Books with Spirit – Joyfulness between horses and people

A student’s horses were recently treated by a vet for pinworm infestation by treating them for 5 days in a row of an Ivermectin based chemical wormer. 

I’m anti toxic chemicals, but even so, I was shocked at that kind of toxic overload for worms that are not harmful to the horse’s health (they don’t migrate through organs or body tissue for their life cycle).  They are unpleasant little critturs though, who can cause the horse to itch like crazy, so I decided to post this simple remedy for pin worms.

Click here for the rest of this article.

I enjoyed reading Linda Parelli’s article on Hill Therapy that is in the Fluidity program.  Since that is a particularly strong area of expertise for me, I much enjoyed seeing a focus on restoring horses to good muscular and skeletal health.  

You can add a powerful improvement for your horse to that Hill Therapy Program – by adding an emotional aspect to the work.  

“What?” you’re probably thinking…

What have emotions got to do with bad posture, poor musculature, short, choppy, uneven strides and even skeletal damage? 

Well, emotions have a HUGE effect on our horse’s  physical body.  Click here for the rest of this article.

Do you think it’s a full feed bin?  Or a lush paddock or a field full of long grass?  Is it a pocket full of carrots or a piece of apple?

Sure he likes all those things.  He also likes plenty of space to move around for vigorous expression of joyfulness and good health and feet that are comfortable and good companions and a whole host of other things.

But for horses living in our world, the relationship with us is the one thing that has the capacity to bring them happiness – or to bring that happiness undone.  Whatever reservations there are within our relationship,  adversely affect both us and our horses.

And reservations with each other’s relationship can be coming from stuff that happened to them before we even met each other (although in my case a lot of my horse’s reservations were coming from our time together!)

I made a commitment a while ago now, to notice and “fix” any areas in my horse relationship that were getting in the road of our happiness together and our enjoyment of each other.

I wrote a book about those insights and ways of being with our horses and laid down some simple, practical lessons on an audio track that will take you step by step to how you can get the awesome co-operation from your horse that comes from getting rid of all that old crappy “stuff”.

Zen Connection with Horses is a book and audio lesson set that takes you step by step through a very unusual process of deeply connecting with your horse, understanding that connection and then using that connection to bring happiness to you and your horse.

It’s simple and practical and you can apply the lessons and way of being with your horse to any way of riding or horsemanship.

And, do you know, when your horse is happy – it rubs off on you!

What can you do today that brings happiness to your horse?   Cheers, Jenny Pearce  Click here for the bookshop.

Here’s a post a bit outside of my normal subject matter, but I think that lots of you will find it interesting. 

I read a great article yesterday, weighing up  both sides of the animal rights argument as it relates to farmed animals - including the health outcomes for we humans.  It talks about ways in which we can influence the world with our opinions, by simply walking our own talk – whatever that might be.

Click here to go to the Dr Becker website and read that article.

We’ve been with the wwoof program (willing workers on organic farms) for some time now, working with the most amazing bunch of young people from all over the world – turning out confident and competent students who understand their connection to the horses and to other people. 

We’ve decided to expand this program as an opportunity for paying students to come here to Tanjil South and pick and choose which aspects of what I have to teach that they want to learn.

This is a tailor made program of mostly private tuition for each individual, whether you are a complete beginner or an advanced rider.  You may focus on just the horse skills on the ground, at liberty and in the saddle when appropriate – everything that you read about here on the website.  Or you can eat, sleep and breathe every aspect of horses, from the communication to the riding to the healing work. 

Browse around the “clinic” section, click here - you can pick and choose and learn any or all of those skills, with the opportunity to become an amazing all round horseman or woman.

You live in with us, sharing family life while you soak up what I have to teach.  Learning in this environment is relaxed and informal and, like all my teaching – at your own pace.

The cost for a live in student is $1000 per week, which includes organic and chemical free board and keep, access to my herd of horses or paddock room for yours.  The student lives in the house, here with the family, receives some private tuition every day, goes to any clinics that are happening and stays for as long as is mutually perfect.

What an opportunity!  Email me jenny@bookspwithspirit. com (take out the space when you email me) or phone on Australia 03 5160 1481 to apply.

I have altered the time on this blog so that first time readers read these emails about Emma’s lovely journey with her horse Rosie in the right order.  So for the regular readers, just skip to the next post.  Everybody else, read on and enjoy!

I’ve had a number of people say to me over the years, “Oh dear, I don’t think I want to hear my horse, I don’t want to know what my horse thinks about me.”  And I’ve realised that although they talked like they were joking, that that is a very real concern for some people – if only subconsciously.

Why indeed would we want to know what our horses think, if we had no simple way of changing that for the better for us and our horse?

If you could be interested in a beautiful journey with your own horse and never having to be worried about what your horse thinks of you - here’s a new perspective, click here for an email from a reader.  My reply is in italics.

I have changed the dates on this blog, so that both Emma’s emails are side by side with the first email reading first, so that if you are reading them for the first time, you can enjoy them in the order in which they are meant to be read.

You will share her beautiful journey with her horse Rosie – as she is making it.  It’s a lovely glimpse into something quite special.

Click here for the rest of Emma’s email, with my reply in italics.

We were lucky to have two wonderful French people wwoof here for a few days, who were in Australia rejuvenating themselves after a long stint in Madagascar. Fred is a specialist in organic agriculture and Claire’s speciality is eco friendly water and sewerage.

They have been working with an organisation that is training Madagascan rice farmers to increase their rice yield times 10.  Wow!  The awesome change in results, has been brought about mostly by the recognition that rice is not really an aquatic plant after all.

Here is a link to their website if helping out, right at the front line of a volunteer organisation appeals to you.  2000 of Madagascar’s farmers have been re-trained in this new method.  If the 2,000,000 farmers that farm rice all grow rice like them, the country would be a net exporter of rice instead of old people and babies dying regularly of starvation as they run out of food every year. 

Keep up the great work Fred and Claire.  Click here for their website.

P.S.  Fred seemed to connect with the land in a similar way that I connect with the horses – he is seriously talented!

Boy this photo just says it all doesn’t it?  Leonie already has a great relationship with her other horses, using what she learned from the approach in Zen Connection with Horses and here she is, using all that knowledge with her new foal, Angel. 

Like everyone proudly featured on this website, Leonie brings all her wide variety of life skills and things that she has learned from other teachers and insights that she has gained from her own experience, to this beautiful relationship with her horses.

Angel is named after our dear friend, Sheila Angeloni.

Angel has the best of both worlds – a person who listens and understands and acts on what they “get” and yet sets boundaries for a safe and contented and well balanced little horse.

How cool is this?