#46 The Healing Power of Breath with Holly Barnett

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:00:03-00:00:12]
On this episode, we're talking with Holly Barnett, founder of Enterobreath and professional breathwork facilitator with a background in applied neuroscience.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:00:13-00:00:27]
The best thing I can do is come at this like really clear state of offering and communication versus like, I want to make the horse better and I want to make the owner happy. And that just opened up a whole new playing field for body work.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:00:28-00:01:34]
Welcome to the Equestrian Connection podcast from WeHorse. My name is Danielle Crowell, and I'm your host. You may recognize Holly from episode 31, where we chatted about saddle fit. Holly has been a saddle fitter and equine body worker for two decades, but was beginning to notice a shift in herself and a shift in the way she worked with horses. When faced with a sudden surgery, she used her knowledge in breathwork and applied neuroscience to create a modality to reduce stress, manage her emotions, and regulate her nervous system. This method prepared her for a major surgery and created the ideal internal environment for healing. Holly's method, which she calls intero-breath, is a practice that combines the profound healing and regulating properties of interoception and breathwork. In this episode, we discuss enteral breath, how it can change our relationship with our horses, how it can impact us as equestrians and humans, the ability to heal, and so much more. So let's dive in. Holly, welcome back to the WeHorse podcast. I'm super excited to speak with you again.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:01:34-00:01:35]
Thank you.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:01:35-00:01:56]
So the last time you were here, we chatted about saddle fit and we talked a bit about body work as well. And now I have you back to discuss breath work. neuroscience and all of those things. So do you want to talk a little bit about how this change came about and this journey?

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:01:57-00:04:38]
Sure, absolutely. I'd love to. So what people don't know much, well, I've shared it along the way, but I haven't spoken about it a lot. And that is that neuroscience has been like this side passion and this side curiosity that I've been exploring for well over 10 years. So it was always there in the background. And honestly, I never imagined it coming to the forefront. So and I kind of the way it goes. But I read a book about 12, over 12 years ago called The Power of Habit. And it just unlocked these questions, mostly because the first chapter sort of irritated me by kind of saying, you're not as in charge of the decisions you make as you think you are. And I was like, yes, I am. And so I was like, what are you talking about? And so then I was like, And the more I went through the book, the more I was like, oh my goodness, our brain is the most complex structure in the universe. And I barely know Jack about it. So I have what I like to call an insatiably curious brain or mind. And I just, when I like get interested in something, then everything else kind of gets pushed to the side. And I just, you know, indulge in learning about this area of interest. And so I started back then podcasts weren't like, quite where they are now. So I'd be listening to podcasts and some of the people like, oh, it wasn't the most common thing like it is now. And so I had like the podcast going on it. I started reading all the books on neuroscience. Coursera has like neuroanatomy courses you can take for free. So 10 years ago, I was taking those and just I bought the Netter's Anatomy and the Coloring Anatomy. So I just started like learning about the brain. I was just like fascinated by it. And then I had also taken an applied neuroscience course because I thought that would be great too. And I just like took it and didn't do anything with it. So that was about 10 years ago. And then, so, you know, I drove quite a bit. So my little truck was my rolling university. And a couple years ago, I started to dive into breath work as well. Again, just curious about it. And even two years ago, I was leading free breath mechanics classes every Tuesday on Zoom, just for the fun of it, because I'm like, this is really neat information. Still having no idea that I would be transitioning full time into it. It was just a curious thing. So it happened organically. And yeah, I mean, there's a bit more to the story, depending on how much you want to chat about on that. But that's like the cold notes version.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:04:40-00:06:17]
Are you feeling inspired to put as much focus on your end of the partnership as your horses? Here at WeHorse.com, we have over 150 courses with top trainers from around the world, covering everything from dressage to starting young horses to jumping and cavaletti training to groundwork and horsemanship. And we also have courses designed to help you become more grounded and present with and without your horse. This includes courses like the Mindful Equestrian and Matwork for Equestrians with yoga teacher Kathy Woods. Check out WeHorse.com for a free seven-day trial to get started. And as a member, you get access to everything in our WeHorse library to watch whenever you want. And we also have an app, which means you can download a course or video to watch without Wi-Fi, which is perfect for those days at the bar when you just want a quick dose of training inspiration before your ride, or in this case, to ground in and feel a little bit more mindful and present before you meet your horse. So what are you waiting for? Go to WeHorse.com and check out our free seven day trial to access our WeHorse library. See if it's a good fit for you and start training with our amazing trainers today. We can't wait to see you in there. And now back to the episode. So let's let's chat a little bit more about that. You were a saddle sitter, you were a body worker. Saying you were a body worker doesn't even do justice to like the education that you have. How did you start to think these can work really well together?

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:06:18-00:09:19]
One of the things that happens with my body work, and it's been noticed by a lot of people who worked with me, and they're just like, something's Like they just couldn't exactly explain, but all of a sudden their horse is really into the session and it looks like I'm not doing anything. Like my hands are, you know, barely touching the horse sometimes. And a lot of it is because I had been dropping into my sense. So very, even though I spent a lot of time outside of the bodywork sessions, I would say in a dysregulated state, A-type, overachieving, perfectionist, you know, all the things that many of us are familiar with. there was a level, like the body work became kind of this place where I practiced regulation. And I didn't know that was happening in the beginning, but in order for me to show up as the best to honor the horse and with what I knew, I just felt like in order to, because the horse doesn't make the appointment, right? Like the owner makes the appointment for the horse. So it's kind of thrown at them, whether or not they're in the mood to receive it that day. There's pressure from the owners. They're hoping for really good sessions, really good results, right? I have pressure to deliver and the horse has all this double pressure to like, what is this? And it's getting done to them. So I'm like, I always try to come in with these like awareness levels and how could I like diffuse that a bit or, you know, neutralize the situation and I just started uh with this really calm approach where I would like be talking to them in this um way that it's I'm working with you I can offer you you can take it or you can leave it and I just removed all pressure to for myself to deliver I'm like of course I've trained in like modalities plot on that sort of cultivated through organically that my horse taught me. So I have skills and maybe I'm not the right person for this horse. To date, every horse seems to have taken away quite a bit, but it really isn't how I deliver the approach. And that is not putting that pressure on them. I don't feel the pressure from the owner, even if they have they have some attachment to the outcome of it. And I actually want to say that Cheryl Gibson, the founder of Equibo, she first dropped that into my awareness as I was like, I think it was the first day in class learning to become an Equibo practitioner, was drop your level of attachment to the outcome. And that just like echoed in my ears. And it took me about a year of conscious application for me to be able to do it. I was so attached to doing a good job. like ridiculously attached and I allowed the outside pressures, but I did get results and I wasn't putting the attachment on the horse. It was more on myself, but at the same time, if you're that horse is picking up on that. So I just like, okay, the best thing I can do is come as this like really clear state of offering and communication versus like, I want to make the horse better and I want to make the owner happy. And that just opened up a whole new playing field for body work.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:09:21-00:09:41]
I love that. I had to mute myself and I'll probably go back to mute once I ask this question. My dog, we feed him with a ball. So all of his food goes into a ball and he rolls the ball around the floor and then he gets it and he's chosen to roll his ball at this moment. So I apologize if you can hear the background.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:09:41-00:09:42]
That's totally fine.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:09:43-00:10:00]
So intero breath, and I want to go deeper into what intero breath is and all of the things around that. But before we do, let's break down the two words that combine it. So starting with the interoception, what is interoception for everybody listening?

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:10:00-00:12:43]
Yeah. So interoception is really your perception of your inner world. And the process of interoception, we are, there's a sensing process. there's an interpreting and there's an integration piece. So, so often you live life focusing on the external world, exteroception. And we talked about the mind body. I talked about that being just one thing. Mind body is one thing and the communication with that. And most of, civilization, especially because of modern lifestyles, many things are designed in modern lifestyle to be focused outside of the body, we lose that level of communication. So interoception can be sensing of physical sensation. One of the things I suggest to people at the beginning of breath class is to drop in is can you sense your heart? Can you sense where it is in your body? Can you sense it beating without putting your hand on it? Can you just Sense your heart's pace. And some people can and some people cannot. And it doesn't mean anything. It just means that maybe there's room to develop a stronger connection to that area of your body and that sensing of your body. but so often the first response is oh my goodness I'm like I have a dysfunction here or whatever and so we're also really I'm really conscious with practicing interoception of what we are tying our emotions to so if we don't feel that without putting our heart on our chest and we associate that with that that's not really conducive environment like so it's really important for me that the interoception is shared in a way that we're really conscious of the emotions of the experience as well um interoception actually can involve and include the areas of the autonomic nervous system so your emotional areas and it's not uncommon for emotions to to come up i was talking to someone else i'm still like learning how to really refine my language around. And I also get very excited when all these ideas come forward. But when you're doing different types of, you know, self-development work, you can kind of go in and articulate things and talk about them or analyze them. And I'm like, breath is a little bit different. It sounds very subtle and it has this like really soft appearance. It can have this really soft appearance when you're doing like the conscious mindfulness breathing, but it's like a scoop that goes in and like brings whatever up to the surface. So it's like, It can be pretty profound, pretty uncomfortable at times. So it's the combination of the sensing of the inner world and then also bringing breath into it is the intero breath.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:12:44-00:12:53]
And so breath work, can you explain a bit what breath work is? Because we all, we breathe subconsciously. So what is breath work?

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:12:54-00:16:14]
Exactly. That's a great question. I attended the first biohacking expo in Burlington in January. And I just loved because people were like, why do we need breath work? Like we already breathe. And I was like, exactly. So we don't necessarily have conscious awareness of our breath. And we sort of take it for granted because it's an autonomic process. Why do we have to think about it? And the fact of the matter is, is what is your most vital nutrient? What can you go the least amount of time without before you're in big trouble? Oxygen. Air. Right. So it's our most vital nutrient, and we give it the least amount of attention. And so the quality of the air is one thing. So the quality of the air we're breathing. And then our modern lifestyle tends to lead to breathing dysfunction, right? This is going to have huge ramifications, like the impairments from improper breathing. Like when you start realizing them and reading the list, it is just like all of that. It can actually manifest as really anything. So it's one of those like really broad spectrum descriptions. But at the end of the day, we know that there is optimal oxygenation of blood and tissues. And breathing dysfunction is going to give us suboptimal ranges. So for example, a lot of times breathing, people are over breathing, they're not breathing fully. So there's also the connection to the heart and your nervous system that's related to your breath pattern. So that's why it can manifest in so many different ways. It also affects the pH level of your blood. So We think about over breathing so we can only really metabolize so much oxygen. So if we're over breathing, then we can have extra free radicals and deal with that. We also imbalance our blood pH as well as the biochemistry between oxygen and CO2. We think of CO2 as just that waste product that we have to exhale, but the relationship, the ratio of oxygen to CO2 is important for the oxygen to leave the blood and get in oxygenated tissues. If we don't have the right balance now, that's not happening. So there's all these like little subtleties that come in and the majority of it is coming from modern lifestyle. I guess something between 80 and 95% of people have one form of breathing dysfunction. Mouth breathing is really, really bad news. We're actually just breathing in everything and not having anything get cleaned first. So we're just going from the outside world into our lungs. So no mechanisms to clean or hydrate and moisturize and humidify and temperature change the air. So breathing, you know, we think about an engine and air intake is the first. If your vacuum's plugged with the air not moving, it's not working. So we know air is important. So when we're thinking about optimizing wellness, breath needs to be the pinnacle. All the things are important. You can change your cellular health in a couple weeks with food, a week with proper sleep, a few days with proper hydration, and literally minutes with proper breathing.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:16:15-00:16:25]
So cool. What inspired you to... build this Entero Breath program for equestrians?

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:16:26-00:20:00]
The first part of it is probably something that might get me a little eyebrow raised, but there's, and myself always included in comments like this that are abroad, but I think that having horses is a big responsibility. It can be stressful. We know as soon as a horse is If they're not perfectly healthy, if anything's the littlest bit wrong, a little bit sore, like we just, ah, everything. Like the world is ending. The world is ending. So I actually was laughing because I've been kind of sharing this thought with a couple people. And, you know, as the horse bull jokes. It's like, oh, yeah, horse people are crazy. Or there's all these generalizations that are all being said everywhere. And I actually was like, yeah, why is that if we're joking about a concentration in it? And I actually do genuinely wonder if there is a relationship between horses, like being around horses and the level of dysregulation sometimes. Like it's a really good place if we feel dysregulated in the world. And I am like absolutely including myself in this conversation. We feel good around horses, but think about like they have this huge heart and they have this huge electromagnetic field around their heart. Like there is a degree of entrainment, of co-regulation that we can take part of. So I joke about that. But for me, I would see like I've worked with over 15,000 horses and riders. So I've had a really unique point of view, viewpoint on the situation here. And, you know, when some people would be around horses and they act differently, sometimes I'm doing a massage, the owner's there, they're not there. Like you just start to see the trainer reaction and how they are with other people. So we all have our own energetic signature and the way that we are and this level of nervous system regulation. And I was like, how beautiful would it be for the relationships where they're at already to be enhanced through more regulated nervous systems? Because it's something that we're taught in school. Like I don't blame any, like I didn't have these tools until I just happened to learn them because I did make it a focus point, but it's not commonplace knowledge. Like it'd be wonderful if nervous system regulation, emotional resilience, and breath work were taught in school. I think those are very important life skills. And I also think everybody that has a horse has this untapped, I don't want to say therapist because it's not about leaning on your horse to give you therapy. When I say co-regulation, the horse isn't fixing you. It's equally showing up and offering this level of emotional stability to one another and it's really beautiful because you can actually physically feel when the heart starts to resonate like co-resonate and it's like a very I think it's very healing and I think it's why some of the equine assisted programs working with like PTSD and trauma and anxiety are so helpful we've seen so many examples of it And I don't think it needs to be only in that setting. I think horses and riders of any discipline of any area of the industry could, you know, participate in this and it can be part of your grooming session. So with me, it's always part of all my body work sessions. And I didn't, I was doing it before I knew what I was doing. And then I kind of was like, oh, wow. And that's how Ontario breath itself came to be was, um, through an experience of myself going through a big regulation. And we can talk about that more if you like as well. But I was like, this would just be wonderful for every horse and rider relationship to be able to bring this to the table.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:20:01-00:20:44]
And did you find, you know, when first starting to, introduce it via body work sessions so you're there somebody let's say and you can correct me if i'm wrong somebody hires you to come in says okay i want you to do xyz with my horse um and while you're there maybe you start to the owner has no idea you're just incorporating some of this stuff in regulating yourself helping to regulate the horse at the same time did you start to notice okay By me regulating myself, I'm therefore assisting the horse in finding its sense of regulation. And then with both of us being regulated, the owner starts to get a sense of, like, did you start to notice that at all?

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:20:45-00:22:52]
Yeah, because I used to, like, I had a barn binder that was solely, I would put all kinds of neat information in it, interesting information in. solely to hand to the owner to look at while I worked on their horse just to like keep because the energetics um filling into the session I would say this is like early on back in the early days And then when I learned Equibo, like I would run to offer them, we have these four moves called the emergency moves that are over the upper thoracic. And it's kind of like a, like unplugging the upregulation. It's like, it just plugs you back into like a downregulation. It's pretty fast acting. So I'm like, yeah, just like go sit down and like think about how that feels. And you can share the experience with your horse. I found different ways because so often people, And also not just like chill out so I can work on your horse attitude, but like how wonderful for them to like have some of the experience as well. So it was kind of rooted in that. And I think now also I've been doing it for so long and I have a bit of a distinct style. So you kind of know what you're getting when you call me. And so now there's a bit more of, like, okay, what do you need to, like, give the right environment? And I'm like, yeah, you can stay. Just, like, bring your energy out of your head into your body and, you know, allow this to be whatever it's going to be. If you're kind of sitting there hoping and worried about things or whatever, just shelf that for the hour or however long. I like to do body work however long it is. Um, and it does make a huge difference when I was still doing saddle fitting, how I would get them to do that in the saddle, completely change the saddle fitting and the ride. So I was always kind of bringing the breath in and bringing actually in some of the interoceptive stuff. Um, even when they were in the saddle, trying saddles or getting the saddle refit, um, I'd be looking at things and it would still be a bit crunchy. I was like, ah, no, we're not quite there. It's still a little bit something else we can tune in. And then I would walk them through this process for their seat, for their chest and for their head and just kind of like bring this like mental internal alignment together. Then the horse can just pick up an extra gear and it's just like, oh, wow. And I was like, yeah. So it's like, what a great saddle.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:22:52-00:22:52]
Yeah.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:22:53-00:23:44]
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. But I was like, yeah. And sometimes it's just like, you want to really, you know, we want to define everything to a formula. And I'm like, there's a lot happening in every scenario. Like you've got a saddle, you've got a horse, you've got a rider, you have an emotional creature on the top and also on the bottom. We're putting a lot of pressure on that saddle. And that was the other reason for a little bit of the strict as I was like, When I'm showing up as a saddle fitter, like my lane is so defined, which is fine, except I have other areas that I can offer that are not being accessible. So I was like, okay, I need to, I need to put myself in a position where when someone wants to access these other areas of input that we can, we have the freedom and just sort of the, the idea around that that's what the appointment is going to be about. So, yeah. Yeah.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:23:46-00:24:05]
You briefly mentioned the heart frequency and I know that you can, you can speak to that a lot. And I love the stories you tell of like, I remember this one time and just, just also for those listening full transparency, I actually took a program with Holly. She hosted it with eight or 12 weeks.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:24:05-00:24:07]
I think it was 12 weeks. Yeah. Yeah.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:24:07-00:24:38]
I think it was 12 weeks. Yeah. It was a 12 week program. And yeah, It was phenomenal. We did breaths, but we also did so many other lifestyle things, and I had so many aha moments in it. So, yeah, I highly recommend checking out what Holly does as a little tangent because I can speak to it from a personal perspective that it's awesome. So can you tell us about heart frequency and tell the story about the rabbit that you told in our group? Oh, yeah.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:24:38-00:30:22]
Yes, yes. Gotta get out of love when the wildlife jumps in. Yeah. So yeah. So all February and tarot breath each month, we start a new theme. So I kind of weave a theme. I don't want it to get stale. And I also think it's an awesome opportunity to like bring this really interesting information that I have learned and picked up along the way. And it also becomes this like ongoing thread. So January we did frequency of emotions or emotional resilience. And February was frequency of the heart. And, The heart, just like the brain, became this area of fascination because, like many, I was like, oh, yeah, the heart is this muscle and it pumps blood because that's sort of the general consensus. And that is quite a minimalistic perception of what's actually happening in the heart space. So we know that we can measure heart. It is 10 times stronger than the brain. So when you walk in your energetic field is like reading the information. So like reading the room is actually a pretty true statement, but it's more from your heart. And when you have, when you have like, we call it in coherence and that's another favorite word to explore of mine, because even you can get a whole panel of experts on coherence and their definition is going to vary slightly. So, but basically coherence is that like, You're speaking coherently or you're speaking incoherently. We understand that pretty easily. And so all of your systems are communicating with one another. And it's easy to think that the brain is communicating to the body and telling the body what to do. You do this, you do this. It's like a control center. But it is a bio-directional communication line. So all of the systems or the organs communicate. have their own little mini brains and little mini networks. And they're communicating back information to the brain. So the brain's processing. The heart actually provides 10 times more information to the brain than the brain sends to the heart. So your heart is very much attuned to what's happening in the body when it's experienced incoherence. And so some emotions are going to be less coherent. And that's by design and it's not. a bad thing. Like we talked about resilience is the ability to experience something that's maybe irregular, erratic, or difficult, and then coming back to that emotional homeostasis. So anger, for example, would be an example of an emotion that you're going to experience and it has incoherencies. Like people that are really angry are not necessarily predictable, right? There's an unpredictable pattern to that energy that's moving. Emotions are energy in motion. So all that to say that that's affecting the heart and the heart rate variability. And when we stay in long periods of time in those incoherent states, that does have effects on our wellness and our wellbeing. And it's gonna create mixed messages. That's going to create an environment where cells aren't thriving as much. We have that incoherent pattern, the communication's not there. So things start to get messy and muddy and broken down versus when we work on coherence, which is one of the beautiful things in EnteroBreath is that we really bring these properties together and create that coherent inner environment. So it's like the communication lines are clear. And so, yeah, so it might be making me a bit angry. It's healthy to have anger. Anger is not a bad thing. It's living in it isn't good for you, but there's a reason it's unpredictable because it's something happening that makes you need to act fast and you need to be unpredictable. So it's like, so your heart's experiencing all of that, but if it's experiencing incoherence, We think about all of the Wi-Fi and all these things that are affecting our electromagnetic field. We want to have a practice that's kind of combating things that tend to pull us out of coherence. Even things like modern lifestyles, how often are we Focus on things that maybe don't make us feel great, depending on the state of the world or if we're in a relationship that's difficult or any matter of reasons. So having some sort of practice that brings you back into coherence and connection is actually a state of healing as well. So we have this inner healing process. energy. We access it through breath. We access it through acupuncture. So we know about this chi, this life force energy. It's the same energy that when you were a single cell organism, first fertilized egg, there's an energy of creating chaos or creating structure out of chaos. And that is the same energy that's like, okay, split into two, split into four. You're going to go be a crest cell. You're going to go be a stem cell. Like there's all these different, what is doing that? Like we don't have nervous systems yet. So what is making the call to differentiate cells at that point? That's this healing energy that's in all of us. And when we drop into a really still state of, and that we can feel that energy in our body, we amplify it and it increases our healing. So it's the key to self-regulation. So the frequency of the heart, when you're around somebody and you just feel really good around them, there's a reason, right? Like you feel safe because they're predictable. There's that general sense of feeling. So if more of us have that sense of coherence, then it kind of affects the world around us, our friends, our family, our pets. And then beyond that, our communities, and it just kind of keeps on rippling out. So it's a really big topic and probably a few directions to explain it. I love it.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:30:23-00:30:32]
Can you tell us about the, I think it was, I can't remember if it was the heart coherence or like, I remember it was like the Care Bear Stare.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:30:33-00:30:34]
Oh, yeah.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:30:34-00:30:40]
Same with the body work and the horse and the rabbit and all of that.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:30:40-00:33:09]
Yeah. So, like, that's that thing. Like, when you are in that state where you're, you know, and I was, like, we're bringing in, I used to think the state of gratitude was up. Yeah. too busy and I didn't really know what it was. And then all this gratitude chat sort of made me a bit irritated. I was like, oh yeah, the gratitude granola is like, you know what I mean? Like I just had this not, I didn't get it yet. And then when I started learning more and practicing and literally it started happening because I would be practicing. I just go sit in the paddock and practice working with my heart frequency. And I would just notice the horses, even if they were across the paddock, I would look up and they'd all have their heads low, but they'd be looking at me from across the paddock, just staring at me. And they'd kind of come and point their noses in and just want to hang out. And I was like, wow, I'm really starting to notice that when I work on myself in this way, when I say work, it doesn't really feel like, sometimes it feels like work, but you get to a point where it's like, you're just retuning yourself. Like it's like a tune in and out. And the animals really, what's fun is how much the animals reflect it back to you. And the one time I was heading out to the paddock and there's this wild rabbit, like literally only a couple of feet in front of me. Normally they will pause and then at the most opportune time, they'll just like buzz, like they'll leave really quick. And so I was like, oh, hey, buddy. So the horses were down in the paddock eating and I'm on the walk a little like halfway there. So I just dropped into my heart space and I just kind of like started pushing out my energy through my heart. So you're breathing through your heart, you're. thinking of a sense, like I was, you know, gratitude for visualizing the horses in the paddock. It was a beautiful day. There's this, like, little creature, this little rabbit. And so I just started sending him my heart energy. Well, and he's, again, he's literally so close to me. So doesn't he all of a sudden just kind of, like, do a little wiggle, readjust his feet, kind of like does, like, a little bit of a rabbit loaf? And he's, like, looking around, and he's hanging out. And it got to the point that I didn't want to disturb him because I was going to wander down and visit the horses or maybe bring one in. And I was like, I just love that he had that relationship, like moment connection with me that I turned around and I left him. And he walked away and didn't move. It was just wild because it's not been like any other wild rabbit encounter I've experienced, like. I love it. To see him like loaf out a bit. I was like, that was, that was really confirming. Yeah.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:33:10-00:33:30]
Yeah. I love it. You also recently released very limited and you have to apply equine consulting. And so if, if you decide you want to do a wait list and, you know, some people listening might be interested, can you tell us a little bit about what those involve and how those seem to be? Yeah. Yeah.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:33:31-00:36:46]
Truthfully, I loved what I did, and it was not a light decision to retire from saddle-fitting and bodywork, but it was a necessary one. And I also really needed a break. There were just so many moving parts, and sometimes it's good just to step back and give yourself a little bit of quiet time. And when I say quiet time, it was basically just going full-blown. full uh force into breath work but i i just look at so many um situations online sometimes or i had clients that were really open to like what i call the full gambit of the services i had to offer and that feeling of helping a rider overcome obstacles deepen their connection with their horse understand where the body work situations were understand the saddle it's a really holistic approach. And again, when you show up at the saddle fitter, you're like, we're just talking saddles here. And I'm like, well, we, we really also want to think about the fact that there's a TMJ issue and a hoof balance and, and, and, and, and, and so I don't say that I can come in and solve absolutely everything, but we do have a pretty good track record of getting a lot of things back online pretty quickly. So it's, it's a really unique opportunity to have someone come in unbiased. I'm no longer, I mean, I was never buying some even when I was selling saddles, but I don't have an inventory. I'm not coming with the saddles to try, but to really have a full look approach. So we're looking at gait. We're looking at posture. We're looking at muscle development and confirmation. And a lot of times we're trying to work with horses that are in compensation patterns and wondering why we can't get to the next level of success. That's because we need to get them out of the compensation pattern first. And they're just getting trapped more in there because if we're fitting a saddle to a horse that has a dysfunction and it's changing the whole shape and fit of their back or they don't have enough musculature to even carry a rider proficiently, then we're just going in circles around the drape. So really getting to the root of why things are the way they are. And sometimes people are actually in a good spot and they just want to amplify more. Like what can we do to optimize our performance? So it's a longer, lengthier appointment. We'd start with an onboarding call just to kind of get an idea of what the person's looking for and make sure I can deliver. And then we have like a several hour appointment. We have a start time and the end times when it ends necessarily. It's a few hours, like depending on what the horse is capable of receiving. And then we, you know, we look at the horse's nervous system. We look at, I teach them how to co-regulate as well. So we're doing the body work. We're blending in the breath work. We're looking at the saddle. There's different packages from base to including body work to including assessment under saddle, like the ridden assessment. And then because there's also areas that will present that are out of my scope of expertise, then I've aligned myself with some professionals that we can extend the consult to go outside of myself and that I would bring that information, consult with someone outside, and then we have the integration call a couple weeks after that just to make sure the game plans working out. And, uh, so it's like a big level up what it is.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:36:47-00:37:13]
And so from, from what I heard with that is that you are not only quote unquote using air quotes, quotes for those listening, um, fixing the horse, but you're also addressing things with the human as well. So the breath work, all of those things so that it's not like here I've, Again, quote, unquote, fixed your horse. Here you go. But then the rider then brings all of their stuff. So it's like you're kind of addressing both.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:37:13-00:38:24]
Yeah, like the one I did last summer, she was really in tune with herself already, really in tune with her body, working out, breath, doing courses for herself. And she still was having trouble breathing. activating, like dropping her right seat bone down. So her right seat bone was always in the air. And so she would do like all these things and she'd learn ways that she could like work on her body and then get it. But then if she didn't keep doing that workout the specific way, it would go back up. And so I said, okay, That's great. Let's just try something else. And I brought a mat out and sure enough, she's on the mat and we did the exercise and we did the breath with it. And she was just like, yeah, no, it's there. So there's just there's more than one way to get there. And sometimes having this different perspective helps. I like to think of it as like we kind of go through this mechanical, physical 3D way. And sometimes we need to embrace the fact that everything is energy and that we have this really complex inner orchestration within us that we can also do things differently.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:38:26-00:38:33]
Love that. Yeah. I'm just like, my brain is going, this is so smart. Like I love, I love that so much.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:38:34-00:38:34]
Amazing.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:38:35-00:38:44]
One more question, because I know it's going to get asked from those listening. Do you do distance sessions or is it only for people that you can travel to and physically touch the horse?

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:38:45-00:39:02]
So I've done some distance and it's worked really well. I haven't marketed it. And obviously the body work is more in person. And I actually have, when is this getting released? I have a little bit of a, It's going to get released this Sunday.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:39:03-00:39:06]
So at the end of the week. But yeah, we can give a teaser. Yeah.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:39:07-00:40:03]
So we've got a membership opening where it'll be more accessible to more people. So it's like a saddle fitting membership, saddle assessment. Let me rephrase that. Saddle assessment membership. And so people can join monthly and we will take, you know, the information from those that are members and then go through those cases together. So that'll be like a lower in-depth version. And then as far as the one-to-one, there's some in person and then I can discuss online. It just requires the person being able to get the documentation really. I spent years refining my documentation skills and, you know, There's even more I can do to improve on my personal ones. So it would take someone who's really going to take the time to document well, because I'm really good at observing videos and pictures, but there is always that room for misinterpretation because it isn't in the physical. Yeah.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:40:04-00:40:31]
Love it. yeah that's definitely a possibility yeah yeah okay super cool um i'm super excited for you with this membership that you're speaking about so i can't wait to learn more about that that's awesome if someone was brand new to all this let's say they're listening to this and they're like i don't even i don't even know where to begin this sounds really cool it feels like it's something that could help me and help my horse um but i have no idea where to begin what would you recommend

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:40:33-00:42:08]
So everyone has a little bit of an inner knowing of that direction of where is best for them. But that lack of connection or the outer focus will kind of muddy that knowing. So I would say this kind of lean back and say, like, am I more into the breath or am I more into learning the saddle? I do have foundations of fit live training coming up, which will be a deep dive for a few hours. and really going into posture. And then at the end of that, that's when we're going to open up the membership. But they could also, if they're like, I really can't decide, I want to learn about breath and I want to learn about saddles and how that all comes together, then there's a breath club membership as well. So I have breath club for equestrians and then saddle assessment for equestrians. And I will be having a special price if they want to do both memberships. The breath, there's eight classes a month and you can come to as little or as many, you get three plays as well. And then the saddle assessment will have like one webinar style training a month with the people submitting their saddles for assessment to share with the group. So we all kind of learn together, which is really nice. And then the other week is question and answer. So you can bring your questions, like whatever questions you have about things and then we'll publicly in our group kind of like share. So we all learn together. So there's, But I think if you're ready for the in-depth, it's a higher ticket service for the one-to-one consult. So that's someone who's like, yeah, I know I'm ready for like all the information. But I would start with either one or both of the memberships.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:42:09-00:42:24]
Awesome. I love it. And just this is me speaking personally to you, Holly. Yeah. You know I'm such a fan of yours. And I am just hearing these things that you're releasing and that you're doing. I'm so excited for you. And I'm so happy that you're bringing this out into the world.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:42:25-00:42:31]
Oh, thank you. That really means the world. Like really, truly. Thank you. Yeah. Genuinely receiving that. Yeah.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:42:32-00:42:59]
The last thing I want to ask you, do you have a personal experience, whether it's something that you personally experienced with this work or, or I should say, and, or do you have a story? It was somebody like a client or a horse, whether human or equine client or, that you witnessed such a positive change with this that you could share with us?

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:43:00-00:45:48]
Yeah, I have several. I'll refer to the one-to-one client I had last year. And when we started the session, and she was so open to everything I was bringing, which is like the perfect layout, the perfect environment. And we got to the appointment and we brought the horse in the barn and the horse spun and bolted out of the barn and left us both there. And she was just like, I just, I imagine that she was going to feel like, oh my goodness, I booked this like really big day. I invested in this. And then my horse just like left the building, like literally left the building. And so I looked at her, I said, no problem. And we went outside. The horse did not run back to his paddock and he did not run to the grass to eat because He was standing there in the driveway waiting for us. And I was like, isn't this interesting? So I looked at her, I said, well, I don't think that we're meant to start with the posture and the saddle. I really think he's letting us know that he would prefer we start with the nervous system regulation. So why don't we take him to the arena and let's start there? Because now I know at this point, she's going to need her nervous system to like come back down to earth too, because it's just, you know, it's just a natural response. And we go into the arena and we immediately start walking with him. I was like, is he okay to be loose? Let him loose. and allow him to like have the freedom to be with us, but go where he needs to go. Long story short, I was teaching her how to work with her heart space, work with her breath. He immediately started responding and he stopped, dropped and rolled. And I was, you know, I was like, okay, cool. He's in the grounding thing. And she just looks so like surprised. And I was like, what? And she's like, he, I've had him for years. He's never rolled in front of me. Like he doesn't roll. Like, he doesn't do this. And I was like, well, he does do this. He just, like, there's something. So that was, like, a really immediate, profound shift. And from there, the day just kept on getting better and better. And I think that, you know, I didn't have an agenda. Like, did I notice that, yeah, she invested a lot in this experience? And do I want to deliver? Absolutely. But I also was like, all that matters right now is this horse and his experience. Like, that's how this works. And so to be able to like step back, not make it about anything other than reading what he needed, because he was very, very clear, like, He was like, I mean, there wasn't any other horses in the barn. So that was, you know, but if he didn't want to be with us, he would have gone back to the paddock or gone and ate grass. He was literally just standing in the driveway, like not there. And I was like, this is great. He's so clear. And to have that experience. And then ever since our session, like I get follow-ups from her and she's out in the paddock doing the same thing. And I'm just like, oh, it's just such a beautiful relationship to see. And it was already a good one, but it just keeps blossoming now because we leveled up.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:45:49-00:46:04]
I love that. Absolutely love it. We asked you, we have the four WeHorse questions that we ask at the end of every podcast. And I know I asked them to you on your original podcast, but I want to see if maybe they've changed a little bit. And if they haven't, that's fine.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:46:04-00:46:11]
I don't remember them either. So you could say the exact same thing. So the first one, do you have a motto or favorite saying?

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:46:11-00:46:12]
I have a,

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:46:19-00:46:47]
Yeah, what is my motto? I meant to like look that up ahead of time. My motto like really truly is around like honoring the moment, like honoring the awareness of the moment, the feeling of the moment. So that's just sort of being it's like around the idea of being present. But it's also meeting yourself where you're at in the moment. But honoring the moment is kind of where I'm at with my motto these days.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:46:48-00:46:59]
I love it. Who has been the most influential person in your equestrian journey? It has to be a person. It doesn't. It could be a horse or anything.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:46:59-00:48:47]
I was hands down. My horse, Whiskey has, completely transformed what I thought the word equestrian even meant. He has just taken me on so many journeys. I'm very fortunate. I met him when I was 16 and he was three, fell in love. I waited until he was 19 to become a person. So I've had, he has turned 29. So I've had him for 10 years. When I met him, I was a massage therapist and I was a good massage therapist, but I knew I didn't have, there was more for me to learn. And I started looking and I started taking different courses. And then he was like my my practice horse. I didn't buy him to ride. He was already 19 and I kind of was like retired from the start. But when I was practicing, when I was learning, he was like, no, like he would literally I would be like, oh, maybe I feel this. Maybe I should do this. And he would step away and step right back. Step away, step right back. And we're talking months of his patience and my obliviousness of, like, trying to learn, like, what does he want? What does he want? And then one day I just started, like, letting the tissues kind of start talking to me and, like, telling, like, it wasn't me doing to them. It was guiding me. And I picked up on this inner, like, way to connect with the tissues and the nervous system. And then he was like, finally, you got it. So he taught me my greatest body work gift. And then we've had different stages in our horsemanship and learningship. And, you know, we learned how to do Liberty dancing stuff together. Like we just like had so many unique experiences, I think, because I didn't buy him to ride, but also like the body work, like he's the reason my before and afters are kind of like, how'd you do that? And it's that tissue. It's a conversation. It's that bi-directional level of that. So I would say him. Awesome.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:48:48-00:48:55]
If you could give equestrians one piece of advice, what would it be? Hmm.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:48:55-00:50:00]
One, what is the top one? I feel like listening to your horse is definitely one that we hear often, but to kind of bridge off that, uh, generic and important one, um, Trusting that inner knowing. I think that so many equestrians, and I feel like that actually might be the one I said last time, is that we, and that's where this connection to your inner body, it's your innate wisdom. We all have it. We all have it. And we don't necessarily live in environments that really promote listening to it. It's like, oh, you should do this, or everyone's doing this, or we've always done it this way. Your inner knowing, your inner wisdom is there's a lot for you to unlock. So in situations where it comes up, especially around your horse, because we all have very strong emotional connections to their wellbeing or, you know, we want to have a good ride and how good do you feel after a good ride in your day to day with your horse? Just, just trust your inner knowings. Tap into those, look at them, question, you know, invite them forward.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:50:01-00:50:27]
Yeah. I don't know if this is going to make sense or not, but I feel like, by listening to your horse, you're listening to yourself in this really weird way that it's like, if I can be so tuned in and be so present that I'm able to look at what they're telling me, then I'm Listening to it. I don't even know if that makes sense.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:50:27-00:50:37]
Totally makes sense because when you're speaking and doing and thinking, it's like an outward action. When you're listening, you're receiving. Yeah.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:50:38-00:50:48]
Much more eloquently said. The last one, please complete this sentence. For me, horses are... Oh my goodness.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:50:49-00:51:53]
For me, horses are... I mean, there's so many, like the teachers and they have just, they reminded me what love it. They reminded me how to love myself. They reminded me of so many things that it's not the quality of like, just how well I fit saddles or do body work. Like all these things that you, or the old, um, characteristics of the, you know, my working personality, um, you know, having just spent time with them as I, you know, got kind of ripped off the road for health reasons and then just sort of forced, like literally got sat down and just this new, it's like this tiny little sprout of knowing and they share, like when you're in your heart space around them, they just come up and reconfirm, reaffirm, and they share it with you. So they just, they are amazing. horses for me are a connection to our higher selves, our consciousness, our heart space. Like, yeah, there's, I'm still, still writing that one out, but I'll leave it at that for now.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:51:54-00:52:00]
I love it. Holly, where can people find you and how can they connect with you? And we'll put everything in the show notes.

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:52:01-00:52:36]
Amazing. Yeah. So I have, um, a Instagram account, um, And I have a couple of websites, so I will link those with you. But it's enterobreath.com for the breath work. And August Equine is where I have some of the equine offerings around like education. And, um, I've been trying to start a tick tock. I'll see if I get back into it. I just haven't been very consistent there yet. Um, but those are the, the Instagram and then also on Facebook. Those are the main ways.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:52:37-00:52:40]
Awesome. We'll, we'll link all of that. And, um,

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:52:40-00:53:08]
if I I'll see if I find you on TikTok and I'll link that too so that if anybody if you do get into it and then then it is there for those yeah the TikTok I really want to play with highlighting breasts and horses because like playing with your breasts and with the horses and sharing some of the experiences there so it's going to be hopefully more of a story time thing um I had a camera the day the rabbit was out that would have been on there absolutely yeah just really you know

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:53:09-00:53:38]
highlighting and showing people that there's like when you really get into breath around your horses and just seeing how they respond it's a lot of fun that will be a very cool account for all of us to follow amazing thank you i am so glad that uh that we were able to get you back on here for this episode thank you so much for your time um i've enjoyed myself immensely and i know those listening uh will get a lot of benefit from this too so thank you so much holly i really appreciate it

[SPEAKER 1]
[00:53:38-00:53:41]
Thank you for the invite and the honor. Truly. Yeah.

[SPEAKER 2]
[00:53:42-00:54:16]
Thank you for listening to this episode of the Equestrian Connection podcast by WeHorse. If you enjoyed this episode, it would mean the world to us if you could leave us a rating and review as well as share us on social media. You can find us on Instagram at WeHorse underscore USA and check out our free seven-day trial on WeHorse.com where you can access over 175 courses with top trainers from around the world in a variety of topics and disciplines. Until next time, be kind to yourself, your horses, and others.

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