8/ DECEMBER 2013 THE RIDER SUSAN DAHL’s MY SPIN: The P Word


mind-body healing, Deepak Chopra, MD (www.chopra.com) and one of Oprah’s major con- tributors has a new book out called “What Are You Hungry For? The Chopra Solution to


$20 billion diet industry accord- ing to this ABC news article. (www.abcnews.go.com) Wow! World-renowned expert on


By Susan Dahl. 100 million dieters and a


(http://marthabeck.com/) and columnist for O, the Oprah Magazine, has many best selling books and the one I’m reading now is called ‘The Four Day Win. End Your Diet War and Achieve Thinner Peace.” I don’t do any of the known diets. They didn’t really work well for me. Too much structure (restric- tion) and hand holding (dictat- ing) for my liking. I don’t even know why I picked it up. The words thinner peace caught my eye. I’m very much into peace these days. Now that I’ve read it, I’m glad I did.


Beck,


Permanent Weight Loss.” Have your read it? I haven’t. It sounds really interesting. According to Dr. Martha life


coach


why I’m focusing on these two experts on weight loss and the psychology behind it? And what is the ‘P’ word? And what does it have to do with horses? Well... I mentioned in a previ- ous article on common horse behaviour problems that I was going to address the difficult


You maybe wondering


the book, Martha talks about horse whispering, which is cool. She also talks about round pen work with a horse named Nute and desensitizing Nute to a plas- tic bag. Again. Cool. Anyone in natural horsemanship knows all


body to go into fat storing mode even with the slightest, remote hint of restriction. It all about the anxiety. We comfort our- selves with food when we are anxious. Martha’s answer is to have more self-compassion. I encourage you to read this book if you want to know how to never, ever go into starvation mode. She is such a lovely, funny lady. The humour in the book is awesome! Perhaps Deepak’s is too. In a couple of chapters of


Martha’s book was how a lot of yo-yo dieters including myself, have unknowingly punished our bodies. We didn’t mean too. We were just following the experts on how to loose that extra weight. We ended up teaching our bodies to go into starvation mode. I’m sure a lot of people have heard that term before. From food deprivation, our bod- ies go into ‘famine mode’. Martha calls it ‘famine brain’. I remember trying to eat only 600 calories a day in my dieting days. Ooh. Famine brain causes our


with dieting you ask? Well.... I wanted to find a fresh perspec- tive to talk about punishment and the book suits what I’m looking for. See what you think. What I found when I read


and prob- ably taboo topic of punishment. a.k.a. The P Word. What does it have to do


passion and also with horses. I believe that working with horses will teach us more about self- compassion. I’m now totally into fruits and veggies (ie. grasses) like horses. Well... most of the time, anyway.


Disciplining Horses is Like Loosing Weight for Some People


ple tell me that everything was punishment as far as they were concerned. I, personally, hardly


slightly raising your voice above normal was too harsh and believe or not, I’ve seen a lot of horse handlers not discipline their horses. Period. Ever. They just put up with it, like a bad undisciplined kid. Have you ever been around one of those! I don’t stick around long myself. Too hard on the nerves. I’ve had some horse peo-


relates to punishment and hors- es, is the actual method she sug- gests to learn the skill of how to loose weight and keep it off per- manently. And no, I’m not talk- ing about adopting it to horses (though it would work). I liken this to how people, horse han- dlers find it hard to discipline their horses. Even if it means they risk their safety. They just don’t want to risk loosing love from the horse. I get it. Compas- sion for the horse. I’ve had clients think that


In Martha’s book that


dieters do need to experience a short temporary discomfort of some hunger for 3 days. That’s it. Before it goes away. So simi- larly, I would say that a horse handler does need to experience some discomfort of learning how to discipline or correct a horse (not punish). I believe the


when a horse has to have a severe correction because they are going to jeopardize the safe- ty of a human (and possibly themselves) such as biting, rear- ing, striking, charging, bucking. Nasty. Not good. I don’t believe in just ignoring it and selling the problem to someone else. I think that’s unethical. And I get this too. Some horse people don’t know how to discipline their horse. They were never taught just like we weren’t taught how to properly stay per- manently thin. Martha does mention that


ever use the word. It rarely hap- pens here. I use corrections (or small discomforts). To me, punishment, is


about this. She talks about how, as dieters, we have to be use body whispering, and how this work with horses works well for people who have relapses with weight gain. Can you see why I like this book? We need more self-com-


same. Take it in small, turtle steps as Martha calls it and you will learn how to discipline your horse slowly but surely for your safety’s sake. This concludes the


same 4-day win strate- gy would work. I’m going to try it for other skill learning. The results are the


series on common horse behaviour prob- lems. Have a great sea- son’s holidays and a happy new year!


@KISS Reiners


Putting my spin on The 4-Day Win and Punish- ment. Oh, and weight loss. Reinersue


Susan Dahl, now an ACTHA Canada judge, is celebrating 21 years in reining, 11 years in natural horsemanship & 6 years writing for The Rider. Proudly a member of Toklat’s Myler (Bit) Ride Team as a certified techni- cal bit clinician. She is a certi- fied professional horse trainer, NCCP coaching theory certi- fied, competitor, clinician and owner/operator of Foundation Reining Training Centre in Durham, On. She specializes in modern horsemanship, western performance horse development & reining training for horse & rider. She has trained & won numerous ORHA, NRHA, & Reining Canada Top 10 awards. For more information on her very innovative & fun approach to training, clinics, lessons, or coaching, please visit her on facebook,


www.reinersuehorsemanship.co m or Reinersue@hotmail.com.


her website


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