Reclaim Your Stolen Attention: The Secret to a Deeper Bond with Your Horse & Dog #132

In our hyperconnected world, your most valuable asset isn't money or equipment—it's your attention. And it's being systematically stolen from you every day. This episode reveals how modern distractions are sabotaging your relationships with your horse and dog, while robbing you of the deep, present connections that both you and your animals crave.

Discover why your "attention muscle" has likely atrophied without you realizing it, and learn powerful, science-backed methods to reclaim this essential skill. Through the renowned Feldenkrais MethodⓇ for humans and specialized Debono Moves for animals, you'll not only strengthen your ability to focus but also create profound healing and connection that transforms lives.

Whether you're constantly context-switching between devices, mindlessly scrolling social media, or simply feeling scattered in your daily interactions, this episode provides practical, immediately actionable strategies to break free from digital distraction and develop the deep work skills that will revolutionize both your wellbeing and your animal relationships.

Key Takeaways

• Your attention is your most valuable commodity, and it's being hijacked by modern technology
• Animals respond to your quality of attention more than expensive equipment or training methods
• The Feldenkrais Method helps you reclaim focus while improving movement and posture
• Debono Moves for animals helps strengthen your attention while improving the movement and comfort of your horse or dog
• Context switching (jumping between tasks) weakens your ability to connect deeply
• Small practices like mindful standing or reading physical books can rebuild your attention muscle
• Your movement, breathing, and attention quality are all felt by your animals
• Starting with just a few minutes of focused attention can begin transforming your relationships

Resources:

💥Learn how the Feldenkrais Method can help improve your seat, position, and balance on your horse! Free rider videos masterclass: https://www.marydebono.com/rider 💥

Grab your FREE video training to help your dog. 🐕 https://www.marydebono.com/lovedog 💥

Want to help your dog move more easily and feel their best—at any age? Join the waitlist for my upcoming program, Easier Movement, Happier Dogs, and be the first to know when doors open. Spaces are limited. 

Get Mary’s bestselling, award-winning book, “Grow Young with Your Dog,” for a super low price at: https://tinyurl.com/growyoungwithyourdog. Demonstration videos are included at no extra cost. ⬅️⬅️⬅️

All information is for general educational purposes ONLY and doesn't constitute medical or veterinary advice or professional training advice. Please consult a qualified healthcare provider if you, your horse, or your dog are unwell or injured.  Always use extreme caution when interacting with horses and dogs.

About the Host:

Mary Debono is a pioneer in animal and human wellness, blending her expertise as an international clinician, best-selling author, and certified Feldenkrais Method® practitioner. With over three decades of experience, Mary developed Debono Moves, a groundbreaking approach that enhances the performance, well-being, and partnership of animals and their humans.

Mary's innovative approach draws from the Feldenkrais Method®, tailored specifically for horse and dog enthusiasts.  Her methods have helped animals and humans:

• Improve athletic ability and performance
• Enhance confidence and reduce anxiety
• Reduce physical limitations and discomfort
• Deepen the human-animal bond

Mary's flagship online programs, "Move with Your Horse" and "Easier Movement, Happier Dogs," provide animal enthusiasts with an innovative approach that combines the concepts of Feldenkrais® with her signature hands-on work for horses and dogs. Through this transformative method, both people and their animal companions discover greater harmony, ease, and connection.

TRANSCRIPT:

Hi. Your horse or dog doesn't care about fancy equipment. They don't care about your bank balance or even your fashion sense. And thank goodness for that one, by the way. I'm not known for my fashion sense. What they want from you is something far simpler and far more valuable. But here's the catch. This valuable commodity, if you will, is often being stolen from you. It's being kind of taken from you.

And that valuable commodity is attention, your ability to attend. And if you think about it, this is not only important for your horse or your dog, but it's also important for the quality of your life, because where you direct your attention basically shapes your whole life. And many of us don't even realize that, you know, there's all kinds of distractions out there in the world and that are subtly and not so subtly drawing your attention and directing it.

And we just get so habituated to this that we don't even realize where our attention is going. But don't fear, because I have something that you can do to regain your attention, to actually, you know, take it back, to reclaim it, and to use it very intentionally. So let's talk first about how it's stolen from you. So this wonderful author and podcaster, Cal Newport, he's also a computer scientist and professor at Georgetown.

He talks about this a lot, how, you know, our attention is just being hijacked in a way. And, you know, that ability to focus without being distracted is getting more and more rare in our culture. So he talks here. One of his books is called Deep Work. He has a number of books. Slow Productivity is his most recent book. And he really makes some very, very valid points about this, that we're constantly being distracted, and it's like we're losing the ability.

If you think of, like, your. Your mind is like a muscle. You know, it's like we're. We're losing strength. We're losing that ability to focus on something and actually, you know, really get into the. Into the meat of something. And instead, we're constantly doing what. What is called context switching, where maybe we're answering an email and then a text comes in, and so you. You answer the text, and you're supposed to be writing an essay, but, you know, you get distracted.

Maybe you go on social media or some other notification bings or pings or whatever, and it's like we just don't know how to attend to things. But this is why I love, love, love the Feldenkrais method, to help you gain your attention back and improve your Movement, well being, vitality, all that and the hands on work that I teach to help your horses and dogs, and that's called dibono moves, Both of those approaches will help you strengthen your attention muscle, if you will.

They will help you reclaim your attention. And this makes total sense because let's talk about you first in the Feldenkrais method. When you're doing an awareness through movement lesson, which I teach, you're really invited to become curious about how you're moving. And we do these, you know, easy, gentle movements that bring a sense of pleasure and novelty to your movement. So your brain really pays attention, really gets the attention of your brain.

So now you're honing the skill of attention. So again, in addition to improving how you move, how you feel, all that good stuff, your posture, everything, you're also learning how to be more attentive. It's like you're, you're fighting back from all the modern distractions that are reducing your ability to attend. And you really learn how to attend with your whole self. And so that's number one. And that's why it's so important to me.

I always, in my work of teaching you how to help your animals, I always help you improve your own ability to be aware of your self, your own movement, your well being, all that good stuff because it goes hand in hand. And now with your, with the hands on work, the de Bono moves. So when I teach you how to do that, I'm also inviting you to pay very close attention to how your animal feels.

Like you're sensing with your hands, you're listening, you're seeing, it's, you're attending with your whole self. And again, this is a wonderful way of developing that attention muscle, if you will. So you're, you're reclaiming your ability to attend. And here's where it gets really interesting too, because like in the beginning, like if you really like many of us in the modern day, we're so distracted and jumping from one thing to the other, it may not be easy to do more than a couple of minutes of being very attentive to yourself or to your animal.

And that's fine. So you start where you are. In other words, if that's all the time, you can stay attentive, that's where you start. And if you find yourself kind of wandering, thinking about something else, getting distracted, you know, you could just gently bring yourself back, do a little bit more and then pick it up again another time. But the idea is you want to generate a sense of, well, Being that's associated with you being attentive.

So that's why we're so. It's so important that when you're doing, for example, the Feldenkrais awareness through movement lessons, you're moving in a way that feels pleasurable and novel. And again, you're generating this sense of kind of power and well, being and vitality. And also with your animal, you're really you. You know, I combine it when I teach this, I combine it with this idea that you're sending loving energy and you're creating this deep connection along with helping your animal move more comfortably, more freely and all those other good things.

And this tells your brain this is important and it feels good so your, your mind will want to start doing more of it. Okay, so let's think of all the places where you're maybe tempted to context switch, to jump around from thing to thing, and why that's so powerful to start to recognize where you're doing that. And, you know, it's going to be obvious, but the number one one is social media.

Now, I'm not against social media, you know, totally by any means. I found it's a wonderful way to connect with people, you know, cross distances. The way I do it is I use it very intentionally. I. Yes, I have the app on my, you know, the different apps on my phone, but I rarely do it on my phone. I usually do it on my laptop. And I am, I guard against doing it habitually to just compulsively.

Instead, I go on Facebook, for example. I have Facebook groups that I run, both a public one and a. And a private one for my students. My move with your horse students. And we discuss things. I answer questions. Other people, you know, contribute to the discussion. It's wonderful. It's absolutely wonderful. And I also belong to other groups and I learn a lot from them. I try to contribute as much as possible to those other groups as well.

And so again, I go in there and I very intentionally go to my groups. Now, just a little tip for any of you that are interested. On my laptop, I have a Chrome extension that it's called like Feed Eliminator or something like that. And what it does is it hides your Facebook feed so you don't get that. You know, how like instantly, you know, a Facebook feed comes up and you hear about, oh, that's a gal I went to school with, or, hey, you know, what is that guy doing?

Or whatever. You know, you don't even see that. There's just like an inspirational quote that comes up and then you go to wherever you want to go. So if you wanted to look at an individual's page, you can, you can just put their name in the search bar, but it's not going to, you know, automatically send you stuff. So I find that very helpful. You know, it's. It's.

Again, it just gives you a little buffer so that you can be more intentional. So, you know, and of course, there's other social media platforms you might belong to. Again, I would encourage you to be aware. This is all about awareness, right? To be more, you know, to have just more understanding of the actions we're doing. We do this in our work, in our movement work, right? We talk about that all the time.

The way we sit, the way we stand, the way we breathe, the way we ride our horse or hold our dog's leash. You know, things become habitual and we just do them unconsciously. Well, you might be kind of leaking your attention unconsciously as well. So first step is to really, you know, take a step back and start noticing things. And for example, it's. It's very common for people to just reach for their phone.

If they're just say you're standing in line, right? Maybe you have to, you know, you're going to the grocery store, whatever, there's a line. What do people do? They pull out their phone. It's like everyone around you. I see people constantly. They're crossing a busy intersection and they're staring down at their phone. Okay, not recommended. What if you're standing in line, for example, and you want something to do because line's taken a while.

What if you just got curious about how you're standing where, you know, like, how your weight is distributed over your feet, how your knees feel, your hips feel your back, you know, how your shoulders are hanging. Not with an intention to change anything, but just to notice it's going to start to tune, allow you to tune into yourself. And then you might want to play around with, you know, shifting your weight more to the outside of your right foot and the inside of your left, and then the opposite of that, a little more to the front of your feet, the back of your feet, you know, more on the heels.

And you can do this, and I've done this many, many times, you can do it in such a small way with just like micro movements that you're not going to draw attention to yourself. So if you don't want to draw attention to yourself by doing some big movements, right, you can just do these subtle movements and just start to really feel, feel how you're standing and the difference when you shift your weight in different ways.

To me, that's much better than just habitually, without thinking, grabbing your phone. Okay, we want to be able to have some control of where our attention is going. And again, this is something that you may need to develop over time. For many of us, it is another useful thing. And I believe Cal Newport talks about this. Yes, he actually, I know he does. Is picking up a book like a physical book, maybe in the evening where you would, you know, mindlessly scroll on your phone, maybe you pick up a book and just start reading even a few pages.

And maybe at first you don't want to have a heavy scientific text or anything like that, but instead you choose something that's really light. This kind of goes along with our Feldenkrais concepts, too, of, you know, starting with something that's really easy, right? And then you'll again, you'll start to develop the skill of reading more deeply and paying attention to maybe concepts that, you know, your brain has to work a little harder at.

Okay, so these are things, again, that I really, really encourage you to do. And then, you know, all the work you do, you know, I, I have a number of free resources. You could look in the show notes where you can work with your horse or your dog and start to just develop that ability to really attend to your animal. It's going to deepen your connection with your animal, and you'll be able to help them more effectively.

And doing the Feldenkrais awareness through movement for yourself will also help your, you know, enrich your own life, your own movement, your posture, your wellbeing, all that good stuff. So I, I, I feel so strongly about this because you just see over and over again how many people are like, they don't even realize that they've let their attend. I'm gonna call it the attention muscle. Just atrophy. You know, they, they don't realize that they don't even know how to, you know, do deep work anymore.

So let's, let's consider this sort of a call to action for all of us. You know, I'm not going to say that I was immune to this either. I mean, it's so tempting in our modern day to just constantly be pulled in one direction or the other, but really taking the time and doing something deeply, whether it's a Feldenkrais lesson for yourself, a de Bono move session with your animal or reading a book or talking with a friend where you're not distracted.

You're not distracted. I mean, all those things will really enrich your lives. So let me know how this works for you. Let me know what you struggle with. Like, do you feel distracted? Or again, maybe you don't even notice you're distracted. But be mindful of the context switching because we really want to be more empowered. What I love so much about the work that I teach the Feldenkrais for humans, the Dibona moves for the animals, is that it's an empowering approach.

It's an optimistic, hopeful approach that you can improve at any age or at any level of physical condition. So this is part of it. Part of it is, is taking back your attention. So let me know what works for you. And remember that your attention means the world to your animals. You will have a stronger bond with them. It. It shapes your relationship with your animals, you know, so something I say frequently is how you move, how you breathe, and how you direct your attention are all felt by your horse or your.

And they all shape your interactions with your animal. So this is a very important skill to reclaim. So thank you so much for taking the time and attention to listen to this. And as always, I love hearing from you. You could always reach me. Maryaryerrydebono.com and I look forward to talking to you again soon. Bye for now.