TeachingHorse Stories

Thank you Harley

I learned from Carolyn Resnick, creator of the Liberty Method of equine training, that horses test your leadership skills by how well you are paying attention.  Carolyn spent years living among and observing a natural herd of wild horses in the desert of Southern California.  She was able to observe them establishing their pecking order and how horses move up the hierarchy.  One of the ways you gain status is by being able to catch the horse above you in the pecking order off guard, or not paying attention.  Their tests are very subtle.  A horse will walk up behind another horse grazing and see how close they can get before the other horse notices them.  If they can get close enough to nip them they will.  In that moment, a change in status takes place. 

The lead mare demands that every member of the herd keep an eye on her at all times and know where she is.  When she notices that she does not have a herd member’s attention, she will abruptly with swift clarity remind them of that rule of being a member of her herd.  Carolyn summed it up best when she said, “When you are in the presence of a horse, she deserves your full attention.”  One of my horses, Harley, a dominant gelding, took it upon himself to teach me about paying attention.   His behavior towards me was his way of asking me the questions, “Are you paying attention?  Are you leading and protecting this herd, because if you are not, I will.”  Harley believes it is his job to protect the herd and he does this by testing whether or not they are paying attention.  To earn the right to lead his herd, I have to demonstrate that I am paying attention and, that when we are together, he can count on me to keep him safe.  I take great honor in the trust that he places in me.  I am also very thankful for him because I know that no harm will come to Yani and her new baby, Grace, while Harley is around. 

At the same time Harley was teaching me the true art of paying attention, my ability to notice shifts in my environment, whether it be at work or in a pasture, grew exponentially.   There are some wonderful questions you can begin asking yourself on your journey of remembering how to pay attention. 

• What do you truly care about?
• When do you feel joy?
• What is happening in your life right now?
• What do your loved ones see when they look at you?
• What has your body been trying to tell you?

As you reflect on these questions, if any of your answers are, “I don’t know”, you have gotten an affirmation that regaining your ability to pay attention is critical for you. You can also use questions like these to stimulate growth in you and your team’s leadership skill of paying attention.  Use these questions as conversation starters that will enhance leadership attention:

• What have your employees been trying to tell you?
• What have your customers been trying to tell you?
• What is happening in your community/organization right now?
• What do your team members see when they look at you?
• What have you been ignoring or avoiding that it is time to face?

Learning the art of paying attention to reality can be very freeing.  Temple Grandin, author of Animals in Translation, summed it up nicely when she said, “Animals see what is there, we see what we think is there.”  I have seen this way of moving through the world create a lot of problems for people.  In a group of nurse practitioners I was working with they were consumed with a fear of losing their jobs and being replaced by physicians because of a leadership focus on recruiting primary care physicians.  I asked them, “Have any of you been fired?” The answer was no.  The other fact was that there were over three hundred open positions for primary care physicians.  The other question I asked them was, “Are your patients happy with the care you are giving them?”  The answer was yes.    Taking time to look at reality for what it really was, was quite freeing for this group.  What we fear is always worse than reality. 

Recently I was in teaching a leadership workshop for physicians and nurses and wound up in a conversation that is a disturbing testament to the state of our healthcare system.  A nurse raised her hand and proceeded to tell me that she was about to enter the hospital for a procedure and was afraid of what might happen to her while she is there.  With the common occurrence of medical errors she has told her husband that he needs to stay with her around the clock.  She asked me, “Should I tell my husband to be afraid and on alert?”  I sat down beside her to make sure she knew I was with her and I said, “Don’t tell your husband to be afraid.  Tell your husband to pay attention.” 

We have a lot to learn from horses in this arena.  Horses are prey animals.  They live every day knowing that at any moment a cougar could jump out of the woods and try to eat them.  So how is it that they can enjoy relaxed grazing in a pasture?  Horses have learned how to embody a state of being referred to as “relaxed and ready.”   They can be relaxed and grazing in one moment and moving away at a full gallop in the next.  Even though they are relaxed, they are aware and are paying attention with their eyes and their entire bodies, keeping themselves agile and ready for any moment.  As an aside, being relaxed and ready is also a mantra for how to ride a horse.  You learn to be relaxed in the saddle and ready for any moment at the same time.  The way you respond to unexpected moments is to relax even more with a heightened sense of awareness, giving the horse clear direction and confidence that you will lead them through the situation.  Riders, like leaders, who tense up and become rigid lose the horse’s confidence and usually fall off.  I learned that the hard way.  We will all be less paralyzed by fear when we learn to be relaxed and ready for the ride of our lives.