A 6-Week Friendship Program: 1.5 hours/week
We are all too aware of the challenges facing young people today – these include the pressures of social media, unavoidable pressures at school, controversy in the wider communities, and families dynamics – compounded by the lasting effects on one’s social development and ability to confidently engage with others caused by prolonged isolation during lockdowns.
Schools are not equipped to manage this wide-scale issue. Attempting to develop resilience and social skills in environments where many others are feeling some degree of social anxiety is more likely to produce more of the same. Neuroscience tells us that stressed individuals release stress chemicals that are literally absorbed by others.
Maybe a herd of horses is the answer?
Horses have a lower resting heart rate than humans, and the electromagnet energy field of their heart can be measured up to 5 meters away. A herd of well-adjusted horses naturally syncrhonise their heart rhythms and produce a collective energy field that literally co-regulates and soothes our heart rhythms and lowers our stress levels.
Horses have codes of behaviour that promote safety, harmony, respect, and cooperation that have enabled them to not only survive but thrive for over 60 million years. Could we learn from?
No other program offers what horses can. Given the opportunity, horses are forgiving, non-judgmental, and patient which makes them perfect learning partners for participants to safely experiment and learn essential social skills that they can immediately apply in their human relationships.
Horses offer unconditional acceptance – which enhances one’s sense of self-worth. They also teach us about boundaries, safety, respect, communication, body language, empathy, leadership, trust and authenticity.
Our learning and therapy horses are experienced
Our horses have lived together for many years, and have established roles, friendships and positions within the herd. They are not ridden, and while they are conditioned to be comfortable and safe around humans, they are not trained to submit to a human. They will respond and engage when they feel safe with us and we embody necessary leadership and social relationship qualities – such as respect, confidence, authenticity, empathy, among others.
Horses are patient and compassionate, but they are strict teachers! They will show us and show us until we get it ‘right.’ If our communication is not clear, or we have weak boundaries, or we are sending mixed messages by not being authentic, they will show us what we need for them to engage. They are also naturally curious and playful which make them valuable learning partners.
About the program facilitators
Candice and Cindy are passionate about integrating the latest research in neuroscience with innate herd wisdom for participants to learn through engagement, play, and group interaction.
Through specialised program design, psycho-education (learning about our nervous systems and stress responses), skillful facilitation, and asking insightful and relevant questions they steer participants experience, engagement, and awareness. Asking the appropriate question makes all the difference. For example, “What does the horse need from you right now?” This question invokes reflection on:
- safety, and what others need (empathy)
- how are we being or what are we doing (self-awareness, and impact of self on others)
- relationship dynamic (social engagement – e.g. what are the social cues our body is giving),
- what behaviour change could be made (action and responsibility).
What participants learn with the horses directly translates to their lives and human relationships
Participants will develop awareness, emotion regulation skills, and strategies that will enable them to form healthy, sustainable relationships, and engage in group and community activities. Through their own reflection and the unfiltered, biofeedback from the horses, participants can learn the many facets of self-awareness, social dynamics and engagement. Participants become, confident, self-aware, and well-adjusted individual with life skills to navigate the complexities of human relationships.
There is no riding, horsemanship skills are not taught, anyone can attend regardless of fear or physical limitations, and participation is by choice – for both horses and humans