Skip to main content

Brandon & Kokanee

When people hear “let the horse do the talking,” they often do not take it as seriously as they should. Brandon, a quiet boy who never talked much at school, came to our program with a very talkative attitude. It was very surprising for the teachers. He began to break even more out of his shell after working with one our horses, Kokanee.

During the 5th program, Carolyn put everyone into groups. Brandon was not happy about this at all. It was not long after that I heard a whimper coming from the wall. I looked over and little Brandon was standing there crying. Unsure, how to proceed or what to do-as I have never had a crying child at my program before- I decided moving was the only thing to do. It was important for me to move as it releases, just like a horse. So I go over to him and asked him what was wrong. He explained to me that he was upset because the others had taken over Kokanee.
   
After taking a few breaths, Brandon and I walked back over to his group where they were working with Kokanee. I looked at Kokanee and I asked him “who do you think should be brushing you right now?” Kokanee moved his head right to the direction Brandon was in. It was clear then that Kokanee knew exactly who he wanted to be brushing him.
   
By me directly asking Kokanee, it allowed him to give us answers instead of me making an assumption. Always talk to your horses, they know best.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Our Journey Around the World: Part 16 - Sydney, Australia

Sydney: A Dreaded Place to a Dream Place Off to Sydney we go! We were initially nervous to see how this time would go as last time we were not big fans. We stayed in downtown Sydney and did not enjoy it at all because lets be real… We are not city people! But we knew we had to go get people certified in Sydney, so for the sake of our business we did it. We finally arrived in Sydney, far later than expected, but everything still worked out. Our lovely Australia Instructor, Jane Hemingway-Mohr, whose house we would be doing the program at, was there to pick us up and she greeted us with such a beautiful smile! Since we arrived so late we were unable to see the place where the program would take place the night before so we had no idea what to expect the next morning. Staying positive, we eagerly waited for morning as we were curious where this program would take place. Morning finally came and Jane came to pick us up bright and early to take us back to her place before...
Post a Comment
Read more

The Spirit of an Amazing Horse… Faye.

Calgary AB October 3, 2011- Owner and Senior Facilitator of Spiritual Equine Connection, Kari Fulmek nearly gave up on her dream of running an Equine Assisted Learning (EAL) program after a year of trials and tribulations. This is a story of an amazing horse that has beaten so many odds to come be a part of our EAL program. EAL learning is “Where the Horses do the Teaching”. All our programs our done on the ground, “out of the saddle programs”. We work with horses and at risk youth to help build self esteem, self confidence and many life skills. We use horses because; By their intuitive nature and innate sensitivity, horses can provide facilitators with a window into the participants’ personality. They mirror back what the participants are feeling and participants need to adjust their feelings and behaviours to work successfully with the horses. Fulmek had always dreamt of being able to work with horses to help others, and her dream began to come true when she was certified as an...
Post a Comment
Read more

Our Journey Around the World: Part 17 - Wellington, Florida

It has been a cold winter in Alberta, so the opportunity to head off to Florida was perfect timing! However, our booking for this could have been thought out a bit better. The course was Starting on May 1st, but when we booked the course, we didn’t realize that Karsyn's wedding reception (Kari’s oldest daughter and Carolyn was the emcee for the event) would be the Saturday before. Generally for travelling schools we tend to get there the day before so we can check out the set up and location and to make sure we know where we are going (if you have read the rest of our travelling blogs you will understand why we need to do that). Well this wasn’t going to be the case for going to Wellington Florida. Luckily, our beautiful host Sasha was willing to work with us and send us pictures of how the set up was so we felt a little better about getting there so late. So we got up and headed straight to the airport after a beautiful reception and about 4 hours of sleep. Off to Florida we wen...
Post a Comment
Read more