Episode 261: Becoming congruent: The skill of shifting your perspective

Episode 261_ Discovering, allowing, observing, and influencing_ Yourself and your horse..mp3: Audio automatically transcribed by Sonix

Episode 261_ Discovering, allowing, observing, and influencing_ Yourself and your horse..mp3: this mp3 audio file was automatically transcribed by Sonix with the best speech-to-text algorithms. This transcript may contain errors.

Speaker1:
By discovering the things on my own. It actually seems to stick a little bit more in my brain and also in my body as I keep practicing that.

Speaker2:
I had been telling myself for a long time that I wasn't a true horsewoman. I, you know, I didn't have enough experience and I would probably not have enough experience ever.

Speaker3:
Oh, I'm not the only one that thinks that or feels that. And it's so incredible to have that kind of community.

Speaker4:
Podcasting from a little cabin on a hill. This is the Stacy Westfall podcast. Stacy's goal is simple to teach you to understand why horses do what they do, as well as the action steps for creating clear, confident communication with your horses.

Speaker5:
Hi, I'm Stacy Westfall and I'm here to help you understand, enjoy, and successfully train your own horses. Today, you're going to have the chance to meet three more of the curious, creative, courageous students from my Resourceful Rider program. They talk about money, their unique challenges, emotions, community, learning, life lessons through horses, and then applying those lessons in other situations. Congruency. The challenge of truly holding your focus and the joy and delight that comes from celebrating together. There are so many great quotes from inside this episode. I'm tempted to just keep telling you more, but instead, let's jump right in. Could you introduce yourselves to the listeners and tell us a little bit about who you are, what you do with your horses?

Speaker2:
My name is Elizabeth Alcamo and I'm from Minnesota, and I own a 17 year old Quarter Horse gelding named pilot. And in the past, with pilot, I've mostly just done trail riding with him. I haven't done any showing yet. My background I have ridden for most of my life on and off. It's not been super consistent, but it's been one of those things that when I was younger, it was a huge part of my life and then life came along. I met my husband, we got married, had kids, stepped away from horses for a while, and then in 2020, kind of during Covid, I had my son and I don't know what came over me, but all of a sudden I was like, I need horses back in my life. I just need them. And so my husband, he's like, well, you know, why don't we just take this time and let's just see what happens if we got a horse. And so we did. And it was the best decision I could have ever made. And so since then, it's just been an amazing journey to just dive into horse ownership and all that that entails. And growing in my relationship with pilot and just it's been an amazing experience. So that's kind of where I've been. And yeah, it's it's amazing.

Speaker1:
My name is Ann Williamson. Newton and I live in Tennessee. I have two horses. An Anglo-arab mare who is considered a senior horse now received her as a gift from my sister, who is also in this course, back when my mare was a weanling. I also have another horse, a gelding Spotted Saddle Horse that is also a gift to me from my hoof trimmer. He was about 15 when he came to me, so that was a couple of years ago. What I do with my horses is basically play with them in my back yard. I call it the playground. It's on our property and I ride around our our property, basically trail riding. Maybe someday, who knows what kind of shows. There are possibilities that have opened up to me because of this course actually, so I'm not quite sure how I will express it in the future, but those possibilities are out there.

Speaker3:
I'm Cheryl Hodge. I am from western Massachusetts. I own a Quarter Horse mare. She's 14. We've been together since she was four. We both were pretty much green when we started together. Pretty much on paper. It was everything wasn't supposed to do as far as, like, my first horse. But when I met her, I just knew he wasn't until, like, it was in my 40s that I started riding. I wanted the relationship, the partnership. I always dreamed of trail riding. We've done showing most recently Western dressage. That's a lot of fun. I like the focus. I like the patterns. We have come a long way with trail riding. Now we can go out by ourselves and just enjoy it, and that's a really great place to connect. And now with the course, all the stuff we're learning in the ring, it applies so greatly on the trail and just how I ride and how we connect. And it's it's been amazing. Just it's a constant journey. But I just I love every piece of it and groundwork, which I call ground play, which I love that you use that word playground because I just call it play because we we do a lot of that stuff. A lot of games just kind of make them up. That's me right now.

Speaker5:
Well thank you. And one thing I love that all of you echoed is the idea that. That whether we call it play or relationship or connection, there's something deeper than just training, if we want to call it that. And what's so interesting to me is I was thinking about this because of doing the different interviews. It's almost like the words get in the way sometimes. It's like we have to use words to communicate between each other and to explain. When I'm explaining to you the way that I perceive something and the way that I'm trying to help you see something. But I honestly, at the end of the day, love the wordlessness of being with the horses. And so sometimes I can hear in myself and then in other people as we're trying to express this, that makes up the relationship. It gets all woven between like it's a it's ultimately a wordless experience that we're trying to describe, and sometimes the words get in the way. But I think at the core, after listening to all of just your introductions, just for this one piece, it's possible for me to hear that you're after more than just the quote unquote results or end goal, but you're after also more than just sitting and sipping coffee and watching the horse in the pasture. So it's that balance of like, how can we have both the relationship and the results? So thank you for sharing that. Why did you sign up for The Resourceful Rider? Was there something that you were struggling with or something you were looking to achieve? Or both?

Speaker2:
Um, so honestly, I've been looking for something like this for a really long time. Especially when I, you know, bought my first horse back in 2020. I remember searching a ton online for just something that would be able to teach me more about training my own horse and growing in my relationship with him. But as a stay at home mom, I knew that I couldn't be leaving the home. You know my house all the time for lessons, and I wanted something online that would be a little bit more easy for me to access just from my house. And I had a hard time finding anything for a while until I stumbled across your podcast, Stacy. And I knew of you. I'd known you for you know of you for a long time and had been, you know, super intrigued by obviously, the bareback bridleless ride and all of that and just the connection that you have with your horses. And then when I saw you at a podcast, it was just super cool to like, tune into that and listen and remember the one podcast episode that just kind of drew me in completely, and it was the one on self-concept and realizing that I had been telling myself for a long time that I wasn't a true horse woman. I, you know, I didn't have enough experience, and I would probably not have enough experience ever. I just all these things that I kept telling myself for a really long time and then realizing that, oh, well, if I told myself, I'm a horse trainer, what would that mean to me? How would that make me feel? And I did a lot of work on that after that episode, and I'm like, okay, I need to learn more.

Speaker2:
I need more of this. This is something that I just want to get more of. And so I went on your website and found your course, like right away and didn't sign up right away. Honestly, because a lot of those thoughts that just kept coming into my mind of, you know, I had to kind of battle with that self concept for a little while, but eventually it was like, okay, I just, I just need to do this because I believe that if I do this, my relationship with my horse is going to be, you know, greatly impacted, but also just me, my own personal life and knowing that I could do that and that there was a course for that meant a lot to me. So I signed up. Mainly because, I mean, for one pilot and I were in kind of a, I don't know, I wouldn't say kind of a stage in our relationship where kind of like you say, like a very long plateau where there was no, no goal in sight. And we didn't know. I didn't really know where we were going. We just kind of like wandered the arena around and around, and we were both bored. And so I knew that I needed to step it up a notch. So then signing up for the resourceful rider, all of a sudden, it was this world of possibility that was open to us, and it was just an amazing thing to see right off the bat. So yeah.

Speaker5:
Thanks for sharing that. How about you, Ian? Why did you sign up for The Resourceful Rider? And was there something you were struggling with or something you were looking to achieve? Or both?

Speaker1:
Um, a little bit of both. I recognized that I was the limiting factor in her education, so I needed to grow my knowledge and skills in order for me to be able to help my my mayor in particular. But any horse I knew I needed to grow somewhere along the way in life. I had given you my email Stacy. Um, and you, you began doing webinars and such, and you began doing a podcast and which I listened from, from day one, from the very first, and it resonated with me. You're teaching the way you taught through the podcast was attainable to me, and I recognize my limitation with my horse. I was learning from Stacy Westfall and I was thinking, I really need to have someone who could coach me, teach me, train me how to train my horse. But and was trying to figure out because of financial limitations and was not able, at that point in time to be able to haul to a trainer. How much would it be for a trainer to come to my place to teach me and see my horse, and kind of get an idea of where we are? How much would it be for one lesson? And I had come up with a dollar figure, and later that day happened to be a Wednesday, a podcast released.

Speaker1:
When you announced Stacy, the steering and neck reining course, and I went, wow, that's coincidental, because that was the dollar figure that you were offering that course for. And so the timeliness was. Impeccable and couldn't have been more perfect, because that day you announced the opening of that course and it was the same dollar amount. And I like well, you also mentioned, I think, in that podcast, that lifetime access that was important to me, not just one lesson. One time I can go back again and again and again, and I'm a little bit slow and learning sometimes, and I need lots of repetition, kind of like my horse. Um, but I need that repetition. I need to hear things again. I need to be exposed to concepts and nuances of details that help to flesh out those concepts again and again. And you offered that with the rollout of the the steering course. And so I signed up and have remained a student as you've rolled out additional features into that. So that was just it was just impeccable timing. So.

Speaker5:
Perfect. Thanks for sharing. Sure, Cheryl.

Speaker3:
So I, I'm listening and thinking like, wow, you know, I can't pinpoint a time but mean from think the since the beginning of my journey with my mayor, I have followed you. I started with your book, the DVDs. Recently when you said the free video. Quiet your mind, calm your body, train your horse. I got on to that and that afternoon we had the most amazing ride. It was just because, again, the timeliness mean timing is everything, right? Because that's where I was at. I was really at a place where I was just struggling with feeling stuck a little bit lost, couldn't find my way back like I'd lost some confidence. I don't know where or why, but I was just like. I just couldn't find my way back. And it was mental. Emotional more than anything because I knew what we could do physically. But until I could get my mind back where I needed it, I couldn't get us there again. And. So then the opportunity came up and just, you know, money was an issue. But I was like, you know what? This is just a once in a lifetime opportunity for us right now, and this is the time I need to do it. So I signed up and. We started and then my mayor got injured. I don't know, some kind of freak accident in the paddock. So we were down for a little bit. But the mindset mastery was so that's where I started. It was kind of what I needed anyways, but on a different in a different way. And it all kind of just came together. I really just threw myself into that and huge, huge difference. Mean as soon as she was able to do stuff like mean, I never stopped really doing stuff with her.

Speaker3:
We just weren't riding. We got more and more into our groundwork has always been our go to anyways, but we just got more and more in that and more connected that way. And and that program was just. That's just incredible. Like mean continue to just really use that. And it got us through that. And then the first time I got back on or was like, it was just like, oh, here we are. We didn't lose anything. And in fact, I think we gained a lot. Emotional control, I think, is kind of the key thing I've been focused on with us. She has more of it. I have more of it. I call it the power to control for both of us. And it is empowering, for lack of a better word. That was pretty much where we started and mean. I thought we had a good thing going before, and it's so much deeper and better and stronger now and with this opportunity to keep. Growing and learning. That is just so helpful because I. I can get a concept and understand it. But can't do it right away. Think. Have to process it. Get it through my brain, get it to my body, then get it to my horse. And then we and then we get it. So I love that we can do this at our own pace. And I love how encouraging you are always to all of us, no matter where we're at, what we're doing, and and everybody sharing their their pieces of it, like the whole, the totality of the whole program is just there's no one piece. It's it's everything together.

Speaker5:
So you came into the program and then we're faced with this issue with your mayor and. You were almost funneled straight into it. Can you explain that piece of the program to the listeners?

Speaker3:
On a surface level, I think people tend to understand, okay, what I'm feeling, my horse feels and it you know, it all. It resonates. But like on this level, I think the program really got me a lot deeper into that mindset and that thought process. To me, it was more about really figuring out in a very safe, non-judgmental space. It really helps you think about what you're doing, not just doing it. It really helps you break it down. It really helps you understand not just yourself, but your horse and how that all interrelates. And for me it was just like. Such an important piece of it because negative thoughts can just derail you in a heartbeat. We're just know humans are wired to focus on the negative and not the positive. So you have like 99 great moments and you're like, whoa. And then you have that one bad moment and you're like, oh, I'm just terrible at this. I shouldn't be doing this. I'm ruining everything, you know? And this really taught me to just. Okay, except that that's just how we we think. And we have to we have to do that. We have to go through that piece of it. But then to really put the energy into all the positive things, and the program really just gave me that the power to really do that, not just say, I'm going to, you know, not just know I should, but it really gave me the tools. To be able to work it out and, you know, and then to read other people's stories and be like, oh, wow.

Speaker3:
Yeah, we're all like, we're all very different but very similar. And you know, we all have such. Circumstances and situations that compare to each other and we, you know, or just like you think, oh, I'm not the only one that thinks that or feels that. And it's so incredible to have that kind of community and, you know, to not feel like you're doing everything wrong. You know, it's what you learn from it. For me, that's always been like those hard rides, you know, like that really bad show that you're like, whoa. But, you know, at the same time, like, that's how you learn and grow, right? So it's like, you know, going through that uncomfortable thing, but having this, this platform to really. Dig into that and express it. Because sometimes, like too much internalizing of it, you can't get out of that. You get stuck in that. Yeah. So having having this way to discuss it and get, you know, this great feedback from everybody and you know, from. A professional side and just from all the personal side, because it seems to all kind of blend together. Yeah. So so that was that was just really, really huge. And then, you know, when we finally got back into the writing piece of it. I was in a place to be able to do that. Like, don't think. Initially I was when I started, the idea of videoing myself was like, oh God, you know, she's going to think I'm just, you know. And even though I never saw there was any judgment to anybody, it was just, you know, that whole like.

Speaker3:
How you see yourself and. What always would. Sometimes a ride feels like, and what it looks like are always so different. And so like I do like videoing for that purpose, but to send it in to, you know, to you and be like, okay, here we are. And but you were just nothing but generous. And what fascinated me even more than that was. I was like, oh my God, why hadn't done this sooner? Because. After all this time of us writing and with different instructors who, you know, all these wonderful people, just not right for us. They just you in a very like two minute clip, you're like, here's what you need to work. And I'm like, that's what I've been trying to figure out, you know, the whole time. And you just saw immediately where she was at where, you know, and what we needed. And and again, I love that I have been able to. Do it at our own pace so that we're we're getting it, not just forcing it. We're we're really learning it, if that makes sense. Because I always feel like, you know, it would be told something and then they're like, well, just do it, do it. I'm like, okay, well, we don't really not feeling it yet. Like we both need to like process. So like to break it up and like I love that we can just kind of do it. Staying true to the exercise, but do it in our own way as well, if that makes sense.

Speaker5:
I teach in the in the patterns and in the techniques. But ultimately the goal is for as you absorb the techniques by using the pattern, is to then be able to transfer those techniques to other places. And that's how the patterns are there to help you and to show you. Because then we all have an agreed thing to talk about. But the technique is very transferable to whether you're doing western dressage or trail riding or whatever you're doing. So it makes perfect sense to me what you're saying. Awesome. Elizabeth, if you were going to explain the experience of participating in the program to a friend, can you tell us a little bit about your journey and what that experience inside the program has been like?

Speaker2:
Yeah. So it's funny, since I joined. I've been doing this to like, a ton of people now because this program has literally changed every aspect of my life. I mean, my husband literally, I can't say the amount of times over the course of the nine months that I've been in the course, he's like, I am just so grateful for Stacy. She's so amazing. She's helped you so much, like, this is what you needed. And so honestly, I've just been talking about it a lot over these months. Just because the experience it's not just about it is. I mean, it's primarily about how to train your own horse. Right? Like it's about that, what you're saying relationship and results that that's a thing that goes together, which is, I think, just a novel concept. You know, I hadn't really thought about that before as being something that goes together. But the course itself and the experience of it is not just about that. It also encompasses all of life, which I think has done so much in my life because it's like, okay, I learned my life lessons through horses so I can go to the barn and take all the things that I'm learning from the mindset mastery part of it, and then just the actual coursework, the, you know, the steering course, the road course, like all these parts of the course that I've taken and brought to the barn. And I work with pilot, and then I can all of a sudden start getting these things, like all of a sudden in my mind, I'm like, oh, that works with pilot here, but could it work with my husband and with my kids, and even just in my own self, and my ability to control my emotions and be able to understand them more? Because I've always been a person who struggles with emotion and even naming what I feel a lot of the times, you know, someone will ask me how I'm doing and I just, I'm like, I'm fine, I'm fine.

Speaker2:
But underneath there's just so much more that I've never been able to tap into before until this course. And it's just opened up my whole world to, oh my goodness, like, I can actually say what I'm feeling and not feel weird about it. And that actually started at the barn, because I realized that if I was able to know what I was feeling while I was riding pilot or working with pilot, then that would influence our relationship. And so if that influence can reach a horse, it can reach people too. And it's just amazing how that bridges. So when I've talked about this course to other people, I'm like, honestly, it's it's genius because I think life coaching, I've just come to really respect it and find that it. I think it's a necessary part of life in a lot of ways, because we just need to be able to hone in to that part of our brains. Um, but I also think that it's amazing what you've done and been able to do in the course is say there's a third party. It's not just coach and the person who's being coached. We're talking about action. So it's going to a horse and a rider and then being able to take those principles and work with our horses, but let that also stream into our normal life. And I just think that that experience, for me, it's it's going to impact my life forever. It's just been such an amazing experience. And I don't know, it's it's amazing. So yeah.

Speaker5:
Is there an example that you could take us through almost like an a story format that you could share with us that would help us understand what you were just explaining to us, but in an example version that we could all picture maybe.

Speaker2:
Okay, so this is something that I dealt with the last couple of months. So the story would be I go to the barn, you know, and this has happened to me before, but this in this scenario, I have gone to the barn during feeding time or whatever. And pilot, you know, in my mind I go and my initial response to say, oh, it's you know, I see it's feeding time. My initial response would be, oh my goodness. Like, great, I'm already doomed for failure here because he's going to be distracted. I'm going to be frustrated because I probably have to wait around now and wait for him to finish or wait for, you know, all this to happen and whatever, but all of that, I would just shove aside. I would shove aside the feeling of frustration. I would shove aside all of those feelings and just kind of press on and be like, well, fine. Like, I'll just figure it out. I'm good, I'm happy. This is great. But really, that's not what I was feeling at all. And so that was kind of my scenario that I did take into the course. And I was like, okay, you know, we had a discussion about it, like, what do I do here? Because this is not working. And I did, you know, a lot of mindset mastery through it. And then at the same time, I was trying to deal with my boys and bringing them to the barn and wanting to know how could I make them main, you know, be happy at the barn, you know, not go crazy at the barn so that I could kind of keep my sanity while we were all there together.

Speaker2:
So there were two kind of things going. I wanted to keep my boys happy at the barn and then also be able to. Don't know, have a better, better experience. When pilot I was coming around that feeding time and so kind of had those things running. We did some work, you know, over zoom calls, but also just did a lot of the mindset mastery portion of it, too. And the biggest thing I think that I took away from those experiences that led to the success of both of those, was you telling me that there was such a thing as neutral and being able to say, okay, I'm an observer in this situation, and what would happen if I did not have the emotional connection to all of these things that are going on? So let's just say I'm at the barn and it's feeding time and my boys are there. And every this is going on right now. What would happen if instead of just kind of going into like, either I'm just withdrawing and becoming really frustrated or I'm going to just pretend to be super happy, but nobody's going to believe that because it's not true. Instead of putting on any kind of emotion, what would happen? And you kind of encouraged, this is to say, become an observer, like just start saying what you see.

Speaker2:
And when you say what you see right away, it's like, okay, this isn't so bad or like, this isn't so insane right off the bat. Like I can watch pilot, okay? He's just eating. He's a horse. He's eating his grain. Is that something that I need to go panic over? No, it's just he's eating. It's nice. It sounds great. And then I could look over at my boys and, like, observe them, like, are they going a little crazy? Maybe. Maybe not. But, like, if I was just an observer and I wasn't emotionally connected, it would just look like, oh, my two boys are just playing with each other and it's fun and they're having a good time. So the observer part and becoming neutral, that was huge for me to like, actually realize that was a possibility and that I didn't actually have to, like, anchor into an emotion right away and then just realizing that. Okay, there is neutral, but then there's also the initial emotion that you do have to recognize before you can kind of go into that neutral. And so I was able to recognize I feel frustrated when I get to the barn and I have my boys or it's feeding time, and then what am I going to do from there? And so then taking that frustration, being able to become the observer, become neutral.

Speaker2:
And then after that you encouraged me to go into, then what was it that I want to anchor into, say it's I want to be peaceful in this moment, or I want to feel joyful or happy or determined, whatever that might be. But that from that perspective, from that neutral perspective, I can say, okay, I can hone in to what I chose to do. And then it worked. That was the greatest part of it was through all of that. Then I actually went to the barn one day and all those things happened at the same time. It was feeding time. I had my boys, and then all of a sudden I was like, oh, I feel frustrated and anxious right now. This is going to this is I've done this before. It's crazy. But then getting into that observer mode and getting into the neutral. And then one of the things you told me to with the boys was just telling them what to do, instead of just telling them what not to do the whole time. And so I just kind of gave them jobs. We had a great time. It ended up being wonderful. But that's the mindset mastery that's being able to take those thoughts in your mind and actually be able to control them. I think that's huge. And it's it's just done wonders for me.

Speaker5:
Thank you for sharing that. It's so interesting because basically, what I hear you saying in another way is you've gained that ability through becoming the watcher to identify and literally just experience your emotion without judging the layer of that happening. That's the neutral part. And inside of doing that, just to get to that one piece, you recognize how much more control you actually have in the world, because it's in you, and you literally get to control your response to the feelings and emotions that could be coming up in your body without denying them. And there's something magical that unlocks there. And that's what so many people are after with their horses. But it's also so much of what is being reported by student after student about it being life changing, because it definitely applies to all the other areas of your life, because it's you that we're anchoring into, and it's you that we're impacting and and showing that you have this power to control you essentially, and not control in this dominating, weird way, but to control in this very allowing, opening way, which is literally exactly how we want to show up for our horses. We're most of us, and I would largely say like it's true of everybody in the course we're not after, like, tell me how to control and dominate this horse we're after. Tell me how to communicate and allow and observe and influence. And yet that starts with us doing that for us first, before we're then able to do that with something external, whether that's the horse or your boys. How old are your boys again?

Speaker2:
Six and three and a half.

Speaker5:
So very.

Speaker6:
Good.

Speaker3:
I just in response to that? That's what really struck me when I started the mindset program, was to give yourself permission to have those bad feelings, and not because I would. I would get frustrated at myself for being frustrated, and the one I cannot ever hide my true emotions from is my mayor. She she knows. And so, you know, pretending wasn't working. It was just making it. She would just be my mirror. Like, this is how you're feeling and you can't pretend otherwise, so just own it. Now. I can do this. I can control this. I can accept it. I can work through it, and I can get to that good place now, which we couldn't before. And that's why I think what had us so stuck. So yeah, it is it's life changing and it's made me it's helped me deal with other issues in life tremendously better now as well.

Speaker5:
Yes. What you're speaking to there is that horses are really good at picking up on incongruency. And when the rider shows up trying to stuff down or deny one emotion and paint over the top of it with something prettier or more acceptable or far fetched thing, they want to be that it creates an incongruency and that vibrates out through your body. And it's what the horses read, and it's also what they don't attach to. They're not drawn to. Horses are very drawn to congruency, which doesn't even always have to be happy. And we know that if we've ever gone and had a good cry in the barn, that our horses can be some of the most empathetic creatures on the planet, you're very congruent in that moment when you're expressing that true sadness and it's congruency at the end. It's not that they need you to always be in what we would consider positive emotions. They do, however, respond best when you are congruent with your emotions.

Speaker1:
I have a recent example of that. In a recent ride, actually, I was beginning, I noticed the tension in my body as I did a body scan. I was feeling the emotion of frustration because she and I weren't getting whatever it was I was trying to focus on that day and I stopped, got off, sort of let that frustration out of my body, and I could see my mare standing next to me, flick her ear in my direction, and it was almost as if she's like, okay, now you're better hopped back on. And we were able to work on in a positive direction what we were working on. But she knew that I was incongruent. At that moment, and once it was released, that frustration was released. Even though it was a negative emotion, she wasn't put off by it. She was okay with my becoming congruent. All right, you've allowed the frustration and now we can continue on.

Speaker5:
So that's a beautiful example. And it's one of the reasons why, you know, as you mentioned and when you began the course, it sounds like you came in as I was building the different components because you came in at the beginning when there was the steering course. And I'll get emails from people that will ask about buying different pieces, one component here or one component there. And what I end up responding with is that the program is built to support the whole journey, because the program itself contains this mindset mastery piece, because you're always going to be experiencing your viewpoint through your mind and your emotions. And so you do have to be able to build that skill that you just referenced of recognizing the tension that's coming in your body from the thought of something going on versus the tension that's coming in your body, because you're trying to hold your hands in a different position or hold your legs in a different position. There's differences between the technical skills of changing some of your physical ways, of using your body to communicate more clearly, and that's a thing. But then there's a whole nother level of it. And Cheryl referenced it when she was talking about judging herself for being frustrated. So it's almost like frustrated with being frustrated. And it can create these circles where if you don't know how to break it, it doesn't matter how much you concentrate on your hands and your legs and your seat, if you don't break out of what's going on in your mind and that side of it, you're going to continue this cycle. And that's why I have the whole thing together as a program, because each piece of this supports itself, and the one that people most often mention when they're inside the course that they needed without knowing it, is the mindset mastery side of it.

Speaker1:
That is true for me. You know, starting and as you were building out this whole program, you know, I came in looking for the technical aspects, but it was the mindset mastery that has transformed everything. And it occurs to me almost even listening to Cheryl and Elizabeth and you Stacy talk that it's almost like it's a color lens. Like if if the mindset mastery were a color, say, red, everything that flows in the course would be a shade of that red. It's a critical component that is often overlooked or missed, maybe even unintentionally, but it supports under everything else in life and horses, everything. It affects everything, as others have already mentioned. So yeah, that was that was a game changer for sure. And what I needed more coming in than I realized. So thanks for all your hard work and putting that piece in there, because it does affect everything.

Speaker6:
Well, you're very welcome.

Speaker5:
And if you were going to explain the program to a friend, how would you describe it?

Speaker6:
Wow.

Speaker1:
The mindset mastery because it affects everything. I'm more self-aware. I'm more aware of my own body and what I'm am communicating, what's going on inside me, in my thoughts and emotions. And so from that aspect, again, like I just said, it affects everything from being with my horse. Being with my grandkids, being with my family, being with my dog. That is something that has had profound impact on me as a person. In addition, the horse training piece, I would describe it as being able to know yourself as well as your horse and interpreting and understanding my horses better seeing. The interaction is more of a conversation rather than as me, the human telling the horse what to do, but that there's there is conversation and feedback going back and forth between the two of us, and learning to be a detective of what the horse is really saying to me. Is it me? Is it the horse? Is it both of us? You know, that sort of thing. So with every zoom call and even in going back time and again, rewatching the videos that are available on in the courses, in the modules, just picking up those gems and nuggets along the way. Sometimes you call them breadcrumbs, even for the horses, but they're I get them too. There's a breadcrumb. I'm going to go play with this breadcrumb now and try it on and see how it works. What results do we get? I'm a little more open and playful. Rather than going I gave this cue. The horse needs to respond this way. If they're not responding that way, wonder what the reason is. I become more curious. And those are things that I would describe to a horse person that they might be interested in learning in such a course.

Speaker6:
Thank you.

Speaker5:
The evaluations inside the program are twofold. There is the self evaluation process, and then there is the ability to attend the zoom calls, ask questions or have videos evaluated. And so inside of those zoom calls you'll see me doing the evaluation. And my hope is that is influencing you doing your own evaluations at home. And it's also a chance for you to build your skills as you watch me evaluating somebody's ride. You have the chance to be practicing that skill set with your own eyes, watching somebody else's video, because it's a different experience than you watching your own video. Can you talk to me a little bit about the experience of learning to evaluate, watching other people being evaluated, and how that has helped you grow as a writer?

Speaker2:
Honestly, I love that word, detective. I think that's a huge key to the whole question, because when I see you evaluating somebody else's ride, I see the level of detail that you go into. I just love how, you know, you pause and you put it on slow motion and you'll look at every part of the horse and every part of the rider. And I think that that is just huge, you know, because I can like at the beginning, when I first joined the course, I watched my video, my first video, and I didn't really know what to look for. I didn't know what I was really looking at. I was like, well, it looks fine. I don't know, like it's good. But now, having watched you go through tons of people's videos and my videos, I actually I'll do the same thing. Now. I like to put them in slow motion. I like to pause them. It's fun to be a detective and to put that spin on it to make it fun. Like I pretend, you know, I sometimes I'll wrote my kids into it too. We're like, okay, we're detectives. Like, what can we see? What am I doing in this video? And it's really fun to kind of be that and to make it an experience of curiosity. Instead of just watching a video, it becomes, it's so much more fun. It's alive. It's it's a really cool experience when you can do it that way. It's been really fun to kind of watch that grow over the months that I've been in the course.

Speaker3:
Yeah. Think that was like the key for when I sent in our first video just for like a baseline was think I would watch them just like overall watch them like the big picture I would feel things. But when I was watching I wasn't looking for those things. So like when you picked out immediately where her head was at, where her shoulder was at, and it was just like was like all of a sudden I was like, the light goes on, like, oh. And that's why. I think we never really got the level of detail that we needed to work on, what we need to work on. There wasn't that breakdown of watching each little where my hands were or where her head was. You know, all of that, that you just broke down immediately in that small amount of time and then the amount of detail you, you put behind each little piece has really helped me go from just feeling it to seeing it to just a whole new level. And then watching you break down other people's videos. It's just it's been so incredible because it's not just one thing. It's not just this. This is the ride. It's it was all those little details that just all of a sudden was like, oh, that's why it's not working. And using the legs simultaneously was a huge thing for us, because had gotten so much in the habit of using one leg more to push, because that's what I had been taught, and all it would do was cause more of a side pass or a leg yield, because she can do both. But it wasn't getting us the bend. And so watching other people and you talking them through it, then I would just take that one piece and go work on it. And I was like, oh. And then and then go back and rewatch so many because every time I watch, I pick up something different. So then I can work on that because I kind of need one piece at a time and then put it all together. And yeah, that's been. Unbelievably helpful.

Speaker1:
Though my brain wants to resist the recording in the first place because God, you know, is what's the weather like? Don't have an indoor arena. What's is the. Is it too windy? My brain offers up all of these reasons why it's a pain in the neck to record, but it is tremendously valuable. It has been helpful to watch you evaluate even as you've taught us to evaluate. But watching you apply that you've coached us to look for something good first. And that was very hard. That involves mindset, mastery. A lot of mindset mastery work for me because I would look at the video and like in a general way, like, what's my hand doing? Why am I why is that there like that, you know, need to fix that, and I need to fix that, and I need to fix that. And I wasn't looking for the good thing first. I even then. And when I was looking initially at some of my. Videos, then thought, wait, what does Stacy do when she's evaluating videos during our zoom calls? And you would often pause it? The video. Right there on the screen and tell the person, look, what you're after is right there in that frame. Paused video and I'm like, okay, I'm going to look for the one good step that I was hoping for, found it and had to focus on that. And I literally at that point for me was I took a screenshot and I kept looking at that pretty screenshot.

Speaker1:
That's the frame I'm looking for of. But I want my horse to be in that collected state. That's what I'm looking for. But I had to look at it. I had to let my mind grasp that that's the good stuff. That's the good stuff. And then I went, oh, there is a good step. That's great. We can go from there. We can get to good steps. So you're demonstrating on the zoom call what, like pausing it at the good and then you can even pause it at that's not so good because then you can evaluate what's working what's not working. So you demonstrating that helps to reinforce it in my own slow old mind. So that has been helpful. And I've been able to use whether it's a short video and watch it right away or, you know, take it back and rewatch it and replay it over and over again and make notes on that. And it's really interesting, the things that I discover. And by discovering the things on my own, it actually seems to stick a little bit more in my brain and also in my body as I keep practicing that. That is been fabulous. To be able to have you demonstrate that for us all, whether it's my once a year video that I send in, or if it's just watching other people as they submit videos again and again.

Speaker5:
So something you just said there that's so.

Speaker6:
Key.

Speaker5:
That I think a lot of nonprofessionals so professionals being people that train horses as a profession for a living and nonprofessionals being people who own horses and don't train professional in a professional capacity. One thing that professionals do is they learn exactly the same way you just outlined. It's anchoring into. That's the one step. Now, how do I repeat that? One of the biggest differences for professionals is that when I was a trainer, I would ride for 8 to 10 hours a day. What a professional does is they get really good at gathering that one step there and that one step there, and then recreating that. What you just outlined so brilliantly is the fastest way for a nonprofessional to do it is to video, look for it, anchor into that one step and that one feeling and seeing it and then being able to go back and recreate it just one step again. Because what you're doing is you're dialing up your awareness of that one step and your awareness of how it was created, whether it was intentional or accidental.

Speaker6:
Like.

Speaker5:
Because it often times is that you just need to anchor into that. It's possible. And this is what it feels like. And then you start gathering those together. And one thing that people miss when they're not doing this evaluation work, as you stated, they're skipping past those good moments. And that's the actual key to being able to gather enough of them to feel it and change that in your body. You got to be able to see it.

Speaker6:
So.

Speaker5:
That you can then gather it so you can start to snowball those breadcrumbs, those little, those little nuggets so that it can pick up steam. Thank you for that. Has the program changed the structure of the way that you work with your horse?

Speaker2:
In the past, I've had it in my head that I need to devote a lot of time to working with pilot to achieve any kind of results or relationship, both, and then realizing that. It could be as small as 15 minutes a day in certain seasons of life, but yet that's still builds. It builds towards the same goal of that relationship and those results, and that sometimes actually it's like less time, but consistently can do more than like three hours, you know. And I think that's something that I've kind of discovered. So yeah, for sure it's it's definitely affected affected the, the structure 100%.

Speaker3:
Um I my focus is like quality over quantity because think around me. There's a lot of that mind that, you know, oh, if you don't ride for an over an hour, you're not doing anything like your horse is not in like, this wicked sweat. And I'm like, yeah, she's not learning at that point. Like there's it's just mean. It depends on the horse and the person and what you're doing. Um, for us, I'm finding that I just, I love that this program just fits us so well that. That is the reality. Like you, you take a piece, you work on it and it doesn't have to take an hour. It can be a ten, 15 minute ride. And I feel like we are making so much more progress now doing that than we were before, for just riding through what really wasn't quality stuff. We would just kind of doing the time thing like, oh, let's do it one more time. Like until we get the piece that we need to make it better. We're just. We stopped working on it. Really. We were just kind of riding around it or past it, and that would kind of lead to frustration for both of us. So I really like this this focus I have now. And it's it's more all right, that's that was a success for today. And then we'll just do something that's fun. We'll play some games and we'll just. And then when we go back, we're both just more into it. We're just both more excited about doing it. Don't it's not a chore. It's exciting. It's our next adventure. Hey, we're going to get a little bit better at this today. And and that's been huge.

Speaker1:
Same. I know I've talked with you Stacy before about my tendency because I lose all track of time, because I love being with my horses and playing with them and doing stuff that I could set a timer on my watch. And for ten minutes and the timer will go off, and I'm just going to do just a couple more minutes, right? And I lose all track of time. And then it's like, you know, a half hour later and I'm still working on it. And so I could overdo things in that direction. And so I have learned through this course the benefit of when there's good effort. And I think I sent a recent success story in sort of in the last few months about my world record shortest ride training session ever was like less than ten minutes because we got out there. She, my mare, just put her whole effort into what we were working on. She did wonderfully well and I actually dismounted. I said, well done, let her go back out to the pasture and hang out. Eight minute training session from endless to eight minutes. And it was interesting then after that to notice how she came the next time we went out and her ability to dial in and focus on on what we were working on was even more obvious to me. Because of that. I think she just kind of noodled on that for a while and came back the next time we worked together and was very willing, and her mindset shifted in that to somehow.

Speaker5:
Yeah, learning to be able to see things in those small chunks is always useful, whether you use it as the full ride, like an eight minute successful ride, which is very much how I would do when I'm introducing a horse to a new concept, new horse under saddle, which is a very, very new concept to the horse. The rides are very short because I'm basically giving the horse these breadcrumbs of of what's to come, and I'm answering questions before they ask bigger questions that I maybe don't want them to ask. So when I'm looking at this through that, you know, professional trainer lens again, what's very interesting is that there are time periods in the horse's life where those very short sessions are very, very valuable because of what they highlight for the horse. And that's exactly what you are all referencing when you talk about them also being very beneficial for your mind to have to just hold focus for, let's say, eight minutes. Truly holding focus for eight minutes is actually more mental work, especially if you read the statistics online anymore. That's a chunk of work to hold your true focus for that long. I think the same thing is true for the horses. So when I look at horses like Roxy doing the bareback and bridleless, it took her learning small chunks and then being exposed to then stacking those small chunks with break time in between.

Speaker5:
And that's how eventually you end up getting the both the physical and the mental stretch bigger and bigger, to the point where you can do something as big as the bareback and bridleless freestyle ride in front of thousands of people. But it's not done by going out there and riding endlessly without focus. It's done by going out there and riding in small chunks with great focus and the downtime in between, which is also just as key as the focus time, because I personally want my horses to be able to dial in a lot and then relax a lot. And that means that as humans, we're going to have to practice dialing in a lot and then relaxing a lot. And so it makes perfect sense to me that it's going to work best when we learn that in small chunks and when we teach it in small chunks. And then if we should choose to go a direction that we would need to build the horses stamina or mental stamina, then we would start adding more chunks and then still remembering that plateaus are a good thing. And coming back to that and seasons are a real thing. So thank you so much for sharing all of that. And before we go, I'll ask, is there anything else you'd like to share about your experience in the Resourceful Rider program?

Speaker2:
Okay, I got to say that the one thing that I would love to highlight is just the success part of everything, because I think that makes everything, I don't know. I've done a lot of thinking on this recently, just on the beauty of encouragement and the beauty of truly seeing success in in life and with our horses. And I love that every zoom call that we do, we start with a success. And someone is someone is successful. You know that they're it's so encouraging to hear that. Um, and then it feels like for me, you know, there I become it becomes easier for me to see my own successes and to celebrate them and not just be like, oh yeah, woo hoo! That I did that right that day. But, you know, it's a it's a real thing and it should be celebrated. And it's something that it's come to the point for me where I'll do something with pilot and I'll watch the video and I can see it, and it's exciting to me, and I'll pull it up and I'll show my husband and I'll be like, oh my goodness, you've got to see it like I did it. And he'll look at it with me and he can see it too. And we get to celebrate. There's this like it's success. It's meant to be celebrated. It's a good thing. And this course, it's just kind of designed to kind of orbit around that success. Like this is something that we all get to do together. It's a community of successful riders, you know, that we actually get to do this together and celebrate each other's wins. And I just think that that's huge, because in the past when I've done different, you know, lessons or training or whatever, it's a lot of focus on, of course, like all the things that you have to work on, but not a whole lot of like, oh, you're doing this really well, you know, but you it's been such an amazing course that we focus on success.

Speaker1:
I love watching all of my fellow classmates as they submit videos. I love learning from them. I love being inspired by them. It's just been amazing to watch many fellow students thrive and blossom as human beings through their horse training. It's just it's amazing.

Speaker6:
It's.

Speaker3:
That the success part that you mentioned in the community. There's just key. It's the encouragement and the positivity I feel from everybody in this program and the generosity of everybody sharing their struggles, which leads to the successes which make them all so much sweeter. I feel like you were saying too, with the with other lessons. I always felt it was so focused on what you're not doing right. And here's how to fix it and, you know, get better. I never felt like we would focus on what I was doing right, and so didn't really have that that good place to start. You know, I felt like I was always fighting for something that wasn't achievable. I was like, so I was never going to succeed, right? So to see the success, to see the small things, to embrace those and to enjoy those and for those to to build on those. This program has really given me more permission to do that and more power to do that, and what the success I'm seeing from that and hearing everybody's story is just. It's just been so amazing and I just get excited every time I watch a call. I just it gives me more inspiration. I go to the barn and I'm like, yes, this is we can do this instead of before, like, oh my God, I'm just not I don't know what I'm doing, you know? Now I'm just like, I can and we will and we can together. And with this community, that's. I can't even I can't even express how important that has become and how much of a big deal it is, because without that, you kind of do feel lost and there is more negative out there than there is positive. But this group and what you've created, Stacy is just it's incredible. Life changing.

Speaker1:
One more thing. The success piece. I think enjoying that together as a community flips everything right side out. The other thing I want to would like to say, it is also a joy and delight Stacy to watch you be filled with joy and delight as you see us. Your students get it. Yeah, that is very affirming for all of us. So thank.

Speaker6:
You.

Speaker1:
For you being you.

Speaker5:
Oh well, thank you for encouraging my expressiveness that I do use quite frequently on the zoom calls. Well, thank you to all of you again for joining me today. And I will see you on the next zoom call.

Speaker6:
Absolutely.

Speaker3:
Thank you guys. It's great to meet you.

Speaker1:
Great day everybody.

Speaker6:
Bye bye.

Speaker5:
To learn more about the Resourceful Rider program, visit my website Stacy westfall.com and put your name on the waitlist where you'll receive behind the scenes peeks into the program.

Speaker4:
If you enjoy listening to Stacy's podcast, please visit Stacy westfall.com for articles, videos and tips to help you and your horse succeed.

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