Paula Curtis (00:42)
Today we're honored to welcome two extraordinary horsewomen whose work has transformed the way we connect with our horses and with animals of all kinds. Linda Tellington Jones is an internationally acclaimed horsewoman, educator, and visionary, best known as the founder of the Tellington T-Touch method. For more than five decades, Linda has pioneered a heart-based approach that blends compassion, science, and practical technique, empowering riders, trainers, and veterinarians, and animal lovers around the world.
Her influence extends across 40 plus countries with thousands of practitioners, nearly 1 million books sold, and a legacy that continues to inspire Olympic athletes, rescue organizations, and everyday horse lovers alike. Alongside her, we're thrilled to welcome her sister, Robin Hood, a senior instructor who has been deeply involved with the development of the Tellington Method since the early 1980s. Robin has taught T-Touch full-time across North America, Europe, Australia,
New Zealand, South Africa, and Russia. She's also been a driving force in expanding the T-Touch to dogs, cats, and other animals, and has authored several companion guides, including the popular All Wrapped Up series. Together, Linda and Robin bring a profound legacy of innovation, compassion, and hands-on knowledge, reminding us what's possible when training is rooted in empathy, cooperation, and respect.
Please join me in welcoming Linda Tellington-Jones and Robin Hood. Welcome Robin and Linda. It's so great to have you here today. And we're so excited to hear about the history of the Tellington-Jones method and the 50 years that you've had influencing the horse industry. And like we talked about just before we started here, there is so much
that is starting to evolve in the industry big time, that really the foundation started way back 50 years ago when you came up with this method and saw some huge results. And I would love to dive into how did this all start? How did this all begin? Well, actually, I think one of the things that I want Robin to jump in, 50 years is only the part
where we started talking about working horses from the ground. Before that, we were well known in the horse world with articles in Western, monthly articles in Western Horsemen and several other, many other magazines, but it wasn't the Tellington Method. And what changed 50 years ago is the level of awareness when we actually started working horses from the ground. You know, found out what you could do to connect with a relationship that was a safe way. And the working from the ground actually
started when I was teaching a workshop in Germany in, I think it was 1976, was, uh, what, 70, 77, because I introduced trail horse competition to Equitana in Germany. The Germans had never seen it before. And I was asked to do a workshop at a big quarter horse breeding place. And so people were doing trail horse stuff. And one woman came with her Icelandic horse, who was a flat out runaway and not, couldn't be trusted. I said,
can't have you on a horse that is going to bolt with you. So I had to work from the ground and do all the stuff we were doing on your saddle from the ground. And at the end of the weekend thing, she went home and her horse had a cough. So she had to stay on the ground for about another month. And she wrote to me and said, when she got on her horse, she no longer had a runaway. I mean, it was so interesting. That was the start for me of working the value of working on the ground.
And it's so interesting. That's what influenced me in 1978 or 79, I think, to do this 20 horse study where Ursula Berlantz, who was like considered the pope of the German platter horse world, said, Linda, you have to develop a method because we've been preaching this for years through my school, a nine month residential school, but it was never, didn't have the tea touch and it didn't have the groundwork that we had. And that's all.
If you talk about groundwork, it's about this more mindful movements, because people lunged horses before and they did, you know, there were different things that people did, but this is, you know, mindfully taking horses step by step through a variety of elements to help enhance their learning. And Paula, what was so funny, because when we approached Eccles with this, and I think it was, what was it, here was that,
Well, articles that Bobby wrote were, think, and came out in 1983, the series of three. When I wrote to her and said we had this new way of working with horses, she said, and we have the quote, nothing can ever be learned from the ground. It's all been done. You can learn from horses, that's it. And then of course, EQUUS came out with this huge, really wonderful, I think it was the 20 page introduction of the work, because they realized what you can introduce from the ground. was so different. And that's the way we do it.
And that's a difference. I just did a workshop with Frederique Pignon and Magalie Delgado in March. And one of the horses, we took like four horses, Frederique worked with them and I worked with them over the weekend. And the first horse that came in was a three-year-old, very nice young woman leading this horse. And she said, this horse is completely uncontrollable. I can't turn her out on the pasture because she'd just go crazy.
And she doesn't know where she is and she can't be trusted. And this is a very nice young woman who led, so she led in. had like a hundred people there around the, it was a round pen, but I made it into a noble pen because I don't believe in round pens. And she came in and this horse's head is up, the whites of the eye are showing and she's looking at these horses out on the posture, like way down the couple of hundred meters away and really ready to bolt. And she said, see, this is what she did.
The thing is, this young woman was leading her with the rope about, I don't know, at least three meters long, fully loose behind her. She couldn't see what the horse was doing. And so I just took her and all we did was bring her into the labyrinth and just come up and work a little bit on her, just say hello, and just start leading her quietly where she could see me. And I had a way of influencing that horse because when that horse was walking behind you,
and has no connection to you and doesn't know what to do and all these people are around and all these horses are over there. We can't influence them. And I just gave her confidence. Wait a minute. Just, that's what we need. Just bring your head a little because when the head is up in the air and the whites of the eyes are showing, that hunk isn't in the water. And she changed. mean, literally within one hour, the horse was different. Just quietly, not running around, not my ear tired, but just bring her in stopping, just putting hands on her during these few...
little work on her body and it was a different scene. Making that, getting the human to be aware of the horse and to actually observe what the horse is thinking and feeling. Yeah, exactly. Making a connection. Making a connection. What a beautiful thing. That simple connection is what everything else is then based upon. Yeah, is. It's so exciting. I love what you're doing. Bringing many people together is a great idea. We just, we had
seen so many people that just aren't aware of their own selves. They're not even aware of themselves, let alone with horses. And we just, realized that it starts from within oneself and that if they can, have themselves figured out and, and if they can emotionally and mentally and physically, and if we can be kind of running opportune in all those areas, it's going to really help our horsemanship a great deal. But getting people to do that is really hard. so.
This was a way for us to try to work on that aspect. I love it. And it's funny because Robin asked me a question two days ago when we started filming and she said something like, something like, what started you going in this direction? Like what was behind all this? And one of the things that came to me and it falls down to what we're talking about here, it was a weekend workshop at Stanford University. And I think it was 1979.
And it was a workshop in what used to be called IFTTT, know, Earhart Seminarist Training. And I had had a friend who had gone to one of these and I decided it would be such a change in turn. I decided to sign up and there were like 500 people in this room. And the thing that was so interesting is that we went through a process. You need to see this thing like 25 people at a time up on the stage. They sing 25 every week.
And you just had to look that person in the eye. And that was easy for me because I'd learned to do that. It doesn't mean that I saw them. That is a really different thing. And so a couple of people fainted on the stage. And then the next thing they did was a Stan Grof exercise where everybody lies down on the floor and you're supposed to think of something that makes you afraid and you just cry out, know, do all this emoting stuff. And everybody's cheering on and I'm thinking, I'm not afraid of anything.
We were a funny thing, right? And so I go out of there. And what's important about this is that three days before that at the Stanford riding and reading arena, I'd been giving a private lesson and dressage and way down at the other end of the arena, the huge arena was another woman I'd known for years before I'd gone to Europe. And she used to come to my horse shows and I thought, well, what a stick up person. didn't say anything to me. So I do this process like three days later in, in, at Stanford.
And I'm thinking, wait a minute, when everybody's like carrying on theoretically thinking about what scares them and theoretically nothing scares me, I realize everything scares me. But actually it's not quite true. What I thought is, wait a minute, why didn't I go and talk to that woman at the other end of the arena? And three days later, this is how intuition brings it about, you know, it's our angels setting things up for learning.
So I'm back in the same arena giving a lesson to the same person and this other person's down at the other end. So I go marching down there and say, hi, it's so nice to see you. And she says, Linda, I thought you didn't recognize me. And I thought in that moment, it changed my life because I started going up to people and greeting them because I realized we're all afraid. You know, this thing, as Robin said before, talking about afraid of failure, afraid of not being seen. She thought I wouldn't know her, right?
And I thought she was stuck up. mean, talk about making judgments. That simple shift allows us to have so much more empathy, not only for other people, but for our horses as well. Exactly. It's the empathy thing. It's the understanding thing. Well, and you know, I believe that horses and dogs, have a higher level of expectation of behavior than we do for any other species. We have it, it's a higher level than for ourselves. You know, we're allowed to
make mistakes or feel differently one day versus the next. But the horse is supposed to know if they've done it once or twice, they should know how to do it. And I think that's, it's so unfair to horses and so bizarre because there is just such a high level of this, you know, of expectation. If they don't do it, they must be getting one over on us. So, you know, there's all these things that it's because we take so many things personally. And again, I think it's that whole thing of fear.
I mean, we've certainly all been there fear of looking stupid, fear that people don't, we don't know enough for that what we're doing doesn't work. I think everyone goes through that. agree. So your sisters and growing up, how did you each help and influence one another? Because I have a sister too, and I know it goes both, both ways back and forth. How did you, you each grow together doing your work with, with horses and actually with, I mean,
across many animals. if I can start with that. So I'm the second youngest and Linda's the oldest of six. Linda left home when I was three. And so I didn't see her for some years. And then when I was nine, I started going down to take part in like to work with her in the summers and go to the summer camps and so on. And so that's kind of had our separate lives until I was thinking about this when I came to Nasa Miento in 19...
must have been 82. was just, I was pregnant with my daughter and I started to see these things that Linda was doing. I guess I'd seen them at Equitana first. And I was working in a different way with horses, not a different way, with Icelandic actually at that point. And so I got really interested in what she was doing. And Linda had always done like things that were different. And you know how that is as you go along in your family.
could see these things that were sort of unusual. And so I decided that I really wanted to learn more about this. so I had an opportunity. I brought Linda up to Edmonton and did some workshops there and then, you know, followed her and carried on. started writing the newsletter and just kind of carried on on from there. It's interesting. There's people in this world that, that just, think differently and they, and that's like great. We need people like that, but people that just think so.
differently, but then they totally turn something around like for the horse or like for an industry or something like that. So at the time when you both were kind of early on, you know, with, with some of your practices, what were like the responses and the reactions of all the people around you, like in the competition world and, and, and also in just at like the barns you were at, what did people think about what you were doing? And this is, I mean, I mean, more early, early on.
Were you always well received? you thought of as different? Well, I mean, I'm thinking and let Robin jump into this, but for me, you see, I had the advantage of marrying a man who was 20 years older than I, and I would never, I wouldn't be here today if that hadn't been so, because he was brilliant and an engineer and an artist. mean, a musician at the same time. And
Well, and a horseman. mean, he was in the graduate from the last cavalry class at Norwich University, officers training the year I was born. And you're right, Robin, I forgot about that. That's the important part. Yeah. And so he had, I was, we were teaching at Chadwick school and we had a part, β man who was one of my, his daughter was one of my students that he wanted to be in the horse business. Wanted to use his money to
be in the racehorse business. So we did a partnership and wound up managing a big ranch for thoroughbreds. And then we went, my husband was Windhorse Dillington, and he thought, is definitely not what we're supposed to be doing. Let's just start a research farm where we're looking at, it was a time when horses were emerging as backyard horses, but there was no literature at the time.
All the literature was government about working with workhorses and went as a wonderful writer. And we started experimenting at the research farm with different ways of feeding and keeping horses. And that was, we had a newsletter called the research farm newsletter in 63 or four. We still have people who are members of that.
And it went to 20 countries at the time. And we had people, one vet who visited us from Korea and wanted to know what we were doing. I don't know how this got around the world, but it was thanks to WIMD that I had this, you know, such a, such a, I would never have had that. And it was really interesting. We started a school. It was a nine month residential school for, for writing instructors and trainers. And that's where I came to that one summer to that. And it was an incredible program.
And I had the good fortune to have to ride to school for the first six years of my life in rural Canada. bet you don't know anybody else who had moved to a person's school. And after school, we had moved to a place when I was nine, where there was a riding school like a mile and a half from our farm. So I would ride to school in one direction, ride toward home, and then ride to the riding school like every day. And one day, well, first of all,
When we first went there, I wanted to have riding lessons and my dad said, okay, you can have lessons if you can exchange it for work. So I walked in and talked to Mrs. Metherall and because I'd written the school at that point for three years, she had all these young horses, ponies. And so she put me on ponies first. And then I was the kid, you all, who got to be put on her horses after she bucked them out on the round pen. And I say that I'm shorter than my sister because I've been dumped on my head so many times. And when I was riding home,
I was 12 at that point, I'd been there doing it three years. And an old man walked out with a book in his hand, hooked up with a cane. And he had to me this book and he could see from his back porch, the round pin where my, where the horses were bucked out. And he said, he thought I should have this book. I took it home and read it. And my parents were boarding at a farm, three year old, a third-bread mare, blowing her friend to bars. And she wasn't started. And I just started her from the book and it was written by.
I'm a real officer on how you start young horses without ever bucking by ground driving in first. And I went through all this and drove this near and never any trauma or any bucking. And that's how over all the years through our school, what we taught, and we brought so many things into it. As we found out, when you have people who don't know horses that well, you can actually teach them with this method, how to start a young horse without ever having this fear of running or bucking or reacting.
So anyway, so, can I fast forward this back to Jack's question about how people sort of saw it? And I guess I think that it's important the background because Linda was confident and experienced enough with what she was doing with horses. It wasn't that, I mean, she could handle a horse. It wasn't an issue. She's seen, you know, been involved with lots of well-known people. And so.
A lot of horses that first came on the workshops and they were big weekend workshops, they had a problem because at that time people didn't expose their problem horses in general to people. Well, there wasn't a venue for it. People didn't do these like even weekend clinics. And so these horses would come with an issue and there would be a significant change. so of course there were people who came.
that were skeptical because I actually think it's good to be skeptical and really question what people do. I question what I do. I question what Linda does because I think that's important in terms of our learning. But they could see the proof was in the response and then people would go home and see the change in their horses. And I remember Linda did a big workshop. I don't even remember where it was Linda, but there was a guy who he wrote a letter to Linda after and he said, you know, I didn't, I had this really difficult horse and I didn't bring it.
because I didn't want to make you look bad. And it was a horse who they had to do, they had to do a scotch hobble to trim his feet. had to, they never came to be caught. They'd chase him around to catch him. they had rope her to catch her. Sorry? They had to rope her to catch her. okay. So I went home and I roped her to catch her. I brought her in and I started doing these little circles on her, you know, her body. didn't know what I was doing. Next day I went out.
The horse was waiting for me at the gate. We brought her in to do her feet and we didn't have to do a, use a sideline to hold her foot up. We didn't have to do that. So he said, you know, I, I realized that there is something to this method. And the beauty of it was that he could go and watch something and simply change something that he did, which changed the horse. And I think that a huge part of the philosophy of this work is there are really important steps and tools. If you simply.
change something that you're doing, it can make a huge difference in the response of your horse. Well, the fun thing about that workshop, that was in a big ranch, horse ranch out in New Mexico. And I'm amazed that they have me there because they were mostly, you know, convoys and Western people. And I wasn't known for that, but I had certainly done a lot with Western horses. And that was one of the guys who was there and my host who
owned the ranch and asked this guy, why didn't you bring this horse? Cause he was telling me it was really hard to catch. So that's how it happened. It was really cool. that's that Paul and this can happen in that. And actually what he did, Robin, he really started with the ears. Cause I was saying, if you just can bring that horse, you can touch the ears like this and do a little bit. And he was waiting and actually what he said, he had to slam the gate on the horse to keep them from following him.
I remember, my first family horse, we were doing a lot of the T touch, at least we thought we were doing it the right way anyway. But we were doing a lot with our first horse. But I remember even like colicking and working like with the ears and like how relaxed they, and I still use that technique to this day to get a horse to relax. And at the time when I read the book, you know, I was a teenager and I had been reading about like the
swirls in the horse and like personality, you know, sort of temperament predictions that we might make based on some of those things. And at the time I was like, this can't be, you know, how could, how could a swirl or a white hair in this place have anything to do with the horses, you know, and then years went by and I start
seeing horses and observing more and more and becoming more aware. I realized, I'm like, that, that book was right in so many areas. I was wrong, but how interesting. And so now tell me a little bit more about that. Like when you, when you wrote about like all the different swirls and white marks and things like that, and this is based off of experience, but did you have other like mentors and people that helped kind of helped you get there as well? Absolutely. Of course. I mean, things come out at so-called out of the blue, out of the quantum field.
But in this case, in the swirls, my grandfather talked about swirls on horses and he learned from gypsies. Because when he trained race horses in Moscow, he went there as a jockey and then wound up training race horses and won the prestigious Tsar Nicholas II Award for the most winners in the season. He said it was because of his gypsies, his grooms, and they, you know, went over the whole horse, the body.
but they also talked about these different swirls. And then I discovered this little book when I was 10 years old, maybe. I wonder if any of you people ever remember this. There was, what the heck was his name? Professor Berry. Thank you, Robin. Professor James Berry. And he put out this this book, and you could get for a hundred dollars, you could get all of this information, but I didn't have a hundred dollars when I was in at the time. And so I didn't answer back. And then I kept getting these news.
Well, for $10 a month. And finally, for, I don't know, a dream, I got this little book that showed three different things. If you look at a horse's face and he has a dish face and a bulge and the Roman head, Roman head, that's going to be a bucker and, three or four things that he said about these horses. So I remember taking the book out to the pasture and we, were boarding several horses at the time and looking.
And then I just started paying attention to it. And then when I was doing the field of rice training in San Francisco in 75, somebody can't remember his name anywhere, but he had developed a system for humans looking at the shape of the eyes and the physiognomy. She were at my sister. Yes. He was really interested that I had done that with horses. Linda, can I just stop you for one second? Because then in the sixties, that's when went, when you did the survey.
of 3000 horses of your members and asking them about the shape of the head and the nostrils and the ears. And that's when my understanding was is that from that, you also really expanded that and the swirls. Yeah. And we expanded a lot. Yeah. So it was really getting their feedback from that, that, β that created it. And, know, it's interesting the thing about swirls, because as Linda said,
in her books, the Bedouins paid a lot of attention. They would buy and sell horses, buy body swirls. And in Iceland, they also have beliefs of certain swirls that, you know, a certain swirl would make the horse, they would have a tendency to be a good swimmer. And for many years in Iceland, they had, they called the horses the bridges of Iceland. And so they had to swim them across these glacial rivers. And some horses could pick this path that meant that they would go across it. So
It's just interesting how so many different cultures have, you know, look at swirls and, you know, have different beliefs and the tendencies that they can, they can indicate. You know, it's really interesting in that book, The Drinkers of the Wind, they talk about this long swirl. And when I was, I was in Jordan in the nineties and I talked to some of the horse people there and they said that they had this, with this long swirl was a sign of a, they call it a ripped shirt.
Because if you had a horse like that, you'd rip your shirt off, you'd be so frustrated with them. That is interesting. I mean, there's some older, even like country music songs where they talk about conformational features of a horse and like how that horse might buck, like ears that touch at the tip and a dish nose. And there's a lot of physical conformational features that we know apply to horses. But then, when you get into like, you know, these things that we're talking about, it really is pretty wild. And I've seen some
some swirls definitely hold true. So that is super cool. And the thing that I love about it, if you have enough patience, then some of those horses you can turn around. it's a show. And it also depends on other characteristics. That's where, like when you're talking about the shape of the ears and, you know, whether they're touching or whether they're straight up and down or lop-eared and so on. So it is a combination of things for sure that can give them the tendencies.
But I was thinking, Jack, about you reading, you know, seeing it in a book. And you know, the TV show Heartland was actually based on the books that were written by a woman who the main start of it was about T-Touch. And β when they first started producing it, they called me and they asked me if I could make a certificate because the premise was in the books is that the mother of the daughter that
whatever the star is of it, was a vet and she was also a T-Touch practitioner. So I made this certificate that would go in the office on the set to show it. And so we'd have all these kids come up to us at some of the trade shows and ask us if they were doing the circles right. And so it was really fun to see that. So how did you discover the different patterns and movements to use with the horses, like in the groundwork or with the touches?
How did you discover and then I'm sure they evolved and you refined them based on what you were seeing, but how did that whole process work? You mean of the different circles and the different parts of the hands you're talking about? Yeah. How did you get the idea? Like I remember after in the Feldenkrais training, you went out with Roger and you decided to start doing some groundwork with the horses and to see what would happen. Could you help them learn how to learn?
Well, the reason we say 1975 was the beginning. It's when I started the Feldenkrais training. And then the second day of that training, Dr. Moshe Feldenkrais made a statement that made me prick up my ears. And it's a statement that a human could learn in one experience using gentle, non-habitual movements that activated new neural pathways to the brain thereby giving more brain cells for learning, more potential for learning. And I remember lying on the floor and my ears like,
for picking you up like a horse and thinking, if that is true for a horse, I mean, a human, could it be true for a horse? And what went through my mind is all the times I'd lunched a horse for a couple of weeks at the walk and drive, and it was clear that they already knew it. But we believed in those days that horses learn, are long time learners, you have to keep repeating over and over to do it. so I, later in that week, I went out and I on a, I had a horse that had
belonged to a person I just met and brought this horse down from Montana. And she had, I was looking for something, habit that a horse had that maybe we could influence in one experience. So he chased this horse around and caught her up because they always had to chase her to catch her to bring her into feed at night and be overnight. Didn't make sense, right? And then we caught her up and I'm standing there and I'm thinking, now you have to understand, I'd already been working on horses for years on their bodies because I'd been a
judge at the North American Trail Ride Conference events. And so we were always going over the horse. And we'd already in the book, thanks to the influence of my grandfather, this book shown how to do leg circles and different stuff with horses, but never with the intention of activating new neural pathways to the brain that would actually help a horse learn. And it's the intention that I just did the same things, but with him.
Could this activate, could this make this horse give this horse more potential for learning? And so I just kind of did many of the things that we'd been doing, but with a total different intention. And I, you know, I worked maybe 20 minutes and people watching thought I'd hypnotized the horse. I was just freaking gently moving the body and I didn't think anything about it. But the next morning, the guy who owned this horse called me and said, Linda, I was really surprised when I turned the horse out after.
And when I went to catch her, she was at the gate. And when I took her in the stall and instead of diving for the feed, she just kind of stood there next to me thought, that's really interesting. That certainly changed the behavior. And so we began and during the summer, these were like four summers for 12 week horses that I gave at the Humanistic Psychology Institute with Michelle Goldwyn-Harts. And so during the summer after class, because we finished at four, we'd go out and we'd find horses in these areas that
you know, belong to friends that I know, because that's when I had a stable bear before I went to Europe. And so one of these horses that was so interesting was a horse that belonged to a polvo player, a very competent horseman. And they had this older, like teenage horse that they never could use in the school as a jumper for, you know, kids to learn on. And because they couldn't get this horse to step over a pole, even if you drew a line in the sand, she wouldn't step over it.
So I'm out there with Roger, my partner at the time, and he's at the head of the horse and there are bunch of jump poles standing around the arena. And he was standing in front of one of them and I was back working on the tail. And as I did something in the tail, because I was looking for non-hibitational ways of moving the body. And suddenly, as I just did this little pole on the tail, the horse dropped the head right in front of this pole. I said, Roger, see if you can walk over this. And the horse just walked over it. As soon as it dropped the head.
It changed. And that's one of the ways that we discovered. Wait a minute. This is so interesting. The I got a head has a lot to do with it, but that's a long story. That came years later when I really got what was really happening. can I just jump in Robin? you see, well, no, what I was going to say, the piece that you missed is that the book she was talking about before was a book in 1963, a booklet called physical therapy for the athletic horse.
And that's the book that she's talking about with the more massage-like movements. You know, this concept of doing body work on horses was not unknown to you. It was just, that's what you were talking about when you were going over the horses too with the checking them out. was a book that we produced based on my grandfather's work. How neat. And not only have you applied it to horses, but you have applied it to many different species and
Robin, I'd love if you would talk about that a little bit and talk about how that kind of evolution started happening, moving from, you know, the Feldenkrais work with people, now we're applying it to horses, and now we're starting to say, hey, look, this probably works for all of us with nervous systems. Exactly. Well, I mean, after the, from, this is what I remember, Linda, is that after we'd been doing the work with the horses and then
Somebody asked Linda to work with their dog, a German shepherd, like an adolescent that had been chewing up everything. And so Linda went there and because we know that the mouth is connected to the limbic system and really attached to emotions and so on. my recollection is that she went and she did touches or, you know, did touch all around the mouth and inside the mouth. And what she said to me was I did this for like 20 minutes, but he kept gnawing on my hands. And so she thought, well, this doesn't work on dogs.
And then she went home and the next day or a couple of days later, the friend she was talking to it and they said, by the way, you know, since you did that work with my puppy, it hasn't showed anything that was inappropriate. But what she learned from that is you didn't have to do it for 20 minutes or until they stopped. But it was about giving that more awareness and the feeling that that might be totally my, my interpretation of the story. It's exactly what happened. Except that we didn't know.
I was totally intuitive. The reason I went for the mouth at that point, Robin, we had no idea that it the limbic system. Came later, because when you kept saying to me, how do you know that? And so just so you know with this dog, I mean, it was clear, if he's chewing on something, something's bothering him. That was question too, waiting at work, what can I do working on his gums, on his lips? That's where he's chewing, why not go there and see what's happening? I'm sure it wasn't 20 minutes, but it was a long time. And I thought it didn't help at all, because it didn't change it.
until the next day. And then it did start, we know now, mean, puppies have maybe teeth problems, it hurts. And just working on the gums, you know, that's all we had to do later. But the thing, this thing about the mouth, it was so interesting. You kept saying to me, how do you know that? I realized after years later, actually, the reason it was years later, because that had to be maybe, maybe in the second or third year of my Feldenkrais training as a graduate.
In the fifth year, we went back and had a session with an Israeli neurologist, and he was talking about when an infant has seen any abnormal movements around the mouth, it's something neurologic that's going on. And I took that back to Germany, and I was sent a horse for the reason that they said this horse is not friendly. Hard to get a bit in the mouth. It was a young horse.
and not very easy to catch, not friendly. And so I found when I worked around her mouth, she was really stiff and hard and resistant. I just, this was way before the circles came up. I was just gently working around her mouth and I found that when it softened and I could actually handle it in the mouth differently, the horse changed. And then we found that working in the mouth of a horse actually seemed to affect the behavior. But the truth for this,
Actually, for those who love, because I love to see validation, it's in the book Emotional Intelligence by Noleman. And in the second chapter of this book, he says that anything to do with taste and smell affects the limbic system. And that's when I started with consciousness then working in the mouth and recognizing we can really affect the behavior of a dog or a human because we can do the same thing if we're very gentle.
keychatches, one-quarter circles around the mount, and you can help to overcome fear. Well, and Linda, know, thinking of other animals you've worked with, the orangutan at the San Diego Zoo, Linda was asked to work with this baby orangutan that wasn't sucking well, probably sort of a failure to thrive. His mother rejected him.
And it would take him so long to take a bottle, only part of it and it would fall asleep. And so it was really a failure to thrive. And when Linda went in and just did this, you know, mindful, just gentle, just bringing awareness to the tongue around the lips and all of those things, he just would take a bottle down immediately. And I don't even remember what year that was, but it was a long time ago. So long time ago.
that was amazing. The thing was like when he'd be held for the bottle, he'd be arching his back. So I just took his little belly and very gently just, and always with this attitude, what can we do together? Like, know, doing something, but how can we just deal this together?
He softened his back. so when she picked him up to hold him instead of arching, he could actually round his back and suck the ball and empty the ball. It was a really big deal. That's super cool. that the whole idea of intention too, we should maybe talk about that a little bit because we talk about that in our horsemanship and in our training, we talk about that. We should convey a clear intent to our horse or that we should know, you know, have a clear goal, a clear. Well, and go to our horses with intention. Exactly. Like with gratitude or.
Whatever sort of things that we'd like to bring into that training session emotionally. Right. But then even taking it as far as like now you're working in the mouth, so now you need to be like, what kinds of things are you thinking in your mind? Because people don't always think about that. They think about what they're physically doing and they might be aware of how they're feeling, but what could somebody be thinking in their mind when they're working on a horse's trouble spot? Well, one of the things that I
only learned the last couple of years, which changes so much and I'm going to bring this in. Because it's this concept of intention. Intention has to do with what we're thinking, right? And one of the things that we talked about for years when we first started teaching this work is don't hold an intention because the intention was I'm going to fix this horse. That will not work when you have that. But the point is, how can we help? Can we find a way?
by doing one thing or another when one thing doesn't work instead of getting louder, harder, faster. What can we do to sit back and make this course interesting, curious, and make it okay? when I went through the Failed in Christ training, we were not allowed to use the word energy. This is 1975, you all. In San Francisco, everybody was throwing.
bad energy off everybody else. And Moshe Fyodorovitch as a PhD, there was no definition for energy. But with the quantum science concept that started in my awareness with the Dancing Wu Li masters from Gyaray Zhukov, the realization that everything is energy. And then what changed my realization for it is it's a book. Are you all acquainted with Greg Braden? Yeah.
Well, I love Greg. Yes. In his book, the spontaneous healing of beliefs, spontaneous. Yeah. God, this book is everywhere around me. Spontaneous healing of belief, think, was he talks about what energy is. And this completely changed my realization what our intent energy is. Every thought we have, every feeling, every emotion and every belief.
So if we go in and we believe that horse is being intentionally aggressive or, you know, what they say, making you look like a fool, taking advantage, all these things, all we have to do is just think, wait a minute, if we realize if we're believing this, it's going to affect that feeling that we have, which means that it's this ego against this egotistical feeling. And when we go in and we just think, wait a minute,
What can we do together to make you safe and make you understand what it is, help you understand what it is that we want from you? That's this concept of how can we make the horse interested or do something with the horse so they can be interested and curious? Because I think we lose a lot of that when we do too much with horses instead of just being with them. Can I just say something about intention and this can sometimes, sometimes people can be so intent on a goal.
And my intention when I'm working with the horse is to not have an attachment to the outcome. So I want to actually see what happens and what steps take. do, how do I have to make it smaller, easier? Where, when do I have to just stop and just, you know, when something isn't working, the best thing you can do is pause, pause, take a breath, exhale, and just, you know, just be there for a moment. So I think that it's hard because sometimes people have get so much of a
of a goal in mind. And when we start to maybe work with the horse, I remember I was at a gated horse show and there was a Peruvian stallion and he started refusing to go into the arena and he would just back himself up and just, and of course they were embarrassed and this is supposed to be a good breeding horse. And so they got more aggressive to get him to go in. But then they said to me,
could you look at this horse? Because I think there's something wrong. So I went in the stall and I ran my hands over his body as I would and I checked the tail and the neck and so on. And then I went into his mouth and I just went in to start to do some of the just touches around the mouth. it's a, we do it with mindfulness, not just playing or messing with the mouth. It's how does it feel? How can we, you know, slow it down? And I got him the bottom lip and he had an abscess on his right side.
on lower in the lower jaw. And so what I surmised was happening to this horse. So he's ridden in a Rubian bit with a curb chain and you put the bridle on from the left side and you do the curb chain up to the, you know, where you normally do. And that was pressure on this, this abscess. So of course he asked to go forward. He's trying to get away from the pressure by tightening his neck and moving his head back so he couldn't come forward. And as soon as that was.
dealt with. As soon as they got rid of the absence of force was 100 % okay. And so it is our belief that there is always a reason for the behavior. So behavior is a form of communication. And it's, it's not to say that we say, you can't do this because it's not about saying it's okay. It's just about understanding that when they're not complying with what we're asking them to do, look beyond that behavior and find out what's going on. Because honestly, I can tell you that
in my years of doing this, every time that I've maybe thought, and maybe this horse just doesn't want to cooperate, there has been such a good reason that they couldn't. It was embarrassing to me when I found out because it was just, I just have found that there is always some reason. And what an important message for people to hear because then we come into the situation instead of with the goal in mind.
We come into the situation with a curiosity about why the horse is showing up in the way that they're showing up. So then we can start to do our research, right? And like you're talking about, you're just, feeling around, you're doing some touches, you're watching the horse's response. And then from there, we're able to find the place where the horse needs help. And I mean, some people they're so...
goal-orientated in the moment of what they want their horse to do. Their horse could be trying so hard and that person is just thinking about what they want. And so their horse just, they, never mesh. They never, they never connect. They never mesh with, with that horse. And the whole time the human's thinking the horse isn't doing what they want them to do. And the whole time the horse is, is thinking the human's just isn't capable of bashing together.
we'll say, this is a goal I have, but maybe not today. And it just, it's going to take more time. And that was something that I couldn't do for, for years. I just wouldn't let myself do it. I always thought, well, I'm a trainer and I train and I've got this much time and this is how I need to do it. And I was stuck in that box. But I think what you're saying is so helpful to horses. Well, and it's like, make a plan for sure. And prepare to deviate. Cause I think a plan is always good.
but just be prepared. And I think what you're talking about is, it is that, it's not even that people are in a hurry, but I think people are, it's that fear of not being able to do it. Like you're a trainer, so you should be able to do it, right? And if you can't, then what's wrong with you? And then, you know, that's, we might think of ourselves as what's wrong with us that we can't, that this isn't working. Well said. And I think the neat part is, you talked about this earlier, I'm not exactly sure how you worded it, but.
maybe not being attached to outcome or that sort of thing. But then we open ourselves up to possibility. And that's where the really cool things happen. And you'll surprise yourself, your horse will surprise you or whatever animal you're working with, because now you're open to even more actually than what the initial outcome that you maybe were thinking of could have given you. it takes you in another path, right? Just takes you in a different path. you know,
Moshe Feldenkrais had some great sayings and one of my favorites is his intention to make the impossible possible, the possible easy, and the easy elegant. And what that means is, you know, the impossible. So you get one step toward the possible. Fantastic! Because you have to get that first step before you can get two steps, ten steps, a hundred steps. And if you can't get that first step, you won't get anything. And that's where I think that, you know, being able to adjust what you're doing.
So you have this plan and you go, well, maybe I need to do ABC or maybe I have to go backwards. So I that really exciting in terms of helping people realize how far they've come. they've got a step. I love how his work really invites in the idea of exploration and through that exploration, you know, in our own bodies and with our animals as well.
There's a so different when we are in exploration and just feeling and sensing and allowing versus when are trying to make something fit. I would actually, what I think would be really helpful for our audiences, if you could explain, cause all of these concepts are so important and they are becoming part of the vernacular in the horse industry. mean, people are really starting to understand, you know,
the idea of developing new neural pathways, the power of intention, the idea of exploration and or allowing and or just being with our horses. And T-Touch obviously encompasses so much of these elements. So for those in our audience that aren't really familiar with T-Touch, how would you explain it to them? Because there's, you know, we're covering all of this, but like, how do we put that in a package where people can understand?
you hear about the Tillington work many people think it's only the work on the body. the fact is this is the question because the fact is if we just did work on the body and we didn't have the movements
that allow the processing to go on, it would be, it's just so much more effective when you actually move the horse in. And our concept is to bring, give the horse a feeling of the body. For me, this most animals, most humans don't have a feeling of their body. I mean, and the fact is with the circular T touches, which is something that didn't come to me until 1983, Delaware Equine Veterinary Clinic, when I was working on a horse, when I was asked to work on a horse,
I was doing a workshop there for the weekend from Matthew McKay Smith. Who is it? I've known for years. And they wanted to see this new work I was doing with the Velocrytes concept of new awareness. And so they asked me to work on this 12 year old horse that belonged to one of the vets and they could not understand why it is when the horse would be approached with the saddle or the grooming, the horse would start to move or, you know, be resistant. And when I put my hands on her.
just quietly and she got really quiet. The person standing there said, Linda, why is this horse not rejecting you? You know, not resisting, not snapping her teeth or moving her body as a kick. And I said, don't worry what I'm doing because it takes years to learn this beautiful felting press work. Just go up and put your hand on the circle and move the skin. Push, said, push the skin in a circle. And when I said that, I thought, okay, what's that about? And
I didn't tell her I didn't know what I was talking about. That's pushing, moving the skin in a circle is not a part of the Belencries work. And she went up and did it and the horn spot is quiet for her as she was for me. And she just kept going along like in long lines on the body. And I thought, man, that is really interesting shift in behavior. And I started following the circles and it took years. was years later when I was doing a work, we were doing a workshop in, beginning with humans.
for self-help. And there was a young man who was a savant in that class. And he said, you know this one and a quarter circle, because originally it was just a circle. And then we found out as we worked it, as you do it on yourself, you just do a circle from like six around to six. It's not finished. And when you do a six, and first of all, we started saying just a little farther, it was like to 730. And then when we started writing about it, it was easier to say one and a quarter.
And so we wound up with this actual one and a quarter. And in this workshop, this young man who was a savant on the autism spectrum said, do you know this one and a quarter circle is part of that golden spiral or that sacred spiral that's in all of nature? It's in our DNA. It's the same shape as our DNA. And we started looking at it from that point of view. And what I realized is that, hmm, interesting. And this has only come to me in the last few years of teaching so much for self help online is that, a minute.
when I come to that one and a quarter circle, it's like turning a key that opens a door to connect with this divine intelligence in every single cell in the body. And it's totally known scientifically that there are tens of thousands of functions of cells that can be exactly described, but nobody can say really what's behind them. And so the latest song of the cells by one of the way this looks at modern medicine is this idea.
of this, β this nexion that can't be described. It's, always forget what it's called. It's, β Roland, do you help me remember this the other day? It's, this is so crazy because it's so ideal and it just describes it can't be described. Here it is, but that's not what they call it in this modern science. Roland, do you remember that word, the CC, what it stood for? And I asked you the other day, how can they remember from the Song of the Shells what they call this intention behind?
What's behind? How come we can see? How come our blood flows? Why does this all work? It's totally known that we have nothing to do with it. It is phenomenal intelligence that is known in every cell on the body. And what turned me onto this in 1976, in the second year of my Thautify's training was this book. We were asked to read Man on His Nature by Sertrall Sherrington, who said that every cell in the body knows its function in the body. So when I look at a horse or an animal or a human,
I don't just see what the problem, I see this amazing being here at all this function that is going on and some issues that may be, but instead of seeing the problem, we see, wait a minute here is the infinite possibility for change with it. It's on my wall in my room, in my office. And this is so crazy that I can never remember this. That's all right. You explained it really well. that's, because the word doesn't quite fit, it's-
The unexplainable, mean, it's divine or intelligence. It's just absolute intelligence in every cell in our body that is known. we might think we've thought of something, but did we think of it or are we just rediscovering something that was there?
You know some of these things must have been done for how many thousands of years? Forever. Forever, exactly. You just reach up into the quantum field and that's interesting. Exactly. And it is interesting how things will just come to us that way. it's just like a download. Exactly. You have to trust that. And I have to ask you too, from the way you're speaking, do you know Gary Zukof's work?
Look at it in the late, in the late seventies, end of our lives. And none of us, all the people I could speak, we couldn't remember how, but it completely, it's totally interesting for what's going on in the whole world. It's world we're all in. And it's really about the new consciousness, this idea that all consciousness when we believe there were only five senses and when we realize now this infinite possibilities of much more that
multi-senses that we have that we know is much more than what we can see. I think you'll enjoy it. podcast, just get your podcast. Gary Zukof, it's everywhere. we'll definitely do that. It's right behind, you know, on the YouTube or what we're all talking about. If I take us back to the original question about what is T-Touch, that you could look at it as a...
a combination of there is the observation that we make and this is you can take any part of this. Just how do we, how do they move? What's the changes and so on. And then there's the body work. There's the T touch body work. There are the movement of the ground work, which it's about if we can take, because body work has been done now for many years on horses. But if we don't take that change in how the body feels into some kind of movement, it's hard to change the habits. And that's where
I think our groundwork is a little bit more like doing Tai Chi for a person because it's done generally pretty slowly so that horses can learn how to organize their bodies in a more functional way. And so it's not done, you know, quickly and it's done, can be done in these little pieces. And then we have these tools that we use sometimes like the body wraps, different things that we may use to help the horse also sort of reinforce or find that place that they are in space and find that place that they're comfortable.
And then it goes into the riding, the joy of riding, some of the different tools that we would use. But I think that sort of overall, there's this overriding philosophy so that even if you don't have exactly the techniques, just like you were saying, Jack, I didn't really do know what I was doing, but you changed something. And what you did then is also look at what you were doing as opposed to doing things simply out of habit. And if we, I mean, all of us have habits, which help us.
help us function in a fairly expedient way during the day. Horses have habits as well. And whenever they're under some kind of duress or stress, all of this go back to our first habit. They go back to that default behavior. And so what we're looking at when we work with animals is that it isn't that they're going to, you know, no animal is a robot, is how quickly do they recover?
How quickly can they come back? And I think that in all the training, when people are working with their horses, you know, the people will go, but he just did that again. It's how, you know, did they recover a little bit more quickly? You know, were you able to, were you able to change what you were doing in order to help them recover? And so I see a lot of this as a philosophy. We want our horses to feel safe and we want to feel safe. Cause if we don't feel safe.
We can't work with animals in a way that has any kind of confidence and therefore the horse doesn't necessarily have confidence in what we're asking them to do. you know, with the wraps and those sorts of things, you've got great presentations and the fair with that. How did you come up with that and develop that system? Can I share this, Linda? Of course. Yeah, okay, so.
So we used to use, know, anybody that's been in the horse world very long time and had foals, you use like a butt rope on the foal to out teach them to lead, right? Pretty common thing. And so with the horses, we used not just around the butt, also around the neck, like a figure eight to help them give a sense of their bodies. And we found that that was, you know, so many horses are nervous about going through a narrow space because they don't have a clear picture in their brain about how much space they take up. And this helps. And then
we started working with dogs. And one of our practitioners had a dog who had two dogs, one died and the other one was very afraid of her cats at the barn. So she wouldn't come down to the barn and brought the cat dog down, didn't have, didn't know how to put a body rope on a dog. So she took a leg wrap and she put the leg wrap around the dog. And the dog all of a sudden wasn't afraid of the cats, didn't chase them, but was just able to go in and it was cool.
And so she told us this and we thought, wow, wouldn't wraps be a lot better, easier to use on dogs? So we started that. And then we said, β well, maybe we could make them into smaller pieces to use on the horses as well. So, you know, one thing leads to another, you know, and that's, you know, that's where, you know, so many things, you know, sort of started. And then we just started to experiment with various ways of putting them on. then.
when we put them on ourselves, because we always like to have some sort of feeling maybe of what like the touch might feel on yourself versus a horse and or dog and, found that they did amazing things for humans as well. So there was a, you know, it was really a process and the animals were our teachers. Always. Actually, the day that I remember I first started to use it as a giving boundaries to a horse was
when I was doing a six day training in Morford Park in Virginia and somebody brought a horse in that had been found tied out in the woods and wanted to know if we would work with it and do something with it. And it was terrified. Apparently kids had been, you know, throwing things at it and what was said, we don't know what happened. Anyway, I just had this idea of giving boundaries. And so we used a rope at first, just put around the neck and then around the hind quarters. And it really made a difference in the...
feeling of safety that the horse seemed to have, but the wraps were so much better when we started using bottle wraps. Thanks to that was Janet from who did that, it was way better. The wraps are way better than the loops. Well, there is space for the rope for our foals. It's fantastic for horses that are having trouble with the farrier. You can use it sort of as a balance point to help them shift their weight. So there's not so much, it's not about having, you know,
doing it from the halter because all that does is throws them out of balance more. you can really, it's almost like a little suitcase and you can shift their weight very, very precisely with a little, with a body roll. neat. it sounds fun. It does. So where do you see the Tellington Method going moving forward? What's the vision? Because I mean, you've got practitioners in basically almost all the countries in the world, I would think, you know, that there's
millions have been exposed to the books. It's out there now, but like, what do you see moving forward with, what is your vision for it moving forward? Well, I mean, where I'm coming from is just the hope that we keep putting it out there and thanks to things like this, where you bring many different people together, that people begin to realize, you know, that coming from the sympathy, empathy, sorry, empathy and from the heart is
a different way of being on the planet. And I believe our horses are here to help us evolve instead of having to come from a place of ego and control that we come from a place of understanding. That would be the ultimate, like that right there is a really great mission statement. And I mean, that's a lot of what we're trying for with the fair too, with better people, better horses, better world. Yeah, that's what you're doing.
your books are around at this point, you know, everywhere. I mean, and it's, amazing, but yeah, this next, the next generation of, of horse people, you know, we really need them to be exposed to the, especially these ideas that not everybody was exposed to at first.
And it took me a while to come around to, but we need these, you the people that are starting out with horses, if they could find you first, you know, that would be so excellent. One of the things that Robin said that I think is really interesting is how this most body, many body works started with people and went to animals, horses, dogs, chiropractic, all the stuff that's done nowadays.
Yet this actually came from the horses, the circular fetches and this concept of the wraps and all this came from the horses, the animals to humans, which I think is really interesting. And just the heart tug that we're going to be teaching people on this, that can help a person in every situation before they go to work with their horse and they're in situation where they see something is just really shocking or terrifying. You can bring yourself out of that place of stress and absolute
you know, feeling of disaster and coming to a place of heart coherence in a matter of minutes. And that's one of the things I think that being with our horses, just beginning to come from a place of dare to come from your heart. And I have to tell you something, like I could never use the word love around horses. I mean, that's something horse people didn't do right until I did my first training and I gave a presentation for a, have you ever had, you need to have them. Frederique Pignon.
And my village El Gordo on this. Have you ever thought about contacting him? Have. He hasn't gotten back to me. You have to put in a good word. I will be happy because it was when Fred in the beginning translated for me, which is the most fun when I'm speaking in English and he takes over French. And one of the things he described what I was working with doing with horses was coming from a place of love. And I was kind of shocked because in the horse world, there's no place for that.
I mean, we're hard, right? And when he said that and he started talking about that, it made me change my mind. If Frederick Pignon, with what he can do, talks about love with horses, that gives me a different place to understand and come from. And now this concept, what is love? Well, it's understanding, it's empathy, it's compassion. You know, it's appreciation, it's gratitude. Those are all aspects of love.
And when we bring this into our horses and put that out for young people to think, well, I don't have to just command. don't have to control that horse. How can we find a way of cooperating so that everybody's safe and can trust that place of safety of the horse and the rider? And that's what our interest is in that. And just think what you're doing is fantastic and however we can support you. We love doing this with you. know, it's sorry. Finished.
You know, it's an interesting concept. remember I was in teaching Australia about 25 years ago and we had 25 people in the training and nine of them had never handled horses. were Feldenkrais practitioners who just wanted to know more about the work and so on. And we had horses that came into the arena the first day, like on their hind legs and, you know, quite challenging horses, which you would not hand to someone who did not handle a horse.
And by the end of the six days, all of those people could handle those horses calmly and quietly. And I think I was thinking about what, you know, what Linda said is you can be like, we're kind of horses, but they don't walk over us. It's not that you have to escalate things and, but you do have to learn about how do you use your body? What are the techniques that you can use to help calm the horse other than shaking the rope at them? Because I
I think people just do that because they're afraid and they don't want to be run over and so on and so forth. And so I feel like the groundwork techniques are so helpful and that's what we could teach those people. And one of the organizers was he at one point was on shortlisted for the Australian three day team. So lifelong horse person raised with horses, his whole family. And he said that he learned more in six days about handling horses from the ground than he had in his whole life because he'd never been taught.
how to handle horses in a way that was calm, that was really, really effective, and that was also kind. And it is about, that's where the teaching of people is so important, how we use our bodies, how we organize ourselves, the things that we do. And I think that that is one of the ways that we can then come from a place where we feel safe and we feel, then we can feel more appreciation and so on. But the techniques are such that they're very
teachable. And I think that, you know, we all know people who've been around horses a long time. And if you have, you can get horses to do a lot. You know, you can, you know, get horses to behave, but can you teach someone else how to do that and how to cooperate and so on? I think that for me is one of the most interesting things. a beautiful message. It's about that cooperation and being able to come together in that relationship in a way that even somebody
that hasn't handled horses before, once they understand those little pieces, they're able to make their communication clear to the horse and get good results, even on horses that would have come in emotional and uncertain and because you've built in that trust and that language between the two. You're doing a great job. One of the things that I find is really important in all of this, working with our horses and with each other, is the concept of forgiveness.
You know, this idea, if we don't do something perfect, or if somebody does something that I sure as heck would never do, instead of judging it, just saying, wait a minute, I can hold the possibility that at some point that person is going to feel what that horse is feeling and find another way of maybe being with them. That would take a lot of pressure off people too, because they just can't, they're always so worried about making a mistake or they're so hard on themselves. And then they relive.
the same mistake or they manifest the same mistake because they're thinking about it all the time. Right. And just taking that pressure off would help so many people to relax when they're around their horses. Amen to that. That's a really great point. Right. Well, we sure appreciate both of you and all your time today and all of the work you've done with horses and people all over the world. I mean, we're so excited that to have both of you on today is such a big deal for us to have you.
Where can people find more information about you both Linda and Robin? Well, have websites. have ttouch.com and ttouch.ca are both, um, are sort of two websites. They're, they're just didn't, we're in Canada. I'm in Canada and Linda's in, in the States. So we have a lot there. And of course we're on social media with the Tellington T-Touch world and lots. Linda has a Linda on the go and on Instagram and places like that. So, and there's a lot on YouTube.
And I want to get to know both of you more. How can we do that? We've both been lifelong. Students of the horse. of the horse. for sure. A variety of disciplines and we used to show horses and take students, but we've worked on ranches and we've done that too. Yeah. And now we don't really computer show anymore, but just try to help people and horses out basically. We were.
blessed with the opportunity to live in an area where there were so many different great clinicians and methods and people brought into within like a three hour radius, just north of Milwaukee, Wisconsin. so Linda, I think you were right down the road from us. My parents had one of your instructors when I was in high school come and teach and I don't remember who it was. we had this exposure to this.
of both Western and English and dressage. I mean, just really, we never ended up being very discipline specific, but we both were very attached to people that promoted the wellbeing of the horse. And then when we got into making it a career, you end up going and doing a lot of the shows and that sort of thing. And although our students were horse first and
whatnot, you'd lose students along the way because sometimes if the horse is first, you're not going to be pushing as far as some people might like. And so it was kind of like, how do we, and then we saw the division in the horse world so much too. We did, you know, dressage to a hundred jumper stuff, to venting, to Western, we did barrel racing and speed events and you'd get this sort of
hitting one discipline against another or I do XYZ and you're looking down your nose at the other XYZ. Yeah. yeah. I always say to people, if you're in a discipline or a breed, it's considered a training method. If you're looking from the outside, you know, the sort of outside in, then it's abuse. I mean, that's over and over again, you know? So it's really, it is interesting. Very fun. I mean, they're based and there's people in this world that just, they,
I don't know, I like to say that we think for ourselves or that we at least observe what's really taking place and not just observe what we want to see or what somebody tells us to see. And that's the one thing about the horse industry that really bothers me is I want people to learn on their own. I want people to do it themselves. Of course, you've got to get some help along the way first, but
Everybody wants to put it in, well, this is the veterinarian category. This is the saddle fitter category. Right. And then, and then they never learn how to do it. And then that poor saddle fitter, they only get to your barn once a year. So if somebody could do it themselves, that would really help the horse out. Or be knowledgeable enough to be able to. Or to know when they really need someone or what they can do to actually make a, make a shift in something.
And then they go out and those are the people that help their friends more, right? Those are the support and that's what we need in the horse world. it's so much like with your program too, is it's educating people on how they can do it themselves. that's the beauty. Yeah. And question thing, just to say people need to ask questions and I don't care who it is. know, it doesn't matter. It doesn't matter. You just need to think for yourself. Like critical thinking has gone.
Why the wayside? You know, take the information from what you agree with, what you disagree with, and also put it together with what works for you. And you're always learning, right? Always. Not something's wrong. Right. And of course your fair presentations. Yeah. We're really happy with the, you know, I think they're doing actually a total of eight presentations between the two of us on this. Thank you for that. thank you. And you should, you should give us a little highlight about what people can be expecting to tune into.
While we're working about, one thing, one of the things that find, both of us find really important is this concept of how you prepare your horse to be with you, whether it's under saddle or any work you want to do on the ground. Either way you start the day with the grooming. It's just so, for me, revenue, how people don't think about that. And then, you know, are showing like examples of horses.
how you can change behavior by changing, by seeing the posture and affecting that posture in many ways that we do that. And we're also going to talk about how we restart, start or restart horses because it's a very systematic step-by-step chunk it down that any anybody can use if they're, they don't have to be super experienced. But so many horses can benefit from a very, just a.
quiet restarting, you know, just because there's a lot of holes that happen. And when people are super experienced, you can get away with a lot. It doesn't mean the horse has the education. It just means that the riders are good, you know, or that the trainers are good. And so what we want to do is show people things that they can do with their own horses and even just, it doesn't have to be exactly that, but the.
but the direction to go. And so that's going to be, you know, one of the definitely one of the presentations. And Robin, you've got some great ones on the body wraps for both the rider and the horse and helping improve posture and movement. Yeah. And, you know, and pain and reducing pain for people. I can't tell you, you know, if you spend a lot of time on a computer, which lots of us do, is that, you know, some of the wraps just light wraps around the shoulders and
when we can feel something, now we don't know exactly how the horse feels, but when we can feel that this light contact can make such a difference to us, it actually helps us understand that it could make a huge difference to the horse as well. you. We are too. Thank you both for being here and being a part of the fair and for everything you've done for the horse. Horse world, for sure. And we're super excited, but can't thank you enough.
I hope everybody, you know, check them out at the fair because it's really special, especially eight videos from both of you. So thank you so much.
