But, you know, just think about that celebrating person, arms up, arching the back. Belly is free to allow that a gymnast landing in a certain posture and poise, but power to the legs. So I would say that usually we want to empower the person. instead of telling something about the shoulders and whatever. But if it helps the horse, I'm first about how does it help the horse? How does it help the person help the horse? Is the seat empathetic? And then, of course, we come up with a way. But maybe it's just the saddle. Maybe the saddle is fitting in a way that puts the rider in a hole. Therefore, every time they sit, they slouch. Maybe the rider is ultra tall. and therefore puts a lot of weight in the saddle, and they intuitively know to round their shoulders in order to help the horse's top line. So I am 6'4", and sometimes with horses that have... a weaker top line, I try not to sit on them until I know they can support my weight and my height. But when everything is good and if I still feel it's a bit of a weaker back force, I'll sometimes soften in the chest and in the shoulders in order to not transmit as much force through the skeleton in the saddle. So for example, if I sit up totally straight and I'm aligned, I'm pushing more weight through the saddle. slouching slightly would reduce that impact. Therefore, it's for that purpose. So I'm sorry to say, but we have a joke within the Feldenkrais world that there's always two answers to whatever question you ask. One is the pelvis. Two, it depends. So I covered that it depends, but actually the pelvis.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:45:50-00:45:52]
That's where I want to go next is the pelvis.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:45:52-00:46:41]
Yeah, the pelvis would definitely cover why the shoulders are round. Yeah. So if the rider sits with their butt tucked under and tailbone under at the back pockets or further back in the saddle, eliminating curves of the spine, rounding the lower back, they would then be inclined to slouch. I'm not saying being arched is the answer either. It's about being elastic in that famous coits that we talked about swinging with the lower back, being able to move at the lower back. And the pelvis, again, I can talk about it forever. I just want to add before I forget, there was a Danish study done on whether horses preferred core stability or pelvic mobility. And guess what they liked?

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:46:41-00:46:43]
Pelvic mobility, I'm sure.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:46:43-00:48:46]
The horses preferred pelvic mobility. So you can look that up. That was Dr. Hilary Clayton with, now I'm not remembering her name, a famous Danish veterinarian. They conducted this together, but you can find the PubMed report on this online easily. But the conclusion was horses preferred the pelvic mobility. And Dr. Clayton, who many of you know about who are interested in equine biomechanics, she's done many of my courses online and in person, but her and I have had the chance to talk about this, and she admitted to being Very surprised by the results. Prior to going into these lessons, or sorry, prior to actually doing her study, she thought that it would be core strength. stability so she learned something and i think of course it affected how she did my lessons because if we think that core stability is what we want and you do certain movements everything will be inclined for that if we think that well we want that length and stability or self-carriage but we want that pelvic mobility what is it is it the lower abdomen is it the hip joints is it the psoas is it what you know it doesn't have to be muscles but whatever we think about maybe for you it's the eyes the jaw something in the ankles but to figure out how to find that suppleness or elastic Quality that we want whether you had a lunge lesson and you're trying to create a certain way of sitting or moving or following and then later Influencing and it doesn't matter whether your dressage ride or jumping rider Or event or of course that the function is different depending on what we're doing but the quality of being elastic and supple and mobile and all the joints is important hmm and I am.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:48:46-00:49:33]
I'm just getting started in your 14 day course about unlock the pelvis, which I'm so excited about because I actually broke my pelvis a couple of years ago, quite a few years ago now. I know nothing horse related. And I, as a tendency, I tend to clench through my hip flexors. And I don't know if it's like a safety thing, like I'm subconsciously protecting the area. But I have a lot of tightness in my hips just because of the trauma of breaking them. And so I'm so excited to go through the unlock the pelvis course that you have.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:49:34-00:53:43]
wonderful i'm really excited that you're doing it and uh if it's okay to say um you know in talking about you did the previous course as well the introductory free lesson and um i will brag on your behalf that you are a very well trained yoga trainer teacher pilates teacher so you know movement and bodies Very well, so I think it's a very good conclusion to say that well the pelvis broke the hip flexors are locked because of some kind of protective mechanism I do believe that we can hit a reset of sorts with that course that you're about to start. So it has to do with improving hip mobility and using the back. Those are the riding functions. But underneath that, specifically what we're doing is resetting what we call the flexors and extensors. So you're talking about the hip flexors. So whatever happens behind the scenes, if you will. We do these lessons not because we're going to go and rehearse them. You can sometimes think about things while you're riding. But the goal is that we've presented a case of sorts, as we did with the experiment with the eyes, that the nervous system finds the solution. It's not all riddles and difficulties. It's actually lessons where we find the nuts and bolts or refine them pre-injury, pre-confusion or misconception. And all of a sudden, the flexors and extensors work in a more harmonious way. So what that means is that famous kloitz again, the lower back swinging, that'll work better. It would mean that someone that has chronic tension in the hip flexors, that will also work better. So there's more elastic interplay. So by the elastic interplay, I talked earlier about too much engagement of the abdominals. That's a very common problem, often emphasized by current or, I believe, outdated models of fitness. You know, Dr. Feldenkrais way back said in a society riddled with back problems, people are told to strengthen their abdominals, but they still have back problems. you can get some temporary relief by using the abdominals because you've lengthened passively the back. So of course you get something. And I'm not saying that exercise per se is not good. And of course it's very good. We all have to be fit, but this elastic interplay and whether you watch a horse cantering, it also uses its flexors and extensors. It's not locked in one position with its back or its top line. You know, so there has to be this movement, this elasticity. If we talk about the interplay with the flexing of the human bicep or tricep, one side is used, the other is lengthened, and there's an interplay. If both were contracted at the same time, that's a co-contraction. And that usually results in problems of back pain, tight hip flexors, glute pain, sciatica. These are the types of things that end up from that. It can also result in problems further up because, you know, when you have problems in the foundation, it mirrors up top. It could be clenching jaw. It could be stuff that we actually don't like to see in the mirror. So there's a lot of things that can change by reorganizing the pelvis. And of course, the connection of the ground to the head is through the pelvis. The pelvis is the main conductor of movement. We want to connect the spine. But if we have that pelvis moving as it should, in reality, classical riding teaches that to us anyways. We want to follow the horse, move with the horse, not lock, not grip. So I would say that 14-day course is going to do all of those things. So I will be excited to hear back from you how that goes.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:53:44-00:54:06]
Yeah, I'm really excited to get started. And it's a perfect, as I was telling you before we started recording, I'm just getting into the season of being like, oh, I think I'm going to be able to ride again soon. So we're currently in our get back into shape mode. And so I'm excited that I'm going to be doing it before I get back on their back.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:54:14-00:58:28]
see these changes in my body and then um get on their back in a month or so um so hopefully we have a good riding season yeah well i'm pretty certain to be honest at least from my own experience i got started as you know with feldenkrais when i was injured and unable to ride and in my personal you know level of where i was and where i ended up uh it was quite fascinating i went from i remember it's almost too long ago to remember this is now 23 4 years ago uh 24 and i remember prior to the injury that i always was never never happy with pictures or video my left hand was always further back and i would get yelled at about uneven contact i would try my best i actually even had one trainer you'll laugh because we've all had this type of teaching um She was frustrated and she was a bit of a snob. I had wonderful trainers. She had some good things to offer. I'll never say her name. But she said to me at one point, do you even know what even contact is? And, you know, that kind of thing, it hurts. Yeah, it does. It's not something and, you know, all I could think was, well, I'm trying. I just can't. I don't know how. Help me. But I will thank her because she very clearly highlighted, underscored, underlined, bold, exclamation, the importance of even contact and also the feeling of guilt that I don't provide my horses with even contact. I'm not saying that's the good way, but for me, I guess it was the perfect thing I needed to hear at the time. I never took another lesson from her again. But, yeah, probably fast forward a few months later after doing Feldenkrais, I didn't ride immediately because the injury was quite bad. But I was able to get on and, you know, have very even contact because of clear organization of my spine, my shoulder blades, knowing where my arms were, where my pelvis was. But the look or the appearance was enough to all of a sudden feel start to um when i did get back to showing the marks on the seat went from six to eight i'm not i'm not exaggerating from six to eight and um i hadn't done exercise i hadn't lost weight there was nothing that changed other than the feldenkrais feeling more comfortable of course but i and and i'm talking about Pre-injury. So not I got injured and now I get six in my seat. It was pre-injury. The best to my ability is trying really hard. A young trainer, early 20s. So, you know, relatively advanced for as much as we can be. But yeah, and then another really interesting thing happened was the Piaf and Passage. I had difficulty feeling that transition moving in and out of those transitions. So Piafing itself was fine, but a bit of a shuffle in. And I remember particularly moving forward into Passage, there was sort of a glitch, regardless of what horse I would be on. And all of a sudden it was smooth. Because I could feel myself, I could feel the hind legs. Again, pre-injury, I remember asking a German clinician, when will I feel that timing of the hind legs? You're talking about the timing and feel this and feel that. When? How? And all she said to me, don't worry, it'll come with time. I don't know if it would have come without Feldenkrais, to be honest. Hmm. So, yes, I think not writing and doing Feldenkrais will give you a wonderful outcome. That doesn't mean you can't do both together. But anyone who is doing that should please give some space between the lessons and writing and stay away from trying to get to the end goal. Because almost by removing the end goal, just doing the lessons is when you get the best result.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:58:28-00:59:00]
Yeah. Can we talk a little bit about self-carriage? So not self-carriage of the horse. We hear that a lot. It's like the thing everybody is seeking for. What about self-carriage of the human? And I love that. how you just said about going from the, you know, transition into the passage and it's almost like the horse that you said that it was every single horse, you know, it was like a, there was a glitch. And, and so once you were able to find that in your body, the horses were able to find it in theirs. So what is self-carriage of the human?

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:59:02-01:02:50]
So if it's okay, before I answer that, to touch on that PF passage thing. And I think this, I really would like to say that, you know, this is when I go to a clinic or help. I'm lucky I get to help riders that ride at that level. And it's not that I don't like to help riders that are at any level, but for example, trying to create something that, sculpt something, if you will. I have some riders that ride on their prospective teams for their countries and some that are trying for the Olympics this year, some that have been to the Olympics. So that type of rider that I can do these lessons with It's so amazing because you can make those tweaks and you know where things like line of force are or how thinking about using the seat like a suction cup and where does the activity of the hindquarters go. So we have lessons that we do on all four as well trying to learn about how horse movement works and what happens in the rest of our body when we, for example, bring one hind leg forward. So if we can clarify what it is we're trying to do for the horse and how we're doing it, It becomes so easy, but these lessons need to be within the body. But all I can say is fast-forwarding to that, it's such an amazing process. It's so fun. It's so powerful. You can make, you know, Olympic riders have a certain standard. Let's just put it that way. But to be able to help them make a horse or many horses piaf more evenly, because they've done lessons. Otherwise, my words would not be enough to help them other than any other instructor. So, yeah, that's definitely that. But the self-carriage thing, I think it really depends on the function, the gait, the type of saddle, the age of the horse. And I think comparing posture to what we call position, I don't like the word posture, nor do I like the word position. So in the Feldenkrais world, he would often use the word actor instead of posture because it's about the ability to act in any direction spontaneously and freely, smoothly, easily. He was a martial artist himself, Europe's first black belt in judo. And he was really interested in why do some frail looking martial artists have much more power like kicking and punching through bricks, and somebody that's huge with tons of muscle can't. So the function behind that was of interest. So, again, if we think about function, posture, self-carriage, there are certain things that we can do that resemble more posture, whether we're a ballroom dancer, whether we're a dressage rider. But movement and, of course, we don't want to have a Grand Prix posture when we're riding a young horse. there it just doesn't make sense so the tone to the spine it means something to the horse what do we do are we stiff and rigid through the sternum all the time or can we be mobile and soft there the the height of the hand so whether we lean more forward we do what's called um you know the german expression remount seat what was used in the old days in the army for the new horses so the young horse training in two point cavaletti position so i think it really depends of being able to move from a central place much like a martial artist spontaneously as needed in any direction and return easily to a home base in good balance

[SPEAKER 2]
[01:02:53-01:03:27]
If somebody wanted to go out and ride. So let's say I was about to go out and ride my horse and I'm thinking I've been sitting all day long. I feel like I'm a little locked up in my body from just being in this posture. Now I want to go ride and I want to be... supple and soft for my horse? Is there anything that I can do to get me from sitting in my desk chair all day to then being able to be that supple, soft rider for my horse, like a pre-ride warm-up or exercise?

[SPEAKER 1]
[01:03:28-01:04:50]
Sure. So Feldenkrais is actually not used in that way. And I say that because I don't want this to be mixed up with, do we do Feldenkrais as exercise or some kind of suppling warm-up workout? I would like to say that there is a lot of importance on warming up our bodies. And if we reflect on our habits as a sport, It's one of the sports or maybe the only sport where people don't warm up before they do their sport. So just to pause on that. So whether it's at least taking a hot bath or doing whatever it is that you like in terms of movement. But there are aspects of Feldenkrais that you can do, including what we call a body scan. But before anybody, you know, worries that they don't have the possibility to, you know, get access to these lessons, at the moment I do have a free lesson, the one you did, on my website. So it's accessible to anybody. It is only one lesson, but it's better than nothing. And I think it can be repeated or elements of it. within, um, that frame of, can I do something at home before I ride?

[SPEAKER 2]
[01:04:52-01:06:27]
So I actually, like you had mentioned, um, had the opportunity to do the, the free introductory video yesterday. And, um, I just, I want to recommend to all of our listeners to definitely go check it out. We'll put Dave's website in the show notes. Um, so you can go and get that free lesson. And I, um, I set aside the time in the middle of my day. So I had been sitting for a couple of hours at my desk and then I stopped what I was doing and I went and I did it. And the difference between how I felt previously sitting at my desk to how I felt after doing the video um was huge I I felt taller I felt more like taller yet softer at the same time if that makes sense like there was just um there was a relaxation in my body um but also I felt like I I stood and I sat taller and then I took my dog for a little short walk and and I just I felt like I walked with like, I don't know, I just walked better. And and I got that all from a 60 minute free video. You know, so I just want to let everybody know that that's available to go check it out. And like I said, the link will be in the show notes. But please keep going, Dave, with explaining about the introductory video and how that could be something that people can do as a body scan and as a bit of a movement in their body prior to riding or just something to remember throughout their day.

[SPEAKER 1]
[01:06:29-01:12:05]
Well, that's awesome. I'm so glad that you experienced those results and, you know, especially that you know your body so well and you've had some injury. But to get those types of results of sitting better, more comfortably, walking differently, feeling longer, as you said, softer, it's not unheard of. But I'll just say for some people, if you don't notice anything, please be okay with that. Sometimes people feel left out. But I will say that riders as a general, as a group, we feel our bodies quite well. We spend all this time, all these years feeling our bodies, feeling what's under, behind us, hopefully. moving together with the horses. So teaching Feldenkrais to riders is really easy and fun. It's a perfect match. Most likely doing the same lesson for a non-rider, they wouldn't feel as much or have comments. It feels good, but I don't know what feels good. But these feelings of change are definitely clear for most riders. And again, don't feel bad if you don't feel it, but please still do the lessons. So you will end up being able to feel more. But yeah, wonderful things can happen just from one lesson. That lesson I will be offering on my website for a couple more months free. The reason I've left it long like that is because it actually is an intro to a very specific course. uh called skeletal strength um it is a course that i taught last year both live in person in wellington and also online so that's the recording of that online version And the reason I'm offering that free course is because, you know, obviously our community is primarily women and osteoporosis is an important concern. Eventually being, you know, maybe even the reason why some riders have to stop riding. And we have a program on my website. You can access that. It is an equally good program to start with as any other lesson or any other course. So you're doing the 14-day course, which is usually a wonderful intro, but you can't go wrong if you start with the skeletal strength or the 14-day course or whatever. So wherever someone's interest is, that's where I think they should start. But that course... covers material which tells us or teaches us that we can improve bone density through concussive forces acting on an aligned skeleton so if we think about that a bit further and pause we get concussion on our body when we ride we get concussion when we walk even if you're not riding but you know put those two together and if we can have that opportunity to provide feedback, if you will, to the nervous system, because we actually form a new skeleton every seven years. So we're not stuck with the one we have, depending on what we do today, if we're very sedentary, or we're favoring something, you know, you can have a better, stronger skeleton. And how we do that, you know, we know about weight-bearing exercises for bone density. There's a lot of other research, but these specific lessons were made by Dr. Ruthie Alon. who unfortunately passed away. I met her at Harvard well into her 90s. She came to teach there in Boston. And she came up with this work that is based on Feldenkrais, but specifically for bone density and, of course, transmission of force, concussive force through an aligned skeleton, which aligns perfectly with writing, pun intended. And her inspiration, if you all think about it for a moment, is quite interesting, was the African water carrier. So, you know, just that image of an elegant woman carrying something effortlessly over her head and walking barefoot for miles in a very long spine, fluent movement, easily. That alignment is actually quite similar to what we need. We get length in both directions to the spine. And the counter pressure, right? So if you have something heavy on your head, if your head is in the wrong place, you'll drop it or you'll pressure on your neck or something weird if you're not aligned. But if you end up longer in both directions, the ground force actually gives you that air ride feeling. So it's the ground force coming through your legs or in the case of riding through the pelvis to the head. And in both directions is what's going to give us that self-carriage that we just talked about as well. But it's not just in that perfectly aligned posture. I want to make sure that self-carriage as a repeat, it's about moving in every direction. Yeah, so that's that free course. So it's available. You can get that on my website, davethinmethod.com. And I plan to leave that there at least a few more months.

[SPEAKER 2]
[01:12:06-01:12:13]
And I know that you do have a special code for everybody here as well. Do you want to talk a little bit about that?

[SPEAKER 1]
[01:12:14-01:14:43]
Sure. I thought, why not? You know, since we're talking about this, hopefully lots of our listeners today will want to give this a try. So if you want to do the free course and enjoy that and play with that, great. If you want to do more... I thought about offering a coupon code specifically for the listeners with a 20% savings. And the coupon code is, you've guessed it, WeHorse. And it will, of course, expire. So hopefully some of you who are listening to this now and this podcast and it's, you Date-wise relevant, great. Otherwise, you know, most likely June of 2024, that coupon will have expired by June 1st. And yeah, I will try to create something so that you can try the or we have created something so you can try either the 14 day course or you can do what we call the 60 day improve your seat program. It's a full encompassing from several directions. program that will definitely create a full change to your riding and your way of movement in and out of the saddle, hopefully help with any pain relief and stiffness. So just as an important piece to mention, the 14-day program is module one of five of that 60-day program. Okay, so it's essentially the same beginning. There's a reason for that. So if at all you're thinking about the 60-day program, the 14-day is a good start. The benefit of starting straight with the 60-day program is that you don't have to buy both because the 14-day doesn't upgrade. But yeah, I'll definitely have that available for all of you at a discount to try if you wish or hopefully start and do. And I laugh about this. I meet people often who say that they've purchased courses from me, but they haven't done them. And I always laugh and say, please don't purchase them if you're not going to do them. So that's important for me to actually say.

[SPEAKER 2]
[01:14:43-01:15:45]
That's such a big thing with the online course industry is people that are like, oh, great. Okay, I'm going to do this. And then everything comes up. So I'm just going to, again, speak to my experience and say that from what I've seen so far, this is definitely worth doing. And I'm super excited to keep going with it. So just to... mirror what Dave had said, that the coupon code will put all this in the show notes. The coupon code is WeHorse, all uppercase, and it's going to be 20% off for Dave's courses. And then it will expire by June 1st. So you're listening to this right now. This episode is airing on the 17th of March. So you have a good amount of time to use the coupon code. But yeah, if you're going to do one of them, then you'll see me in there. The last thing that we have, Dave, is our four rapid-fire WeHorse questions. They're just a quick thing that's the first thing that pops into your mind. Are you ready to get started?

[SPEAKER 1]
[01:15:45-01:15:46]
Of course.

[SPEAKER 2]
[01:15:46-01:15:49]
Okay. The first one, do you have a motto or a favorite saying?

[SPEAKER 1]
[01:15:51-01:15:51]
Less is more.

[SPEAKER 2]
[01:15:52-01:15:59]
Love it. Second one, who has been the most influential person in your equestrian journey?

[SPEAKER 1]
[01:16:02-01:19:25]
That's a tough one because it would be unfair to give credit to one person. I've had so many wonderful, thoughtful trainers that I'm grateful to. But even more than that, I will say I'm mostly, you know, the gratitude and the love goes to my horses, whether they're my horses or horses I had the pleasure to be entrusted with. Each one has given me learning that no words could. And, you know, we just unfortunately had to put down my soon to be 28 year old ex Grand Prix jumping horse. So purchased back in the days of when I was a jumper rider, bought him six months. Sorry, when he was six months old. And we've had him all these years and, wow, reflecting on that life and all the lessons, the hardships, the fun, everything that that one horse taught me I could write, forget one book, five books. I've been lucky to have so many horses, you know, whether... We call it their intelligence on a soul level or for whatever. I believe the right horses come into our lives at the right moment for whatever lessons we're supposed to learn about, whether they're painful or not. Um, but I've been lucky. I've honestly been blessed with horses. As I said, either they were my personal horses. And as you've heard, I tend to keep my horses forever. Um, but even horses i've had in training and you know the blessing is extended from their owners when they give me horses to train and entrust me with that responsibility but you know really getting to know the horses and their personalities and the good and the bad but really I always try to stay open and learn whether it's through Feldenkrais or you know educating horses also through Feldenkrais but you know classical riding I try not to come with an approach that I know what the outcome is or that I know what what is best and on that note I guess the I have to give credit to Dr. Feldenkrais because I would not be doing this work without his teachings. I never met him, of course. But his legacy is such that he's enabled all of us to what he called have our own handwriting, to learn his work and apply it in our own unique way, not to do it as he did. He worked with you know, cerebral palsy kids, if anyone's interested, there's videos of him working on YouTube, literally teaching a four-year-old to learn to walk and crawl when they could not before in 20 minutes. But yeah, so his whole thing was His expression was, I will be your last teacher, not because I will be your best teacher, but because for me, you will learn to learn. And that's where the emphasis on learning within the Feldenkrais method is so interesting and important, but also being open and not knowing what the outcome is, because, you know, that's definitely what we're trying to do.

[SPEAKER 2]
[01:19:27-01:19:41]
Love that. I love that you spoke about your horses as well. I completely agree that our horses come into our lives for a reason. And they have so many lessons to teach us. So that's awesome.

[SPEAKER 1]
[01:19:42-01:22:45]
Thank you. No, it's really, you know, everything that I do within this industry is a gift from those horses. And I think all of us who are listening, we feel the same way about our horses. And, you know, we can never emphasize enough how much we love them and all the things that we do. So, again, I mostly meet people who want to improve their riding. you know, we want to do this for our horses. Yeah. And especially these days when there's so much discussion on animal welfare and, you know, all the horrendous riding we've been hearing about, I think leading by example, whether it's on our own small level at home, knowing that we've done right by our horses, knowing that we've tried our best to to not be crooked, to be supple, to be attentive, to be listening, to be feeling our best to develop ourselves, not because there's a compulsion to do so or a competitiveness that's driving us, because is it horse-centered? Our decisions have to be horse-centered. Our decisions have to honor the horses, has to honor the sport, the classical tradition. And I think, again, back to that responsibility of the rider forms the horse. And we are in our own way on whatever level, as a trainer, as a competitor, or again, like I said, riding at home. Do we represent the sport in a way or the tradition? Do we honor the tradition? And I think. And feeling ourselves in order to truly know what we are doing, what we're feeling, how we're breathing. Do we feel good? Do we feel bad? The same for our horses. It gives us that opportunity to almost act as measuring devices. This is something that we learn in the Feldenkrais method, that we want to be accurate measuring devices in the sense that are we slightly off? And if we weigh something, meaning the weight in our reins, is it truly at zero or is our scale off? But I use that as an analogy to basically measure everything. good bad easy difficult crooked comfortable and then be able to be neutral and not make it so difficult sometimes adult amateurs are so hard on themselves they want to be perfect and they feel they've been wrong and corrected that it doesn't enable them but if we come at this with some Kindness to ourselves and allow mistakes to exist and imperfections to exist and just be happy that we're doing the extra efforts that we can do. Everyone will do their own version of extra efforts, but some extra efforts I think are required.

[SPEAKER 2]
[01:22:47-01:22:53]
I love that. The third, if you could give equestrians one piece of advice, what would it be?

[SPEAKER 1]
[01:22:56-01:22:58]
What I just spoke about, be kind to yourself.

[SPEAKER 2]
[01:23:00-01:23:05]
The last one, please complete the sentence for me. Horses are.

[SPEAKER 1]
[01:23:07-01:23:07]
Magical.

[SPEAKER 2]
[01:23:08-01:23:19]
That's always my response to, I'm like, they're just magic. I love it. Dave, where can people find you and how can they connect with you? And we'll put it all in the show notes.

[SPEAKER 1]
[01:23:19-01:24:24]
All right. So my website, it's my name, Dave thinned method.com. that's t-h-i-n-d davethinmethod.com and on there there is of course the possibility to send me a message if you have specific questions i'm sorry i can't answer everybody that wants help with their seats but definitely if you have any of my courses you have access to those types of questions But if you wanted to contact me about, hey, I wanted to purchase something, I'm not sure. This is a quick question. You can send me a question. Otherwise, you know, there's information on the courses. There's information on the live group courses. There's also possibility to book, sorry, online privates as well as to inquire about clinics. So there's a schedule there, of course, that you can see where I'll be traveling to. And yeah, that's about it.

[SPEAKER 2]
[01:24:25-01:24:35]
Awesome. So we'll have everything in the show notes, including that coupon code that I mentioned earlier. WeHorse, all capital letters, and it gives you 20% off on Dave's courses until June 1st.

[SPEAKER 1]
[01:24:36-01:24:44]
Awesome. Thank you so much. Really appreciate this opportunity to chat with you. I feel like we could have chatted for a couple more hours.

[SPEAKER 2]
[01:24:44-01:25:18]
I agree. I agree. I had to rein us in. I thank you so much for being here, Dave. I got so much out of this personally, and I hope that our listeners take something away too. And also, if you haven't done that beginning exercise that Dave walked us through, maybe you were driving or you were doing something else, I highly recommend going back and And then going through the movement that he walked us through and going onto his website and getting that complimentary course. It was a game changer in just 60 minutes, so I highly recommend.

[SPEAKER 1]
[01:25:18-01:25:31]
Awesome. Thank you very much again for this opportunity. Wishing all of you at home wonderful success, fun, and happiness with your horses. And thanks for tuning in.

[SPEAKER 2]
[01:25:32-01:26:06]
Thank you for listening to this episode of the Equestrian Connection podcast by WeHorse. If you enjoyed this episode, it would mean the world to us if you could leave us a rating and review, as well as share us on social media. You can find us on Instagram at WeHorse underscore USA and check out our free seven-day trial on WeHorse.com where you can access over 175 courses with top trainers from around the world in a variety of topics and disciplines. Until next time, be kind to yourself, your horses, and others.

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