EMHH Episode 36: What Type of Horse Person Are You?

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Story Mary mentioned on podcast: https://www.marydebono.com/blog/think-outside-the-stall  

TRANSCRIPT:

Hello and welcome. Do you have riding goals or any kind of equine goals? Like for example, do you wanna have more flexible hips in the saddle? Do you want to have a more balanced seat? Maybe you wanna have more confidence. One I hear a lot is just, you wanna feel more relaxed when you're with your horse, whether on the ground or in the saddle.

So if you have any kind of goal related to your horses from the most simple goal imaginable to something really ambitious, this episode is for you. Because today we're going to dive in and I'm going to give you a strategy that will help you really finally start accomplishing your goals. Because there's, there's a big reason why a lot of times you're not doing the things,

the steps that will help you get your goals, okay? There's this unconscious resistance that's coming up, right? You, you, you consciously want something, but your subconscious or your unconscious is not aligned with it. So we need to align them. And we're going to start to do that today by first identifying the type of horse person you are. Now,

please stay with me here, okay? I'm not talking about whether you're a dressage rider or a jumper or a rainer or a trail rider or anything else. I'm talking about something that's much more basic to your identity. Okay? So really what I'm talking about, or your values. And before you, you think, Oh, I already know what my values are,

Mary. I'm really clear on them. I'm gonna say, I'm not so sure about that because I have worked with hundreds and hundreds of riders over the past 30 plus years, and so many of them are really not clear on their values or, you know, they have certain conscious values, but again, it's that misalignment, that incongruency with their unconscious that holds them back.

Okay? So let me start out by telling you a story, okay? I'm gonna give you an example of a few different people that, that they were living their values in a particular way. Okay? So we'll start out by, I'm gonna tell you about a woman that who I'm gonna call Shelly, that's not her real name, but Shelly had a couple of really fancy meaning,

really expensive dressage horses, and competition was everything to her. And I mean, like going to competitions, not just competition among her fellow borders or fellow writers, I'm talking about she wanted to win. So she was at a very upper level dressage barn and we're talking international level stuff. And she would have me come out, work with her horses. This was back when I was also doing one on one work in addition to my teaching.

And by the way, shout out to my move with your horse students who I adore my online program. But anyway, so Shelly would have me come out and each time I came out I noticed that her horses were so sore and so tight, especially through the back. And, you know, just, and this was many years ago. So it was before I had a commitment,

a commitment to myself basically, and to my clients that both the horse and the human had to work with me. That I wouldn't just work with one or the other. So this is before then, So this is quite a while ago. And I would come out and work with the horses and I would question her about, you know, what are you doing?

And try to get her more involved in this session because she seemed to be not as involved. She just wanted me to come there, do her horses. And that was the end of it. She really didn't want to know what was happening and what the horses were feeling. And she even said to me one day, I don't care what you do or how you do it,

all I know is that every time you work with my horses, they win. They win always, every single time. So she said, I don't, I don't care what you do, but to me, that that didn't, that didn't work for me because what was happening was it was unfair to her horses. I would help them feel better and they would feel so good that they then they would win.

You know, they would be able to move so freely that, you know, they would win. And then the type of riding and training she was doing would just continue. There was no change in her approach. So sort of like, I just kept putting a bandaid on these horses and there was no real change. Nothing at the foundation of their life changed and she didn't want to change.

And she had a lot of other things going on. In other words, what I discovered, and again, I'm, I'm not in her mind, so I don't know, but I was guessing, okay, which is always dangerous, but I was guessing that one of her big values was winning competitions. That that was extremely valuable to her. And no matter what she said about loving her horses,

it seemed she put competition as, as a higher priority than love or connection with her horses. She also had a certain dynamic with her husband. Her husband was footing the bill and it was astronomical for all her training. And the, these horses and my were everything. And he wanted, quote unquote, this is what she told me. My husband wants to see those blue ribbons,

so I need to win. So I think she valued financial security over some other things. So again, there was a lot going on and, and I'm not trying to get into her mind, but just to give you an example of her hierarchy, In other words, she had certain values and she prioritized them in a certain way and in a way that to me,

to, I'm being judgemental here, but in a way that I felt she wasn't being fair to her horses or not at all, kind to her horses. So I chose to no longer work with her, okay? Because she would, she wouldn't change. So she wasn't willing to examine her values, to question her values, to question her approach. And so she just kept chasing after this.

And by the way, what she ended up doing was she sold those two horses. She got two more horses, and there was this continuous cycle, cuz I would hear about it from other people, continuous cycling through of different horses and different husbands I might add as well. So, and again, I'm trying not to be judgmental about that. And that was just her way.

So she had certain values and, and who knows why she chose those. But she did. Now, another woman in contrast to this a bit, she, she was a hunter jumper rider, and I also was working with her horse and he was this wonderful caner, you know, this type of warm blood and back was incredibly sore. And her problem was he kept refusing the jumps.

And she very sheepishly showed me her, her arm muscles cuz she said, I have developed massive muscles in my arms from beating my horse. She wasn't proud of it, but she said, My trainer keeps telling me I just have to whip him when he stops. And to her credit, she had had a vet out, cuz that's obviously I require that.

And she had that even before she contacted me. And the vet just said to her, Don't jump this horse anymore, but did not give her reasons why. So her trainer discounted that vet's suggestion or that vet's proclamation, I should say. It was more than a suggestion. The vet was very clear, this horse should not be jumped. And in defense of the vet,

the vet probably would've given more information if there was more interaction with the vet, probably the type of thing. She was at work, the vet came out, examined the horse, the trainer was there, the trainer had a financial interest in keeping the training of that horse going. And so they, they, they discounted what the vet said. Okay?

So I was able to show her though, because again, she was interactive with me in the session. I was able to show her exactly what was going on with her horse and how this horse like physically was not capable of jumping because of the issues going on with a horse. And what this woman ended up doing, she did have the vet out again to address it also,

not only from a movement improvement perspective that I was doing, which was, you know, very helpful. But on my recommendation, she also had the vet out again, and I made sure she was there when the vet was there. But what she ended up doing, which I thought was really interesting, and I gave her credit, she decided that the journey for this horse to come back as a jumper was too long.

And she really wanted to jump. She said, I just live for jumping, I love to jump. So her husband, who was a very kind, very soft, balanced rider, I made sure that he took the horse and he only did things that were well within the horse's comfort, right? Within the horse's capabilities. And she got herself a sound horse who could do deal with the jumping.

And very importantly, she got a new trainer. She left that training barn. And I was so happy because, okay, so for her jumping and competition was very important, but she was also, she also valued kindness and compassion, right? She wanted to be a horse lover. So those were qualities that she valued. They were val, you know,

she found that valuable for her as a human being. And so she kept in alignment with that, so give her a lot of credit. So that was actually, that's quite a big difference from the, from Shelly, right? So that's one. So let me give you another one. There was a woman, she was a dressage rider, and again,

she had a lot of ambition. She wanted to compete at the highest levels and she bought a very expensive horse and who, who had competed very well. So she thought, oh, like great school master, this is great. She found that he was having a lot of issues. Again, this is so common and it's not the only thing certainly that we come across,

but he also happened to have a really sore, tied back, a stuck ribcage, all kinds of things, sore hend end. And, and she had obviously her vet involved as well. Well, what she had discovered and that she had bought a horse, this horse who the re was being maintained on a series of very frequent back injections, okay?

She was not happy to find this out, and long story there was litigation involved, yada yada. But that's how the horse was being maintained. So he was winning at the shows, but he required these frequent back injections by a veterinarian, of course, to compete at that level. And that was not okay with her. That was not okay with her.

So she had me work with the horse, she totally changed her approach. She gave the horse lots of time off and she lowered her expectations for this horse. Again, I give her a lot of credit because she had certain values, she had goals. Yeah, she had these massive goals, but she adjusted them. She had that flexibility, just like our jumper woman.

She had the flexibility to say, Okay, I want that, but what can I do differently? Okay. Or maybe I can just totally adjust my goals and maybe we won't be competing at Grand Prix. Okay? So, so that was really important. So, okay, one last story, but you're gonna really love this one. Okay? This was a woman and I,

and I will actually link, I wrote a whole blog post about this because it was so transformative, and I will link to that in the show notes. The, if you go to mary Debono dot com slash blog slash outside the box, outside the stall, excuse me, you'll find it. But anyway, I'll link to it. So you'll, you'll have the actual url.

I was teaching a long hands on equine workshop at this barn. This is back in the lots of in-person days, right? Right. I did all the stuff in person and I had this lovely group of students, and we were at one end of this very large barn. The other end was a saddle bird trainer. And it was a type of training he did the type of training where you keep the horses in the dark for 23 and a half hours a day.

They're in tail sets, they're often in bidding rigs, they're in all kinds of contraptions. The hoves are, are shot in such a way that there's stacks of pads with those long toes and just brutal stuff. The horses are taken out. So they're kept in this very dark, confined confinement. They're taken out to be ridden. I'll just say exuberant is a nice way of putting it for about a half an hour and then put back again.

And this young woman was one of his, his students, one of his clients. And she approached me and my group because her horse wasn't picking up the right lead. And they had this big show coming up and, you know, would I help? Anyway, it's a long story because yes, my students wanted to just fight with this, these people because of the type of training they were doing.

But I advised them not to do that. And long story short is this young woman who had spent her entire life enmeshed, you know, just in this saddlebred culture, if you will, that's all she knew. She was born to a family that did this. She married into a prominent family that did this. She loved her horse, but she didn't know anything was wrong with what they were doing.

But through the work that I did, and I explained this in great detail in the, in the blog post, and I explained how we helped this horse. Yes, after one session, the horse could pick up the right lead. That was wonderful. That wasn't the most exciting part of the story. The most exciting part of the story, I'm just gonna give you the punchline,

is she quit that whole industry and she was able to transition out of that. And with that same horse, because she valued her connection and love for that horse higher than staying in that culture of, you know, that type of training, she started to question it. So she started to align her conscious and her subconscious, and she, it was,

it was the mo it was one of the most beautiful stories. Okay? So anyway, if you want more detail, certainly look at the show notes. This is episode 36, so it's mary Debono dot com slash blog for slash h, That's lowercase H as in horse, 36. All right? And you'll see it in your podcast app too. It'll give you the show notes.

Okay, so let's start talking about your goals. Now, you heard those stories, okay? You might think, I don't relate to any of those, Mary, I'm not mean to my horse. All right, great. I doubt you are mean to your horse cuz you're here. However, let's, let's dive into aligning your conscious with your unconscious as far as your goals and values.

Let's start by talking about what are values, like, I'm talking, I'm using this term, values. What are values? So values are things that you place importance on. And we have different values. Like some people might really value competition, you know, showing their horse. Other people have no interest in that whatsoever. It doesn't make one right and one wrong.

They should have different values. You might like to drive a certain type of truck and you might really, val, that might be a big value for you. Other people wouldn't value that type of truck. Okay? So you can apply this to really anything in your life you might value living in a certain area. Other people, not so much. Okay?

So we project value onto things or experiences and certain, basically it comes down to how they, they, they make you feel what kind of feelings they create in you. Okay? It gives you the, the, the, the value. Okay? So some people really value lots of riding and that's all they care about. I see this a lot at some of the big barns that they have grooms,

for example, that tack the horse up, groom the horse, do all the things, and they just ride. And they get a lot of satisfaction from that. And they don't ever handle their horse. It's unlikely you're listening to his podcast if you fall in that camp. But certainly I, there's many people like that. So let's, let me give you some examples of values.

So these, this is not an exhaustive list by any means. And, and by the way, if you go to mary Debono dot com slash locke, you will, I'll, I'll give you a pdf of values and how to kind of elicit your values. But here's some, here's some just to get you started, okay? And these are not in any special order,

but, you know, love, success, respect, or recognition, health or fitness, happiness. And, and let me tell you, you might think, well, isn't happiness a a high value for everybody? It's not, it's not. I especially see this with people who maybe were born quite a while ago and maybe in situations where they didn't have financial security,

they didn't have, they didn't have food security, okay? They may not place happiness as, as one of their top values. It's just not that important to them, Okay? So we still see this, you know, even today, depending on your, your environment that especially you were raised in, and this can even when your financial circumstances change,

your economics change that can stay with you. That happiness is not a clear value for you, not a high value for you because maybe you were raised in such a way that there was a lot of scarcity or a lot of just instability in different ways. So happiness is not always a top value for people, okay? Or they certainly don't place it at the top.

Maybe they'd be happier if they did. Haha, I didn't, I didn't even know I was gonna say that. So, excuse me, wealth is another one, right? And, and you can define wealth in many different ways right now, a lot of people, for example, if they thinking of financial prosperity, right? That type of wealth,

so, so lots of money basically, they may place that well above love and connection. You see this a lot with people who are like working themselves to death or never seeing their loved ones because they're, they're ma trying, they making money is more valuable to them than other things. And they may not realize that. Again, this is why it's so important to elicit your values like this because we want to align your goals with your values in such a way that you feel fulfilled in your life,

that you're living your, your best life. Whether that involves your horse life or other areas as well. Okay? Competence is another value, creativity is another integrity, connection, learning. Maybe you're someone who's a lifelong learner, like I love to learn new things, okay? Kindness, contribution. So in other words, helping other people or animals, beauty,

being surrounded by nature, leadership, problem solving, I mean, you get the idea, right? Independence, like freedom, that's a, a big one for many fun, right? Having fun or travel an adventure, maybe you love the feeling of, you know, like adventure, maybe just having healthy movement, right? Ha being mobile and keeping that sense of mobility,

right? And therefore independence into your mature years might be a big value for you as well. Okay? So again, many, many people compromise their values when it comes to their horses, okay? They don't even question what they're doing and whether it's in alignment with their values or not. Okay? So you wanna make sure you're not just going along and like staying stuck in a rut because you won't feel fulfilled.

There'll be something off about your, in this case we're talking about horse life, but again, you can apply this in the end, I'll talk to you about how you can apply this to other areas of your life, but something just won't be a hundred percent you won't feel satisfied or maybe you'll feel satisfied in the moment. And then it's sort of like it wears off,

it's kind of like me, or it just feels kind of blah. It's probably because your values and your goals aren't aligned, you're not aligning, you're conscious with your subconscious. Okay? So maybe that maybe you're a person that you think you value competition, we'll use that ex as an example. And so you do, you, you win all these things,

you get these accolades, you get the recognition and the respect and you know, all that good stuff. And you might feel good in the moment, but something's lacking. And maybe you keep changing horses or, or trainers or you just think you know something else is out there and it's really because you're not truly aligned with your values. Okay? Maybe you have external pressure that other people are telling you that you have to ride a certain way or do certain things,

but it's not in a line with, with what you know on that unconscious level to be true for you to be valuable to you. Okay? So the key thing here is to do this, is to do things, to create experiences that give you the qualities or the characteristics that align with your values. So, so here we're gonna use the value of creativity,

right? That's, that's one of my val values. I love just feeling creative. Now I get my, my creativity through doing my hands on work with, with horses, with dogs, with humans, you know, I just feel very creative when I'm doing a session. I also feel very creative when I'm teaching. So again, a shout out to my move with your horse of students,

my online program, right? I feel very creative when I'm, you know, I'm creating my curriculum for it. I love that, I love sharing that work. Like I just feel creative when I'm doing it. I also love doing liberty play with my horse. One reason is because I'm very creative, I feel very creative when I'm doing it. I have to come up with all kinds of ways of,

of teaching him certain things, right? And it's really fun. So fun is another value. So you want to choose the experiences very consciously that align with the, the qualities that you want to experience. Okay? So maybe another one is connection, right? You want to feel connection. So for example, the work that I teach you get a very strong sense of connection with your horse when you do it.

Also, we have a component of the work that I teach where you're doing, you're improving your own movement. It's, and we do something called the Feld in Christ method awareness through movement lessons. And they're like very gentle exercises that totally can transform your movement and help you be flexible, balanced, and all that good stuff. And you also feel very connected to yourself,

okay? You become your own inner authority and you don't succumb as easily to that outside pressure that you might be feeling even unconsciously. So that's another way to embody connection. So, so there's all different ways. You may have many other ways of feeling connected. Like you might do something where you're just hanging with your horse and you just start to, to really feel that connection or so,

so think about the different ways that you can experience the characteristics that you value. So I hope that makes sense. So in other words, you, you list out your values and it's very, very helpful. It's very helpful to prioritize them to say, you know, which ones are at the top and which ones are, are valuable, but maybe less so.

Okay? Cuz you wanna make sure you're really getting those high value ones, okay? Those high priority. So you, you take the time, you really map out, write down your values, okay? It's, it's helpful too to do it by hand. A lot of people believe that. There's a lot of studies that show there's a different way your,

your brain organizes that information when you hand write it. But do it however it works for you. Just do it. I would say just do it. And then what you want to do is, again, if you so contribution to others, maybe that was one of your values, okay? How are you managing your life? How are you creating the experiences that give you the feeling of contribution,

right? What are you doing that allows you to contribute? So you see how you just take it? So learning, we talked about that. That was a a it's a high value of mine probably for you too. If you're listening to podcasts like this, how can you give yourself that experience of learning more, maybe learning more about how to help your horse,

how to help yourself be a, be a better a question. Any, any of these, you just take them and then take that characteristics. What you want to do is, what we're doing here is we're creating evidence, okay? Evidence for your brain that you are that type of person, okay? I started out by talking about how to, that,

that it was important to identify the type of horse person you are, right? Maybe you're a horse person who wants to learn all the time, right? You, that you value learning as a horse person, okay? Make sure you are having the experiences that allow you to learn. And again, that creates evidence that you are that type of person,

right? And you're conscious and your subconscious mind starts to get aligned. It's like, oh, that's important for me. I better do everything I can consciously and unconsciously to get there, to, to align with that, to be congruent with that, Okay? This is how you reach your goals by that congruency. So this will also help you feel satisfied,

it'll help you feel fulfilled because again, you're, you're doing what's deepest in your heart, okay? And you're not succumbing to that outside pressure that we, we, I mean, it's all around us. Whether you're at a big training barn, maybe you feel it from your fellow borders, from your trainer. Maybe you feel it just from the culture,

maybe from your upbringing, who knows, right? There's all different ways, all different ways. You're getting bombarded constantly with information that you're not even consciously aware of. I mean, there's a certain amount you're consciously aware of, but there's much, much more that you're not conscious of. Okay? So we wanna get that, we wanna get you to have that sense of alignment or congruency with what you truly want,

Okay? So I would invite you to choose, choose something that you want to transform, choose something that you want to improve. And again, you might do this outside of your writing life as well. Like maybe with your, your work life, your, you know, personal relationships, your, you know, home environment, whatever it is, you can apply the same ideas to this,

okay? And maybe for the next 90 days, if you will, you know, think about being very conscious about creating the experiences that match up with your values, okay? That give you those experiences. And I'm gonna give you a big, big shortcut here, okay? Next week, which is starting November 7th, I'm doing a free five day challenge,

okay? It's gonna be in the Facebook group, which is happy healthy Horse women, but you have, it's free. It's totally free. You have to sign up for it though. So if you go to mary Debono dot com slash unlock, unlock, and again, this will be in the show notes, but mary Debono dot com slash unlock, you can sign up,

okay? And what we're going to do is you're going to learn the seven keys to yes, unlock your horse's superpowers, Another, another word for potential, but also your own. And you'll find that those seven keys will help you really, you know, hone in on your values. They will help you recognize and experience the things that you want to experience and to embody the qualities that you really want to embody to become the person you really truly want to be.

Okay? So, super important. And if you've been following me for any length of time, you know, I'm a win-win type of gal. Like, in other words, it's always about improving you and your horse, right? It's it they both have, To me it's like, yes, I wanted to help both of you at the same time.

So I, I designed my, my work, my programs to help both of you, right? And this is true with my dog programs as well. It's like the dog and the human improve. So that's what you'll find when you do the seven keys to unlock your horses superpower. You're going to find that you'll improve too, and you'll be able to,

to really hone in on what you value and how you can reach your goals, Okay? So I hope you join us there. Again, that's mary Debono dot com slash unlock and it's totally free. So it's gonna be a lot of different free training. So, so please sign up. Okay? So, all right, one last example. Say one of your values is healthy movement,

healthy movement. We're all about that here with, in this program, right? Easier movement, happier horses. Get it? We're all about healthy movement for ourselves and our horses. And if you value healthy movement, right? What will you do? Once you recognize that and you, you start to align your conscious and your subconscious minds, you'll do the things it takes.

You'll invest the time and the resources to do, for example, the Feldenkrais lessons to improve your movement, right? If you value, again, like I mentioned earlier, freedom, Independence, you'll do the things like, again, the Feldenkrais lessons, et cetera, that will allow you to maintain your freedom, your independence, even in your golden years,

right? If you value, you know, your horse, if you love your horse, if you value that sense of I just wanna care for my horse, I wanna, you know, I'm compassionate to my horse, you'll do the things, you'll invest the time and resources to learn how to help your horse stay happy, healthy, and sound. Okay?

So I hope this gives you some ideas. You'll, again, please join our five day challenges totally free, and it'll really help you crystallize your vision of what you really want to create in your horse life, okay? You'll get clarity for that. You'll also become aware of what's stopping you, those resistances that pop up because you're not congruent, okay?

And you'll really truly start to prioritize. You really will. You'll start to live in alignment with what you really want, and that really leads to a just more joyful life, much more fulfilled life. And that's what I want for each and every one of you. Okay? So, so let's do it. Let's achieve those goals and, and live a wonderful life for ourselves and our horses.

So I can't wait to see you. Go to mary Debono dot com slash unlock and thank you. Thank you so much for your time, for listening to this podcast, and I can't wait to talk to you again soon. Bye for now.