I have recently seen a post introducing the idea of Equine Assisted Services, particularly in the context the ground-based activities that are often engaged to facilitate learning and therapeutic interactions. The wording of that post has challenged me to consider the foundations of this work. When I first learned of […]
Emotional intelligence
25 posts
The Clever Hans phenomenon At the beginning of the 20th Century the world has consumed by the capabilities of a horse called Clever Hans. Clever Hans and his owner Wilhelm von Osten created a great stir in the popular entertainment of time. According to von Osten, Hans was a very […]
How many times does this question come up when I have been training learners with Athena team or delivering Equine Assisted Services sessions? And how many different ways are there to answer it? Our understanding of horses has thankfully moved on from the view of them as mindless automaton, the […]
The literacy of feedback involves an understanding of the conscious and unconscious language within everyday exchanges. My work, wherever it s undertaken, consistently returns to one topic. The importance of developing a meaningful level of self awareness! Even if it is not the core agenda, it so often rears its […]
I came across an inspiring opening to a chapter recently in Erik Jampa Andersson's book "Unseen Beings" (Hay House, 2023) which I wanted to quote in full to kick off this reflection "Nature is not a place. We often speak of it as if it were a kind of stage […]
This week I was lucky enough to spend an incredibly inspiring day at a conference on "Neurodiversity in the Workplace" with the Athena® team. I was struck by the Chair's (Dan Harris) prescient parting words, they were a powerful reflection on the future of the workplace, they paraphrase as best […]
I first read of Plato’s “the allegory of the cave” in The Republic, when I was in my 20’s. To be frank it was a stretch to comprehend. Now increasingly close to 60 it is beginning to make a little more sense to me. Without trying to recreate the detail […]
So how do horses make us human? There is a question. Someone once asked me what my thinking was on there being empathy in the relationship between horses and humans. Empathy is generally described as the ability to put ourselves in the shoes of others. To understand their experience. "To feel […]
As facilitators and coaches (and similarly for those in therapeutic practice) we are often charged with, or engaging in, working with the idea of supporting change or developing in individuals. Yet so often we encounter a degree of resistance, even if our clients wish for it. Kagan and Lahey, in […]
A lesser-known element of my career these days is delivering Stress Awareness and Resilience training across the construction industry. Not always the easiest industry to share these types of messages with, but a place where these skills are of incredible importance and very much needed. I have a simple model […]