Often when a client comes out to work with the horses, we walk out into the pasture with the herd with no particular horse in mind, no particular activity scheduled. As we breathe in the sweet air and feel it fill our bodies, we step into “horse time”, that kind of time that just is, open and spacious without pressure to perform. Often it seems as if nothing is happening. As a human being, I want something to happen for my client, but as an equine guided coach, I’ve learned to manage myself and just drop into that spacious place of being, keeping myself and my client present in the moment. As we watch and wait, things begin to shift. A hawk flies over. A horse comes forward. A feeling comes up. An action occurs. All of ...

Many clients who come in for coaching report that they feel a little deadened, overwhelmed or burned out and wonder why. With very little probing, it often becomes clear that they have become separated from their creative soul. After all, it is a busy, productive world we live in, and art, music, dance and dreaming don’t seem to fit.

I’ve been coaching for a long time now, and I’ve found that creativity and coaching go hand in hand. I’ve always been interested in the creative arts, but I, too, wandered away from the joy and aliveness playing with paint and sound and movement and words can bring. I rediscovered my creativity through Julia Cameron’s wonderful book “The Artist’s Way”. Her ...

I visited the doctor this week for my annual physical. The check-in nurse saw my journal. “What are you writing?” she asked. “I’m writing about going sane,” I said. It took her a moment. “Oh. As opposed to going insane. I get it.” And she proceeded to tell me how so many more teenagers are coming in with depression. “I wonder if it’s all the bad news about the war and the economy,” she mused. “Maybe,” I answered.

But I really think it is a direct result of the constant stimulation that kids—and the rest of us—are expected to handle.  Always available by phone, text or email: immediate response required. Days filled with non-stop activity. Pressure ...

After the Baroness, my dear horse friend of twenty-five years, died, I wasn’t able to take care of another horse for a while due to health issues (that are now fine) and the financial tangle that ensued.

At the end of 2011, I had a strong sense that it was time to invite another horse into my life, one  who would be special to me. I have great horses in my coaching work and treasure those relationships, but none of those horses are “my own.”  I had no idea how having my own horse again would come about or how I would support a horse if it did—I was still chipping away at those medical bills— but I knew it was time and that it would work out.

Come January, 2012, I received a video of a young woman ...