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Slow Horsemanship · Relatively Stable

• 0:09
  SPEAKER_00: This week on Stable Roots, I'm talking about slow horsemanship.
• 0:17
  SPEAKER_00: It's a movement that's grounded in rooted systems and living work.
• 0:26
  SPEAKER_00: Authorship.
• 0:29
  SPEAKER_00: This is where I begin again.
• 0:32
  SPEAKER_00: It's interesting to write about authorship in a world driven by AI,
• 0:37
  SPEAKER_00: in a time when few people have the attention span for long form reading,
• 0:42
  SPEAKER_00: and even fewer have tended to livestock and farms.
• 0:48
  SPEAKER_00: What is authorship?
• 0:50
  And what happens when what starts with horses stretches out
• 0:54
  slowly into life?
• 0:56
  SPEAKER_00: For me, it's never just been about the horses.
• 1:00
  SPEAKER_00: This week,
• 1:01
  SPEAKER_00: I'm sharing my manifesto,
• 1:03
  the scaffolding of the system I work through and under and
• 1:07
  between at my horse farm
• 1:09
  SPEAKER_00: in upstate South Carolina.
• 1:12
  SPEAKER_00: If you live nearby or if you're visiting, come join us.
• 1:15
  SPEAKER_00: And if you live far away,
• 1:17
  this framework allows me to bring the farm to you virtually
• 1:21
  wherever you are in the
• 1:22
  SPEAKER_00: world.
• 1:23
  SPEAKER_00: We all have stories.
• 1:25
  SPEAKER_00: The animals have stories.
• 1:26
  SPEAKER_00: The land has stories.
• 1:28
  Stories are where we make sense of the world and the
• 1:31
  relationships we form and foster within it.
• 1:34
  This blog and my podcast are an essential part of the farm's
• 1:38
  mission,
• 1:39
  which is story.
• 1:42
  SPEAKER_00: For a long time, I thought I had to stay vague.
• 1:45
  SPEAKER_00: When it came to my farm, I let the place speak for itself.
• 1:49
  SPEAKER_00: I let the horses do the talking.
• 1:52
  SPEAKER_00: And I let people come and make it whatever they wanted it to be.
• 1:57
  SPEAKER_00: But there's a difference between building something and claiming it.
• 2:01
  Bramblewood Stables is my home and the farm that I've been
• 2:05
  building for 20 years.
• 2:07
  SPEAKER_00: It's weird living where you work.
• 2:09
  SPEAKER_00: It presents its own set of challenges,
• 2:11
  SPEAKER_00: and I've done my part to create physical boundaries and limits.
• 2:16
  SPEAKER_00: I have done very poorly creating boundaries around my heart,
• 2:20
  SPEAKER_00: the chem that exists beyond the farm.
• 2:23
  SPEAKER_00: That chem started out as a writer.
• 2:27
  A rider that was building a system before I had words to
• 2:30
  describe what it was
• 2:31
  SPEAKER_00: becoming,
• 2:33
  like every single one of us are doing by a mission in our lives
• 2:37
  every day.
• 2:38
  SPEAKER_00: In the early days of Bramblewood Stables,
• 2:41
  the language of horsemanship I had inherited was still tangled
• 2:45
  with control and
• 2:46
  SPEAKER_00: perfection.
• 2:48
  SPEAKER_00: I believe my job was to be everything for everyone who showed up.
• 2:52
  SPEAKER_00: I fall back into old habits all the time, this one being the root.
• 2:58
  SPEAKER_00: but survival is not authorship.
• 3:02
  SPEAKER_00: I was so careful not to say too much because too many words can,
• 3:06
  SPEAKER_00: I've learned,
• 3:07
  SPEAKER_00: invite misunderstanding.
• 3:10
  I've lived long enough in the aftermath of misunderstanding to
• 3:13
  know how quickly
• 3:14
  something beautiful can get bent out of shape when someone sees
• 3:18
  it through the
• 3:18
  SPEAKER_00: wrong lens.
• 3:21
  I've shaped this farm with my bare hands,
• 3:24
  with my body,
• 3:25
  with my voice,
• 3:26
  with my choices.
• 3:28
  SPEAKER_00: I have spent my time and my presence and my absence growing it.
• 3:34
  This farm is my refusal to keep doing things the old way just
• 3:39
  because we've always
• 3:40
  SPEAKER_00: been told there is only one way to spend time with horses.
• 3:44
  It's time I stop hiding behind the fog of hoping people figure
• 3:48
  out what I'm trying
• 3:49
  SPEAKER_00: to say and intuit what's happening.
• 3:53
  SPEAKER_00: This is my farm and this is the slow horsemanship movement.
• 3:58
  I hope what I've built at Bramblewood Stables can become a
• 4:00
  model for reimagining
• 4:02
  SPEAKER_00: what a public riding stable can be.
• 4:05
  SPEAKER_00: We're not just service providers or stepping stones to competition,
• 4:09
  SPEAKER_00: but places of rooted relationship.
• 4:12
  SPEAKER_00: In our farm, the horses are not tools.
• 4:15
  SPEAKER_00: They are teachers.
• 4:16
  SPEAKER_00: Our clients aren't consumers.
• 4:18
  SPEAKER_00: They are participants.
• 4:21
  SPEAKER_00: And here, the land isn't a backdrop.
• 4:24
  SPEAKER_00: It's a collaborator in the work.
• 4:29
  SPEAKER_00: Beneath the ground is a system of fungi called the mycorrhizal network.
• 4:36
  SPEAKER_00: It exists everywhere,
• 4:37
  SPEAKER_00: a web of thread-like mycelium that stretches through the soil,
• 4:42
  SPEAKER_00: connecting roots,
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  SPEAKER_00: passing information,
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  SPEAKER_00: and feeding rich nutrients to the world above it.
• 4:49
  SPEAKER_00: Plants and trees send signals through this network to each other.
• 4:54
  What appears still on the surface is an immense structure of
• 4:57
  information being
• 4:59
  SPEAKER_00: passed and received.
• 5:01
  There is expansive wisdom in this system that continually works
• 5:05
  within the shadows.
• 5:07
  SPEAKER_00: This is how my farm works, too.
• 5:10
  It's an ecosystem,
• 5:12
  an organism,
• 5:14
  a place that invites you to become legible to yourself.
• 5:18
  It offers a rhythm and the companionship of the herd if you're
• 5:22
  willing to meet
• 5:23
  SPEAKER_00: yourself without armor,
• 5:25
  or if you have a willingness to get to know why you've built
• 5:28
  armor in the first
• 5:29
  SPEAKER_00: place.
• 5:31
  SPEAKER_00: If this system can live at this farm, it can live in other places too.
• 5:36
  SPEAKER_00: And if it's possible here in this corner of upstate South Carolina,
• 5:41
  then maybe the future of this industry doesn't have to look so
• 5:44
  much like its past.
• 5:48
  SPEAKER_00: The farm that I built is a living system of relationships.
• 5:52
  It's a slow moving ecology where nothing is ornamental and
• 5:56
  everything participates.
• 5:59
  SPEAKER_00: The soil holds memory and the fences carry history.
• 6:03
  SPEAKER_00: The water knows when to rise and when to disappear.
• 6:07
  I'm the caretaker of a system that I built from scratch because
• 6:10
  I needed it.
• 6:12
  SPEAKER_00: And the horses in my program told me they needed a different way.
• 6:16
  SPEAKER_00: This farm moves at the pace of belonging.
• 6:20
  SPEAKER_00: Some people notice the horses.
• 6:22
  SPEAKER_00: Some fixate on the scraggly pastures.
• 6:25
  Some talk about the rhythm of the day and the way we fold
• 6:28
  things back into order.
• 6:30
  SPEAKER_00: But that's not what makes it work.
• 6:32
  What holds this place together are the unseen threads that
• 6:35
  stretch between horse
• 6:36
  SPEAKER_00: and human,
• 6:38
  SPEAKER_00: human and human,
• 6:39
  SPEAKER_00: tree and threshold,
• 6:41
  SPEAKER_00: gesture and response.
• 6:45
  SPEAKER_00: It's the understory that holds it all together.
• 6:47
  And it's time to bring that scaffolding to light and list the
• 6:52
  threads that hold it.
• 6:54
  I'm not advertising new offerings or polishing it all up to
• 6:57
  create a bigger reach.
• 6:59
  SPEAKER_00: This is about my long, slow movement towards authorship.
• 7:04
  SPEAKER_00: It's owning that the work has always come through me,
• 7:06
  SPEAKER_00: but also owning that I've often stood beside it,
• 7:10
  SPEAKER_00: waiting to be seen before I claim it fully.
• 7:13
  SPEAKER_00: It's easier to want than it is to do.
• 7:17
  SPEAKER_00: And authorship implies responsibility.
• 7:21
  SPEAKER_00: Responsibility is a hard thing for us humans to stomach.
• 7:25
  SPEAKER_00: So much of this work has lived below the surface.
• 7:28
  For years I've let it speak through the horses,
• 7:30
  the land,
• 7:31
  the feel of the place.
• 7:33
  SPEAKER_00: I've trusted people to sense what it was, even if they couldn't name it.
• 7:37
  SPEAKER_00: And some did.
• 7:39
  SPEAKER_00: Some felt it instantly and stayed long enough to let it work on them.
• 7:43
  SPEAKER_00: Others wanted a product,
• 7:45
  SPEAKER_00: a protocol,
• 7:46
  or something that could be easily summed up and handed back in
• 7:49
  a sentence.
• 7:50
  SPEAKER_00: That's not what this is.
• 7:52
  The web of this farm's work has a shape,
• 7:55
  but it's not a curriculum or a brand.
• 7:58
  SPEAKER_00: It's the scaffolding, and I've been building it all along.
• 8:03
  SPEAKER_00: It begins in the body, in the land, in the nervous system.
• 8:07
  It moves through relationships and rhythm into something deeper
• 8:11
  than language,
• 8:12
  something old.
• 8:14
  SPEAKER_00: In a lot of ways,
• 8:15
  codifying a structure to the work I do here at Bramblewood is
• 8:19
  like excavating an
• 8:20
  SPEAKER_00: archaeological dig.
• 8:23
  SPEAKER_00: But over time,
• 8:23
  I've come to understand that the work at this farm lives
• 8:26
  through four steady
• 8:27
  SPEAKER_00: pillars.
• 8:29
  SPEAKER_00: They're not separate offerings.
• 8:31
  SPEAKER_00: They're not sequential steps.
• 8:34
  SPEAKER_00: They're the spine of the farm.
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  And the first is the one people miss most easily because it
• 8:41
  looks like doing nothing.
• 8:46
  SPEAKER_00: Pillar one, respite.
• 8:50
  SPEAKER_00: This is where restoration happens.
• 8:54
  These are not sessions as much as they are a space to stretch
• 8:58
  into new mindsets,
• 9:00
  SPEAKER_00: notice old patterns and plot a way forward.
• 9:04
  SPEAKER_00: It's where you can let go of your urgency and sink into your curiosity.
• 9:09
  SPEAKER_00: Respite is an orientation to the herd and to the farm,
• 9:13
  SPEAKER_00: but it's also where you can relax and enjoy your five or more senses.
• 9:20
  Respite sessions allow you to stretch into the childlike wonder
• 9:23
  that's bringing you
• 9:24
  SPEAKER_00: to horses or to the natural world in the first place.
• 9:28
  SPEAKER_00: And if you're a child in a respite session, even better.
• 9:31
  SPEAKER_00: They're for all ages.
• 9:33
  SPEAKER_00: You might sit in a pasture.
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  SPEAKER_00: You might walk in the woods.
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  SPEAKER_00: You might brush a pony and say nothing.
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  SPEAKER_00: You might dive into the old art of classical groundwork.
• 9:44
  SPEAKER_00: You might talk to your respite guide about your day.
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  SPEAKER_00: Respite is the first layer.
• 9:50
  SPEAKER_00: It's where we drop our need to be, or do, or achieve.
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  It's the part most people didn't know they needed until they
• 9:58
  feel their feet
• 9:59
  SPEAKER_00: underneath them and notice the sound of their own breath,
• 10:03
  SPEAKER_00: maybe for the first time.
• 10:05
  SPEAKER_00: The sound of the tree bugs whirring in the branches will hold you.
• 10:09
  SPEAKER_00: The farm will hold you.
• 10:11
  SPEAKER_00: And from there, anything is possible.
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  SPEAKER_00: Pillar two.
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  SPEAKER_00: Riding, where boundaries and movement meet.
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  SPEAKER_00: We do ride horses here, but riding isn't the point.
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  SPEAKER_00: Riding is a language that has the power to show you where you brace,
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  SPEAKER_00: where you collapse,
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  SPEAKER_00: where you try to control,
• 10:34
  SPEAKER_00: where you disappear.
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  It shows you how you relate to partnership when you're not the
• 10:39
  only one with a say.
• 10:42
  SPEAKER_00: Sometimes riding is a full lesson.
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  SPEAKER_00: Sometimes it's groundwork.
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  SPEAKER_00: Sometimes we never leave the mounting block.
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  Sometimes you're on the horse and suddenly you're a child
• 10:52
  remembering what it felt
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  SPEAKER_00: like to be dismissed for speaking up.
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  SPEAKER_00: And for children,
• 10:57
  riding is a place where they can stretch into their strengths
• 11:00
  and learn to move
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  SPEAKER_00: through frustration.
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  SPEAKER_00: It's all in there.
• 11:04
  SPEAKER_00: Riding isn't about equitation.
• 11:06
  SPEAKER_00: It's about energy.
• 11:08
  SPEAKER_00: It's about learning how to stay in your seat without shrinking.
• 11:11
  SPEAKER_00: It's knowing the difference between pressure and release.
• 11:15
  SPEAKER_00: The horse doesn't need you to be perfect.
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  They just need you to show up honestly and ready to see them
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  and do the work.
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  SPEAKER_00: Pillar 3.
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  SPEAKER_00: Story.
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  SPEAKER_00: Where memory becomes metabolized.
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  The stories we carry live in our bodies until we make space for
• 11:38
  them to move.
• 11:40
  SPEAKER_00: And even then, they don't leave us, but they loosen and shift shape.
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  Story becomes something we can touch instead of something that
• 11:49
  touches everything
• 11:50
  SPEAKER_00: around us without our knowing.
• 11:52
  SPEAKER_00: We don't have to craft a narrative to explore our stories.
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  We just get curious about the ones that are already running the
• 11:59
  show and decide if
• 12:00
  SPEAKER_00: we'd like to change the plot.
• 12:03
  The writing I do and the podcast I record are part of the
• 12:06
  system of the farm,
• 12:07
  too.
• 12:08
  They're how the stories metabolize beyond the barn with threads
• 12:12
  of reflection that
• 12:13
  SPEAKER_00: stretch out into the world but remain rooted here.
• 12:17
  SPEAKER_00: My stories aren't made for content.
• 12:19
  SPEAKER_00: They take shape for continuation.
• 12:23
  SPEAKER_00: When we know our stories,
• 12:24
  SPEAKER_00: we can write them differently or choose to honor them in our bodies,
• 12:28
  SPEAKER_00: in the field,
• 12:29
  SPEAKER_00: and in life.
• 12:31
  The horses are masters at showing us the stories we carry and
• 12:34
  how to blend them into growth.
• 12:39
  SPEAKER_00: Pillar four, coaching.
• 12:42
  SPEAKER_00: where presence becomes participation.
• 12:46
  Coaching is where we start listening to ourselves instead of
• 12:49
  trying to fix everything.
• 12:50
  It's the part of the farm's work that allows you to meet
• 12:53
  yourself without a script
• 12:54
  SPEAKER_00: when something in you is ready to move.
• 12:57
  SPEAKER_00: Coaching isn't therapy.
• 12:59
  SPEAKER_00: It's not goal setting.
• 13:00
  SPEAKER_00: It's not another system to follow.
• 13:02
  SPEAKER_00: It's a spacious,
• 13:03
  SPEAKER_00: grounded conversation with your own internal rhythm held by the land,
• 13:08
  SPEAKER_00: the horse,
• 13:09
  SPEAKER_00: and your guide.
• 13:10
  Sometimes that happens here in person on the farmhouse porch or
• 13:14
  beside a horse.
• 13:16
  And sometimes it happens in a virtual session with a cup of tea
• 13:19
  and your bare feet on the floor.
• 13:22
  SPEAKER_00: What matters isn't where it happens.
• 13:24
  SPEAKER_00: What matters is when you're ready to show up.
• 13:30
  SPEAKER_00: Stable Roots is where I share stories about horses,
• 13:32
  SPEAKER_00: resilience,
• 13:33
  SPEAKER_00: and the life I've built from both.
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  I write weekly about connection,
• 13:37
  healing,
• 13:38
  and the messy,
• 13:39
  beautiful business of showing up.
• 13:41
  SPEAKER_00: You can subscribe for free and follow along,
• 13:44
  but a paid subscription goes even further by directly
• 13:47
  supporting the farm,
• 13:48
  SPEAKER_00: the horses,
• 13:49
  SPEAKER_00: and the work we do here every day.
• 13:51
  However you choose to be a part of this community,
• 13:54
  I'm just grateful that you're here.
• 14:01
  SPEAKER_00: The tap roots.
• 14:04
  SPEAKER_00: Without them, nothing grows.
• 14:09
  SPEAKER_00: The pillars of the farm system don't stand on their own.
• 14:13
  They're held together by deeper structures that reach down into
• 14:17
  the quiet.
• 14:18
  SPEAKER_00: These are the tap roots of the farm system,
• 14:21
  the parts of the work that keep it from drifting into
• 14:23
  performance or projection.
• 14:26
  The tap roots pull us back into our body,
• 14:30
  into relationship,
• 14:31
  and into the land.
• 14:33
  SPEAKER_00: When things feel scattered or brittle, I return to these anchors.
• 14:38
  SPEAKER_00: These tap roots are what let the rest of the work breathe.
• 14:44
  SPEAKER_00: One, nervous system awareness.
• 14:47
  SPEAKER_00: Regulation isn't a luxury.
• 14:50
  SPEAKER_00: It's the root of everything real.
• 14:53
  SPEAKER_00: This isn't a bonus feature of the farm.
• 14:55
  SPEAKER_00: It's the foundation.
• 14:57
  SPEAKER_00: If you can't feel safe, you can't integrate.
• 14:59
  SPEAKER_00: If you're in survival mode, you'll perform instead of participate.
• 15:04
  Every part of the work here honors what the nervous system
• 15:07
  makes possible.
• 15:09
  SPEAKER_00: We slow down,
• 15:10
  SPEAKER_00: we notice,
• 15:11
  SPEAKER_00: we breathe before we speak,
• 15:13
  SPEAKER_00: we pause before we push through,
• 15:15
  SPEAKER_00: and we stop pretending urgency is a virtue.
• 15:22
  SPEAKER_00: Two, mutual relationship.
• 15:25
  SPEAKER_00: The horse is not a tool,
• 15:26
  SPEAKER_00: you are not a project,
• 15:28
  SPEAKER_00: and we are here to meet one another in integrity.
• 15:32
  This is not a hierarchy,
• 15:34
  not with the horses,
• 15:35
  not with me,
• 15:36
  not with each other.
• 15:37
  SPEAKER_00: Mutual relationship means no one is over functioning.
• 15:42
  SPEAKER_00: It means we don't rescue each other from discomfort.
• 15:45
  SPEAKER_00: It means we stop pretending that power is the same thing as leadership.
• 15:50
  SPEAKER_00: You bring yourself, I bring myself, and the horses do what they do.
• 15:56
  SPEAKER_00: And we meet in the middle.
• 16:00
  SPEAKER_00: 3.
• 16:01
  SPEAKER_00: Land-based presence.
• 16:04
  SPEAKER_00: The land is not passive.
• 16:06
  The work changes when we remember we are always in relationship
• 16:10
  with place.
• 16:12
  SPEAKER_00: The work doesn't happen in a vacuum.
• 16:14
  It happens here,
• 16:15
  in the barn,
• 16:16
  in the field,
• 16:17
  surrounded by trees and through the seasons.
• 16:21
  SPEAKER_00: The land isn't a backdrop, it's a participant.
• 16:24
  SPEAKER_00: The fences break, the barn aisles flood, and we cannot control the wind.
• 16:30
  The farm isn't a studio or a stage,
• 16:33
  but it's the place that taught me how to stay.
• 16:36
  SPEAKER_00: And that's what the land offers.
• 16:39
  SPEAKER_00: Not an escape, but a return.
• 16:45
  SPEAKER_00: This work has a spine.
• 16:48
  SPEAKER_00: When your body becomes steady and the land holds you,
• 16:52
  SPEAKER_00: forgotten energy begins to move through your system.
• 16:56
  SPEAKER_00: You begin choosing your next steps differently.
• 16:59
  SPEAKER_00: You let the work do what you came here to find.
• 17:04
  SPEAKER_00: It's not magic, it's relationship and it's alive.
• 17:09
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm not building anything new with these pillars and tap roots.
• 17:13
  SPEAKER_00: I'm just finally building from my center instead of my edge.
• 17:17
  SPEAKER_00: I'm living the work and I'm letting it live me back.
• 17:22
  SPEAKER_00: If you feel the signal through the soil,
• 17:24
  I invite you to join me in the barn or in these written spoken
• 17:28
  spaces and allow it
• 17:30
  SPEAKER_00: to live you back too.
• 17:32
  SPEAKER_00: Some people still think Bramblewood is a riding barn.
• 17:35
  SPEAKER_00: Some think it's a healing place.
• 17:38
  SPEAKER_00: And some think it's a pretty backdrop for their own becoming.
• 17:41
  All of these ideas fall short because Bramblewood Stables isn't
• 17:46
  a product.
• 17:47
  SPEAKER_00: It's a practice.
• 17:49
  It's a living,
• 17:50
  breathing ecosystem where growth doesn't come from urgency.
• 17:56
  SPEAKER_00: I will be sharing more about how to begin,
• 17:58
  SPEAKER_00: how to engage,
• 17:59
  SPEAKER_00: what sessions are open and what's unfolding next.
• 18:03
  SPEAKER_00: But this post is the threshold.
• 18:05
  SPEAKER_00: If you're ready, you already know.
• 18:06
  SPEAKER_00: And if you're willing to walk through the gate,
• 18:09
  SPEAKER_00: not just literally,
• 18:11
  SPEAKER_00: but energetically,
• 18:12
  SPEAKER_00: then you are welcome.
• 18:14
  SPEAKER_00: You're part of a growing network enacting change in small and large ways.
• 18:20
  SPEAKER_00: This is Bramblewood.
• 18:21
  SPEAKER_00: And this is what I made.
• 18:25
  SPEAKER_00: And when I say what I made, I don't just mean the business or the farm.
• 18:29
  SPEAKER_00: I mean the culture,
• 18:31
  the idea of slow horsemanship for people of all ages who love
• 18:35
  the land and feel the
• 18:36
  SPEAKER_00: call to horses.
• 18:38
  SPEAKER_00: But maybe they just don't have a horse.
• 18:41
  SPEAKER_00: I'll provide the horses and you provide yourself.
• 18:45
  It's a movement that serves as a model for what local public
• 18:49
  horse farms can be.
• 18:52
  And it lives in the nervous system of every person and every
• 18:57
  horse who's ever belonged here.
• 19:01
  SPEAKER_00: Love, Kim