Speaker 1: Live. This is Pet Life Radio.
Speaker 2: Let's talk pets.
Speaker 1: Welcome to the Human Animal Connection Show, where we believe
we can communicate with all animals. Join us as we
explore the thirty three principles and healing methods of the
Human Animal Connection. As animal lovers, we know that you
share our commitment to making the world a kinder place
for all creatures. Together, let's embrace the transformative healing power
of the Human Animal Connection.
Speaker 3: Hello everyone, welcome to the Human Animal Connection Podcast. I'm
your host and the executive director of the Human Animal Connection.
I am so delighted to have Melissa Pears. She's a
lifelong horsewoman and she is the founder of Touched by
a Horse and the creator of the equine Gestalt coaching method,
which she's been doing for decades and she's helped so
many people and so many horses and I can't wait
to hear all about it. So, just for people who
don't Millia with Gestalt, can you give us just a
little explanation of what your method's all about, what that means?
Speaker 2: Well, thanks for having me so much so. Gestalt is
a German word and it loosely translates into flowing into
form or coming into wholeness. So it's a form of
therapy and a form of coaching that allows people to
go back and finish their unfinished business. It's efficient, it's quick,
it's creative, and the horses are are partners in doing
the work.
Speaker 3: That's wonderful. I think horses know something about wholeness that
we need to learn. They do.
Speaker 2: They well, they live a very gestalt life. You know. Hey,
in gestalt, you're in the present moment, and horses are
always in the present moment. Yes, my horses are not
thinking about I wonder yesterday why this happened, or wonder
if tomorrow we're going to do this, or that. They're
right here right now, and they teach us that. Yes,
I think it's why we're so connected to them. We
go out to the barn and be with them for
a while. You're not going to get anywhere unless you're
present with that right right, Yeah, you can't get anything
done unlist or here they said about your button, then
they say, are you with me?
Speaker 3: Yeah? Here, what is it you think you're doing here? Hikes?
So that's wonderful. Well, let's start a little bit of
your history. Now, you grew up with horses, tell us
about your life and horses just briefly.
Speaker 2: Well, in sixth grade, my science teacher actually announced to
the class that he had a horse for sale, and
I just knew in my heart that was my horse.
I just knew it. I call him and badgered my mother.
My dad was out of town, and long story short,
but we got this horse and she was my very
first and I went on from there to many and
then later became a breeder of horses in my career.
And I've shown I've done a whole variety of different
things with horses all the way through. But now you've
kind of find your passion your work with this gestalt
method of helping people come into wholeness. And tell us
more about how your method works. I became a psychotherapist,
and I trained from a psychotherapist viewpoint. I train lay people.
They do not have to be therapists or coaches when
they come in to the program. And what happens if
you were my client. Actually I had a client just
this morning, finished just in time to get here on
time for this backcast that oh okay, and she came
in her daughter, her grown daughter actually referred her to
me and got her a session, and she came in.
She had raised three children with her husband with a
six year brain tumor, and he passed when the kids
were like twelve, fifteen, and seventeen. So she didn't give
herself any time for her grief process because the mom
of three teenagers, and she got into a mode of
distraction and let's get this taken care of. But they're
all grown now, they are out of the house, and
she finds herself despondent and lonely and not engaging in life.
And we discovered together today, so much of it was
her not dealing with her grief when it happened and
you know, moaning it and here it is all these
years later, you know, catching up with her and the
horse this morning was phenomenal. He did a great job
and she had a huge breakthrough.
Speaker 3: Wow, wonderful. So this was an in person session then.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, she was here on site. She lives a
couple of provinces north of me, about an eight hour
drive and.
Speaker 3: Oh hey, Amanda, stay up. Well, wow for town. So
tell me a little bit about the horse in the
in that session, Like, what what did the port like?
If I was a fly on the wall, I'm glad.
I'm not a fly. But if I was, what would
I have seen? What would I what would I've noticed?
A cat in the arena? I was letting us go
with the cat. Let's go there. I'll be a cat.
I'll be I'll be the barnyard cat, the happy grave,
calm barnyard gat. What did I see? So? So Halo
was Halo's hello? Is a horse?
Speaker 2: Yes? He Gipsy Vanner gelding about ten years old, and
he was in a round pen, and she had start
by sitting outside of the round pen, and already he
was very aware of her and very engaged with the fact,
kind of giving me signals that she was in her head,
not in her heart. And that's part her temperament's part
who she is. She's been a nurse and a kind
of scientist and stuff. She's always in her head. And
so he gave me that signal by detaching. So they're
very interested in what we feel. They're not at all
interested in what we think. It's as so interesting nice. Yeah,
he just quietly looked at me, and then he moved
away and stood about fifteen feet back looking at us.
And that's not usual behavior for him. That cued me
and listening to how she was speaking, I knew she
was coming from a thought pattern, not how she felt.
So I started moving her through my work of speaking
to her daughter in law, who's a little bit of
a problem for her. We started there in an empty chair,
so she's saying her truth to her daughter and law,
and then we got around to what was really going
on as I'm probing and asking questions, and it was grief.
And so we went into the grief of her husband,
had her speak to her husband, and she's not a
person who cries easily, and she definitely let down into
some very big tears of what it's been like to
be alone all these years, even the struggle she's having
now is there adult children? You know what to do
with all that. So the session goes and I end
up inviting her in and she doesn't know anything about
horses her into the pen with Halo kind of gave
her a few little safety reminders and then he's on
free liberty and she steps into the pen with him.
Speaker 3: Old on one second, let me just ask one quick question.
When she started to cry, did Halo shift in his behavior? Yeah?
Speaker 2: Definitely, good category. Right over to the fence and standing
there and I don't point these things out to the client,
observe it sometimes more. Yes, he absolutely what. She dropped
down into her feelings about her daughter in law and
then her feelings about the husband.
Speaker 3: She he was right with her.
Speaker 2: He was like, I grant you, I'll write with you.
So part of what horses do in this work is
they are what I call an equadetector, kind of like
a lie detector, not meaning lies like I'm not telling
the truth. It's more personal if I'm not telling the
truth to myself. So if I'm thinking something and it's
not benefiting me, it's not really how I feel. That's
what they're very sensitive to. So she moved into kind
of an equidetector position with her. I placed her in
the pen. I asked her to walk a certain direction.
She walks that direction, and I asked her a couple
of questions that said, finish this sentence. And I gave
her sentence and she's starting to finish it, and immediately
Halo went over and blocked her, stood just stopped her attracted,
and I said, he's identifying truth that you need to
repeat to yourself again. Hear what you're saying say that again.
She says, I don't really know what I said. And
I said, I realize that, and so it is halo,
say it again. What you were saying was something like this.
She goes, oh, and she dropped again, and dropped into
her truth, and he kept her just quietly blocked, not
doing anything bad, just standing peacefully. Once she got it
and got it all the way through, he turned and
started allowing her to walk forward again, and he did
that several times. One time she said to herself, I think,
I think I She said something like, I regret, I
regret being such a distracted mother. That's what it was,
and she was being hard on herself about it. I
was so distracted, and he walked away from her. He
came all to my side of the pan, just like, nope, nope, nope.
Speaker 3: No, that's not it. We're not gonna do that, right.
Speaker 2: So I caught her on it and I said, I said,
husband's in bed for six years with a very aggressive
brain tumor. You have three children, some who are turning
teenage years, and your working full time as a nurse
in the hospital, and you're taking care of your mother
who had Alzheimer's and you're telling yourself you were too distracted.
I said, what you're saying, right, He shot her with empathy,
and she said, I was doing the very best I
could do with what I had to work with right then,
in that moment in time, and I really wasn't distracted
because I always cared. And he turned around and went
right back over to her. He couldn't walk fast enough, right,
drops his head down in what I think was a
nomous stay post, just kind of yeah, And the session
went on like that, and he'd be right with her,
he'd stop her, he'd engage with her full away.
Speaker 3: You know, so one of a million behaviors that they do. Yeah,
So he's really he's really reading what's happening in the moment,
and he's also recognizing when she's being really authentic to
her heart versus being in her head and giving her
that instant signals say, is it's really beautiful to watch
because like, if not that you would have done this.
But let's say someone said, oh, you're in your head
now or something their finger, that wouldn't have worked at all.
But the horse. But when the horse gives us a signal,
it's like it's just neutral, it's just information. It's it's
not good, it's not bad, it's just okay, you're not
in your heart now. Yeah, And I.
Speaker 2: Tell clients, I say, you know, you never forget the
experience that a twelve hundred pound horse gives you. You know,
that stays with us. That's experiential learning. What I said
didn't matter. It is what she said and what he did.
And when she understood, she said, why did he block
me the first time? And I said, he's wanting to
stop you in your tracks to process what you just said.
And she goes, gosh, I don't even know what I
just said. He said, see, he could feel that, he
could tell you weren't really connecting to it.
Speaker 3: So we went through that.
Speaker 2: Then another time he pulled away and she said, why
did he walk away from me like that? And you know, basically,
he's calling you on your bs. He's saying that you're
being hard on yourself. So let's process that. I just
engage really beautifully and that's one of the ways, and
that's what he does. He's a really good equadetector, you know.
Is when I think of him as is my little
truth detector.
Speaker 3: Your truth detector. And how long you've been head of Halo.
Speaker 2: You know, not long year and a half, probably a
most bay I've raised and had for a really long time.
Speaker 3: But I had him about a year and a half.
And did you know, I mean, what made you say, oh,
Halo has to do this work with me? How did
you know? What did you see? What did you feel?
Speaker 2: No, he's a funny story. He was an intuitive hit
that I had. I had a graduate of my program
who reached out to me and she said, this gypsy
vander gelding's coming up for auction in Florida. And I'm
in California at the time on vacation, and I'm like, yeah, so,
and she goes, I really think you'd like him. He's
really cute and they ride and they do all this stuff,
you know, And I did not meet another horse, and
I thought about it, and then I looked at him online.
I watched the video of them riding him and stuff,
and I think, only he's pretty nice. If I don't
decide to keep him, I could probably find a student
that would want him.
Speaker 3: And all this. Well, anyway, I buy him.
Speaker 2: In this on he comes out to Colorado to my
ranch at Colorado, and I was still in California and
my guy who rides for me then his name is Scott.
I said, Scott, just ride him a little bit and
tell me what I bought, tell me what you think,
all me And he said he had to be drugged.
He's not very rideable, he's not very broke, he doesn't
have a lot of controls on him, and he's not
built very well, so he's rough as all get out.
Speaker 3: So I'm thinking, all darn, I did you know, did
the wrong clim Yeah.
Speaker 2: Came home a week later and I went in his
pen and he was sweet as could be, and I said, Hello,
here's the deal. If you can do the work I
really do in the world and partner with me doing
that work, just loving on people, keeping them safe, but
speaking your truth. I said, you have a home for
life side that's not for you, then we'll find you
another good home. And so I'm like, Okay, he came
out of that stall, no joke, Jimmie. He came out
of that stall about an hour later to work with
his first client. He's knocked it out of the park
every single time, every single time. He never lets me
down ever.
Speaker 4: Low.
Speaker 3: That's such a beautiful story because here's a horse that
somebody else obviously put on auction, they had no use
for him, or didn't understand him, or him away, throw
him away, and then we find what his true purpose is,
which every horse is different. Would you say, let's just
take it on a scale of let's say, out of
ten horses, Well, let's say out of one hundred horses,
how many would you say have the potential to work
the level that Halo's working at. I mean, how rare
is it?
Speaker 2: It's not, it's not as rare. So out of a
hundred horses, I'm going to say, a good eighty eighty
or so are gonna do? Really, I'm form of the
word form, be happy to do it, not necessarily equid detector.
Some are pantomimers, Some are very much in the vibration, energy, balance,
work and different things. But I think what made him
extraordinary was his clere sentience. He understood, he understood I
was being fair with him, Like, okay, the seller was
not fair with me.
Speaker 3: That's not your fault.
Speaker 2: And I don't want to put a bunch of money
into you to get you to where I can ride
you and we can all be happy riding. And it
doesn't seem like that's what you want to do. You
want to do what I do?
Speaker 3: Great, If you don't, I will find a good home.
You will. You will get a good home.
Speaker 2: You know. I just gave him all that comfort, and
he watched my other horses doing two or three different
pieces of work. You know, when you just observed and
watched and then went out was a rock star.
Speaker 3: Wow, he loved it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, he was motivated.
Speaker 3: I love it. I love it.
Speaker 2: I do find the Gypsy van Er breed I have,
I have paints quarter horses have all different I do
find the Gypsy van Or breed are highly intuitive and
very cleare sentient in this work. They have big the
drivers in them, so they tend to be kind of
naturals at a lot of this.
Speaker 3: Yeah, that is so exciting. It's so wonderful too. And
I'm sure you've probably in your travels, either with yourself
or other people, you've seen people who thought they had
a therapy horse and it really wasn't their work true. Yeah,
and how do you explain to that person, I don't
think this is your horse's true passion.
Speaker 2: I travel around the country doing retreats back in the day.
Now I have my own retreats center. I don't do
all that traveling. But I was in Minnesota at a
gorgeous facility in Minnesota. Had been invited up to du
a women's retreat, and I went the day before and
the owner of the retreat said, we've got a lot
of horses for you to choose from, you know, figure
out which ones you know, three or four or five,
whatever you need.
Speaker 3: Just let us know.
Speaker 2: We'll get them cleaned up, you know, and all this.
And I went out and did what I do. I
connected and basically said I'm a human that helps other
humans feel better in their life, and if you want
to partner with me on that and do whatever you
think needs to be done. I listened to you, you
listen to me. You know, it's a partnership. I'm saying
this and thinking this. Of the horses, and there was
a very very dirty it was mud season, very very muddy, dirty,
goofy looking little paint mare that came over to the
fence like pushed her way through.
Speaker 3: All like this. This is I've been waiting for you, you know.
Speaker 2: So I chose her, and I selected three or four
and I got back to the barn and I told
her who I had selected. She goes her she's an
old bread mare. She is an old brood mare, that's
all she is. And I said, for not showing in
the show ring were hearts? And apparently she has a
mega watt heart. She wants to connect with my clients.
So they cleaned her up and brought her in and
she had her dressage champion, very nice, pricey horse in
the horse world, standing in cross ties. And she said, well,
don't you want to work with him? And he was gorgeous.
He was really a looker.
Speaker 3: And they said, I.
Speaker 2: Don't think he wants to do this? What oh, I
think he'll do anything. He's brilliant, he's this, he's that
you don't really love with her horse, And so I
asked him right in front of her, I said, so
I freaking His name was like I don't know, two
letters like JK or something. So he do you want
to do this work healing human hearts with me? And
he shakes his head. Note that was a fly. That
was a fly basking me in JK. Do you want
to take a few days and do this work healing
humans with me? And he stomps his foot and he
shakes and all right. That freaked me out.
Speaker 3: Get bright. No, I do not.
Speaker 2: I do not. I know how to do what I
do and that's what I'm gonna do.
Speaker 3: I'm not in this stuff. So it's beautiful. Yeah, so
when in doubt asked the horse, that's the moral story.
Speaker 2: People hope that horses in sanctuaries, you know, rescue horses
will do the work, and I have very strong feelings
about that. I think that as a second position, second
career for some of them. Yes, they're bored, they're looking
for something. They still trust humans at some level and
they're fine, and they have some that have done really
great work. But then there's the others that, to me,
the sole covenant between humans and horses has been so
badly broken. They be loved and taken care of and
never asked to do another flippant thing their whole life.
Just three beard. I'm always careful, and I do see
people try to do that. I think they're doing therapy
with horses and they go get a part at its
heartwork and it's not it's not rare.
Speaker 3: Yeah, well, we're going to take a short little break
and went from back, we're going to hear more of
your wonderful stories. We'll be back in just a moment,
real people, real stories.
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Speaker 1: Hey friends, If you like what you're hearing and want
to learn more, check out doctor Chi Joseph's book The
Human Animal Connection, Deepening Relationships with Animals and Ourselves, or
visit the website The Humananimalconnection dot org to book an
online consultation. Thank you for loving animals. Now back to
the show.
Speaker 5: Let's talk pets on petlifradio dot com.
Speaker 3: Welcome back to The Human Animal Connection, and I am
speaking today with Melissa Pears and she is the author
of Touched by a Horse and the creator of the
Equine Gestalt coaching method. So you mentioned earlier, I wanted
to just backtrack a little bit about that that different
types of healing. There's not just one way that therapy
horses work. They each work a bit uniquely, but there
are sort of three categories that you've talked about. And
with Halo, what would you call his type of healing? Well, Clarson,
I think he is so sensitive to whether somebody's congruent,
whether they're telling their truth to themselves, and so he
very definitely can pick up the vibe of the brain
and the heart and the gut all being in alignment.
And when they're congruent, he's right with them. When it's discombobulated,
he's not. He backs out it dropped, right. I think
he's very good at that equidetector place. Okay, so the
equad detector, And then we talked about the pantomimer. What
type of healing or do you have a story about
a pantomime horse.
Speaker 2: Yeah, Gestalt is very experiential. We set up experiments with
people and they're working through different things that have happened
in their life. A lot of deep trauma work and
that kind of thing. When I think of pantomime er
most recently, I think of a client of mine, Angelica,
and she had she was fifteen when she was pregnant
with her first daughter. Parents made them merry, so they did.
They had two more kids, and he was highly abusive,
not a little but the real deal to prison for
twenty six years. So you know, you have to be
hugely violent with your wife and children for the courts
to do that kind of action, take that kind of
serious action. And so here she was these several years later,
kids are growing up they're late teens at that point,
and she's taken a look at her life and who
she is, and she was feeling again bad about herself
somehow around it all, she had done nothing but be
a great mom to these three girls, but she kept
taking the responsibility of like, they grew up without a dad,
and that's my fault and all this stuff.
Speaker 3: And so I.
Speaker 2: Built a house out of what I call flower boxes.
They're basically like PVC poles set on their side with
flowers in them, so like you'd use for a walk
over pole or something with horses. And I put four
together in the middle of the round pen, making it
sort of a little house. And I said, step into
your house. And I had three women there at the
group that were helping me. So she's standing in her
house and I said, and here comes your first baby.
And I had one person step into the house with her,
one woman, and I said, this is your daughter, so
and so, and here you are. And Gabriel takes that moment,
knowing the piece. He's brilliant panomimer, he's seen it all
and what she's talked about him, and Gabriel's the horse. Yeah, yes, sorry,
Gabriel horse. He walks right in between the the mother
and the woman playing the baby just boom, just barges in,
not politely and just moves her over and stands in
the house. And so I said, is that what that
felt like? She goes, oh, definitely, says that's what that
felt like. When we process through that, we ended up
putting the second daughter in, and he does it again.
He opens takes his hoof and he opens the box
and gets right in the middle. It's kind of all
about him, and they get all to the sides and
he's taken up the whole box, right.
Speaker 3: So we put the.
Speaker 2: Third went in and the third daughter in. She comes in,
he comes over, he starts to come in, and she went, no,
you stay out there.
Speaker 3: Just natural.
Speaker 2: She didn't think it was her husband. She just said
to the horse, no, stay out there, stay out there.
She knew nothing about horses. And he stopped and he
looked at her, and he starts to come in again.
She goes, no, you stay out there, stay out there.
And I said, Angelica, is that what you did? Is
that when you said enough is enough? And I'm going
to get the police involved and I'm going to speak
to it. And he's going to go to prison. She goes, yes,
that's exactly what that felt like. Just he was big
and imposing and all of this. So I never let
my horses wear the black hat for very long. I
like them to be in the happier side of things,
right right, right, Well, once she got that, I said,
step on out a second, and I said, now I
want you to meet Gabriel as the protector of you,
and not not this playing your ex husband. Let's him
be the protector. She's walking in the circle and he
goes over to her, hoax his head over her shoulder,
pulls her body into him, and then he holds her
like just this beautiful, closed horse eyed hug, and she
wraps her arms around him and just cries her heart out.
Speaker 3: So he knew, he knew.
Speaker 2: And to miming apart, it's not who I am, right
And to miming apart, he's not a rude horse at all.
He would nevers. You and I were just standing in
that box having this conversation, right it never barged into
that box. He exactly what he was doing. Wow, I
only have about one million stories like that. Yeah, that's wonderful, wonderful, Okay.
And then The other one you mentioned was vibrational healing.
What horse is an example of that? I think most
of mine, but I I'm very honored to have a
mayor that's been with me a long time. Her name
is Rhiannon Gypsy Van or Mare, and we we are
My teacher in me now here that we are somatic
creatures and they are somatic creatures. So we have many, many,
many energy systems. Some people think of chakras, which is
the main seven, and horses have them as well. They
have two additional over us, but they have them as well,
and there is a magic between the alignment in that
and what many horses are able to do is elevate
the actual tone of the chakra for the human. So
humans speak, we think of reiki. We do reiki. Doing
reiki on a horse that's sick or hurt, I'm all
for it. Doing reiki on a healthy horse. Know that
your horse is laughing at you, because hey, a reiki masters.
They do it's so much better than we can. So
they're going, oh, that's so cute, she's doing that. Well
they will take I've done it with actually with.
Speaker 3: Sound too. You can't get the tuning fork, thank you.
Speaker 2: We can get the word many swhere, I've hit a
tuning fork show bring that part of her chakra field
over and literally change the So if it's m she'll
raise the sound and that's what they're doing. So working
with a client, she will oftentimes be the one that
puts the bow on the piece. Like after they've cried
and they've processed, I set them in the center of
the pen and I help them hyper ground to the
ground and get quiet inside themselves, and then she'll go over.
She'll work on somebody for maybe thirty minutes, aligning the
part of her chakra body to theirs and then raising
that vibration. She lowers her head, closes her eyes, holds
it really tight. Then she comes up. She moves to
another spot and she works on that. It's fascinating to watch. Well,
most horses will work on the sound of the chakra.
For people that make those changes, She's just developed over
several years with me, she has developed her her own thing. Boy,
I don't mess with it. If I try, I try
to say, rihann and we need to wrap up now
for lunch.
Speaker 3: She the eagle eye. Well, we're not done yet, so.
Speaker 2: That's worried and I think everybody could go home and
have an experience at home with their own horses.
Speaker 3: If they have a horse.
Speaker 2: That I could walk them through.
Speaker 3: If you're interested in me share exercise, well, I just
have one question before we do that, and that is
do the horses take on the energy in a way
that needs to be discharged? How do they process? Is
it just like flows through their main like winded through
their maine or how do how do they.
Speaker 2: They are in continual energy renewal. You know, when you
think about how horses communicate to each other, they are
doing it through that vibrational field. If you look at
wild horses, the alpha mares out front, the field is
a triangle. You know. They don't go past her. She's
not saying, hey, you guys, we got a hurry. She's
going They're following her body language. But they also follow
her sense. So when she says we're safe now, many
will lay down. The alpha doesn't lay down, but many
will lay down a rest and get their rest and
get their you know, they just know that's the world
they live in. They're very conscious of that. So the
moving of energy, they have no thought pattern that doubts it.
They have nothing in the way humans, we have all
that like, is that really happening? Do I really feel that?
You know, we have all that doubt stuff that gets
in our way. They're in full trust mode and vibrational
stuff passes through them. They know how to discharge it.
Sometimes they'll go roll. I don't usually put them back
in a regular stall. I want them to be out
where they can just have their horsey thoughts and clout
and roll and do what they want to do. They
don't hold onto things. You think about two mirrors and
a pasture that turn butt to button kick at each
other because they're mad over something, and they'll make so
much noise. The exel pissed off and their ears are back,
and it's a big kerfluffle. Scarce humans to even watch
it because they look like they're going to just hurt
each other so bad. But an hour later they're not
still brooding on that, they're not thinking about that, they're
not worried about that, and the next time they see
that mare, they're cool with it. Hey, Genie, I'm mostly
you know, they don't hold on to that stuff like
we do. That's that's our analytical mind, our quantitative, qualitative
mind that does comparisons. We hold on to stuff. Yes,
we do for years and years and years. Yeah.
Speaker 3: Great, okay, well let's chat. If people have a horse
and they live with their share their life for the horse.
So they tell us what how people could be good
to think about this for themselves.
Speaker 2: Well, if it is safe for I'll speak directly to
your audience, if it is safe for you to do so.
So you have to uh not do this with a
yearling or a two year old. You know, get a
mature horse around you, and you're able to do it
with just that horse, and you in any size pen
or paddock or field. Uh. The reason I say that
is because you get multiple horses around somebody that can
be unsafe.
Speaker 3: So I want you to be.
Speaker 2: One on one with a horse. Loosen an arena wherever,
and then notice when you walk out there and you
stand still, and you pay attention to your feet, and
you pay attention to being as grounded as you can
allow yourself to be.
Speaker 3: Just stop.
Speaker 2: What they see with us, Genie is we're in constant movement,
constant thoughts, getting things done and doing this and doing that.
So we're like a rabbit to them, right, picture how
a rabbit feels, so we feel like a rabbit energy.
So when we stop and we ground and center our energy,
they're fascinated. They're like, Genie's standing still, you mind as quiet?
Genie know this, We can probably go see her if
she's still standing still, So they will come up. Most
horses will then drop their nose down to your left
shoe first, then they move it to the right. Then
they move it back to the left, back to the right.
Then you left me right me, left hip, right hip.
They do an assessment of your energy. And if you
stand still and you don't talk and you stay grounded,
most horses will walk around you and check around you
as well to the other facets. So that's one your
your folks with our horses, and to see that they're
taking in information from to each side of their brain,
because their brain works very differently than ours, so they're
taking in all that data and then they take it
in on the other side, on the intuitive side, so
going through all that data.
Speaker 3: The other one.
Speaker 2: That we do, and I've done it in front of
huge audiences at horse expos is have the person enter
the arena thinking math. Now, I don't like maths, so
I do one plus one is two and two plus
two is four. Like that, Just thinkright as you're walking around,
most horses will completely ignore you. So they're out in
the field, they're going to ignore you. Then start thinking
about something in your physical body that hurts, and really
get into the field. I might arminousling right now. Really
into the feel of that torn rotator cuff, you know,
get you. Most horses will pick up their head look
at you, start approaching towards you, or at least pay
a lot of attention. But if you can move into
your heart, into some sad day you've had, or a
hurt in your past or anything like that, boom, they
are right there and very present. At that I think
proves to everybody you know this they care about how.
Speaker 3: We feel they were. That's very powerful. We can to
change it. That still very powerful. Yeah, or almost at
a time. But I want to hear about the story
about Gus before we let you go.
Speaker 2: Yeah, we were asking how do they learn to do this?
I think they do it innately. But Gus was this
gorgeous palomino belonged to a gall that was boarding at
my place, and so we were helping him have his
first piece of work with someone. And this client in
the pen was a student of mine, so she understood
we were doing this for the horse. So I asked
her to move into her own, you know, body field
and really ground herself and all. And I asked him,
and I have it all on film. It is so cute,
and I said, Gus, you're over here by me, where
should you be? And he turned around, he looked at her,
and he brought his head back around, looked at me,
and he said, you've got it. That's exactly where you
should be. That's your client. You should go over there.
He looks at her again, he looks back at me,
takes a big breath.
Speaker 3: And he goes over there.
Speaker 2: Now he's not what to do when he gets there, right,
but he has them kind of all over and he's
checking everything out and he comes back like a football
player to the coach. He goes back to Okay, So
I said, well, why are you back over here? Where
should you be over there? But you know, I don't
know what I should be doing, so I'm not sure.
I said, you just do your heart. You do whatever
feels right in your heart. As long as she's safe,
you just give it your best shot. Okay, and he
goes back in. Finally, the third time, he starts to
come toward me, and I go, no more time outs,
you're at work. Did not come to the coaching line,
and he just stops and he looks at me, and
then he turned right around, right back to the client.
He became a phenomenal gestal horse. But getting that was
his insecurity. You know, really just kind of do whatever
I think I'm supposed to do. Whatever you like doing.
They're very kind, very sweet, and very kind creatures for sure.
Speaker 3: Oh it's wonderful, Yeah, wonderful. Well, great story. Well, I've
been speaking with Melissa Pierce and she's the author of
Touch by a Horse. Now, if people want to get
in touch with you, do you do any remote work
with people?
Speaker 1: I do.
Speaker 3: I do.
Speaker 2: We have a podcast Touched by a Horse. My husband
and I do that, and I have a two year
training program for people that want to learn to do
my method of gestalt with horses. Everything's on our website
Touched by a Horse dot com. It came after Touched
by an Angel, that old show that was on TV.
Touched by a Horse. All the information of all three
of our programs and everything that we do is on there.
I see one on one clients here, but I'm blessed
to have three hundred certified practitioners of my method around
the world and so primarily the US, Canada, but in
eleven other countries. So if people are looking for something,
especially trauma work, if you have a background of sexual abuse,
or you've been a veteran, or you've had a house
burned down, or all the myriad of things. A tough
divorce life is full of those things. This is the
work that is quick. One or two visits you feel
completely whole again, So that would be great. And on
my website they can find a practitioner near them, or
they can send me an email tell me what they're
looking for and I'll send them directly to who is
in their area and would help them out.
Speaker 3: Great wonderful. Alyssa Peers, author of Touch by Horse, thank
you so much for being with us today. We'll have
to have you on again because I know we've just
scratched the surface. Thank you, Genie anytime. Love to all right,
all Matte, you've been listening to the Human Animal Connection.
We'll see you on the next episode by for now.
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