What If the Problem Isn't a Problem? #145

In this episode, Mary Debono invites you to reconsider how you approach challenges, whether they show up in your own body, your horse, or your dog. When we label something a problem, we tend to reach for the same strategies that created it in the first place. That usually leads to temporary relief, or to new compensations that surface elsewhere.

Mary offers a different lens: what if we approached these issues with curiosity instead? What if we recognized that the nervous system is highly intelligent, and that behaviors and movement patterns are the individual's best attempt to feel safer and more comfortable?

Through examples including early-morning anxiety and post-surgical compensation in dogs, Mary shows how engaging with the whole individual, rather than chasing isolated symptoms, leads to fuller, more lasting change. She also explores how a handler's own comfort and self-awareness directly affect their horse or dog's ability to feel at ease.

Whether you're working with a dog recovering from CCL surgery, a horse with movement restrictions, or your own stress and anxiety, this episode will shift the way you think about change and what becomes possible when you do.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

1. Framing an issue as a "problem to be fixed" tends to bring in the same strategies that created it, often producing temporary results or new compensations.
2. The nervous system is highly intelligent. Behaviors, physical patterns, and emotional habits are adaptive responses, the individual's best attempt to feel safer and more comfortable.
3. Curiosity is a practical tool, not just a mindset. When Mary guides people to observe anxiety physically, the anxiety itself often dissolves.
4. Whole-individual thinking addresses the full picture, not just the presenting symptom. This is especially important in recovery, where compensatory tension can outlast the original injury.
5. For horse and dog owners, your own ease and self-awareness directly influence your animal's wellbeing. The relationship is a two-way dynamic.
6. This approach supports animals at every life stage, from young animals being set up for healthy development, to those recovering from injury or surgery, to geriatric animals.
7. Lasting change comes from engaging with the whole individual through the Feldenkrais Method (for humans) and Debono Moves (for horses and dogs), not from forcing corrections.

Resources:

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

💥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 💥

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 (Debono Moves). Through this transformative approach, both people and their animal companions discover greater harmony, ease, and connection.

TRANSCRIPT:

Hi. If you'd like to improve something about yourself, maybe it's the way you move. You want to move more comfortably, more freely, maybe minimize those effects of aging or maybe. Or recover from injuries fully or whatever it happens to be. Or maybe it's something that's more emotional. Maybe you want to be less stressed, less anxious, or maybe it's something about your horse or your dog you wish you could change.

Again, whether it's something physical, like, more like maybe, you know, they have some kind of stiffness or, you know, not performing athletically as well as you'd like, or maybe it's also behavioral. So whatever it is, whatever the issue is, let's talk about it, because I can give you a little reframe, a little change of perspective, and it can really help you, because this is what I found over the years.

When we think of something as a problem to be fixed, and again, I just want to reiterate, this applies to you or to your animals, right? If you think of it as a problem to be fixed, we tend to just bring in the same strategies that created the problem. In other words, we're not thinking outside the box, as they say. And that usually just leads to either a temporary fix, and I'm using the word fix loosely, or it could lead to other compensations developing that.

In other words, okay, this particular problem, as we'll call it, is now gone, but now the. This other one came up. So instead of that, if we stop thinking of these things as problems to be fixed or, you know, to be solved, but instead, if we engage with them with curiosity and remember that whether, again, whether we're talking about ourselves or animals, that we engage with the whole individual, if we think about the fact that this individual has a nervous system that is highly intelligent.

Highly intelligent, and that whatever issue that they're creating, again, it could be physical, it could be emotional, behavioral. Is that was an attempt to solve a problem, you know, to solve to feel more comfortable in some way. And we don't even have to know what the originating thing was. We don't have to know. Could have happened decades ago. In the case of, you know, our own childhood, for example, we could think about, you know, maybe there was some emotional habit you created when you were a small child, and you're not even sure why you started thinking that way or having that kind of emotional loop.

Right? Same thing with our. With our animals, there could have been some situation that they had that they were exposed to that caused them to adapt certain behaviors as an attempt to feel safe. So when we engage with those, you know, issues in that way, with this broader scope, when we think about, oh, what if I start with really working on the connection? Either the connection with yourself, really tuning into yourself and feeling.

Yeah, let's do this. Let me talk about you first. And we're going to use the example of anxiety. Many of us have anxiety more than we want. And if we look at it as a problem and we just think, oh, oh, gosh, this feels so uncomfortable. I'm so anxious about X, Y and Z. Or maybe you don't even know why you're anxious, but it just pops up and, and I hear this a lot from people.

It's like those early morning hours where, you know, you, you. The cortisol is rising and you wake up really anxious. You don't even know why you're anxious. Right? But you're anxious and it can feel really uncomfortable. But instead, instead of, like, fighting it and thinking, oh, this is so annoying. This is such a pain. Instead, if you think about, oh, that's really interesting. I'm feeling super anxious. How do I know I'm anxious?

Like, think about it. How am I breathing? How do my muscles feel? Like, if you actually get very curious and, you know, really explore, like, well, how does being anxious feel? If I had to describe it to someone, what would I tell them? I'm going to tell you. You do that, the anxiety goes away. You know why it goes away? Because now you're focused on something else. You're focused on those physical sensations kind of bringing you back into your body.

Okay, so that's just one example, one little example about something that's, you know, emotional. Of course everything is linked. Your body and mind are, of course, they're, they're, they're linked. They're not separate. Now, with the animals, it's similar. We can bring them back into their body. And this helps again, not only for behavioral challenges you might be facing with your animal, but also with physical discomfort they may be having.

Because now, you know, and this is what I teach in my De Bono moves programs for horses and for dogs is you can use your hands very intentionally to help them feel more comfortable in their body and thus in their mind so they can start to discover easier, more comfortable movement. They feel safer. Their nervous system now is like, oh, okay, things are better. You know, it's so fascinating to see this.

And right now, you know, in my, both in my horse programs and my dog programs, I've seen so many amazing changes in animals that either didn't want to be touched or they had a lot of challenges. They were very, very anxious for a number of different reasons. And to see them be at home with themselves is just so incredibly satisfying, I have to tell you. It just feels so good.

And this can help animals of all ages. So, you know, we work a lot with geriatric animals, but we also work with young animals that we're helping them, again, improve how they feel in body and mind. Sets them up for a good start. Also helps if any animal is injured. Helps them have a full recovery, a fuller recovery, because it gets to. It helps them not develop these compensations that they may develop if they were just kind of left, you know, without any support when they were recovering.

So, for example, you know, a dog may have a hind leg surgery, maybe like a knee ligament surgery, CCL surgery, and it gets repaired. The dog goes on their merry way. I mean, of course, the. The person makes sure that the rehab is followed according to the vet's instructions. But the dog may still have tension in the back or the shoulders or some other place because they learn to compensate for the initial discomfort.

So, again, when we look at an issue as, like, this is a whole individual, right? We look at the whole individual, we can then help them make that fuller recovery where they can reduce any compens. Compensatory. That's the word. Compensatory responses from that surgery. Or it doesn't have to be surgery. It could be an injury that they are recovering from. So, and again, all this also applies to yourself when you do.

In the case of humans, I teach the Feldenkrais method awareness through movement classes and programs. When you do them, you become more at home in your own body. You become friendlier to yourself. It helps you stop looking at your movement and behaviors and things as problems, as these isolated challenges or problems that you need to fix, like as if you're some kind of project, but instead help you just feel like embodied wellness, that you have more choice in life, that you can move more easily, you can change your emotional reactions to things, and you just become more curious and therefore have more options.

So I hope this gives you a little glimpse into it. You know, the strategies obviously are taught in my program, so it's difficult to, you know, give you the strategies over a podcast episode. Of course, that's impossible. But simply changing how you look at things, things that you're just maybe, like, so focused on trying to change, to correct, to fix, you know, if you think of them as problems, that's going to be very, very limiting.

Instead, I invite you to think of things that you're dealing with as just like, as part of the individual, part of, in case of your animals, it's part of the relationship between the two of you. You know, that's the other thing when you're dealing with your horse or your dog, they're not separate. It's, it's your, you bring so much to the table and you know, that beautiful connection that you have, you know, you look at that and you realize that, oh, the more at home I am in my own body, in my own self, my sense of self, the more clearly I can help my dog, the more easily and effectively I can help my horse be more connected to themselves.

So it's just a completely different way of looking at things. And I will say it's just, you know, I've been doing and teaching this work for over 35 years and just changing that simple mindset, like changing your focus from fixing a problem to engaging with curiosity and bringing ease and pleasure into the equation can bring about so much joy and so just improve the quality of life and the overall well being of you and your animals.

So thank you as always for listening to the podcast. I so appreciate you. If you want to drop me an email maryarydebono.com and let me know if you're dealing with something, maybe we could do a podcast episode on that. Thank you so very much and I look forward to talking to you again soon. Bye for now.