Why horsepower works so well and quickly in coaching

'Crack'. My buttock hits the ground as my horse literally runs out from under me in the arena. I lie on the freezing ground, then full of sand fixed in an ambulance, on a hard scanning table and in a hospital bed. 'A complicated broken back, you'll hear more tomorrow, don't move anything' is the cold message. 

That night, alone in my hospital bed, I cry silently. Not from the pain, or the possibility of paralysis, but at the thought of not being able to ride again. A few days later, a handsome trauma surgeon screws a scaffold into my back; two weeks later, he discharges me from the VU hospital with the words ‘Never ride a horse again, you can do anything else’. It is as if a piece in me is dying. I cannot and will not miss in my life the feeling to be one with a horse and to forget everything around me. 

The horsepower that broke my back also abruptly interrupts my flying pace of life. I lie flat on my back, needing help for everything, and rehabilitate literally step by step for months. After four weeks, I seek the warmth and support of the horse that caused me so much pain again and wonder what she wants to tell me? I mourn for the deceased rider in me and, encouraged by my dear husband, start the long desired two-year training to become a systemic horse coach. I can be one with a horse again, but in a different way. Meanwhile I understand the powerful message of the horse now five years ago: a little less speed in your life makes it more beautiful and better. 

For three years now I regularly stand as a professional horse coach, with a coachee and a horse in the arena. Together our eight legs are firmly on the ground, there is nothing floaty about that. I let coachees see and experience the wisdom of the horse, nothing more than that. I don't have to know it, you don't have to understand it directly, we see and feel it happening together. It can be grand and impressive, or subtle and almost magical. You don't have to share your story; if the solution was there, you wouldn't be standing here. Together we follow the horse that effortlessly works for you. The horse knows you better than you know yourself and releases something in you that makes you stronger, healer. 

Does that sound vague? That's the censoring of your extremely well-developed human brain. It brings you a lot of good, but it also makes you miss a lot. Your head can't stand the fact that there is so much more than it can perceive, understand or articulate and therefore wants to tell you that it's floaty. 

Take for example the principle that everything is connected to everything else. Horses have been working with this naturally for millions of years, always and everywhere. While our modern science quantum physics discovered that principle only recently. So...do you listen to the censorship of your brain that drives you crazy or do you dare to be open to other wisdom. Like that of a heavyweight who, with four legs firmly on the ground, has your best interests at heart?

The power of horses is that they effortlessly perceive and share their wisdom, without judgment, directly through body language. They let us see and feel things what our heads can't reach out to. They do this naturally to make the other stronger, so that we are stronger together. It is that simple, anyone who is open to it can see and experience it. This applies to you and to me, as a human being and as a professional.

Time after time I see that within an hour something happens with the coachee. Something that sets in motion a lasting change for the better. I dare to say that after my own experiences as a coachee, and about one hundred horse coaching sessions as a coach. Coachees say, for example, that they have more energy, are happier, remain calm when there are hassles in the family or are able to deal better with their dominant boss. 

My fall was a painful coaching to make a lasting change in my life rhythm. I am grateful for my current partnership with horses to allow others to experience their wisdom in less painful ways. 

I would like to grant everyone an experience with a horse as a coach. Feel welcome, alone or together with a friend, partner, colleague or team.