Paula Curtis (00:42)
Today we have Jim Hicks here and we're going to be diving into some of his presentations in the fair and his journey. And I'd like to introduce him. He's an accomplished massage rider who's earned both USDF bronze and silver medals. He has successfully trained horses through grand prix level and has reeducated hundreds of show horses, helping them both return to successful careers or fostering respectful relationships with their horses, their owners. Influenced by Ray Hunt and Tom Dorrance, Jim is
renowned for his expertise in starting young horses and refining advanced horses. Jim reaches a global audience through a collective horseman magazine and the video series, The Horseman's Gazette. As a sought after clinician, he teaches clinics from California to Maine. In his books, A Drink of Water and Riding in the Sweet Light are quotes by Jim Hicks. Readers will discover valuable insights and ideas to enhance their connection and partnership with their horses.
So welcome, Jim. It's great to have you here, and we sure appreciate you being a part of our fair. Well, thanks for having me. I'm very much excited to participate in the fair and see how many lives you're touching for the better. Well, thank you. Horses and humans alike, right? And we can all agree that the lessons in horsemanship really are lessons in living a good quality life.
Lessons in life brought to us by our horses. And I'd love to hear how you started, Jim, and how your journey with horses has progressed and changed and evolved throughout the years. Well, as a young man, I was exposed to the horses through my family. And let's just say that they had a limited understanding of how to work with horses. And so obviously I was exposed to a lot of ideas and concepts that
Maybe didn't support what the horse needed in any given time. And quite frankly, I was probably the test dummy for a lot of situations that I shouldn't have been. That was my first introduction to the horse. then throughout the course of my life, I was in working environments to where I needed to use a horse in order to get a job done. And what I shared with people in the past is that, uh,
I knew how to get things done and I didn't exactly know why I would get certain things done. And it really probably didn't matter to me at that time. The horse was buttoned and it was a tool. It was a necessity.
through the course of a lot of hard knocks and different things. started to, I'm going to fast forward a little bit. started to listen to a conversation that my wife and her mentor started having about a gentleman named Ray Hunt. And they were talking about recognizing the slight changes in small tries and feeling timing and through listening and observing.
Well, I understand some of this stuff, but I'm not so sure about some of it. then through auditing Ray Hunt, when that was my first exposure to the conversation, hearing it from Ray and just in my experience of watching situations that would arise in the climate and how he would explain things.
like seeing things from the horse's perspective, recognize the slight change in small tries to adjust to fit the situation. What became pretty clear to me really quickly is this is a conversation that I've not been exposed to much and it made so much sense to me that I ⁓ had to really key in on what this man had to say and I had seen some capable people get some things done with horses but
I had not witnessed anybody operate with their horse the way that Ray was able to. And he was the only person that was able to explain in a way that made sense. And so from that point on, like, say this a lot in about 45 minutes. I basically knew that I wanted to unlearn everything I thought I knew about a horse. And I was really excited about the possibility of what I.
potential of what could be and I couldn't wait to start exploring what that looked like. And so that's where my passion for the horse actually began. I saw these possibilities and I saw how well the horses responded to being a offering a better field, having better timing. You know, and the big thing that always impressed me about watching Ray is when I would observe his clinics or participate, know, things would come up.
challenges for the riders, challenges for the horses. A lot of times people might get distracted by, know, the, what is this say, the event, you know, maybe a horse's got insecure and scared and started to panic or one of those types of situations, you know, and people would get caught up in the event itself. And what I really became acutely aware of is, what was Ray and how was Ray and his horse communicating while these things were going on?
And that's what I became fascinated with and literally addicted to. I wanted to see what the conversation, what conversation is happening right there between him and his horse because, you know, my experience was is you'd watch him and he could sit there on his horse and his horse would have his neck relaxed and his ears relaxed and great, have his hand up on the neck.
in a moment's notice, you know, the horse should look like it was asleep. And in a moment's notice, the horse was ready. Where are we going? What do need to do now? And it was as simply as, know, Ray could bring the breath into his body and look where he was going. And his horse was on his way. And, know, I've really learned to appreciate that and admire that. It just really creates, it still has a really valuable impression in my mind to this day. Definitely. Yeah. He, you know, Ray would say,
through the mind, arrange the life and the body down to the feet. Or sometimes he'd say arrange the life and the body down to the feet through the mind, but that encompasses the mind, the life, the energy, or the spirit of the horse and the body. So Ray was working all three, I call them systems, but the mind, the life and the body. And Ray could put that into words. Where a lot of people, they couldn't explain the life or the energy very well of the horse and getting the life up and back down. And that sticks with me always.
When I work with horses, I'm always thinking about in that order, get the mind, get the life, and then the body comes. And Ray was really good at, you could see that in his horses. And that's why he could go from the flag between the ears with the head low to he could get into action right away. So that he was quite, quite amazing. I mean, I don't want to take too much time away from you, but I remember when Ray got older, I saw him, he'd been sitting in a chair a lot in the back of trucks teaching. And then we were up in Wisconsin, Northern Wisconsin. He was at a clinic.
He was riding somebody else's horse. And that day he was roping again. And I just remember like, I'd seen him in Arizona sitting in a chair, but then here he is in Wisconsin. He's on a horse, he's roping and he had like a second wind. And I mean, I just remember the feeling of that and thinking, man, when I'm that age, it's what I want to be able to do. Well, and there's a couple things that I have learned over the years. I won't pretend to...
say that I know what Ray meant when he said certain things, but I can give my interpretation. Something that I share quite often with people is I used to fight with the body to get the mind, and then one day, no, no, if I get the mind, the feet will always follow. And so that was a pivotal moment for my horsemanship. And then, you know, I think the thing that I always observed about Ray and...
was from moment to moment, he was able to read the expression of the horse. And in one moment, the expression instead, we're ready to move forward. And the next moment horse would say, I'm not sure. And he had a really, his feeling timing was such that he could adjust for what the horse needed in that moment. know, and that's something that I'm really aware of with myself is when I'm encountering a challenge with a horse.
You know, what is the expression? What am I seeing? What am I not seeing? Where's my feeling timing in relationship to the situation? And you know, my timing is usually fairly good, but it can always be better. what I share with people often is, well, let me back up. Most people are out of fear of making a mistake. They make a mistake by not doing something. And so what I share with people is, know, how do you learn good feeling timing?
You have to practice a lot of bad fuel and timing to find out why that doesn't work. You know, and that's, think one of the things that it's, maybe people get disillusioned about what the horsemanship conversation is. There's this misconception out there. I do everything just right. And I don't make any mistakes that, I'm going to have this perfect horse based on my ideal.
And then what they don't realize is you're gonna make a lot of mistakes. I make a lot of mistakes today, but the difference is I recognize them sooner and I clean them up sooner so that we can move forward. And one of the analogies I like to use is, you know, people look at like these samurai swords that are these works of art. You know, they're ornate, they're beautiful, they're...
their edge is razor sharp, they're unbreakable. But the analogy is, that sword got created through a lot of heating and cooling and folding and bending and pounding and tempering to create masterpiece. And so I feel like that our horsemanship is the same. Each horse that we encounter and work with is masterpiece based on
who that horse needs to be for the situation that it's in. And it's not the exclusion of the heating and the crewing and the shaping and buffing the rough edges off of the necessary areas, the areas that need some refining. You know, and I feel like that every horse that I work, I go through these stages. And if I'm doing my part, the last horse has made me better for the next horse.
Like you say, might start looking at something and go, I need to work here. And in that moment, I might pause and say, wait a minute, you learned a lesson from the last course. This might not be it as it appears to be. And then right at that moment, I might completely redirect my attitude and approach. And that's where I get to find out, you know, was that a good decision or was that a bad decision?
Like you say, I don't look at it as bad decision as, know, the question is it's only the bad decision if it, if it doesn't work and I don't do anything to redirect it. As long as I'm continuing to look in how to redirect things and improve them. To me, that's what horsemanship is about. It's the, it's the ability to evolve.
from one minute to the next or one ride to the next make determinations as to, know, how does this occur for the horse? How am I free? Am I communicating the horse in a way that the horse can understand, or am I confused about what I'm attempting to do? And so there I'm, I'm basically teaching confusion to my horse. So there are just little things where, you know, if I want us to pick on my own humanity, you know, I, I make a ton of mistakes. I'm just quicker noticing them.
and redirecting the conversation and cleaning them up. And I find that through a lot of the people I teach, they've got a lot of information in their mind. Most of them have the answers, but what they haven't been able to do is break it down and sort it out and decide which part of the puzzle do I need to work on first so I can fit the next piece into place so that it makes sense for what my horse and I are up.
And I feel like that the work that I've been able to do with the collective course men in the video series and that is is that it We go through a lot of different Movements piece by piece and I'm able to break it down and say okay. These are the parts to the whole here's the thought process here's some timing based on this situation and then the bigger thing is is here's some of the the common
Challenges that people run into you know, let's just say they're taking their horse out of balance unintentionally You know, they might They might be attempting to like a shoulder in or something the lateral movement, but soon as they drop the alignment You know, they lose the value of the gymnastic exercise of the movement and so To hear those videos have been able to educate people on These are what the things you're looking for. These are the things that ⁓
You may feel like you're accomplishing it. may have keep track of these little, you know, keep track of that shoulder, make sure that you're keeping your horse in the line. And I find that the challenge that I have as a teacher is, is when they're in front of me and they do exceptionally well. Cause I can direct the conversation for the, for them.
and their horse and they even get close and the horse will fill in the difference form because by the time I can convey the message to them and they can translate the horse, it's already laid. But it never ceases to amaze me when the rider can even get close to presenting things in a way the horse understands, they'll still fill in the difference. Yeah. Horses are pretty remarkable at the filling in piece and we're used to talk about that too. And I forget what percentage you said, if you get that right, the horse will...
will make up the rest. And I like that you talked to the fact that people need to not be as concerned about making mistakes as sometimes they are, because like you were saying, it's the refinement. And if somebody is coming to their horse and they're thinking or they're questioning, all of a sudden their mind and their intentions and everything is not present and in the moment with their horse.
So now their ability to observe what's taking place, to remember it, they've got a background conversation going on in their heads, they were not gonna be able to remember what's going on with the horse, because they're thinking about other things, not their horse. And then to make comparisons and to actually learn from their mistakes, because like you said, the mistake, it's okay, it's what do you do with that mistake? And if you can recognize it and make some comparisons and start trying some different.
You know, change your timing or change your feel slightly. Now you might end up with a much better response from your horse. And, I like, I'm just happy you stated that because I think a lot of people come to it thinking they have to get everything just picture perfect, but that's not, that's not the process. That's the, that's the end. That's, know, that's the picture at the end of the process. takes time and you've been doing this your whole life. So.
It looks very simple and easy when you do it, and it's beautiful, but for somebody coming in, it might not look that way. that's that. Well, and the other thing I want to state is, you know, just state so that people know is that I actively pursue my education. I'm consistently putting myself in front of smart people and I'm asking them to give me a good pearl of wisdom.
shine the light on the dark spot that I'm not seeing. And what that does is keeps me as a... Why that's important for me as somebody that takes money to teach people. I feel like that I need to consistently improve myself to deliver better information. But the bigger thing there is it keeps me in touch with the beginner's mind.
Because there's a lot of times I'll go into a situation, a learning situation, and I think this is what I need to work on. I get in there and I'm so far off on it. We completely work on something different. I walk away and go, that's what I, that's exactly what I needed. It wasn't what I I needed. You know, and I think, so I've always been really careful not to adapt the attitude that I've arrived or that I'm somebody special.
You know, yes, I can create transformation for horses and people, but at the end of the day, I'm another guy that puts my hat and my pants on just the same as you do. I. I'm human. And what my message is, that none of this stuff is unattainable. Granted everybody has a different feeling. I mean.
Some people it comes easier than others, but coming back to another statement that I heard Ray say is, don't try to be me because you're not me. I'm Ray Hunt, but be the best that you can be. And so what I see is, and we all need people that we look up to, but what I got out of that was the other part of that is Ray said, thanks.
Think about what you're doing. And so how that translates for me is that I don't try to emulate anybody. What I attempt to do is take information or collect information that I feel like applies to me and that gives me better tools to work with my horses. And I don't really care where the information comes from. Good horsemanship is good horsemanship.
I feel like that that's really where I'm a good horseman and a good teacher is that I do not feel like I've arrived by any means of anything. feel like the more I know, the less I know. And I've been doing this for 40 years, working outside horses, doing all these things. And I get up every day excited to learn about what I don't know. So one of the things that I
Years ago, I used to get a little bit aggravated. I'd go down to the rodeo or the arena and I'd see all these unnecessary things going on. I'd get frustrated because I know that it's not necessary. But what I felt, what happened for me is then it put me in this righteous attitude of you're right, I'm right and you're wrong and you're making unnecessary judgments about people and what they know or what they don't know in their journey.
And I felt like, you know, when I, nothing good's going to come out of that. For me, if that's my approach. So what I learned, especially when I go to competitions, I have to broaden my perspectives because there's a lot of different people there doing a lot of different things and they're not bad people. Some people are just more educated than others. Some people that got a bigger ego than others, but the horse will take care of that. The horse will teach them what they don't know.
But at the end of the day, how I learned to temper my thinking is when I would walk into those situations, I would go, thank you for reminding me why I don't do that. So that would be the majority of the people I would see. And then I would see somebody else standing over there in the corner and you didn't really notice them. And they were experimenting with an idea, but maybe it wasn't really working out for us.
And then you got somebody else over here, you know, whatever they're doing is working pretty good because there doesn't seem to be any major disconnect. Well, what I found is some of the best information that I've been able to gather is, is by noticing that person over there experimenting with an idea that's not working for them, I'll put it in my little experiment blocks in the back of my mind and I'll go home and start messing with the idea with my twist and some of the best things I've
been able to come up with came from those situations because I was willing to be grateful for all the information that was in front of me at that given moment. I think that it's real easy sometimes when we become knowledgeable about something or proficient at something or want to take the stance of, have the answers, therefore I am better than you or whatever the situation might be. And that always just reminds me to stay open-minded and stay humble.
Never take on, you know, my, my standpoint is, is who am I to tell you you're doing something right or wrong? That was my perspective. And there's your perspective. The thing that needs to be taken into account is the horse will tell you what they need or don't. So if you're, I just observe it all the time. I see people that don't really know much about a horse and they're getting along with their horses. Great. And then you see somebody else that knows the significant amount and they're over there pestering them to death.
Well, the horse is saying the horse has given the answer in those two different salarians. So sometimes that's where we just have to remember that to keep it simple. So I jokingly say, give your horse a kiss, keep it simple, stupid. You know, and so I think humans, my perspective, we love to take simple concepts and complicate them to the point of confusion. And so like on my
my books of quotes, you know, there's, there's a quote and then there's a picture. And basically how that applies to what I just said is, you can, there's, here's a visual concept and then here's something for you to think about. The cool part about it is, is there's one, what each quote meant the day I wrote it. And then every day that it's been out there, it takes on a different meaning depending on the horse, the rider and the situation. And so people go, well, you wrote this quote, what did it mean?
Well, maybe I can't tell you what it meant when I wrote it, but I can tell you what it means today. Well, so I find that that's really helpful for people because it allows them a way to think about things like feeling, timing, adjustments, situation, seeing things from the horse's perspective or understanding of nature. And it allows them a way to put a, condense it into a small
small piece of information what picture they can see in their guidance so then they all of sudden they're starting to figure out how they need to fit the pieces together so that the conversation between
them and what their horse needs starts to fit. In your book, A Drink of Water, you're quoted as saying, most situations, the horse is forgiving of the rider's shortcomings. The horse offers the gift of tolerance and patience with the rider's confusion. And what does that mean for you here today? I know it evolves depending on... Well, what it means to me today is that horses are, they want to get along with us.
They want to feel good about themselves and they're not so quick to judge us by our shortcomings. Like I see horses tolerate things all day long that they don't tolerate. But if I really want to simplify it and take it to a little bit more of a spiritual plane, I believe that horses are older, more intelligent souls than we are. And that we think we're here to teach them something when in fact,
They're here teaching us something. So, I mean, I really feel like that, ⁓ what I can say is, they're far more generous with my shortcomings than I am with other people's shortcomings. Let's put it that way. And I'm learning how to be a better human being through the horse's example, because maybe there's times I want to bite. Maybe there's times that horse wants to bite and you see him use, I'll just give you one thing to
And then tomorrow, go, well, maybe I'll just give you another one. But if you miss too many warnings, then they'll gonna, they'll let you know what you need to know. You know, there's a lot of opportunity there to adjust ourselves, to redirect how we're conducting ourselves. And I think it's one of the only places that we're as humans that we can actually experience that because anymore, think human interaction, interaction, we're more,
calloused. We don't necessarily always see the good in people or were my first knee jerk reaction is to get on the defense and reaction. That's another word I hear people in the horse world go, I want my horses reactive. And I look at him and go, well, I don't want reactive forces. want responsive forces. And then I'm the question, you know, I you know what the difference between reaction and responses. And they go, well, no, not really.
I said, well, if you're reacting, you're surviving. If you're responding, you're thinking your way through the problem to the split. And so what the horses taught me is when I'm wanting to be reactive towards somebody, if I can shift into being responsive, then what I'm going to do is I'm going to start attempting to see things through their point of view, their lens. Usually what I find out in that moment is things are not as they felt.
because that's where our egos as humans get in the way as we think, you know, because somebody's having a bad day, we can make it all about us. And that's where we, our ego gets in our way. That's where our arrogance gets in our way. Like I said, if I, in my own situation, if I take the time to investigate things a little bit farther and ask better questions, what I learned is there's traditionally about 10 other things that are lined up.
in a certain sequence at the right timing that created that environment where that person was, they're having a hard time and I'm misreading. So coming back to the horse again is I always like to use these different human horse analogies because I feel like they relate. You know, whatever the horse is doing, coming up with it's not her she and I've learned to do that with the horse really well.
And if I feel like that's changing, it's time to go have a cup of coffee, do something different. Because I've learned to do that with the horse, I'm becoming a little bit more adaptable to doing that with human being. I have not perfected that yet. I'm working on it, you know, and I just feel like that, you know, coming back to there's a lot of denominators between living with good horsemanship and living a good life. And it's not without.
challenges or the different situations. It's a process of asking better questions, but then when we ask the question, actually listen for the answer and then attempting to understand whether it's horse or human, are you coming from at this particular moment? You know, what's the chemistry that's going on?
So then coming back to the, another part of my passion for the horse and it's a conversation that's been up a lot in the last few years is the, is the, the brain science and chemistry and the cortisol and the adrenaline and the dopamine and serotonin and what's happening in those different states for the horse. But the best way that Dr. Peters put it, and he shared it with my wife and I was eavesdropping, so I'm a good thief.
was he said, you know, humans have a pharmacy in their head. And if they knew how to use that pharmacy, they can change their chemistry. And I really watched my wife settle in with that. And there was a couple of things that she was working on with improving her human to human interactions. And I literally watched her transform in front of my eyes because she started to recognize, Hey,
I do have the pharmacy or I do have the ability to adjust my chemicals as I need them. Well, then when I started understanding how that works with course on a real basic level, started to put some language to some of the things that Ray and Tom had talked about, but you couldn't really put vocabulary to it. So I just felt like it was another great.
tool in the toolbox of understanding what chemicals am I working with at any given time. Like a dressage horse, for instance, when they go out there and compete at the other levels, they need to have a, they need to upregulate and have a positive levels of adrenaline and cortisol in their blood to work, to go out there and, and do their job. And then when they're done, they need to be able to downregulate. So a good example is you take like a lot of barrel horses, for instance, they know how to upregulate really fast.
get on the adrenaline cortisol but then they don't know how to drug down-regulate so they it takes them a long time to come off of the drugs and it's not useful anymore. So coming back to the for me the equilibrium between the mind and the body and all the chemistry there is how quickly do I need to up-regulate it how quickly do I need to down-regulate and if my horses are not able to do that what do I need where do I need to look to help that and so
Going back to the first time I watched Ray, and then I watched him for years do it on his horses. Those horses would up-regulate very quickly to get a job done, but right behind them they would down-regulate just as quick. And to be honest with you, I don't know that I've ever seen somebody as masterful at that as what I witnessed him do with his own horses. And I saw one, I saw it on a lot of horses. So...
Like you say, to me, that's another exciting piece of the conversation is just understanding what chemicals am I working with at any given moment based on the circumstances and the situation and how can I bring the chemistry up a little or how can I bring it down? So I've got a lot of these touchy cults you get on the first time that are real snorty, bronky, touchy. There are the upregulated, so.
The worst thing you can do is just put them in a situation to, escalate that because then they're probably just going to check out and things are going to get really entertaining. So on those horses, it's like, all right, the hotter the horse, the chillier the rider needs to be. And you get out the other one where you got this horse over here is pretty chilly and then you need to bring the temperature up a little bit. Let's let's, ⁓ let's go get something done.
But for me, what I've, I'm, I'm exploring every day is this idea of what's, what's the baseline there? What's the balance between how do I adjust the chemistry such that I can, hey, up regulate or down regulate easily. You know, and that's one of those other things that I'm probably going to go to my last breath and go, you know, I couldn't, I'm still wanting to do that better, but that's also the feeling. That's the feeling timing at the moment.
All these things that are out there in conversation and one other thing that will speak to you on that is, and you don't hear a lot of people talk about it much, is the spirituality. Well, what I think, whether Ray or Tom expressed it the way most people think of spirituality, I don't know. What I can say is, my observation is, there was that other piece in there that is divine in nature, it's spiritual. And
It doesn't matter what training technique or what science you put behind it or what feeling timing you put behind it. There's no explanation for it. That's the spiritual part of it is there's just those moments where transformation happens and it doesn't make sense. Yeah. I think that's part of, me, that's part of the addiction that is consistently exploring all the different scenarios and situations that might arise.
Coming back to something I said earlier is every time I work with the horse or work with the human, I always put myself in the beginner's mind. Cause I never want to lose sight of that. There was a time when I was awkward. There was a time when I made all the mistakes and so I was the time. There was a time where I was an example and he planned it. He didn't, it wasn't a good example. I was the example of, you know, you did XYZ therefore this happened.
and think that that keeps us working. So I'm not sympathetic to people because when I'm sympathetic and I'm looking at them like they're victims, like they can't help themselves. I'm empathetic because I believe every person has the ability to help themselves if they want to. Well,
So when I'm teaching people with their horses, the beginner's mind keeps me in that mindset of if you knew the answer, you wouldn't be paying me money to teach you. And regardless of how I'm perceiving that you're receiving the information I'm giving you, it's not up for me to judge what you're going to get out of this deal. My responsibility as a teacher, whether it's with the horse or the human is, is to keep evaluating the communication.
And if what I'm doing is not working, then what do I have to do? What do I have to do is by doing something different. So my responsibility is to continue to keep re-approaching the situation until I find a way to communicate in the situation that connects the dots.
And horses are much easier than people sometimes because people usually when they're going through these different emotions they get scared, they get defensive, they get angry, they cry, you know, whatever the, you know, and you don't know, you don't know what happened 10 minutes before they come in front of you. know, maybe they got a phone call, you know, hey, your mother died. You don't know. But what I can say is, is what I do know is, is how I need to conduct myself. It doesn't, you know, we all need to hear.
certain messages and we need to hear truths. But I can be empathetic in the way that I delivered the message, regardless to whether it's the horse or the deer. You're delivering the message with feel. that's the thing when we're working with horses is we're coming at it from a place from our heart with feel. And if, and like you're saying, we need to be able to apply that to people. I mean, at least I know I do. And that's helpful for me when you talk about that. And I like how you're talking about
the concepts that people don't explain very much, like the example of up regulation and down regulation, life up, life down. That's a balance. And you said it, it's a balance and you hear feel, timing, balance, but people don't explain balance. They always think it's something physical, but it's not only physical, it's emotional too. it's spirit. it's so I love how you put words to something that's, that's hard for people to understand. And the words that you use are very
I understand you loud and clear and I really appreciate you going out there and explaining it that way to people because you really are helping the horse. Well, and one of the words I like to use even more than balance, because balance has a lot of different meanings, but what I like, I like the word equilibrium. And what it means is bringing two opposing forces to a balance. How that looks like for me is...
My mind and body is going to be out of balance with one another. When I find the equilibrium between the two, there's balance. Or I can have, then there's my horse's mind and body and that there's the equilibrium between those two. Then when I put myself into the equation with the horse, then there's two minds and two bodies that need to find an equilibrium. And to me, that's the opposing forces coming, finding the balance point. You know, so that's where.
You know, I feel like we're always challenged with that pretty much in everything that we do. you bring a lot of dressage principles into, you know, the horsemanship arena and you present them to people that maybe aren't being exposed to some of those dressage principles. What would you say are some key principles that you bring into the horsemanship arena that you've found to be really helpful?
for your students? Well, so like clinics, dressage principles for the horse room, there's three parts to them. So the first part is understanding the psychology and the nature of the horse. The second part is understanding correct biomechanics and the value of the gymnastic exercises and dressage. And then the third part is the chemistry, but how this applies
So a lot of what I do and it really doesn't matter. So my goal is, to take the horse and rider where they're at, have them be the best that they can be for what they're up to. So that's the first thing. Now coming back to bringing the principles what's to say the Western world from Bennett. I don't even know that that's the right way to go. Let's just put it the horse world because that's, that's better.
So there's a lot of people, for instance, that will do what they perceive as lateral movement, you know, and maybe it's a side pass, maybe it's a leg yield, or maybe it's a half pass. But first thing is, is most people are confused about the difference between the three of them. So that's the first distinction we make. And then the second distinction we make is if you're going to do any of those movements, have to have a line of travel. And the line of travel.
basically is the geometry for the movement. And why that's important to know is if you don't know what your line of travel is, then you're not.
Let me read your second. So why the geometry is important is if you know what the geometry is, then you can tell whether you're on course or off course. And then if you're off course, all there is to do is readjust, put you back on. So it's just like a house. If you're going to cut a piece of wood, anybody can cut it by eye one time is perfect and have them duplicate that nine more times without a measurement. And they might be really close, but let's just say they're all an eighth of an inch apart or a quarter of an inch apart.
So by the time you get from one end of the wall to the other, you're three feet off course. Well, so I see a lot of people doing their concept of a leg yield or a shoulder in for instance. And one of the common things you see is you see an overflexion in the neck. So then what they've done is, they've, so the value of those movements are, is to start bringing them into the engagement with the rear legs. But as soon as you drop.
them out of their alignment, for instance, you basically disengage the hind legs because then the shoulders negatively loaded and then they're just falling sideways to the fence. about so a lot of what I bring to people's awareness is just making sure that they're going to do those things, that the integrity and the movements there so that they get the value out of it. The way I look at my horses is if I can move the high quarters right or left, I'm going to change the direction of the front.
If I can move the shoulders right or left, I'm going to change the direction of the backhand. But most of things I want to do with my horses, I want to move them forward, sideways, backwards, quarter weight on each foot. The head and neck are the balancing tool. And depending on what I'm doing, I may need to lower the neck, raise the neck or have a flexion right or left. But as soon as I take the balance, as soon as I take that outside of the inline, which is
since I take the nose past the point of the shoulder, I've taken them outside of their alignment. And so then I've taken them from a state of balance to throwing them out of balance. And so the most common thing I see is I see people over flexing the neck and riding the horse in a state of being out of balance. there's, with the Dressage Principle, there's six things that I look at as a diagnostic for myself. And I was...
I've thought about this long time, a lot of airplane rides, and that is what is it that Jim Hicks does when he's sorting something out with a horse? Well, so the six things I've come up with for me is, first thing I need is energy. The second thing I need to do is establish a rhythm around the energy. The third thing is that I actually need them to have a slight flexion, look in the direction of their travel. Fourth thing is I need to have lateral bend through the bones.
That all needs to happen inside of the alignment. And then the sixth thing is the connection ties it all together. That's the hands and the legs. So what I find there is a lot of times you take first thing, the last thing I talked about and we flip it around. So you see people on the horse. First thing they're doing is they're connecting with their horse and they're messing around with.
in the neck, either left or moving them sideways or doing this or that. And they don't even, they've never even established the energy. But if you don't have energy, you don't have rhythm. And that's the difference between in my head, riding them from the front back, you know, coming back to what think about what Ray did with Colts in particular is forward motion. Once you had forward motion and you started to direct the forward motion and then basic
later on, you start shaping it. So for me, a couple of ways that I come about it is if I've got an older season porch, let's just say that if having, know, something just the integrity of whatever they're doing just a little off. I walk back through there, go, all right, how's the energy, how's the rhythm? Where there's energy, there's there's balance.
How's the flexion, how's the lateral flexion through the ribs? How's the alignment, how's the connection? And sometimes I'll back up and say, first thing we need to do is just direct the energy and then we'll worry about shaping it up later. And other times the energy and the rhythm is good. And all I need to do is we make a few little adjustments to shape the energy a little bit more productive. Back to Young Worf's. First thing I want to do is this.
Let's give the energy somewhere to go. Let's direct it. And then when that's all makes sense and we can walk, talk, canter, and we can direct the energy, then we can start adding the ingredients that would be necessary later on to start being able to shape the energy to do a specific job. That answer your question? And that ties into one of your presentations because you went back to starting a young horse is...
So in the fair, you're presenting on Riding for the Future today, and you're on a young warm blood. And can you share just a little bit about what people might expect in that presentation? Well, I really liked that little horse. She's pretty awesome little horse. That's first thing I want to say. She's got a big motor to her. When I started her, know, the thing that I think most people...
Wouldn't want to do is try to over control that energy. So basically I did just a lot of let's just move our feet. Let's direct you. But the thing of it is, is I already created the masterpiece in my mind before that. Or I ever started working with it. I found out what her job was going to be. Basically when I start a horse for somebody, I started with them in mind. Like there's a horse that I can ride and there's the horse that you can ride. And then there's the business.
So what are we going to be the necessary tools? This horse is going to need. so on the first, so let me get you back up here. So when I used to start horses, I used to ride around and put dummy rides on them and I had. Make an excuse and say, well, they're a youngster. So they're rooting on me and pulling on me a little bit here and there. And I would settle for those things. And then six months later or eight months later, you have to go back and you have to.
the sick say undo the things that you taught them to do that weren't useful. So coming back to first time you pick up on the rain or do they find, you where did they give to it? Did they give by taking the rain away or do they give by softening feeling back to you? So on day one, I'm aware that they're youngster, but I'm my mind, I'm, you know, for one, one field at a time, you're going to be, I need
I need a professional. All you gotta do is just feel for me, offer an answer. Done deal. Well, what I find is, that the horse gets ready a lot sooner than we do. If we're really good with our feeling timing and helping them understand where relief is, really quick to pick it up and go this in. So then pretty quick in a short period.
The horse is doing everything that you need them to do. And now all you need is just time for all that stuff to sink in and develop. I I like to think of it like baking a cake. You just give it time to bake. And so I think what that young horse is a good example of is, ⁓ so the cool part about that horse was, that she got five months riding over the course of a year. That's how she got started. And.
I think she's a great example of what the horse is capable of when we don't confuse the messaging. And when we're clear on day one is to how to break things down in the way that the horse can understand it. How easy it is for them to put all the fundamentals together so that later on they become secure in what they know.
What I like to think with the young horses that I start now versus the young horses I started 20 years ago is that my young horses just have the attitude of, this is just what we do. Because I never confused the message. think that it's really valuable for people to understand that you can ride young horses and have a high degree of precision and not overwhelm them or frustrate them.
It's just, have to adjust the intensity, the degree, the duration and intensity is an eighth of an inch apart versus, know, if they're a little bit later on than their high school horse, you know, then it's a mile apart. They learn step by step how to handle a little bit more, a little bit more feel each day. And so how I like to think of it is,
Each day that I ride my horse, I want to find one little spot where things are just a little bit uncomfortable, little inconvenient. Work there for a minute so that it becomes a new comfort zone so that it's accumulative at the end of 30 days. Their comfort zone is expanded a little bit each day. So at the end of 30 days, they have a huge comfort zone. But it really is, for me, it's a discipline of thinking.
And then the discipline of thought creates the discipline of feel. then it's recognizing what timing is going to work with this horse versus another. Because I've never ridden two horses with the same timing or the same feel. But the common denominator is me. So I have to be really good at regulating my thinking and adjusting the necessary feeling, timing and giving it all. Yeah. Adjusting, adjusting to fit the situation.
And to eat that horse. And it's like every session, at least for me, I'm starting over. So with me and this horse, and I start a lot of horses, but I go at it always thinking I'm starting new today. It's just, I'm starting over today. It just gets faster. And as I go, you know, the horse comes along. But I really don't, you don't make any assumptions because sometimes that horse, you know, maybe had a bad day in the paddock with its friends and
emotional level is up a little bit. So you need to not assume it's the horse you put away yesterday. It's not the same horse. I'm not the same person tomorrow that I am today. the way I explain that to people is especially in the performance horses and show world, it's, you know, people invest a lot of time and effort into to hit in a higher degree of proficiency. And so, you know, that'll have have a day where, you know, let's just say things are exceptional.
And they're at a nine and then they come back the next day and the horses, they're not at a nine as a team. Let's put it that way. And they're all frustrated and disappointed. And my comment to people is, know, you don't operate the same from one day to the next. One day you get out of bed and there's nothing or nobody that can stop you. And you're at 10, you know, and you're in bench. And the next day you get out of bed and you're at about a three or four.
And you're not very, you're feeling grumpy or you're just not feeling super. And then where most of us tend to operate is, is if we can figure out where our baseline is and we can consistently operate it, let's just say a six or seven from one day to the next, we're exceptionally happy with our performance. And over a long period of time, that's where we gain the most value out of what it is that we're doing.
So my comment to them is if you want to start to figure out, know, challenge your measurement a little bit, let's just say your work, if your average is a six or a seven, how do I take the six and make a seven? You know, if it's a seven, how do I turn it into a seven and half for an eight? And learn, you know, start developing the necessary thoughts or the skills to be able to support that level of proficiency. know, and I think that's a good, um,
way to explain it to people because they can relate to it. But the disillusionment that I see that people have is, you know, I'm going to, I'm going to have this transformation with my horse and then the work's done. Maybe certain things they'll transform. Let's just say they're really confused or frustrated about something and you've helped them have a transformation. Once they figured out where relief is, they go, well, I never knew that was an option before. So I'm going there because that's where it feels the best.
And then the other thing I hear a lot about is I hear lot of people talk about release pressure and release. And first time I heard the word relief was, was writing for Tom Dorn. So I think I had to write for him once, but I took a horse that really challenged my challenge me physically and mentally. And Tom did an exceptional job of keeping me out of trouble, but he used the word with his horse. When she came to me, she was in a lot of trouble.
Let's just say I was way in over my head for where I was at at the time. Tom was exquisite in how he handled me and handled that horse because he never told me what I couldn't do. And he broke things down, told me what to do. You know, and he kept using the term she's looking for relief. Well, it took me a year to say I wish I'd have the conversation. I wish I could have that conversation with him now. Cause I didn't understand a word of what he was telling me back then.
in the sense of why is relief different than release? And so I get asked that quite a bit, know, why do you, know, pressure release and I'm not talking about pressure release, talking about pressure release. they go, well, what's the difference? And I says, if I came up and put you in a headlock and choke the air out of you. And when I let go of you, I just released you.
doesn't mean that you learned anything other than to be afraid of any hint. You're probably going to go, I was never going to do that again. And I think, maybe I'm smart enough to get around you again, which in that same situation, right here, I'm installing. Here and concern. And then you go, well, now I'm going to go get a stick and I'm going to lay and wait the next time you do that. I'm to talk to you about it. Relief is I give you a notepad.
box of pencils and the box of erasers. And so here's a test question. And you're over there looking for the answer and you're wearing out a pencil and you're wearing out an eraser and you're throwing paper in the garbage can right and left and you're scratching your head and red in the face. And you're really the challenge to it because you just not figuring it out. And then all of a sudden you come up with the answer and you sit back and you go figured it out.
In that moment, you first found relief by finding the answer to the question, but it didn't mean that they didn't have to walk up and shake the door handle on 99 doors that were locked. But the biggest thing I find was the pressure relief thing is, that if you're going to put a horse in that situation, you need to know where they're out is so that they can find it. And I see a lot of riders that are not afraid to put pressure on a horse.
But they don't give them an out. They don't know where the horse is, where the out is. And then the horse doesn't know where the out is. And so at the end of the day, they get into a fight with their horse and then pretty quick, nothing good happens. Anytime I'm working through something with a horse, let's just say I have room for every door that, you know, I'm going to close the door. There's going to be a door for that horse to step through. But once they know they can step through it, it becomes really easy for them to go, they start seeking the relief.
by answering the question. And what that means to me is that they start to feel back to me and think their way through the problem to the solution. That's what I want. That's the relationship I want to have with my horses. Cause it's things are going to happen in the world where things are going to fall apart. I've never met a bomb-proof horse yet. I've seen some that are really tolerant of a lot of stuff, but when it comes down to it, that's what I want to know.
something goes haywire, where you feel back to me, think you work with me and think you're wasting this problem and solution. Is it fair to say relief would be the whole horse, the mind, the life, the spirit and the body has, and hormonally the horse has come down and then that process of thinking and mindfulness comes through. So relief is a big thing because it's a physiological change, but then the horse has this understanding.
And that's, and then, and then they've really learned and they, so relief is a, is a great word releases to me. So momentary and little, but relief is a big, the whole horse. Well, and then the horse knows that there's that place at the end where they can come up with the answer. Right. And that's huge. Cause if you, if you just think that, you know, the pressure went away, but you don't actually know the next time it's, it's coming and when it's coming and
You're not sure what the answer is going to be on the end of that. It's very difficult for a horse to process and go through that. Right. And a lot of people don't let the horse fully come back. Right. And so maybe they release and then they get back to work and the horse is just in the present. So they missed what just happened, but a relief is time. So that's, I really appreciate your language.
and explaining, you know, these, these concepts. I really like listening to you speak. Well, and where I share this, every time I do a clinic, you know, the horse will do something right. And I'll say, now here's where I want you to pause and allow the horse time to process what they just did. Come up with an answer and you know, always get the skeptical ones. And sometimes the trainers are the hardest to convince because
You know, we have a certain amount of time to get something done. so we feel like we've got to be busy in there because we're busy. We're doing something. And the analogy I use is I say, don't know, you if you ever underestimate the value of where a horse finds your lead. I said, just watch somebody in the reading. The box, the horse into a corner and horse will come up off the ground and start to rare. And then pretty quick they dropped the reins and go, boy, I don't know if I like that.
And then pretty quick, they go down the arena a little bit farther and they box him in again pretty quick. Horse put a little more power to it and he go, Ooh, I don't know if I like that. And then the next thing you know, they box him in one more time. And next thing you know, the horse is up there looking and inspecting the light bulbs in the ceiling and the rider gets unnerved and the horse comes down, they jump off and they walk him back to stall and he sits on that for 24 hours. And then you see him, they come out the next day and
They don't have any real estate. move about three feet horse goes up in the air. Well, that horse learned how to rare for a lifetime in about 10 minutes. So my point to people is, is if you can start offering relief to the horse when he does that, that's how quickly you can install that into the behavior that you don't want into a horse. But think about if you started coming at it from, if they
even get close to answering the question and doing what I need them to do. If I offer them a pause and allow them a minute to process it. And then I go on and do check in with it again. And it's a little bit, they're a little more willing, give them a pause. And then maybe they'll go do something else for a little bit and check in with a couple other things and then come back. And then all of sudden, 10 minutes later, the horse is doing it better than if I'd been working on it for a month. And that's the thing I really...
attempt to install in instill in people's mind is, is, know, when you're doing these performance moves, it doesn't have to be perfect, but what we need to do is acknowledge that they're on the right track and give the worst time to process it and allow it to start to sink in. And through my experimentation with this, I found that a lot of times in the matter of the same ride from where we started to the end.
horses made significant improvements. if you do take that concept at the end of 30 days, for instance, a lot of those horses act like they've been doing it, you know, a year, but it wasn't because you're hammering it into them. wasn't because you were being busy. It was because you were offering them relief at the right time and the right moment. And so then pretty quick coming back to that little Mary's is that they go, this is what I'm supposed to do.
And I think, you know, and Tom were masterful at that. I'm just putting my interpretation and my vocabulary into the conversation there from my experience. But, know, ⁓ I saw Ray's horses do amazing things and somebody, heard him, somebody say, what's the oldest horse you ride? he says, well, most of them, oldest one's probably four. But, you know, when he'd come into a clinic, he'd have seven horses out there tied up. He was.
roping off of them or doing Napoleon Colts or doing a flag and Colts, whatever you need it to. And I watched him do a little demonstration one day about basically bridling his horse up and a snaffle bit. The horse was soft and round and doing what everybody, you know, aspires to do with years of the training and the horse. Somebody says, well, how many rides that horse got on? He says, oh, maybe 30. So the reason why I bring that up is.
Coming back to my statement earlier, the horse is ready a lot sooner than we are. And if we can offer them the right information with good timing, it doesn't need to take years and months of pounding things out. needs to be, for me, it's all, if I'm going to work harder, I need to work the muscle between my ears harder because there's a slight quit to the dressage horse. need a... ⁓
a certain amount of athletic ability. So you need a certain amount of conditioning just like any other, but a lot of it's the mental. To me, the mental thought process, the mental conditioning is far more important than physical because I can always bring physical up to speed. you know, how I, the analogy I use with that is, that we all think, you know, I could run a marathon if I wanted to. And we can think about that mentally, maybe we're there.
But then we go to run the marathon and we haven't done any physical work. And then we start to mend the sofa, which was physically suffering and we mentally start to suffer, you know, and then there's these super athletes that just physically are there, but they're making it a lot harder on themselves because they're not thoughtfully doing it. There's powering through it. And this comes back to the equilibrium is for me, the equilibrium of the mind and the body is, is that they
I like teeter totter. needs to work like this, depending on what we need out of our horses. We need out of ourselves. We have to do the mental work and we have to do the physical work that's appropriate for what it is that we're up to. Yeah. Very good. Great. Great stuff. Good wisdom coming from, from you. That's well said. And as far as the performance stuff, tell people you can only go as fast as you can make sense out of it. So if you, if you've gone above your pay grade.
And the way to start falling off, you have to back up and find the edge of where the wheels fall off. Yeah. Yup. Yeah. Don't go over the edge. don't want to always ride to it, but sometimes that happens, but don't go over. And that's a line that you're only going to get through doing experience and observing. I would watch some of those horsemen and yeah, they...
They knew just when, you know, that horse's life would come up and they could, they knew they would feel the horse thinking. And a lot of people, they look at me funny and I'm like, you've got to feel horse think. But that's what they did. So they were releasing the thought and then the movement comes. But if people release some movement, they're too late. Well, that's something that I heard Tom say, he most people release when the action happens. But if you can release it in the thought, that's even more powerful.
And sometimes it's just feeling of the thought is a shift away, a shifting attention, direction of attention. But, ⁓ that comes when I'm teaching people or that, I'm, always talk to them about there's what happens before the what happens and they go, what? I'm like, well, you think of it like a car wreck on the highway. You're going down the road and you see the first pain mark and flare. And then you see the second one and they know, you know, you can get about six marks down the road and you see this.
crash. I said, well, what they're really figuring is, is what's the what happened before the what happened before the what happened? I let it be the reaction. So first mark that you encountered is the first what happened. And then it goes to the second what happened. And maybe in the first or second, or even the third, what happened, you could have recovered. But when you started getting into the four, six, then you can't recover. So
And if for whatever reason that seems to connect with people, but, you know, if they can start to figure out what's the, what happened before the what happened. And that applies to the things that work as well. Most people tend to focus and expand on what's not working. And what I find is more valuable for me is, is that work what happened just before that work or, know, when they're, they're going, well, my horse is bracing in my hands and hard and I'm going.
Well, that's where your focus is. You're going to expand what you're focusing on. So you're going to create hardness. said, how, but what I want you to do is sound off from the horse softens like now, now and get it. Start to shift to focus on what the horse is offering. And pretty quick. What they were experiencing as far as the feeling hand changes because they've shifted from my horse's hard and heavy to two. I'm going to focus on when they stop.
For me, it's more important to know what's the what happens for what I wanted, because that's where I want to work and how I want to improve my timing. I'm more interested in that on that side of the conversation. That's the hard thing about people starting out with horses is knowing what happens before what happens happens. They don't have that experience behind them.
And that's where watching like your videos on the Gazette and watching videos, you can start to see, you know, other people's interactions between themselves and a horse and start to develop that side of your mind where you're making observations and you're seeing what's happening with the horse. Now there's still a lot of other pieces that come into play, like your feel and your timing and all of that and getting the coordination and everything just so, but if you can work on all the little pieces individual one another and then
bring it together, that makes it so much easier. Yeah, and the mind doesn't know the difference between thinking and visualizing an act or an action and actually doing the action. Now the body is a different thing. The body, more movement, muscle memory, the body has to be, we have to do work to do that. Right. But at least you have a vision of what something should look like. Because without a vision,
Where are you? I'm going to add to what you just said here, because I'm a voracious reader and a voracious learner. There's so many brain scientists out there. There's a doctor Andrew Heberle. He talks a lot about this stuff, but they've done some experiments where they put electrodes on people's head and they see themselves doing a specific exercise, isolation exercise.
What they know is the brain doesn't distinguish between the actual exercise and the imagine exercise. But through the course of the study, if it's consistent, the body will start changing tone. that is cool. I, there's, there's a study on biceps and them doing curls. And I think over six weeks, there was like a 13 % and don't quote me, but like a 13 % muscle gain.
if they were visualizing it without moving and thinking, you know, harder, stronger, more, you know, and really like, you know, not just like, you know, I'm thinking about biceps, but they're really into, they were actually increasing muscle, which is just fascinating, isn't it? Well, that just goes to power. It just goes to the power of our thoughts, direct our attention.
Fortunately, you know, this is the I call the infomercial mentality. People go like anybody that watches an infomercial on real and I most of them can say, you know, I'm probably not going to lose 40 pounds in 30 days. But for whatever reason, they get hooked and they buy the product because it's the promise that they might transform.
You know, it always ends up, you know, it's a billion dollar a year industry and always ends up in the same spot. doesn't ever go anywhere other than you're spending lots of money because they're looking for a way to circle around the actual medical physical work that it takes to have the body do what you want. And I think the biggest thing that coming back to what you said is it's a process of just
taking a bite each day instead of trying to the whole thing at once. You know, and I feel like that that happens a lot with horsemanship stuff out there is, is, ⁓ you know, I watched the video or whatever and they made it look so easy. You know, I'm going to be in the next 30 days. My horse is going to be spectacular. then it, it
doesn't work for them, but the biggest thing that they don't realize is, is it's the lack of consistency is why they're not progressing forward. It's a lack of consistent thinking. It's a lack of consistent effort. It's being unrealistic as to how many jobs they want their worst to be an expert at. I was in a clinic in Wyoming and I asked, you know, what do you want with your abortion? She spent 45 minutes telling me what she didn't want.
And then I says, okay, now the word, what you want. And she wanted basically a elite performer as a trail horse jumper horse cow horse. I'm like, well possible that, you know, this is a free agent. Is it possible that you're not, you're setting your horse up to fail because he can be a versatile horse and he can do all those things reasonable for who he is. But if you want it to be.
an elite athlete. You're not being fair to your horse." And she looked at me and she's point taken. And so then it was just getting back to, okay, you know, what, what is this horse's job description? And does he have too many hats to wear? And that's where I find that a lot of unnecessary stuff happened as well. Cause there's too many, one that's ⁓ each day is a new cook.
Well, this didn't work out so well today. So I'm going go over here today. And then all this didn't work out. And then I'm going to go over here and they just keep changing, changing the conversation. And so then what happens is in the end is that it ended up being not being any good at any of those things because they're always, I call it, they're like a butterfly. They land here and then they land there. Instead of just going, okay, this is where we're at. This is what we're going to move forward from one day to the next.
in small, in small increments. You know, I find that when people can do that for themselves, then they can do that for their horse. And then all of a sudden you've got horse and riders transforming right in front of your eyes. And I think that's the value of what you guys are promoting with the fair is you're promoting good horsemanship. You're promoting a broad perspective, a lot of different viewpoints on people's concepts of horsemanship and also
things like this are just invaluable because you never know who you're going to touch or why you touch. And what I do know for myself is, is there's who I think I'm going to touch and then there's who I actually touch and it's never who I think it is. Well, thank you. Well, we sure appreciate you being part of the fair and appreciate you taking the time to do the interview here and take, take a little visit with us here today. We, it's fun for us to get to do this because it's not often you get to.
sit down with somebody like yourself and just have a casual conversation about, about these things. And it's easy to get stagnant in our thoughts and our, even our, the way we work with horses. so sharing you speak really gets me thinking again. And I really appreciate that. thank you. Well, and the good part for me too, is it gets me to think about, you know, what I'm saying gets me to evaluate my delivery because
I think if your goal is to be a good horseman, a good teacher, you're always looking at your delivery and going, well, if it took me 20 words to get the point across, what would it take to get 15 or what would it take to get 10? And so it's always this process of just eliminating unnecessary stuff to deliver the message more accurately. So these are always opportunities for me to learn and grow as well.
Thank you guys for what you're up to and how you're promoting things in the worst world. And it's been nice to visit with you. Yeah. And would you like to tell people, ⁓ maybe just repeat the title of your book and if, if there's like books or if there's a website you want people to go to to find more information about you. Well, I've got two of them here. So the first one was the drink water. You see that? Okay. Yep. Yep.
Second one that just came out is riding in the sweet light. cool. Cool. You can get both of those through the Eclectic Horseman. The horseman's use that or we're on Amazon as well. Anyway, there are and the fascinating thing about the book to side note on that is how people are choosing to use those are fascinating. I've got a trainer in Florida that uses it as a meditation. So when she gets up in the morning, she
flips the page open and that sets the concept for the day. To explore what that particular quote meant for her. so it's always fascinating for me to hear the feedback on that. So I feel very privileged to be able to contribute that to people.
And you can also get them through sagecreekquestion.com and my clinic schedule is on sagecreekquestion.com as well. And if any of you watching the video, if you also go to his biography page on the website, or if you're watching one of his, his videos during the fair, just scroll down to the bottom and we've got some links down there where you can click on through and...
and learn more about Jim as well. go to his website and whatnot. So, well, thank you, Jim. We sure appreciate all your time today. well, let's do it again sometime soon. That'd be great. You take care.
