#38 Lockie Phillips: Feel, Body Awareness, and Holding Space

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:00:00-00:00:06]
On this episode, we’re talking with Lockie Phillips of Emotional Horsemanship.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:00:06-00:00:17]
And I think because I wasn’t in a rush, things happened very quickly for me. It’s one of those paradoxes with horses, that if you’re not in a rush, things will happen fast.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:00:17-00:01:05]
Welcome to the Equestrian Connection podcast from WeHorse. My name is Danielle Crowell, and I’m your host. Lockie Phillips is a horse trainer, equestrian performance coach, international clinician, and hoof care provider. He’s also the founder of Emotional Horsemanship, a training method that recruits three fundamental lenses, science, empathy, and feel. Lockie focuses on both the horse and the human in a groundbreaking approach that allows for a safe learning environment for all. I’m very excited to introduce you to Lockie and Emotional Horsemanship. So let’s dive in. Lucky, welcome to the Wee Horse podcast. I’m very excited for our conversation and I would love to know how did you get started with horses and what were your first few years like as an equestrian?

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:01:05-00:04:29]
Thank you for having me. So I got started with horses because I love them. It’s really that simple. I don’t come from a horse family. No one in my family is horsey except a couple of distant relatives. And the time I got back into horses, I was really into them as a child, but I got back into horses as a young adult when I was working as a classical ballet dancer in Europe. I was a professional dancer at the Grand Opera House in Warsaw and discovered that I had free time and that it was actually a day job that allowed someone to have hobbies. And I remembered what I loved the most before my career and before dance took over my life and horses came to mind and I started dipping my toe in and then very quickly it wasn’t just dipping your toe in, you were going way down deep. And then very, very quickly things started to develop and I was in no rush to develop anything with horses. In fact, quite the opposite. And I think because I wasn’t in a rush, things happened very quickly for me. It’s one of those paradoxes with horses that if you’re not in a rush, things will happen fast. And so very quickly, I found a good place to train and I was training regularly. And then I started a trainer certification qualification process with them. They really took me under their wing. Then I started moonlighting as a riding instructor in my evenings and weekends. Then I opened a saddle business. And then I was training and doing lessons. And then I bought a horse and I’m coming to Spain and I started traveling and things just kind of took off. And I realized towards the middle of my 20s that I had more to offer horses. than I did the current career I was in, and that the current career I was in was the perfect preparation for a life with horses. And I know a lot of other, a lot, many other of my colleagues have had other careers prior to horses. And in my experience, that makes us have a worldview with horses, which brings a lot of balance and a lot of interest to the horse and equestrian situation. So I really took all the knowledge and the awareness and the physical skills also from my dance career and really had a transfer. It wasn’t going from one thing to another. It’s the same thing. I’m just doing it in a different way. So yeah, I dove headfirst into horses and then I moved to Spain and started working in Spain a little bit and then COVID hit and the little local service business that I had set up in Spain, it was doing well. Um, but then COVID hit and that went out the window. And so then I decided to, I had nothing left to lose and decided to call the way I trained horses by its most honest name possible. And that is emotional horsemanship. It is the most honest way I can describe.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:04:29-00:05:57]
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[SPEAKER 2]
[00:05:57-00:06:54]
And I made a little online course. I had a cracked iPhone 6 that I hung off an olive tree with a piece of baling twine. And I filmed an online course in a shipping container and in the on the deserted terrace of a friend’s farm with whatever horses were at my disposal during COVID. And I thought, maybe my mum and like six people will buy this thing. I now have over 700 students just in that course alone. And it just, it caught on, but it wasn’t a fast growth. A lot of effort went into it. Um, and yeah, now I have this business and I have my own farm and I do, I travel all over the world for clinics. Um, I’m fully booked out until next year. I’ve got four online courses. It’s, it’s wild. I’m living the life of my dreams now and I’m, I’m so, so grateful for it.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:06:54-00:07:48]
Yeah. I love that. It’s really interesting. With COVID, it really allowed people the opportunity to see, like you had said, you have nothing else to lose. So here’s my time to dive into this. It’s been really interesting. I’ve been following you for quite a while now. I feel like since COVID or maybe a little bit after COVID maybe, but it’s been really interesting watching your evolution. And I just, I love where you’re at. I love where, the direction that you’re heading and the amount of people that you’re helping. It’s been really neat to see. And I would love to know, have you always been like this with horses? Like, were you always embodying the horse person that you are now, or was there some of your own growth that you went through?

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:07:50-00:09:31]
There’s always growth. There’s always growth. But I’ve never had a Jekyll and Hyde personality shift. That’s not a judgment, but there are a lot of people who… will have a come-to-Jesus moment over insert their career here with horses. That could be competitive dressage or raining or whatever it is they’re doing. Someone, I often hear the story, will have a come-to-Jesus moment that they realize what they’re doing is terrible and everything comes crashing down and then they have to rebuild. I’ve never had that kind of crash and rebuild situation. I’ve never had to go through that. Because I came to horses as a fully conscious adult, having seen a bit of the world, and I’d had some pretty rough experiences in my dance education. That’s not my opinion. That’s now objective fact, because my professional dance training institution is currently under investigation for allegations of child abuse, which I participated in the study for. I testified against them. So I knew what it felt like to be a creature of movement without a voice being coerced by abusive overlords. What does that sound like? I knew what that felt like. And then when I got back into horses as an adult, I was like, no, I’m going to be really, really discerning about who I’m choosing as a teacher. And I had a couple of lessons at like a local place where I was in Poland. And to discover that it was so mechanical and they were treating them like machines, I went, oh, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. You’re doing that with horses.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:09:31-00:09:32]
No, no, no.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:09:32-00:10:38]
I’m doing that with dance already. I don’t need to be scratching that itch twice. I don’t need to be double dipping in that dip. So let me look for something else. So from the beginning, I looked for something different. And this was 15 years ago, so at the time it was natural horsemanship, right? Now, I don’t teach natural horsemanship anymore. A lot of people would say, oh, emotional horsemanship, it’s like a natural something, right? No, it’s really not, because we’re not using alpha mare dominance theory. I don’t use escalating pressure. Even the biomechanics of what I do is totally different. I don’t disengage the hindquarters. I don’t do one-rein stops. I’m much more leaning towards the classical equitation spectrum when it comes to the biomechanics of a horse. But everything’s informed. by the science of emotion and the neurology of emotion and the nervous system. And the powerful role horses can play in our lives as more than just sport equipment, but as companions, as friends.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:10:38-00:10:39]
Yeah, absolutely.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:10:42-00:11:05]
I’ve always kind of been like this, but there’s always been growth and some of the tools I use have evolved and changed over time. I’m now allergic to adrenaline. My life’s been too exciting. So I used to be really interested in highly adrenalized activities with horses. I’m not anymore. Yeah, there’s been growth, but I’ve always been true to myself.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:11:07-00:11:23]
Now emotional horsemanship, it’s my understanding that there’s three pillars to it. And I would love if you could go into the three pillars and just describe for everybody listening, what is emotional horsemanship? What are the three pillars? How do they embody what it is that you teach?

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:11:23-00:13:60]
So emotional horsemanship is the most honest way I can describe what I do. We are basing our horsemanship on what makes horses and humans most alike, rather than what sets us apart as different. If you think of natural horsemanship, they often talked about, we’re predators, they’re prey. We are different, so we have to find a way to bridge this difference. I scrap that, and I say, okay, how are we alike? And if we look at the science, at a neurological level, Most of our brains are exactly the same from a biological standpoint, except when it comes to abstract thinking and decision-making. Horses can make abstract thoughts, but only a modicum they have a decreased capacity to do so compared to us. Whereas a human being can sit in a dark room and imagine this whole fantasy and construct this whole reality, which has nothing to do with reality. Horses can’t be that imaginative. They’re much more responding to very real feelings. It doesn’t mean they’re only in the moment. It just means they just respond to very real felt senses and experiences. So I work with science, I work with empathy, and I work with feel. Feel because I really honor and acknowledge the horse people who came before me who were all feel-based. If you think of the old school horsemanship masters and the classical masters, they all talk about this special thing, this atmosphere, this quote-unquote energy or whatever it was. It was basically like, describe emotion without using the word emotion, guys, right? That’s what they were all talking about, but it was illegal to use the word emotion. It still is for many people to this day. So I feel because there’s a lot of feel in good horsemanship, being able to feel the horse both physically, mentally, and emotionally. I work with empathy because empathy is your superpower. Empathy is the ability to discern what belongs to me and what belongs to the horse when you feel things in your horsemanship. Everyone feels things in horsemanship. No one has succeeded in being emotionally neutral when they ride.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:13:60-00:14:01]
Nobody.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:14:01-00:14:11]
We can talk about it, but that’s an abstract fallacy, in my opinion. Has anyone ever seen someone have a total tantrum riding their horse?

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:14:12-00:14:13]
Yes.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:14:13-00:14:39]
Right. So, you know, and then you’ll see people who are shut down. Well, they’re still feeling things too. So when you’re around a horse and you feel frightened, is that your fear or is that the horse’s fear or is it a combination of both? That’s what empathy is. It’s being able to discern the difference, what belongs to me and what belongs to the horse. I’ve had very specific situations with horses where I’m feeling great and I get around them and I go,

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:14:40-00:14:42]
Hmm.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:14:42-00:16:34]
Something’s not right. And it can even become somatic. It can get quite spooky sometimes. I had a horse at a clinic in the spring who had facial nerve damage. And after the first day of a clinic with him, I woke up the next morning with nerve pain in my face. Like it can get it can get really quite spooky if you let your guards down, you know. So that’s what empathy is. And then the science is just knowing the collective intelligence of the human race and all the energy we’ve put into understanding our natural world. And science is not a fixed subject, but it’s ever-evolving. Science asks better and better questions as we go forward. And it’s about knowing what we know and knowing that confidently without gaslighting the thing. Right? And it’s about standing true in the things that we know to the best of our capacity. For example, the world is not flat. Dominance theory is dead. These are things we know. We know. They’re not up for question. They’re not up for debate. there are certain things we can know for sure about horses and this brings a lot of confidence to myself, to our interactions, to our training and to our horses. So emotional horsemanship is a method of training horses. I have very specific techniques which I use and they sit under the umbrella of my foundation technique which I teach in my online course and then each technique that follows on after we focus on the seven emotional systems according to effective neuroscience and we achieve emotionally balanced horses patiently, slowly, yes, without perpetuating cycles of abuse. It’s not for everyone though and I’m not trying to be for everyone.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:16:34-00:17:02]
And so I love on your website you have actually a little disclaimer that says like if If you are not willing to do this or you’re not willing to do that, I am not for you. And do you run into those issues at your clinics, things like that, where you have to say to people, look, here are some of the things that you need to evolve into as a human before you can be ready for this? Or how does that conversation go? Sure.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:17:02-00:20:17]
But there are always loving ways to impart that to people. And it’s never my intention when someone has paid for my services, my understanding, my assumption, when someone has paid for my services, they are already at a level of readiness to receive information. They want my help. Right. So we’re already there. It has taken me, for example, a couple of days at a clinic to discern that the cause of one horse’s problems was not necessarily training, but hoof issues, body soreness issues, and lifestyle problems. And the client was really, really hoping that my training would resolve everything for them. And after a couple of days of asking questions of the horse, asking questions of the horse and of them, of the owner, I had to politely inform the owner that I cannot solve these issues for you. I am not your messiah and I won’t be and I won’t pretend to be. I can’t solve these issues until your horse gets the social life that they deserve. I believe that quality horse keeping, quality management, health, diet, diagnoses, these are inextricably linked to quality training. Now, for me, that is just I wake up in the morning and that’s how I am. Like that is just an assumed reality in my mind that I naively thought would be industry standard. And to be frank with you, Danielle, I don’t mean to put the industry on blast so quickly, but I’ve been shocked and appalled when I’ve gone out in the world to discover that this isn’t industry standard, not just amongst like the quote-unquote harsh trainers. In fact, the harsh trainers, generally speaking, are doing diagnostics. They are looking at other things. Even some of my closer colleagues, I was shocked and appalled to discover, would see a diagnostics route, an osteopathic diagnostics route, as a threat to the quality of their training techniques, as if through training everything is possible. And I’m like, No. And I mean, I could tell very, very specific stories about this. This isn’t my assumption. This is not my speculation. This is objective fact that I’ve obtained direct from the horse’s mouth, pun intended. I’m shocked and appalled. So in my opinion, our horse keeping should never be seen as a threat to training. It should always work in harmony with the training, whatever training you’re doing. A sport horse will have higher rest demands than a recreational horse. The horse keeping should reflect that. But these things are inextricably linked. We have horse trainers, we have farriers, but we don’t have teachers that teach us how to care for horses. We have nutritionists, but there’s no one who’s consulting on equestrian environments because the trainers don’t feel it’s their purvey or their responsibility or they just don’t want to or they don’t think it’s important. I think it’s very important.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:20:17-00:20:53]
Very, very important. Yeah, absolutely. And one of the things that I love is the way, like you had said, the way that you relay information. And I noticed it in your Instagram as well. And speaking of this, you have been posting a lot about the care and the lifestyle of horses, especially since moving your horses home. And it’s been really interesting because it’s so educational, but it’s never I don’t know. I’m trying to think of the word to describe it. You never feel like guilty.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:20:53-00:20:54]
Condemned.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:20:54-00:20:55]
Yeah.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:20:55-00:21:23]
Well, to be honest with you, Danielle, I’ve had a long journey on that. And I haven’t always been that way. And sometimes I can tip the balance into the realm of condemning people because I mean, if I’m exhausted enough and fed up enough, I would put everyone on blast, right? Because I’m tired of seeing horses in compromised conditions. We all are. No one is more tired. No one is more overworked and tired than the equine advocate right now.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:21:23-00:21:25]
No one. No one.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:21:25-00:22:58]
Well, you know, thoughts and prayers for the equine advocate. But I’ve really, really had to have hard words with myself about trying to find positive ways to be both honest, direct, and clear, unequivocally clear with people about what my expectations are, what I think is happening with the horse, being prepared to be wrong, because I could always be completely wrong when I’m consulting, right? But try to do that in a way which doesn’t crash down on a person’s motivation, because frankly, I need them to have the confidence to take action and not to shame spiral because every second they spend shame spiraling or being guilty is a second wasted where they could be taking action on improving things in their training or in their horse keeping. So if for no other reason it behooves me to find good ways to do it which motivates and encourages people without trying to be some sort of inoffensive horse boy that is some kind of fantasy that allows everyone to feel okay with whatever they’re doing at all times, I don’t think that’s necessarily the answer. Now, horses for courses. There are certain people who find me too strong, and there are certain people who find me too soft. I’m not trying to be for everyone. I’m just trying to be a steel marshmallow and make a living.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:22:58-00:23:57]
That’s what I’m trying to do. That’s what I’m trying to do. Steel marshmallow. Steel marshmallow. Now, looking at this from the perspective of being a coach for humans, so in what ways do you think that the industry, I mean, we all know, we’ve all been to the horse shows, we’ve all been to the barns where you think, oh my gosh, I can’t believe they’re speaking to them that way. And what ways do you think that the equestrian industry could shift the way that the coaches work with students? And what do you do differently in your approach? Because I know, like the word holding space and that and we can talk about like holding space and feel as quote unquote buzzwords and what they really mean. But what What do you do differently and how do you feel that the equestrian industry could do differently for how they coach humans with their horses? Crikey. Crikey. It’s a loaded question.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:23:57-00:24:04]
No, it’s not a loaded question. I almost want to plead the fifth on this question.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:24:04-00:24:08]
Okay.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:24:08-00:26:01]
I am currently fully booked out until January, February next year, and we’re filming in October. And yesterday I started getting bookings for March 2024. I can’t keep up with the apparent demand for how I’m working with people. I don’t think that how I’m working with people is any sort of special secret. I don’t think it’s new. I don’t think I’m exceptional. I don’t think I’m doing anything out of the purview of anyone’s capabilities. I’m really just trying to be nice to people. Period. And I cannot believe that my business is now a revolving door ad nauseum of clients after client after client who tells me these horror stories. the coaches and trainers they’ve worked with. That does not mean that every other coach other than me is an asshole. That’s not what I’m saying. All I’m saying is that, and this is absolutely selective bias, because of course, if you’ve got a great coach, you’re not looking for a coach, right? So if people are coming to me, they’re looking for a coach because they’ve often had bad ones. But I’m shocked and appalled to discover that I show up, I care very much about what I do, I try to teach with a sense of humor and with kindness and with clarity and with boundaries. And that apparently is blowing people’s minds. And I have actually said at clinics, I was like, why is this my job? Is anyone in the room here an instructor? I was like, why, why has this been my job? Why did I need to get on a plane, fly from Spain to Wyoming or wherever I am and say, okay, be nice to your horses, be nice to each other. study hard, have a good life.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:26:01-00:26:02]
Okay, great.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:26:02-00:26:21]
And then I leave. Why was that my job? You know, I’m being facetious on purpose, right? I’m being facetious because there’s a lot more to it than that. But I really, really try to coach people on their strengths. And that’s not something I do haphazardly. I had a mentor who taught me how to do that.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:26:21-00:26:22]
She was

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:26:23-00:27:24]
Australia’s number one sports performance psychologist. She was the leader in her field. She worked with Australia’s Olympic athletes. She worked with dancers, musicians, even equestrians. Anyone who is in a high performance field who needed mental performance coaching came to Dr. Paulette Nifsid. She was my coach. She was my friend. She was my colleague. We started working on a project together. And she was training me up in her system of coaching. And then she got cancer and she died. And before she died, she asked me, quote, to take up the flag for her. Take up the flag for me, she said. Would you continue my life’s work was her exact words to me on the phone. So I do. Now, to some people I come across as abrasive and too strong. That’s because maybe I’m an Aries, right? I lead with my horns first. I’m a fire.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:27:24-00:27:25]
I’m an Aries as well.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:27:25-00:28:20]
There I am. I go horns first, soft fluffy wool that follows. I’m the ram, right? That’s just how I am. People have to allow your service providers to be who they are. However, one of my best kept secrets is how well I treat my clients. my sense of humor, even inappropriate at times, and how much I care about horses and the people who come to me. Just before getting on the call with you, I had a group coaching call with my coaching program I’m doing at the moment. I have 84 people there. One participant, she’s in the program. The last time I worked with her was four years ago. She asked me a question. I remembered her horse’s name from four years ago. I do about a thousand consultations every year.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:28:20-00:28:21]
Wow.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:28:21-00:29:07]
And I remembered her horse’s name and I remembered some of the issues she was having four years ago, et cetera, et cetera. So if you want to be a good coach, show up on time, be well studied, be well versed and fluent in the things that you’re teaching. care deeply about those you’re teaching, treat them well and treat them with respect. It’s really not reinventing the wheel. It’s just going back to maybe good old-fashioned respect and community, which we don’t see enough of in some equestrian environments, because for some reason, horses tend to attract people with a brutal streak. I don’t know why. I don’t know why.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:29:09-00:30:01]
It’s interesting. I, um, I used to own a yoga studio and, um, we used to, part of our thing was you always remembered everybody’s names. You just, you made, you made a habit when somebody came in to go to a class, you remembered their name. And then when they came back the next time you remembered their name and people would be shocked by it. And they used to say, I can’t believe you remembered my name because I haven’t been here in however many weeks. And it was just one of those things where it, It just feels like a part of, I don’t know, I don’t want to say like a humanity. We just all want to be seen. And I think to be seen is, it’s just, it’s not… Fundamental. Yeah. And it’s not done enough. And yeah, so that’s, that’s really interesting.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:30:03-00:30:09]
When I do clinics, I mean, I do online coaching and stuff, and I already know their name because their names are on my computer screen.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:30:09-00:30:10]
That’s easy.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:30:10-00:31:25]
But when I’m doing clinics, it’s a little harder when I’m going three days in one location, three days in another location, and I’m bouncing around. And there might be anywhere between 15 to 40 people in each event. I do all my own administration at this time and I clear my entire schedule more or less when I’m doing clinics and my sole job is just to deliver those clinics and I study. for weeks leading up to the clinic about the people who I’m going to be teaching and even about the auditors. And you’ll find me on a morning before a clinic, and I’m not a morning person, but I’ll get up extra early and over coffee wherever I’m staying. I’ll be on my computer revising and studying the names of the horses, the horses’ issues, their breed, their life experience, ages zero to two, the clients’ names. And sometimes I’ve even managed to remember the names of auditors when they’ve shown up to check in. And that’s really, really important to me. And again, shocked and appalled to find out that that’s not been everyone’s experience at a clinic. I’ve heard of stories of clinicians who get flown in, they stand in a room, they don’t even know who the participants are. The participant walks in already saddled on their horse and they say, what’s your name? OK, all right, it’s Dutch or whatever it is.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:31:25-00:31:26]
I’ve been to those clinics.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:31:26-00:31:38]
Yeah, an impersonal exchange and no hate to them because there’s a there’s a place at the table for everyone because maybe people don’t want a personal approach. They just want to talk about their half holds or whatever.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:31:38-00:31:39]
I don’t know.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:31:39-00:31:55]
But that’s not how I roll. That’s not how I roll. I get that someone’s horse is the most important thing in their life, maybe outside their family. I get that because I am like that, too, about my horses.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:31:55-00:32:07]
I love that. What does it mean to you to hold space, both for the humans and the horses?

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:32:07-00:32:57]
It’s a slightly overused word at this time, especially in the circles I run in. It’s an overused term, slightly, but it’s got an important etymology, I guess. I think its etymology sits in Eastern medicine traditions and Eastern esoteric practices. But for me, hold space is, do I have the capacity to accommodate this, them, and others right now? What can I accommodate? What is in my cup is mine, what flows over is for others. I think sometimes where we can go wrong with holding space is depleting yourself and allowing yourself to be a vessel for others.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:32:57-00:32:59]
No.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:32:59-00:33:50]
If I show up to teach, or to help someone, or even to work with my horse, I have to be honest, I have to be well-rested, I have to be well-versed in what I’m doing, and I have to know who I am, and then I can hold space for others. And not to get dragged into any kind of toxic codependency where you become responsible for someone’s success and their failure. people have to be responsible for themselves and their horses. So I don’t want holding space to ever be conflated with codependency or toxic attachments. But if you think of it like, go to a hardware store and you buy an electrical socket extender, plug it in, you turn one socket into 10. I think of holding space like that. I’ve got one source, but I’ve got many plugs here where you can plug in, but I’ve only got so many plugs.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:33:51-00:33:52]
Right?

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:33:52-00:34:10]
That’s kind of how I see it. Can I expand myself and can I accommodate what is happening in the horse? What is happening in this person? Can I hold space for it? Because sometimes the answer is no, I can’t. And sometimes the answer is yes, I can.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:34:10-00:35:12]
How would you, if somebody, if you looked at someone, so I’m just thinking, I have one of my horses. I don’t think anybody has ever truly listened to him in his entire life. He’s nine years old now. I got him when he was seven, almost eight. And he was a very shut down horse. And the moment that I just, what felt to me was a holding space. It was my definition of holding space for him. It was almost as though he said, This is all I wanted. I just wanted this. And how would you, if you were coaching somebody and you kind of got that feeling that maybe they needed space held for them as a human or their horses needed space held for them by their human, what would your approach be for, I don’t want to say the word instructing it, but guiding somebody into that?

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:35:15-00:36:07]
The way I train horses and people, this is already an assumed reality installed into each and every single technique that I teach. It’s been really important to me to curate an array of horsemanship tools which are edited, which are researched, which I can explain and demonstrate that are very, very discerning in how they impart information to the person and to the horse and what occurs between the two of them. I don’t want that any technique feels like getting a vaccine. You got to kind of look away and just let it happen. You know, I don’t, I don’t want a technique ever to feel that way. So, um, that’s just an implied reality in the way I work, Danielle. It’s like, does a fish know it’s wet?

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:36:07-00:36:08]
Yeah.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:36:08-00:36:13]
Does, does Lockie know he’s holding space? Like I’m always holding space. My, my,

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:36:14-00:36:18]
So it’s not like, oh, just a sec, I have to hold a space for you. It’s like, I already am.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:36:18-00:36:30]
It’s always there. My self-talk is how do I step back from that and have my own identity and my own life? That’s my work. I come from the other side of that story.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:36:30-00:36:47]
Yeah. Now, feel. That’s another one. I feel like as your history and your background as a dancer, feel just comes very natural to you. Would you agree with that? Or was that something that you had to learn?

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:36:47-00:37:25]
No, I don’t think it comes natural to me. It’s something I’ve had to study and learn and refine. What comes natural to me is the desire to feel. People have a lot of complex understandings around feel, and I could certainly wax lyrical on it for three hours, not a problem. I mean, you just press my button and off I go. But the most simple and common sense explanation for feel is, what do you feel? How do you feel?

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:37:25-00:37:28]
How do you feel?

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:37:28-00:37:37]
Not just physical, but emotional too. But those two things are absolutely enmeshed. The physical and the emotional are absolutely enmeshed.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:37:37-00:38:05]
Yeah. There’s somebody that I’ve been speaking to lately, just in regards to like nervous system and healing, you know, adrenals and things like that. And she was saying about how so often people say mind and body as two separate things, when it’s actually just mind-body. It’s one word. Because it’s one thing. It’s not mind and body. And I thought that’s really interesting.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:38:05-00:38:06]
Consider that stolen.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:38:06-00:38:11]
I quite like that. Well, it’s not mine. He didn’t steal it from me. Who’s the source?

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:38:11-00:38:13]
In case I need to quote it in the future?

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:38:13-00:39:31]
Her name is Holly Barnett. She’s been on the podcast, actually. She had a saddle-fitting company, very, very well-versed in saddle-fitting, massage therapy, all of the things. And she also is going into a lot of work around like adrenals and nervous system for humans and how it relates to their horses. She’s a wonderful human being, so shout out to Holly. Very, very needed. Very, very needed. She’s been really, really helping me with a lot of those things as well. And I just thought that was such a cool integration of the word. Yeah, fun. And so fitness, again, going back to the idea of like the dance background. And I know myself having a yoga background. I also find that it’s a little bit of a, I don’t want to say advantage, but I know my body really well. How do you feel there are certain ways for equestrians to get to know their bodies without necessarily needing to lift weights, those sorts of things? We all know fitness is important, but are there any ways that you would recommend for people for body awareness practices? Body, breath, all of the things.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:39:31-00:39:34]
This is the disgusting part where I plug a product.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:39:34-00:39:35]
That’s okay.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:39:35-00:40:57]
So I actually have a product designed to do just that. I have an online course which sits very nicely under the umbrella of emotional horsemanship in my work. I call it Body Instrument Method, BIM, and it’s a very humble, simple take on training your movement and training your body. The whole idea of fitness, again, I think there’s a lot of misnomers there. There’s a lot of misunderstandings in the fitness industry. There’s a lot of obsessions and fixations around physical fitness, which are pure correlation, not causation. A lot of things where we’re attributing to certain things that has nothing to do with those things at all. There’s a lot of bad science around fitness in general. I’ve tried to present modern movement science for the equestrian not presenting something that you have to be a friggin ballet dancer to do it, but I had students in my course who were in their 70s and they’re doing this stuff. What’s more important than muscle strength is your movement. What’s more important than flexibility is your movement. What’s more important than your stamina is your movement. It’s your coordination.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:40:57-00:40:58]
It’s the way you move.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:40:58-00:41:56]
I’ll give a story. When I was dancing, we were working on probably the most challenging partner work I’ve ever done in my career. So I had a human female, albeit small because dancers are small, but still it’s a human female and I had to repeatedly and in right time with the music and make it look good, lift her in the air and hold her there to the music, etc, etc. And it was very, very technical, very heavy work in this particular piece I’m talking about. And when I first started learning it, I was really struggling with it because I was telling myself a story in my mind that I wasn’t strong enough. I’ve always been a bit of a string bean. I’ve always been tall and lanky and thin and always been laughed at for being weak, right? So I was telling a story in my mind that I wasn’t strong enough to do it. And one of the principal dancers in the company, top in his field, walked up to me and said, Bucky, you’re using too much strength. I went, oh, oh, what?

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:41:58-00:41:60]
What?

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:41:60-00:42:48]
Now, he could do all of the advanced partnering work and carry a whole show on his ability to throw a woman around in the air, but he was built so slight and willowy. It’s like, where are you keeping the muscles, dude? Nothing to do. with muscle but about timing. Timing, coordination and movement. He said you’re lifting with too much power too soon and you’re not working together with her. He says you don’t lift with your arms, you lift with your legs and you lift with your core but you have to be in time with her because if she jumps too early, a nanosecond too early, instead of lifting with her, she’ll be falling as you’re lifting. And then she’s three times as heavy as what she should be.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:42:48-00:42:48]
Right?

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:42:48-00:44:56]
And so it’s exactly the same with our world with horses. How many of us have to haul feed sacks left, right and center? Or hay bales? And what I learned in movement is that if you fully relax your body, I mean completely relax everything. exactly the moment before your peak exertion is required of you, you’ll be able to lift and move things you never knew you’d be able to lift and move. So it’s more about efficiency and it’s more about movement and coordination than it is about strength because I subscribe to the church of Judge Judy. She says, beauty fades, dumb is forever. I believe that strength and fitness fades, but movement is forever. If you’ve got quality movement, it’ll be good. If you think of someone like Tom Dorrance, who I believe was still writing cults in his nineties, beautifully, he had no strength left. He had only technique and movement and could ride better than anyone. And someone asked him, why are you still riding? You don’t have to ride anymore. He said, because I think I’m starting to learn something. So a lot of us ride and train our horses on youthful strength. And then in, you know, middle of our lives, we run after that strength with weights and try to try to preserve our quote unquote youth. I say, let it go and be good movers from the beginning. And then strength can be a separate subject, but be good in your movement from the beginning. It’s a little bit like, I always feel like I ride a little bit better on days when I’m feeling a bit tired because I can’t just come in there with adrenaline and power. I have to be more deliberate. I have to be more technical. And I always have a better ride because I’m more economical. And I’m less likely to get into a quote unquote argument with a horse because I just don’t have the power to argue with you today. So I’m just not going to. I’m going to find other ways. So, yeah, a bit of a loaded question, but I have a lot to say on that subject.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:44:56-00:45:17]
A lot to say. I love that. I yeah, I think that’s super interesting. I really like that approach. And is it body instrument as in like using your body as an instrument? Correct. OK, I like that. Yeah. What is your hope? This may be another loaded question, so I apologize for firing them all at you, but what is your hope?

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:45:17-00:45:20]
It’s my middle name. Loaded question is my middle name.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:45:20-00:45:27]
Okay. What is your hope for the future of the equestrian industry?

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:45:27-00:45:31]
Which part of the equestrian industry?

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:45:31-00:45:33]
That’s a great back question.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:45:40-00:47:56]
I’ll make it easier for you. I’ll make it easier for you. Okay. So I used to work for a lady, the last person I ever worked for, who has been 35 years in the industry running trail riding business. And this was the last place I worked. It was in one of the last wilderness areas in Western Europe and I was working for them. She said to me that over the last, these are her words, over the last 35 years, riders have completely changed. Her clientele has totally changed. She used to work with horse trainers and ranchers and veterinarians and professional horse people and riders. That’s who used to come. Now it’s the adult recreational industry. I won’t use the word amateur. I believe it’s insulting. The adult recreational industry, I have huge, huge hopes for the future of that arm of the equestrian industry, the adult recreational industry, where they love horses. Their horses are a companion animal, just like a dog or a cat. And they need very specific training modalities designed just for them, because sport modalities, ranching, agricultural modalities do not work properly. For the recreational equestrian, it is a very unique job to ask these animals that have grown civilization with us for 10,000 years to now be okay with getting trained twice a week and still not kill someone on the trail rides on Sundays. You see, so it’s a very specific job that these recreational horses have and a lot of them aren’t being bred for recreation. They’ve still got performance bloodlines and now they’ve got half the work but twice the demands. They’re supposed to be beautiful and adaptable and sound and healthy and kind and affectionate and powerful and they need to be all the things for these people. And I’ve got huge hopes for that arm of the industry. Other arms of the industry, I will plead the fifth because I’m just not so sure.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:47:56-00:49:30]
Yeah. Yeah. It’s funny. I’m the kind of person that when I resonate with somebody, I feel it like in my solar plexus. And as you were saying that I was like getting that pitter-patter because I am an adult recreational rider and I have for the duration of my two plus decade riding horse journey. I’ve never resonated with much of the industry because it’s always just been focused on competition. I’ve competed from when I was young, just locally. But I never resonated with it and I never fit in. I struggled with finding trainers and coaches and those sorts of things because it was always all directed at, well, what are your show goals? And I think that you are on to something really, really great when you say that, because I do feel as though it is a part of our industry that has been pushed to the side. We’ve almost been, as a recreational rider, you’re always like, oh, cute, good for you. You know, like, just kind of pushed to the side, like, let’s focus on those that have competition goals. And I think that allowing us to to feel like we’re part of something is going to be something that’s really, really cool. And like you said, I think it’s a part that’s going to be, it’s a big thing and it’s a good hope for the future.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:49:31-00:53:21]
I don’t have to help you feel a part of something, because you already are. And shout out to any equestrian professionals, whether you’re a trainer, a cult starter, a writing instructor, whatever, ignore the adult recreational equestrian and their very specific and unique demands. Ignore them at your peril, because if they aren’t already Give it five to ten years, they will be your bread and butter clients that keep a roof over your head. Ignore their unique demands and requirements at your peril or risk becoming so out of touch and outdated with where the industry is going. If you look at even what’s happening at a legislative level. We have some friends, there’s an equine advocate somewhere in the French bureaucracy, because over the last few years, there’s been things happening in France, which I’m really perking my ears up and taking attention to. Because of COVID, we had a situation where horses were stuck in stables without caregivers anymore because they were deemed agricultural livestock. who, during COVID and the house restrictions, you had to be a registered farmer to be able to leave your house to go care for your livestock. But most of the owners of horses aren’t registered farmers anymore. And yet, hundreds of thousands of horses in France were then left without caregivers during the quarantine. Locked in stables, no one taking care of them, and then maybe one livery manager or two who are overrun, and it became an animal welfare issue. In response to this, France has now changed the law Horses in France are now companion animals just like a rabbit, a guinea pig, a cat or a dog. They’re no longer classified as livestock. Now France is the first country. How many years is it going to take the rest of the world to catch up? Maybe a century, maybe. But if we look back at the beginning of the 20th century, we had a period between 1910 and 1930 where in exactly 20 years, collapsed when Henry Ford invented the internal combustion engine. You had in every city, you had the stables, and the feed producers, and the farriers, and the vets, and the trainers, and the starters, and the handlers, and the grooms, and this huge multi-million dollar industry in every city of the world. And in the space between 1910 and 1930, it completely evaporated. And since then, we have been trying to redefine what horses are to the human race now, and usually they’ve been pushed out into rural areas, and yet people from city areas now crave horses again. Everything that’s old is new again. And now you’re starting to see a ruralification of city folk as they start spending time in the countryside with horses in whatever spare time they’ve got. And so this is where the industry is going. It’s been going there for at least 90, 80 years. And I consider myself very late to the party when I say that recreational horse people, whether you’re riding or not, deserve service providers who understand exactly who they are, who celebrate them, know exactly what their wants are, what their needs are, and the needs and requirements of their horses, and have training methodologies designed exactly for them. That’s what I’m trying to do.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:53:21-00:53:24]
I think it’s, like I said, I think you’re onto something really good here.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:53:25-00:53:34]
Well, it’s not just like I’m not trying to be a greasy snake oil salesman. I’m not trying to be predatory in marketing. I don’t have any degree in marketing. I don’t know what the algorithms are.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:53:34-00:53:37]
I don’t think anybody does. No, people do.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:53:37-00:53:53]
People know the algorithms and I’ve seen people come up and try to create businesses based on an algorithm. And I just post whatever I’m doing with my horses. And I make posts where I lose more followers than gain. I’ll do all the wrong things that algorithms shouldn’t do.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:53:53-00:53:54]
And yet,

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:53:55-00:54:24]
I’ve managed to get some growth anyway. So I’m doing this because it feels the most honest and the most natural and authentic to me as a horse service provider, as a professional. And frankly, that’s who I am as a horse person. I’ve never been to a competition I don’t want to go. And because I don’t want to go, that means probably at some point in my life I should go just to say that I did it and I can talk about it.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:54:24-00:54:25]
I don’t know.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:54:25-00:55:06]
But I’ve never been to a competition, don’t want to go. I have worked with horses who had to work for a living, but it was always advanced trail riding, classically trained trail riding horses or school horses for riding centers, et cetera, summer camps, things like this. It’s really the area I specialize in the most and the area I can help people because I look out my window, I look out my kitchen window and my horses are right there. And I’m living the dream many of my clients have. And yeah, got to lay the pathways for them so they can have an easier way to follow.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:55:09-00:55:19]
Lucky, I want to be respectful of your time because I know you’re very busy. We have four questions, just like a rapid fire question we ask every podcast guest. Good luck.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:55:19-00:55:21]
Good luck trying to get rapid answers out of me.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:55:21-00:55:26]
Okay, go ahead. The first one is, do you have a motto or favorite saying?

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:55:28-00:55:37]
God, I am full of allegories and little pities. I’m full of them. Really, I’ve got more of them than I do not.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:55:37-00:55:47]
Do you have any that you go to all the time? Do you find yourself saying a lot?

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:55:47-00:55:48]
Give me half a second.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:55:48-00:55:53]
Yep.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:55:53-00:56:09]
Rejection is protection. That’s one thing I say a lot. You can’t teach a pig to sing. It doesn’t work and it only annoys the pig.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:56:09-00:56:24]
I say that a lot. That’s enough, if no more come to mind.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:56:24-00:56:42]
That’s enough. There’s so many and usually they’re always spontaneously evolving in front of the client that I’ve got. I have, if I have any talent at all, it’s the talent to understand what someone’s going through and immediately bring an analogy to the table which can help them understand what they’re going through.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:56:42-00:56:48]
That’s important. That’s very important as an educator, you know, to make it so it’s relatable to the person.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:56:49-00:57:04]
That’s probably the only talent I’ve actually got. I can still do that if I’m half brain dead, hungover and really, really exhausted. I can still do that for someone. So it’s probably my only gift.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:57:04-00:57:10]
Yeah. The second question is who has been the most influential person in your equestrian journey?

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:57:15-00:57:26]
My horses, I know that’s like a cop-out thing to say, but genuinely, really, truly, my horses, they are it.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:57:26-00:57:33]
That’s not a cop-out. You’re one of the only people that have ever said it, so that’s not a cop-out.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:57:33-00:58:31]
Oh, okay, great. I’ve been really blessed to have some really awesome teachers and mentors too, so they know who they are, but they’re mostly pretty private people. But really, I don’t have performance horses who are bred to be docile and obedient. They challenge me. Well, now I do. I’ve got one of them. But until him, I’ve always had quirky, weird, backyard, mountain, you know, horses that really challenge you, who are maybe born works hour or are works hour because of their experiences. or not just sour, traumatized horses that I had to learn how to get them on side and never make them feel like they’re being trained on. I mean, no one is a better teacher in horsemanship than the horse. Period. Period. No one will teach you how to ride them better than the horse you’re riding.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:58:31-00:58:37]
I love that. The third question, if you could give equestrians one piece of advice, what would it be?

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:58:50-00:59:07]
Listen to your horses. More than you listen to your instructors, to your idols, to your methodologies, listen to your horses.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:59:07-00:59:12]
Absolutely. And the fourth one, please complete this sentence.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:59:12-00:59:19]
For me, horses are… For me, horses are my friends and my family.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:59:21-00:59:22]
Mm.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:59:22-00:59:25]
They’re a safe port in a storm. Mm.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:59:25-00:59:29]
Oh, I love that. Mm. Mm-hmm. Yeah.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:59:29-00:59:30]
They’re home. Horses are home to me.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:59:30-00:59:38]
Yeah. Where can people find you and how can they connect with you? And we’ll link everything in the show notes.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:59:38-00:59:57]
You can go to my website, emotionalhorsemanship.com. I’m regularly upgrading, updating and refining everything there so that I’m less confusing and more understandable. I’ve got social media, Facebook, Instagram, YouTube. I have a video library on Patreon.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:59:57-01:00:18]
I put new content there every week. That’s where you can find me. Awesome. We’ll link it all in the show notes so everybody can check you out. It has been an absolute pleasure speaking with you. I’ve really enjoyed this conversation and I don’t just have a feeling, I know our audience is going to really enjoy this conversation as well. So thank you so much for your time.

[SPEAKER 2]
[01:00:18-01:00:19]
It’s my pleasure.

[SPEAKER 1]
[01:00:23-01:00:57]
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.