Some days you can wake up and feel so full of possibilities, and other days you might feel the complete opposite, life may seem nearly unbearable. All beings need to experience mattering no matter how they feel. All beings need safe spaces where they are welcomed as they are and listened to deeply and completely. Horses have an amazing power to heal and to teach.  They offer unconditional friendship, experience a wide range of feelings, and provide immediate, honest, observable feedback in response to our interactions with them. 

Relationships are healing for both horses and humans. Let me share with you a clients recent experience.

****************************************************************************************************** 

"I had an amazing day today, something I say often. 

And just as often a voice tells me to run far, far away, as fast as I can and that I just need to hide under a rock and die.  It is one of my voices that arise when I feel...

Moving a human from trauma to healing requires the restructuring of emotional response. Both primary and secondary process emotions (conscious and pre-conscious) must be engaged and soothed (regulation of the sensitive limbic region of the brain). This must come in the form of new experiences.  The experience of limbic neuroplasticity (the laying down of new neural pathways and responses) was deeply and beautifully expressed by a client in the following testimonial by Rhoda Ingstad. 

*****

“Wow!  What an eventful journey I have been on since my healing session with horse!  During my session I couldn't tell what was going on in my head or body.  In the session you made the observation that the horse was making the greatest amount of expressions (licking, chewing, and yawning, etc.) during my session. I was not aware of that.  Yet afterwards I felt that my whole chest area was cleared of tension and angst.  It made no sense to me! While I was...