A Thousand Pounds of Learning with Wendy Millet

I believe in the power of horses and the power of nature to really bring us back in touch with our innate being, you know, our authentic self. This is 'Educating to be Human', and I'm your host, Lisa Petrides, founder of the Institute for the Study of Knowledge Management in Education. In each episode, I sit down with ordinary people creating extraordinary impact. People who are challenging notions of how we learn, why we learn, and who controls what we learn. Thank you very

much for listening. Well, Wendy, thank you so much for joining us today. I'm so glad you're here to speak with us about the work you do. As many of you are doing, and I am as well, I've been thinking a lot about education. And it's so clear to see that the focus on how we traditionally learn really neglects that connection to the body and nature as an essential source of

knowing and learning. And I think the work that we'll talk about today that you do is such a great example, really sort of pushing the boundaries and showing us how learning is deepened when it's embodied in some way. And how there's really a potential for deeper understanding and learning when we reconnect education with the physical and the emotional parts of ourselves. You've been working on something that's been just completely intriguing to me in your company, Gallup Ventures.

And I'd love to just hear a little bit about that. You're working with education programs on a ranch, the TomKat Ranch here in California. I've been the fortunate participant in some of these, so I've seen firsthand what some of this work is that you do, but I would love for our listeners to hear more about it. Sure, absolutely. Thank you so much for having me. And I love sharing the work that we do,

both at the ranch and with the horses. So maybe starting with the horses, the field of equine guided education has many permutations, I guess to say. I do it as a leadership coach. A lot of people do it for therapeutic riding and other ways of knowing and interacting with horses. I got excited about doing this kind of work after many years of teaching people riding and seeing how much they connected with the horses and how much

they were learning from the horses. And it was, you know, certainly the skills of how to be a rider and horsemanship skills. But what intrigued me was the deeper content that they were learning about themselves, self-awareness, sense of power, sense of awareness of their self and their boundaries and the way that they. Put energy out into the world. So there's a lot of different applications. And I started my company years ago with two other people, one who was a therapist,

one who was a business person. And our goal was to bring the horses to different people who came to the programs. And we have been doing it for years. So you were teaching horse riding and you were seeing how they were learning or how they were interacting or sort of the power of the relationship between the horse and the person. How did you help people access that? Like when you transitioned into the Gallop Ventures, what did that look like?

I mean, how do horses help people access this sort of different kind of intelligence? How the heck does it work? I've seen it, so I know it works, but I'd love to hear a little bit more about that. Sure. Yeah. Well, the way that we do equine guided education is we give people exercises. They're not complicated exercises. If you're familiar with ropes courses, for example,

this is experiential learning. So we give people exercises that might be leading a horse or it might be brushing a horse or it might be picking up a horse's foot or it might be navigating the horse through a series of obstacles. And we're not emphasizing horsemanship skills. We can teach that along the way, but we're emphasizing how do they go through the process of that exercise. And then as they navigate that, we talk to them about what's showing up for them.

We call the horses the teachers, and we call ourselves sort of the facilitators or the interpreters, because what I do is watch the horse's body language, as you've seen, and I explain to the person. Hey, I just saw the horse respond this way to what you just did. And then I might ask you a question. What does that mean to you? Or what does that suggest to you? Or why do you think the horse did that? And then we might have a conversation about

why you think that happened. And I might be able to offer you some insights about why else I think it might happen based on what I'm reading from the horses. That's obviously based a lot on your experience that you've accumulated over the years. But I've heard you refer to the horses as a thousand pound biofeedback machine. And maybe you could talk a little bit about, you know, is there science behind that? Like, how is it that horses mirror what's going on inside us?

Horses are herd animals and they are prey animals. So out in the wild, they would be very, very, very aware of their environment and of any change in their environment. And so when we take them into a setting where they're interacting with us, when there is a change in their environment, which it could include the people who are in, say, that space with them, they pay attention to that and they react to

that. The reason they do is because they are historically wild animals and they still have a lot of that innate wildness in them so that their instinct is to stay safe. And the way that a herd animal stays safe is two things. One is being in groups and two, running. So as soon as they would be afraid of something, they would move away. And so that's the kind of dynamic that we pay attention to.

Horses that have now been domesticated, they don't run away very often, although I've seen cases where they do, which is really interesting. But they more would move away from a person if they didn't like the vibe, so to speak, of that person or how that person showed up or was talking about something. And so that's the kind of thing that I would read to a person if they, for example, stated a goal. They perhaps stated their goal and

the horse has moved away from them. I would say , 'Huh, why do you think the horse moved away from them?' Because a natural instinct from a horse might be to move towards them because they are herd animals and they like to be with other living beings. They actually feel safer together. You know, that's so interesting when I think just about people and how we act in groups or in the wild, so to speak. In some ways, people have the same kind of reaction,

right? We can work collaboratively in groups. Or we can run away, you know, and it strikes me certainly in education when we're learning, we don't think of that, right? Because we're not thinking about how, I don't know, emotions and physical experiences are shaping what we learn. But it strikes me that we're, you know, we're so similar in that way. I agree with that. No, and I often talk with a group when they come and I'll say, okay, well.

Horses work as herds and humans work as teams or family units. We do rely on each other as do herd animals. And then just getting to the science that you asked about, there's quite a lot of research that's been done and it includes things like studying cortisol levels. It includes things like heart rate variability, brainwave activity. There's a lot of biofeedback. That's what you mentioned, though, is the 1,

000-pound biofeedback mechanism. There's a lot of our body language that a horse is reading. And to humans body languages, did I cross my arms or did I frown? But to horses, it's much more subtle because, again, they are a prey animal, so they need to really— Out in the wild, they've got to know the difference between if there's caution or safety if, for example, a threat is nearby. So they can read our moods and they can read if we're happy. Are they reading our body language in ways that we

don't even really see from each other? Or are they almost reading, you know, when we have a thought or an emotion, it is a biochemical release in our body. And it may well be that they're that sensitive to us. In the same way that they use animals like dogs, it can recognize physical ailments in people and they're being used for those early detection. The horse is the same thing. I mean, animals, even my domestic horses, I'm looking out on the field right now.

If all of a sudden a predator came near, one horse's head would go up very quickly and that would tell the whole rest of the herd, watch out. And if that horse went back to eating grass again and relaxed, then the rest of the herd would relax. But they're watching the other's body language. To your point, in the same way we do, you know, there's a new person who comes into somebody's

workplace. Everyone's watching the cues from each other about, is this somebody who's already, you know, known to the company, known to the team, or is this somebody we're all going to check out? And we do that because we are mammals and we are biologically programmed to make sure we are safe. And so these are the ways that we read our environment to know if we're safer. Are there studies that are actually showing this?

Like if somebody is really looking to see, you know, how you navigate that tension between what's measurable and what's felt, can you prove that? Yeah, there's a bunch of studies. I mean, Google it and you'll see, but one that I especially am interested in, and we've looked into it in some depth because we've done a program for healthcare practitioners before, and it had to be approved by their corporate headquarters as a recognized training program. And

so all the curriculum had to be science-based. And so the research program that was referenced was a program that looks at heart rate variability. And what they did was connect an EKG monitor with both the horse and the human. And they saw that, for example, if the person was stressed, cortisol level would go up. So that's the biochemical reaction. And the horse's reaction, whether they were reading that cortisol level or whether that person was acting stressed,

the horse's reaction would elevate. What was actually especially neat about the research is that the horses are able to bring down people's stress reaction. They're actually able to activate brainwaves like theta that is a slower, quieter brainwave for us rather than like the, you know, kind of static feeling about us. They bring us to a calmer, quieter internal space. They change heart rate

variability. And then the amazing thing too is people who were in the study and they continued to study them when they left the horses and then anticipation of going back to the horses already like biophysically, they knew that feeling. And I believe in the power of horses and the power of nature to really bring us back in touch with our innate being, you know,

our authentic self. I think that's why in anticipation of going back to the horses, once they'd already had that experience of calmness, they felt that calmness and that was activated before they'd even gone back to see the horses. What's so interesting about that to me, so of course, as an educator, this is how I'm thinking about how this applies to learning. And we know that whether it's children or adults,

that we learn at a deeper level. Maybe we're not always connected to EKGs, but we know that we can learn at a deeper level when we're calmer, when we're more in touch with what's happening with our body, with the environment around us. It's just so interesting to think about how this can be applied. And I would love to hear, I know you've done a lot of group work. Both around, all around education, but around leadership and work with schools.

And I'd love to hear a couple of examples. I remember you had, you had done a seminar, I think it was with women entrepreneurs. I want to hear something about the workshop and how that kind of equates to the learning that took place in that. Yeah, I'll gladly share a story of the way it sort of

plays out. So we were working on a program, a three-day program for women entrepreneurs about building their business, and might sound kind of cute, but we'd have them work on their business and then, for example, work on their mission statement, gave them time, they wrote it down, they practiced the words with each other, and then they were ready to go out and talk about it. And so the exercise was pretty simple. It was to go catch a horse with a halter, which is a normal thing for horses.

That doesn't necessarily sound simple if you're not a horse person, but okay, I'm with you. Go catch a horse. And these are very calm horses. And so the first woman went in and she stated her goal. And she went over to go put the you know, harness, we call it a halter, but basically a rope around the horse and then lead it and tell it what the mission statement was.

And what that's doing is when you name, you know, words have power and words have energy and a statement of intention about something that presumably means something to you, allow your mission statement. When you say that, it's alive in your body. It's energetic. Connection to what you said, so she said this to the horse, and the horse came along with her and walked

following her rope. And he was so pokey slow, slow, slow, so we talked to her, we said, 'How much energy are do you have about this goal that you've set your mission statement?' And she said, 'Well, you know I think it's what I want to do, but I'm not sure, maybe you want to do.' Anyway, we get the picture. She's got to go home and do some homework on her mission statement because the horse wasn't that excited about what she was doing

. 'And when I say excited, when you figure it out, this something that really resonates deeply within yourself, you know, is very authentic to who you are, the horse will come right up. They love that feeling of authenticity. It feels very safe to them. It feels very safe to us, you know, as humans too, when someone's being very true. So,

same exact pokey horse. The next lady goes in, she states her goal, and the horse takes one look at her and runs away, all the way to the other end of the pasture where we have them, and stops and stares at her. So, that's interesting, right? Same pokey horse. Now, this one's having a huge reaction. He doesn't want to go anywhere near her. She goes after him to try to halter him. She's holding this mission statement that she said, her goal, and she walks towards him and he comes running

away from her and she couldn't get near him. So the point is not to chase the horse. I said, well, come on back and let's talk about your goal because something's got the horse really activated. So what is he doing? He's just picking up on some vibration some vibe, I call it like the static inner force field,

you know? And so she comes and she tells us why she has set her goal and how she deserves it and she's worked really hard and she sounds just mad the whole time and I'm just listening as a human, I don't know this person, and she-I'm just thinking she just seems mad, no wonder he doesn't want to go near her. So I ask her like, 'Is this really truly your goal? Is this really what you want to be doing with your life And she got really quiet. I said , 'How about close your eyes for a second.

I want you to really be true to yourself.'And so she took a second and she took a deep breath. And then she got pretty choked up and teary. And she started talking about how, well, that wasn't actually really what she wanted to do. It was what she thought she should do. And the whole time that she was telling us-what she. Why she was doing this and why it wasn't really her thing, he walked across the whole arena and came and sat, put his head right at her shoulder. Why did he do that?

I've seen it a million times, so lots of people could say, well, it sounds like a coincidence and maybe she had a carrot or all the things that people like to discount until you see this happen again and again and again and again. Anytime the person is authentic and true to themselves, the horse will come back in. And want to be with them. Because again, he'd rather be in herd, in community, safe in a group of other living beings than to be alone. Being alone to him is a really scary place.

Kind of true sometimes for humans as well. It's authenticity that she worked through. It's, you know, leaderships, but you know, leadership can look a lot of different ways. And we make sure when we talk to people about leadership that like I've had somebody before who came in, he was a hard-charging lawyer and he came in to go grab the horse, or I guess he was trying to pat the horse, but his energy was quite unwelcoming to the horse. So the horse pulled away very strongly.

And I said, you know, if you want to be close to the horse, why don't you just, could you just take a deep breath and be a little bit more present with your your approach would the horse read his energy when it's softer, different, and it's not a judgment from the horse about whether you're soft or aggressive, but it just was inauthentic. And he was like, oh yeah, I thought I needed to be like a strong guy when I went to go approach the horse. And I said, you know what ?

Actually, you are a strong guy, but it didn't mean that you had to come off like overamped. You can just be strong by being who you are. Often times with horses, and even when we watch a herd of horses' leadership, we'll ask people, 'What's looking at a group of horses? 'Which one you think is the leader? And sometimes they think the one that looks like, you know, the misbehaving black stallion is a leader because

he's got a lot of fire. To him and in fact, in a herd, and this is true, you know I'm on a cattle ranch; we have cattle, we have goats, we have horses, and the leader isn't usually the flashy one. It's usually the one who's looking out for the herd. It's the wise one. It's the one who cares. It's the one who makes time for looking out for the whole.

It's such an authentic way of knowing, whereas so often the way we're teaching things, again, whether it's in a school or in a training, it's a much more detached way of knowing, right? We're prioritizing just the cognitive side of learning. I'm wondering about how we could translate that more you know into something that people understand and can do, and how we can like embody our learning not all of us are going to be able to come out to you know the ranch there or in other places that have

this kind of work take place. Is there some way we can think about how we bring that back into education? I definitely think so. I mean, one of the lessons from working with animals on the ranch and working with my team who are people working on the land and in nature is we are mammals also. And we're evolutionarily adapted to moving our bodies a lot, you know, walking around for food, growing food, like that's what we did for so many, many, many thousands of years.

And so even just the simple nature of being in our body, you know, giving kids exercises to do, you know, hopefully they could get outside. Also, because there's so many benefits of being in contact with nature, but even just to work with our hands and giving people an exercise to do, or, you know, sometimes when we have kids'programs here, I think about how many people who grew up in an urban area or even grew up and didn't get outside to play. They might not really understand gravity.

You know, they might not really understand how water moves. Like you miss some very fundamental things if you don't have a live physical experience of how the world works. And we are teaching everybody to learn things in their brain, but we're not activating somatically our body or our heart or our instinct. Like so many people call me and say, well, what should I do with my career? And I say, well,

what do you want to do? What calls you? Do they have any instinct for what calls them, what their heart wants to do, what their being wants to do? This thought that our brain is the only smart thing, smart part of us, I think puts us down a track that's unfortunate because people will follow that track and do what their brain, they think they should do. And at some point in their lives or in their careers, they go, 'Geez, why am I doing this? I have no joy in this.

And I did it because I was supposed to. 'It's kind of like the lady when the horse ran away from her. That was her story. She did it because she was supposed to. She thought it was what was expected of her. So that's part of what I would say. Also, thinking about where do people go after they finish school? They need to work in teams. They need to lead teams. It's kind of like we're not an island

no matter where we are. So just because we teach people how to think about ideas, if we haven't taught young people. In schools, also how to work together. We haven't prepared them for the world. You had also mentioned before, I think you had some young high school students come to the ranch and do some kind of activity. Yeah, we had an interesting situation. One of our farmer friends out here in the community, their partner is a teacher in the school and so knew about the horse work.

And she asked, do you think you could help the high school students with some of the challenges around bullying and setting boundaries? And I said, absolutely. So we had a group of students come in and they were pretty shy at first. None of them had ever been around a horse. It was a big animal. They were really cautious about getting involved with the horses, but we worked on you know a series of exercises, which first was just touching the horse at all,

getting that close to touch it. And then talked about like how do you approach something new? How do you challenge yourself? What does it feel like? How do you you know reach out to a friend and ask for support, so that was a simple exercise but it was really, really meaningful for them. Then we built an exercise,