Latest / Equine Assisted World with Rupert Isaacson / Ep 15: Sheryl Barto - Smiling Goat Ranch

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Ep 15: Sheryl Barto - Smiling Goat Ranch · Equine Assisted World with Rupert Isaacson

• 0:00
  Rupert Isaacson: Welcome to Equine Assisted World.
• 0:02
  I'm your host, Rupert Isaacson.
• 0:03
  New York Times bestselling author of the Horse Boy.
• 0:07
  Founder of New Trails Learning Systems and long ride home.com.
• 0:11
  You can find details of all our programs and shows on Rupert isaacson.com.
• 0:16
  Here on Equine Assisted World.
• 0:18
  We look at the cutting edge and the best practices currently being developed and,
• 0:23
  established in the equine assisted field.
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  This can be psychological, this can be neuropsych, this can be
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  physical, this can be all of the conditions that human beings have.
• 0:38
  These lovely equines, these beautiful horses that we work with, help us with.
• 0:43
  Thank you for being part of the adventure and we hope you enjoy today's show
• 0:47
  Welcome back to Equine Assisted World.
• 0:49
  I've got someone amazing.
• 0:50
  I always have someone amazing.
• 0:52
  Cheryl Bartow.
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  Cheryl Bartow runs Smiling Goat Ranch.
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  She'll be really ranchers in the western slope of Colorado.
• 1:04
  She's an autism mum She's been running an extraordinary equestrian assisted
• 1:14
  I say equestrian assisted not equine assisted because she brings a lot
• 1:19
  of beautiful classical writing and education to what she does and with
• 1:24
  special needs and also to special horses.
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  She's invested many, many years in acquiring this knowledge.
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  And as a result does something rather extraordinary, not just for people with
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  autism, but also people with trauma and people who are lost in the world.
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  And she does it in an area of Colorado that a lot of people are, are Less
• 1:52
  familiar with everyone's heard of Aspen.
• 1:55
  Oh, yeah, all these rich people in Aspen Well, they don't realize is that it's a
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  whole hinterground on the Western Slope of very very ordinary people Living out
• 2:05
  their lives sort of ranchers people with jobs and so on all of these people end
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  up with special needs kids and Someone's got a servant Cheryl Bartow is the person
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  who and has been there for many years.
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  She's not just limited to the horses.
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  She also includes mountain sports.
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  She just includes ranch work, ranch life, life skills.
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  I'm going to stop babbling.
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  But Cheryl Bartow makes me babble because she's so awesome.
• 2:35
  Okay.
• 2:35
  So Cheryl, welcome to Equine Assisted World.
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  Would you please tell us a bit about who you are and what you do?
• 2:43
  Sheryl Barto: Thank you, Rupert.
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  I am incredibly honored to be here and talking with you today.
• 2:51
  Wow.
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  That was quite the introduction.
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  And yes, I started Smiling Goat in 2015 and As you mentioned, I'm an autism mom,
• 3:02
  and that's where this journey started.
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  My son, James, is now 30 years old, and we didn't get a diagnosis until
• 3:11
  he was 10, but we knew something was up during those first 10 years, and
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  gosh, I I was Grew up really wanting to be a horse trainer and that's what
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  I wanted to do when I went to college.
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  And I am the product of a divorced family.
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  And my mom was a single mom.
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  My dad was still very much in my life.
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  He was a veterinarian.
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  But my mom said, you absolutely are not going to college to be a horse trainer
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  and I ended up getting a degree in journalism and pursuing a career in public
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  relations and gosh, for probably 25 years.
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  I had no horses in my life.
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  I I grew up showing POAs from like age 12 through 18, and then I was
• 4:08
  on the writing team in college.
• 4:11
  Rupert Isaacson: What's a POA for we Brits out there?
• 4:13
  Sheryl Barto: Pony of America.
• 4:16
  Rupert Isaacson: Okay.
• 4:17
  Sheryl Barto: Yes.
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  That's
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  Rupert Isaacson: a pretty close thing, right?
• 4:19
  Yeah.
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  Sheryl Barto: They are mini Appaloosas.
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  So they're under 14, two hands.
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  So they're technically a ponies, but they have brains more like horses.
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  So they're not, they're smaller.
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  They're not evil, right?
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  They're not evil.
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  No, they're, they're really, really sweet.
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  And my journey, my, my POA, my pony was named Tomahawks Supreme.
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  And I called him Supreme and I really grew up with him like those were the
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  days, of course, with no cell phones, or, you know, I would say to my
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  mom, I'm going out for a trail ride.
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  I would take Supreme and the dog and I would be gone for 8 hours and I would
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  Rupert Isaacson: switch part of the US.
• 5:10
  Sheryl Barto: In Pennsylvania in between Reading and Lancaster, Pennsylvania.
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  So lots of farm country.
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  My dad had started out being a large and small animal vet.
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  So many of the farms I had already visited because he was doing farm
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  calls and pregnancy checks on dairy cattle and I would just ride by myself.
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  And, you know, being part, being a product of a divorced family,
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  there's lots of stuff you go through.
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  And that pony, I feel like saved my mental health going through, you
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  know, the teenage years of having divorced parents and remarriages and
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  step Brothers and sisters and all that good stuff that now seems very common.
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  When I left college with my journalism degree, I had done an
• 6:10
  internship in PR for IBM at a federal systems division in New York State.
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  And I really thought, okay, I'm going to be a corporate PR person
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  and I'm going to get a job in a corporation doing PR because I loved
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  my internship and I had learned so much in the 6 months that I was there.
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  At the same time, I still had a relationship going with
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  my high school sweetheart.
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  And he was in the Coast Guard and stationed in Hawaii
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  and then in New England.
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  And we always had had this dream of going to Colorado.
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  And I think, you know, Colorado had this magnetic allure of we were both
• 7:03
  skiers, wanted to be in the mountains.
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  And I, my 1st job ended up not being with a corporation, but being with a local
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  government association in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, which is the capital of
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  the state and pretty pretty city like, which was really not my jam, but I was
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  hired to work on a local government magazine that represented the whole state.
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  So I was reporter, photographer, etc.
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  And in the meantime, Two of my high school friends went to Aspen, Colorado
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  after they graduated just to have fun.
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  And I went out to visit them because we all shared this love of skiing.
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  And I thought, Oh my gosh, what am I doing?
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  I'm 22 years old.
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  I'm quitting my job and I'm moving to Aspen, which is what I did.
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  And I became a ski bum for a season.
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  thinking I would go back to the real world.
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  And I ended up then getting a job in PR with the Aspen Skiing Company.
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  So I stayed the summer.
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  And once you experience a summer in Colorado, they always say you come for
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  the winter, you stay for the summers.
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  And this is a lot of people's stories here in Why is that?
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  The summer is incredibly magical.
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  The weather is spectacular.
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  It's almost perfection.
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  There's sunny days, everybody's out hiking or mountain biking, and you the
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  ski areas have turned summer tourism into this incredible attraction.
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  And honestly, in Aspen on July 4th.
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  They do an old town parade and it is more crowded on July 4th in Aspen
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  than any day during the winter time.
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  It's there's, there's a lot of magic to it.
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  Yeah.
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  And so I ended up marrying my high school sweetheart and we had two
• 9:18
  sons and The oldest son, James, is Our kiddo on the autism spectrum
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  and he's very high functioning.
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  We got the diagnosis when he was 10 and as I mentioned earlier, we didn't know
• 9:35
  what was going on age 2 through 10, but we knew something was going on and.
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  I had gone to specialist after specialist.
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  We are three hours from Denver.
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  We had seen three different doctors in Denver and people would say,
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  gosh, this is, this is a puzzle.
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  Is it ADD?
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  Is it ADHD?
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  And I would say, yeah, I see pieces and parts of that, but I don't.
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  Think that that's it.
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  And then crazily, and I don't think I've ever shared this story with
• 10:14
  you in my PR world, I represented import beer companies for 15 years.
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  And it was a really fun gig, which meant that I took us journalists
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  to breweries throughout Europe.
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  So Germany, the Czech Republic, Ireland, even Thailand.
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  And one of these trips, I had a female editor and it was a magazine.
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  I don't even remember the name of it anymore.
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  But it was 1 of those, like, Maxim magazines and a female editor.
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  And I was like, really?
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  I always thought men would be the editors of those magazines, but she and
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  I are still in touch to this day and.
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  She told me this story of her sister being diagnosed with autism and we were on a
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  bus going from a brewery to town to tour and I got home and I started researching
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  autism and I spent a weekend like just getting sucked in and realizing this was
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  it and calling my dad, the veterinarian, and saying, I think we figured this out.
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  And at the time.
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  Children's hospital, Colorado had an 8 month waiting list to you have to in
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  Colorado have a psychiatrist make your diagnosis and so 8 months later, we went
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  to children's and they said, no, we You have a textbook case, a son with autism.
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  And there were such emotions around that of relief of knowing what we were
• 12:02
  dealing with to sadness to, Oh my gosh, like I don't have a neurotypical kid.
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  And being in a small town, we were the only people James actually ended
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  up being the first person from his high school graduating with autism.
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  And so I took the path of Owning it and telling everyone and educating people
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  when we got the diagnosis, he was going from elementary school into middle school.
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  And I called the principal of the middle school.
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  And I said, this is what I just learned.
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  And he said, will you come in and do a presentation to the whole teaching team?
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  And so I came in, did a presentation to.
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  The whole fifth grade teaching team, and it was amazing how they
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  open their arms and welcome James and really made accommodations for
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  him to get through middle school.
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  And then we get into high school and it's a completely different ball
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  game, different Well, we're, you know, he has to advocate for himself
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  and he needs to do X, Y, and Z.
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  And it was for me as a parent, a huge struggle and dealing with bullying,
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  dealing with being ostracized and not like, One of the gifts of autism, I,
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  there are so many which I learned through you and the horse boy method is not
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  really caring what other people think and, you know, I'm seeing where he's
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  not getting invited to the graduation parties or any parties for that matter.
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  And he's blissfully happy with his world of, you know, us having
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  a dog and that dog was his.
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  Lifeline his, you know, looking back on all of this and not realizing how
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  much the dog was his lifeline until I went through the horse boy method and
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  understanding that animal connection with, with humans and special needs folks.
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  So, gosh, then.
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  Yeah, my PR career is going parallel with all this whole journey and my
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  career has really taken off and my business is doing really, really well.
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  And I end up.
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  going through a divorce because I was the breadwinner.
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  And it was a lot.
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  It was a lot, being the breadwinner and a special needs mom.
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  And frankly, I look back on that Era and say to myself, you should have still
• 15:05
  made room for horses, but I felt like I couldn't financially or time wise.
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  And then while, when James was 15, this local autism group said to me, Let's have
• 15:21
  him come to our camp for this session.
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  And that was when my son learned that he had autism, not until he was 15.
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  He didn't even realize, and it didn't matter to him.
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  He was very happy in his own world.
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  And when they had so graciously offered to allow him to be part of the camp, I
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  said, well, how can I give back to you?
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  And And that's when I offered to do the pro bono work for them and
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  they were a growing organization.
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  I think they are now in their 20th year.
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  Rupert Isaacson: What's the name of the organization?
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  Sheryl Barto: It's called a syndigo and at the time it was called extreme
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  sports camp and that had a lot of mixed messages in the marketplace,
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  especially in a ski town where there's actually like extreme ski sports.
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  But the idea of their organization is to actually teach people
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  on the autism spectrum.
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  Skills to do sports.
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  So they were doing rock climbing, they were doing horseback riding,
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  and they were doing water sports.
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  So, wakeboarding.
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  And it was really cool.
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  They had video footage of my son, who we had gone with friends to Lake Powell.
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  With, of course, all my friend's kids are neurotypical kids and their kids are
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  doing flips on the wakeboards and one arms and going sideways, you know, and
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  James could never do that and he gets to this camp and he's the star on the
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  wakeboard because he had seen what some of the other kids had done and he did
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  what he could do to his level and like, the Photos of him and the grin on his
• 17:16
  face of the accomplishments that he had at this camp were absolutely priceless.
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  So then they, as an organization, evolved into wanting to do Big
• 17:30
  gala fundraiser, and that's when they decided they were going to
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  bring in celebrity autism parents.
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  And they brought in Holly Robinson Pete, who is the star of 21 Jump
• 17:44
  Street, and her husband is an ex NFL football player Rodney B.
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  And then they brought in Rupert Isaacson, the founder of the horse boy.
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  And I remember thinking, how can I have been a horse obsessed
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  person and have never heard of the horse boy book or movie.
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  And I have a son with autism.
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  And my conclusion to that was, well, I was a single mom running a business,
• 18:12
  raising a kid with special needs.
• 18:15
  And so.
• 18:16
  When I witnessed your demonstration of the horse boy method on a horse
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  you had never met in a place you had never been to and how you were teaching
• 18:29
  geography and math from the back of a horse, I was moved to tears and I
• 18:37
  thought, Oh my gosh, this is my calling.
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  And this is what I'm supposed to be doing.
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  And, and I, and I think Rupert, that was 2012.
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  So I had no horses, no infrastructure, no no, nothing other than a
• 18:57
  PR firm and a new husband.
• 19:00
  Who had and I came home and I said, you know, I, how do you feel
• 19:07
  about having horses in our lives?
• 19:09
  And he had grown up in Wyoming on a ranch and he had 2 kids
• 19:14
  and he said, I'm open to it.
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  So we had had a small property.
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  Well, I should back up because I want to talk a little bit about the horse
• 19:28
  boy karma that I think has followed me completely on this journey.
• 19:35
  So James graduates high school and.
• 19:42
  All he's seeing all of his friends go off to college and James
• 19:46
  absolutely was not college material, nor did he want to go to college.
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  So I had researched a life skills school, like, where could he go?
• 19:59
  To learn some more life skills.
• 20:01
  So I had found one in Arizona and at the time because I didn't have enough
• 20:07
  to do, I was the volunteer journalism teacher at their local high school
• 20:13
  because I didn't like the newspaper and I thought it could be so much better.
• 20:19
  And it was a way for me to get back to the high school.
• 20:22
  I did not want to be on boosters.
• 20:23
  I did not want to be in any sort of politics and I was like, why
• 20:27
  don't I try teaching this class?
• 20:29
  So I'm teaching this class.
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  I did it for the three years.
• 20:34
  Both my boys were in the high school and a journalism fellowship came across
• 20:42
  my desk after you had been to Aspen for this event and you could apply
• 20:51
  for two weeks to Enhance your skills as a high school journalism teacher.
• 20:57
  So I was like, Oh my gosh, university or Arizona state was on the list.
• 21:03
  And I thought I'll apply there.
• 21:05
  I will go.
• 21:06
  Then I can be down there with James while he's attending life skills school.
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  And then I get a rejection letter from Arizona, but they said, we're happy to
• 21:17
  host you at university of Texas in Austin.
• 21:23
  And I was like, Oh, wait a minute.
• 21:25
  Isn't that where Rupert's whole program is based?
• 21:28
  Well, maybe I should go visit while I'm down there and see if this is the real
• 21:33
  deal and see if it is what I think it is.
• 21:38
  And so I ended up going to Austin and in my two weeks we had a free weekend and I
• 21:44
  went out to visit Horseboy headquarters, which at the time was in Elgin, Texas.
• 21:50
  And I don't know if you remember this visit, Rupert, but I met
• 21:54
  Betsy, the foundation horse.
• 21:57
  And I also remember really having this fear, even though I was an autism mom.
• 22:06
  of other people's kids with autism.
• 22:10
  Like would I be able to handle them?
• 22:14
  Would I know what to do?
• 22:17
  Would I be worthy?
• 22:20
  Could I really help them?
• 22:22
  Like it was, so it was weird that I was having this Awesome experience
• 22:28
  teaching kids at the high school, but they're all neurotypical kids.
• 22:32
  I have this autistic son and then I come to your ranch in Elgin and
• 22:39
  I remember this family from Mexico being there and they had three kids.
• 22:45
  You were working with the entire family and their little
• 22:49
  boy was severely autistic.
• 22:53
  Watching him with the horses and you somehow had me jump in while
• 22:59
  you were doing this session and this little boy turns around and gives
• 23:04
  me the most giant hug and he was nonverbal and I thought, I get it.
• 23:11
  I think I can do this.
• 23:14
  And that's when I started your training program, and I think you ended up
• 23:19
  coming to Colorado Springs, which is a three and a half hour drive for us
• 23:25
  to teach the horse boy one course.
• 23:28
  And I came in to do that also with some fears around my.
• 23:35
  Ancient horse skills that were sort of dormant and how was I going to be?
• 23:41
  How was I going to do this?
• 23:44
  And I think the other beautiful thing about the horse boy
• 23:49
  method and the approach and the welcoming by the whole tribe was.
• 23:58
  We actually can find a role for anybody who has the heart to do this.
• 24:03
  And even if you have a challenge rising to certain pieces and
• 24:08
  parts, we will help you get there.
• 24:11
  And then I remember, I think the other piece I was so incredibly attracted
• 24:18
  to, because remember I wanted to be the horse trainer, was that.
• 24:24
  Horse skills were important to training the horse boy horse.
• 24:29
  And so I was like, wow, okay, now I get to kind of brush up on this.
• 24:37
  And that was the attraction for me to come back to Elgin and start learning
• 24:45
  dressage, which I knew nothing about.
• 24:48
  Zero about dressage.
• 24:50
  I grew up in the POA world with no lessons.
• 24:54
  I was on that writing team in college that we had a coach that
• 24:58
  was like, yep, you guys look good.
• 25:01
  And so I, the dressage piece was.
• 25:07
  Extraordinarily intimidating, but at the same time, I was so fascinated because
• 25:15
  I'm also in addition to being a skier and a trail runner, very much when I was 35
• 25:24
  started doing yoga and, I still marvel at now, after whatever it's been 25, 30
• 25:34
  years of doing yoga, how much similarity there is between yoga fitness for the
• 25:41
  human and dressage fitness for the horse.
• 25:45
  And looking at classical dressage and how it helps build the right
• 25:52
  muscles for the horse to be able to do their job and carry two riders.
• 25:58
  And it, there is just.
• 26:01
  So much synergy between the 2.
• 26:04
  It blows my mind weekly.
• 26:06
  And so, I remember also spending that week with you learning just
• 26:13
  how to hold a dressage whip and my arms and my hands being sore.
• 26:20
  And I'm thinking.
• 26:22
  Okay.
• 26:23
  I thought I was an athlete.
• 26:25
  I've been this skier, trail runner, mountain biker.
• 26:27
  I'm finding these new muscles.
• 26:29
  Holy cow.
• 26:31
  And just learning about rhythm and timing and then looking at your herd
• 26:39
  and seeing So many different kinds of horses and how they all had a role
• 26:49
  just like the humans all had a role based on their abilities and their
• 26:55
  strengths and how they could help people.
• 27:00
  And to see you have Mustangs and quarter horses, and then the
• 27:05
  fancy horses, the Lusitano's, which I had never even heard of.
• 27:10
  I'm like, what's a Lusitano?
• 27:11
  And seeing the different gifts that they had, and how you were teaching
• 27:18
  quarter horses and Mustangs, how to PF and Passage, I was like, okay, I'm in.
• 27:24
  I'm in 100%.
• 27:27
  It's really great.
• 27:30
  Rupert Isaacson: You know, you're kind, and thank you
• 27:33
  for saying these nice things.
• 27:35
  What I need to say back to you is I realized as soon as you came out and
• 27:46
  began the work, that you were one of those people who could see the whole
• 27:51
  constellation at the same time, which is quite rare, that how the autism piece,
• 27:59
  The brain piece, the horse training piece, the environment piece the need
• 28:05
  to work with the whole family, not just with, you know, one, if possible.
• 28:12
  And I remember thinking, I, I, I think this, I think this
• 28:15
  lady's going to go do it.
• 28:16
  Obviously, you know, we, any of us autism parents are trained by our
• 28:20
  children, you know, my biggest mentor, as everybody knows, is my son, Rowan,
• 28:25
  but, and obviously you're coming out of the same school, but nonetheless, not
• 28:29
  everybody, Decides to turn their life upside down in this particular way.
• 28:33
  Tell us about smiling goat.
• 28:36
  Tell us about how you started because smiling goat I just need to say for
• 28:39
  listeners smiling goat ranch in colorado.
• 28:42
  You need to look it up It's a gold standard place in terms of they know the
• 28:48
  neuroscience They know the horse training.
• 28:52
  They know how to if the kids are not into the horse.
• 28:54
  Okay, we're going to mountain sports Oh, you're not into mountain sports.
• 28:57
  No problem.
• 28:57
  We're going to the goat.
• 28:58
  Oh, you know, it's got no problem We're going to the water.
• 29:00
  Ah, you're actually into the wildflowers.
• 29:01
  No problem.
• 29:02
  There we are this Completely holistic approach that you guys have.
• 29:08
  It's very rare, but of course it's very effective.
• 29:11
  Can you tell us how Smiling Goat began?
• 29:14
  Why the name Smiling Goat?
• 29:15
  It's a great name.
• 29:16
  And yeah, the evolution of this and where you're at.
• 29:19
  And, and spoiler alert that yes internships are available.
• 29:23
  And they do take people you know, At this amazing place in Colorado.
• 29:27
  So you might just want to think about that as you're listening to this while driving.
• 29:31
  So how does Smiling Goat come out of this?
• 29:35
  Sheryl Barto: Ah, yeah.
• 29:37
  Well, after going through your trainings in 2013 and 2014 My new husband and
• 29:46
  I had just purchased a property that was mid valley in the Voringford
• 29:52
  Valley in this town of Carbondale.
• 29:54
  And it was right down the road from the Carbondale rodeo grounds,
• 29:59
  which is a public amenity to the town and is free to use.
• 30:04
  The property was three acres.
• 30:07
  And I remember thinking, my dad had a farm in Pennsylvania that was 200 acres.
• 30:14
  How many acres, Rupert, was your place in Elgin?
• 30:18
  I don't know, fifty?
• 30:20
  A hundred?
• 30:21
  Rupert Isaacson: Well, it, it, it grew.
• 30:23
  It started actually with just seven.
• 30:26
  But
• 30:26
  Sheryl Barto: it
• 30:26
  Rupert Isaacson: grew to be about eventually a hundred.
• 30:29
  But I gotta say that the core area was always about five to seven.
• 30:35
  You know, it only grew that big because, as you know, in Texas,
• 30:38
  sometimes it forgets to rain, and for grazing purposes, we realized we had
• 30:43
  to rent and buy and scrub and burrow and as much acreage as we could just
• 30:50
  to kind of rotate horses around.
• 30:51
  But yeah, it, the core area was small.
• 30:54
  Yeah.
• 30:55
  Well,
• 30:57
  Sheryl Barto: I, I remember thinking, Oh my gosh.
• 31:00
  3.
• 31:00
  5 acres.
• 31:02
  I'm not going to be able to do anything here.
• 31:04
  I'll keep horses here and I'll do everything at the rodeo grounds.
• 31:08
  And I remember you coming to help us do our soft opening and we did a demo at
• 31:15
  the rodeo grounds and I had had 3 horses.
• 31:19
  Quarter horses donated to us, so I literally had had them for a week and 2 of
• 31:25
  them came from a cattle ranch in Wyoming.
• 31:28
  Big Creek Ranch shout out to them to the best horses.
• 31:35
  I think I've ever had.
• 31:38
  And one is still alive.
• 31:39
  Gates is still with us.
• 31:41
  A foundation
• 31:42
  Rupert Isaacson: is an old school gentleman.
• 31:44
  Sheryl Barto: He is.
• 31:45
  Oh my gosh.
• 31:46
  He is my heart horse.
• 31:48
  And I'm quite sure he was my husband in a previous life.
• 31:52
  Like we are and Like you said, gentlemen were so gracious with me learning my
• 32:01
  in hand work doing shoulders in from the ground and he would offer it.
• 32:06
  And I would be like, oh, I guess I'm doing something right here.
• 32:12
  But anyway, getting back to the property itself that had zero animal
• 32:19
  infrastructure, so we built sheds, we built fencing, we built we ended
• 32:26
  up getting this lovely man, Brian Cole, shout out to you with Medallion
• 32:32
  Landscaping, who installed a creek into Hooked up to the irrigation ditches
• 32:39
  that all the ranchers use in Colorado.
• 32:42
  So we had running water.
• 32:44
  It ended up being this cute little nirvana on three acres.
• 32:50
  And I also lived there.
• 32:53
  And part of the Horseboy Karma magic also was in year two of Smiling
• 33:02
  Goat, we pitched a there was a call for civic projects by a group
• 33:09
  called Brewing Fork Leadership, which is kind of like Shark Tank.
• 33:13
  It's a bunch of I don't know.
• 33:15
  Business people from all businesses that get randomly put into groups and
• 33:20
  there's five groups and they interview nonprofits and decide which one they
• 33:25
  want to take on for their civic project.
• 33:28
  And the property happened to have this cool little cabin on it.
• 33:32
  So I now have a blended family with two kids that are younger than my kids and
• 33:38
  then my boys who are in high school.
• 33:40
  And The house is small, but the cabin was awesome.
• 33:45
  And the boys are like, yeah, we'll live here.
• 33:48
  And every man that walked into that cabin said I'd move in here.
• 33:53
  It was just a cute long place with like 2 rooms and a bathroom.
• 33:59
  So.
• 34:00
  I, we get picked by Roaring Fork Leadership and they're going
• 34:04
  through their coursework and they interviewed me for two hours.
• 34:09
  So I have Smiling Goat running for a year and I'm doing it all myself.
• 34:16
  With volunteers.
• 34:17
  So because I have kids in high school, I'm the newspaper teacher.
• 34:21
  I'm able to attract these volunteers, pony club girls, like everybody
• 34:27
  who wants to work with horses.
• 34:29
  And so, and I'm still keeping my day job going.
• 34:32
  So I still have PR clients and I'm still juggling.
• 34:35
  So I'm basically working.
• 34:37
  I don't know.
• 34:39
  Seven days a week, 80 hours a week, but I'm loving it.
• 34:41
  Like Smiling Goat was not seemingly work to me.
• 34:45
  It was wonderful to wake up, have the animals there, be back to my farming
• 34:51
  roots with my dad feeding animals.
• 34:54
  I'm loving it.
• 34:56
  And this leadership group looks at me and they said, Cheryl,
• 35:01
  you cannot sustain this.
• 35:04
  You are going to burn out.
• 35:06
  And our recommendation to you is building extra housing in
• 35:12
  your cabin to house interns.
• 35:15
  And I was like, wow, that is brilliant.
• 35:18
  So we had I think on a parallel course had approached University of
• 35:25
  Denver and their Human Animal Health Connection Institute, and they have a
• 35:32
  graduate student program for students.
• 35:36
  Shout out
• 35:37
  Rupert Isaacson: to Nina Ekholm Fry.
• 35:39
  Sheryl Barto: Exactly, exactly.
• 35:42
  Rupert Isaacson: Lads, if you're listening to this, check out her Podcast as well.
• 35:46
  She's a diamond.
• 35:47
  Okay.
• 35:47
  Yeah.
• 35:47
  Go on.
• 35:49
  Sheryl Barto: So we end up getting approved by D U even
• 35:55
  though it's university of Denver.
• 35:56
  Their acronym is D U not U D.
• 36:02
  Right.
• 36:03
  I don't get that.
• 36:04
  Right.
• 36:04
  Yeah.
• 36:05
  But so, and we also had a working student program, so that, and we still have both
• 36:14
  of these, along with a, another one in certified recreation therapy, which is
• 36:20
  another story that came years later, but so DU started sending us interns
• 36:29
  and they were mostly coming in the.
• 36:30
  Summer, because we are 3.
• 36:33
  5 hour drive from Denver.
• 36:35
  And so it was a bit of a commute for some students, but students
• 36:39
  that were looking for internship during their summer quarter.
• 36:44
  We were a really great fit for them and on.
• 36:49
  And it my younger son, Mark ends up going off to college and James is still at home.
• 36:58
  And so the idea from this leadership group was your son can have his own.
• 37:05
  Sweet, if you will, in the cabin that we build out for you and he
• 37:10
  can have the college experience and have roommates living with him and
• 37:15
  beautifully with the horse boy karma.
• 37:19
  It's people who wanted to work with special needs.
• 37:22
  So they end up coming to live with us.
• 37:25
  Taking an interest in James's obsessions, whether it's maps, movies, or rock music,
• 37:34
  like they would all connect with him.
• 37:37
  It was really, really beautiful.
• 37:40
  I think There are and in this group were 3 construction people,
• 37:48
  like, 1 was a high end builder who built all the fancy homes in Aspen.
• 37:54
  The other 1 worked for.
• 37:56
  The hospitality group of Aspen skiing company, and the 3rd 1
• 38:00
  worked for a builder that did like commercial construction.
• 38:04
  So it, I was like, blessed with this amazing group and then they have you
• 38:11
  come and do a final presentation, like, All their teams and they said,
• 38:17
  Cheryl, can you please bring animals?
• 38:20
  And I said, heck yeah, I would love to bring animals to this.
• 38:23
  So we brought our mini horses and they did a grand entrance because I had never
• 38:28
  taken them inside before and they jumped the threshold in a very grand way.
• 38:34
  So we got a standing ovation.
• 38:36
  It was, it was a really, really cool thing, but it reminds me, you asked me,
• 38:41
  how do we get the name smiling goat?
• 38:44
  Before we actually launched the program, we had built the
• 38:52
  infrastructure for goats and rabbits.
• 38:55
  Basically building on your idea, Rupert, of having the small social
• 39:00
  animals around as part of the program.
• 39:03
  So I thought, okay, we'll start small with this before we bring in horses.
• 39:09
  And this lady was moving back east and she had three goats.
• 39:14
  She was an empty nester.
• 39:16
  And she and her husband had the most adorable, sweetest goats.
• 39:21
  So we get these three goats that are massively overweight
• 39:25
  Nelly, Lester, and Hubert.
• 39:28
  And they are as sweet as pie and The boys and I are sitting around
• 39:33
  our kitchen table brainstorming.
• 39:34
  We also had two dogs that were black and they were obsessed
• 39:38
  with the dogs and they said, why don't we name it black dog ranch?
• 39:43
  And so I'm like, let's Google it.
• 39:46
  I swear to you.
• 39:47
  I think there were 10, 000 worldwide black dog ranches.
• 39:51
  I'm like, we can't do that.
• 39:53
  I'm in marketing PR.
• 39:54
  We need a good name.
• 39:56
  And Lester.
• 39:59
  The one goat there are pygmy goats.
• 40:02
  He, oh my God, Lester and Nellie were the biggest characters.
• 40:07
  And Lester had a little quirk where he almost smiled and That's
• 40:15
  how we got the name was Lester.
• 40:17
  And believe it or not, Lester is still with us.
• 40:22
  I honestly thought last winter was going to be his last winter because our
• 40:27
  winters are pretty significant here.
• 40:29
  The beautiful thing about the Roaring Fork Valley though, is everybody's
• 40:32
  skiers and kids love snow days because school's out and their parents
• 40:37
  will drive them to the ski areas.
• 40:39
  So the world really doesn't stop in the winter here.
• 40:43
  We get beautiful.
• 40:45
  snow and then great sunny days the next day.
• 40:49
  It's not endless gray.
• 40:51
  So anyway, but winters can be cold and harsh and I was really concerned
• 40:57
  Lester was not going to make it.
• 40:59
  So we started incorporating more of Lester's lunchtime is what we call it.
• 41:06
  And Lester's lunchtime is where our kiddos and young adults feed him lunch.
• 41:13
  We're And we have a brain injury lady, Miss Kara, who is an adult, and this
• 41:21
  is her favorite thing to do, is come to the ranch and feed Lester lunch.
• 41:27
  Lester has never looked better in his entire life.
• 41:32
  His coat, his weight, like, I'm like, okay, I don't know how much longer we
• 41:37
  have Lester, but I think when the animals feel purpose, it's just like humans.
• 41:43
  Their lifespan lasts longer.
• 41:47
  So that's how we got the name Smiling Goat.
• 41:50
  Yeah.
• 41:51
  And then, so I did not hire an employee for Smiling Goat until 2020.
• 42:00
  And again, you know, I always say, It really, like, life has worked out so
• 42:07
  perfectly that I had all these years of being and still being a PR person.
• 42:14
  During COVID, I get this email from a woman, completely cold,
• 42:21
  Outreach that says, I'm a certified recreation therapist.
• 42:26
  I'm working for a local recovery organization and they brought me here
• 42:33
  from Washington and they now have found they don't have enough hours wondering
• 42:38
  if you do and at the same time on the horse boy international chat and
• 42:44
  I think it might Isaacson sent out.
• 42:47
  Is anybody a certified recreation therapist?
• 42:51
  And I think I chimed in something like, no, but I have one that wants a job.
• 42:58
  What's up?
• 42:59
  And it turns out in certified recreation therapy you have to be
• 43:05
  supervised by Another certified recreation therapist, so you cannot
• 43:12
  so I can't supervise a college student who's interning as a rec therapist.
• 43:18
  It's a very strict licensure process with rec therapy.
• 43:24
  So what ended up happening was the intern that had contacted
• 43:30
  Rupert was a trick rider with equestrian chaos out of Alabama.
• 43:37
  And this young lady, Kaylee was already through college and had horse skills.
• 43:44
  She wasn't just a rec therapist.
• 43:47
  And so I was like, okay, universe.
• 43:50
  Am I supposed to be listening to this?
• 43:52
  Is it time for me to get an employee?
• 43:55
  And I ended up going out to four donors.
• 44:00
  And said, Hey, I have this opportunity for a two for one.
• 44:04
  If we fund this salary I not only get this rec therapy person, we get a therapist
• 44:13
  on our team, which we really needed.
• 44:15
  She has horse skills and we get this intern who we'll have for 15
• 44:21
  weeks who also has horse skills.
• 44:24
  And they all said yes.
• 44:26
  And we have never looked back.
• 44:28
  Like I.
• 44:29
  I lost sleep at night worrying that I would not be able to
• 44:32
  continue to fund that salary.
• 44:35
  And it has just worked out like a dream again, the horse boy karma magic.
• 44:42
  And so we had Brooke here for 15 weeks and Brooke taught us mounted archery.
• 44:50
  And I Oh, my heaven.
• 44:52
  So that's an addition to our program.
• 44:55
  And we can actually long line kiddos that don't have riding skills and the horses
• 45:02
  understand what we are trying to do.
• 45:06
  And they, I swear to you, help line up the kids so they can hit the targets.
• 45:11
  It's priceless.
• 45:13
  And so we're also going to build this piece out further for our veteran
• 45:19
  program and doing archery from the ground and then graduating them to
• 45:25
  archery from the back of the horse.
• 45:27
  And this is where your old schoolmaster horses really come in handy.
• 45:32
  They, they get it and they They end up helping the people, which
• 45:38
  I never understood that concept.
• 45:40
  I remember Rupert, you saying to me when you were 1st, teaching me dressage
• 45:46
  is that with all the repetitions.
• 45:49
  The more you do it, your horses will then become so good that they will
• 45:55
  help you teach new people how to do it.
• 45:58
  And I remember thinking, is that really possible?
• 46:02
  Am I Cheryl Bartow really capable of this?
• 46:05
  Will this happen?
• 46:07
  And then Gates, our gentlemen horse was the first one to do that.
• 46:11
  And I had a DU student who actually had had a little bit of dressage.
• 46:18
  And it was amazing to watch how that all took off.
• 46:22
  Really amazing.
• 46:24
  And I also remember the other piece of advice you gave me was don't
• 46:32
  worry, the good horses will come.
• 46:35
  I really thought that that was going to be such a hard piece.
• 46:41
  And Boy, it really has not.
• 46:44
  And the horses we have are so incredible.
• 46:48
  We have six of them and they all bring such different talents
• 46:53
  and gifts to the program.
• 46:57
  And I, like, I, I just pinch myself on like, how wonderful they are in
• 47:05
  teaching other people and how kind they are with understanding what their jobs
• 47:11
  are, the professionals that they are.
• 47:16
  Rupert Isaacson: You know, you've hinted at the variety, the broad
• 47:20
  breadth, the breadth, that's the word of the work you guys are doing
• 47:23
  there, that you're incorporating rec therapy, that It's clearly
• 47:27
  obviously not just about the horses.
• 47:29
  You have the social animals that you are involved in outreach with schools
• 47:35
  that You're so Go into mountain sports that you, but the horse side of it, you
• 47:41
  have, you are as obsessive as you need to be to create these wonderful horses.
• 47:47
  And at the same time, you're willing to abandon the horse in a heartbeat
• 47:50
  if that's not where the kid is at.
• 47:52
  And it's so interesting that, you know, your average therapeutic riding place
• 47:55
  would not call itself after a goat.
• 47:57
  You know, right.
• 47:58
  Or your average dressage place, because you guys are practicing a lot of dressage,
• 48:01
  would not call itself after a goat.
• 48:03
  And what I love about that is, is, is that really projects a humility that
• 48:09
  says to a child or a family coming in, this is not the horse place.
• 48:17
  And therefore, if you're intimidated or scared or not interested in
• 48:20
  the horse or whatever, therefore this is somehow not for you.
• 48:23
  Or if you're the person who's interested in, in the horse training side of
• 48:27
  the dressage that well, this is the dressage, you know, very important
• 48:30
  and serious, you know, no, no, I mean, it's, it's, it's called smiling goat.
• 48:35
  There's something that's so democratizing about that.
• 48:40
  And the roots in nature.
• 48:43
  There's also, of course, a whole other set of skills.
• 48:45
  And I think it would really benefit listeners if you could go into this.
• 48:48
  So a lot of people now, obviously, the equine assisted world is a growing field.
• 48:52
  When I got into it, when you got into it, it was much more fringe.
• 48:56
  Governments were not.
• 48:59
  getting behind it outside of, you know, certain countries.
• 49:02
  Now that's changed.
• 49:03
  Particularly since COVID suddenly now we have found ourselves drawn
• 49:07
  from the hippie margins, you know, somewhat into the mainstream.
• 49:11
  And this is a good thing.
• 49:12
  So a lot of people now are starting equine assisted practices.
• 49:18
  And of course, as soon as they do this, they run into the
• 49:21
  challenge of how do I not burn out?
• 49:23
  How do I fund it?
• 49:25
  Okay, maybe the government will pay for the kids to come, which of course
• 49:28
  they didn't when you and I began, but that's still not enough to, you
• 49:31
  know, keep the whole place running.
• 49:32
  What
• 49:35
  are your thoughts on the following?
• 49:40
  How do you not burn out?
• 49:42
  You're an autism mum, still have your day job, you're running the ranch,
• 49:48
  you're dealing with a very large number of families coming in, needing a real
• 49:56
  broad range of services, not just the horses, How do you not burn out?
• 50:02
  And then the second part of the question is, as a PR person, if that's your
• 50:08
  parallel profession, what's your, what are the like the five tips that you would
• 50:13
  give people who are, who are running programs going, shit, you know, how
• 50:17
  do I, how do I actually sustain this?
• 50:20
  What are those?
• 50:21
  So let's, let's start with the burnout one.
• 50:22
  How do you not burn out?
• 50:24
  Sheryl Barto: You know, that is such a great question.
• 50:28
  And I know in the rec therapy field, and I think in most therapy fields, the whole
• 50:36
  concept of self care is top of mind.
• 50:41
  And this generation coming up, Behind us is way more aware.
• 50:48
  I feel like than our generation.
• 50:50
  I think I'm considered right on the last year of the baby boomer.
• 50:55
  And certainly, I was raised with that mindset of do whatever
• 51:01
  it takes to get the job done.
• 51:04
  And so, It's my, my PR company is called Oh, communications.
• 51:10
  It's the letter.
• 51:11
  Oh, and it stands for ostrich, which is my maiden name, which I hated growing up,
• 51:20
  but my father is, was a past president of the American veterinary association.
• 51:28
  And he was.
• 51:29
  Dr.
• 51:30
  Ostrich.
• 51:30
  Yes, I kid you not.
• 51:33
  And but his name was very recognizable and he was a first generation college
• 51:41
  student, immigrants of Russian Jews.
• 51:45
  And his brothers and sisters are all small business owners.
• 51:52
  Every one of them from lawyer, interior design, construction
• 51:56
  company, and a very driven group.
• 51:59
  So I feel like some of it is in my DNA and I will say that yoga is really
• 52:09
  Like, one of my self care things, like, I don't, I try to practice three
• 52:16
  times a week just to, but I can only do early morning classes and it seems
• 52:22
  like where we live in the Roaring Fork Valley, the earliest class is 7 a.
• 52:27
  m.
• 52:27
  and sometimes, like, I've already been up for three hours and I've jammed on a bunch
• 52:33
  of things because I have to get it done.
• 52:37
  The other piece I would say is to me doing the horse training is not
• 52:45
  work and being with the horses is also very, very therapeutic for me.
• 52:53
  And I think like some people just think I'm a little crazy because of
• 53:01
  the different hats that I wear and You know, I sleep hard every night, 7 hours
• 53:08
  and they say, like, sleep is also 1 of those rejuvenation things we need.
• 53:16
  That's how mother nature made us.
• 53:18
  And so, and I do spend a lot of time in nature, like, our, our society now
• 53:25
  is so technology focused and being on social media, I'm forced into
• 53:31
  it because of PR, but at the same time, like, social media has served
• 53:36
  smiling goat really, really well.
• 53:39
  And so, like, there's, I feel like.
• 53:44
  My life is so interconnected that there's not really separation of church and state.
• 53:51
  But I also think because I'm so passionate about Smiling Goat, I will do anything
• 53:58
  to advance whatever the goals are.
• 54:03
  And To me, it's what drives me.
• 54:06
  It's what lights me up.
• 54:08
  It's not a, Oh God, I have to go do this.
• 54:12
  Also learning to delegate and letting go.
• 54:16
  The other piece, I think when I was that little girl POA person,
• 54:20
  nobody could touch my horse.
• 54:22
  It's my horse.
• 54:23
  It's my horse.
• 54:23
  And only I can make this horse canter.
• 54:27
  And Where did I hear a quote that what good is my horse if
• 54:32
  another person can't ride it?
• 54:35
  Right?
• 54:36
  So it's letting go and trusting your tribe, trusting, training them to a
• 54:46
  point where you are confident in the decisions that they're going to make
• 54:53
  and not second guess their decisions.
• 54:55
  And so, like last week,
• 55:00
  Sunday, just this past Sunday, I had to drive.
• 55:05
  Three and a half hours to Denver to pick up a calf hutch for
• 55:08
  my goats in our new location.
• 55:10
  So for those of you who aren't ranchers, a calf hutch is like a
• 55:15
  gigantic dog house and we needed something for our goats for the winter.
• 55:21
  And I have a pickup truck and I needed to drive to pick this thing up and
• 55:28
  one of my volunteers had texted me and said, Hey, I, we were talking
• 55:35
  about Gates, our gentlemen horse.
• 55:37
  He had three weeks ago, poor guy, cellulitis in one leg and an abscess
• 55:44
  in the other leg, both back legs.
• 55:47
  So literally, like, I have pictures of him soaking one leg, icing the other leg.
• 55:52
  And honestly, this is where that term, it takes a village comes into
• 55:58
  play, like, yes, I'm doing some of it.
• 56:02
  But yes, when people offer to help, I'm accepting it.
• 56:07
  And so, on Sunday, 1 of the volunteers says, so Gates is
• 56:12
  now at hand walking status.
• 56:15
  She's like, can I also hand walk the donkeys with him?
• 56:19
  So we have too many donkeys that were donated last year and
• 56:23
  so she brought her daughter.
• 56:25
  The daughter's boyfriend and her, and she's from Sweden and
• 56:30
  lives in our valley and works for one of my real estate clients.
• 56:35
  And they sent me these beautiful photos of them hand walking gates and the donkeys
• 56:40
  while I'm picking up the calf hutch.
• 56:42
  And then a third group was going to the other location where two
• 56:47
  other horses are, where that horse.
• 56:50
  Petey, who you have met Rupert, he's my master fancy and delusion fourth level
• 56:56
  dressage horse that yes was donated to the program and is an amazing animal.
• 57:02
  He had scraped his legs and needed dressings.
• 57:05
  So I'm driving to Denver.
• 57:07
  I get photos from Newcastle, photos from Basalt, and
• 57:11
  everybody's being taken care of.
• 57:13
  So does that answer the question?
• 57:15
  I don't know.
• 57:16
  It's like, it's Also, I think you've
• 57:21
  Rupert Isaacson: also just let slip there that you now have two campuses.
• 57:24
  Sheryl Barto: Yes, I did leave it slip, yes.
• 57:27
  Rupert Isaacson: Not only are you not burning out, but you're growing.
• 57:29
  Sheryl Barto: But we're growing and yes, I'm divorced a 2nd time, which
• 57:35
  I think the passion of me working so much is, is it contributed to that?
• 57:42
  But that's okay.
• 57:43
  It's it's again, the horseboy karma of the things that are opening
• 57:48
  up, like, not imagining that these 2 campuses were possible.
• 57:53
  And how they are.
• 57:54
  So we now have a mobile unit that will go to Carbondale and Snowmass.
• 58:02
  And we've been working with the town of Snowmass and for
• 58:05
  people who are not skiers.
• 58:07
  Rupert Isaacson: Oh, does that mean three campuses, one mobile?
• 58:11
  Sheryl Barto: Not really, because the animals are not living in Snowmass.
• 58:14
  It's a mobile unit.
• 58:16
  going to deliver services there.
• 58:20
  So
• 58:21
  Rupert Isaacson: does
• 58:22
  Sheryl Barto: it?
• 58:22
  Okay.
• 58:23
  Well, the town of
• 58:25
  Rupert Isaacson: Yeah,
• 58:27
  Sheryl Barto: it's a sister ski area to Aspen.
• 58:29
  So your ticket is good at Aspen and at Snowmass.
• 58:33
  And Snowmass is the second largest ski area in the U.
• 58:36
  S.
• 58:36
  next to Vail.
• 58:37
  It's amazing.
• 58:39
  And the town has a rodeo ground.
• 58:43
  And the rodeo is very booze.
• 58:46
  It's like all the people from Aspen come in their cowboy hats
• 58:50
  and the rodeo grounds are used.
• 58:52
  I think there's 11 rodeos in the summer before winter hits and the town did this
• 58:58
  amazing event this fall called the main event M A N E and they showcase different
• 59:06
  horse disciplines and smiling goat.
• 59:10
  And so we got to do a back riding demonstration and
• 59:16
  a classical dressage demo.
• 59:19
  And then they asked me, do you have other disciplines?
• 59:23
  So I brought in a Rainer to do raining and sliding stops and raining patterns.
• 59:29
  And then they hired a Mexican.
• 59:34
  Rodeo group that was the women's side saddle rider.
• 59:40
  Rupert Isaacson: Yeah, the Amazon.
• 59:41
  Sheryl Barto: Oh my gosh, the whole thing, the spirit.
• 59:45
  And then they asked me we brought in an equine massage therapist
• 59:52
  who set up a booth on the grounds.
• 59:54
  My blacksmith came in with his dogs and did demonstrations on Horse foot care,
• 1:00:01
  and he did it with my mini donkeys.
• 1:00:03
  And I have to tell you, I haven't talked about Tacoda, who you have
• 1:00:07
  also met, Rupert, who is a PMU horse that was donated to us.
• 1:00:15
  And this horse,
• 1:00:17
  Rupert Isaacson: Listeners won't necessarily know what a PMU horse is.
• 1:00:19
  What's a PMU horse?
• 1:00:21
  Sheryl Barto: Oh, they're So, their moms were bred for their urine to go into
• 1:00:30
  menopausal women's drug called Pramarin.
• 1:00:35
  So, they basically would keep the mare's bread.
• 1:00:40
  All the time so that they could harvest their urine.
• 1:00:44
  So the babies would drop and become hand fed babies and either discarded or put
• 1:00:51
  up for adoption and a woman from Aspen.
• 1:00:56
  I don't know what year it was, rescued 50 of these mares
• 1:01:01
  from one of those factories.
• 1:01:03
  And again, another universe sending me good things.
• 1:01:09
  I had had the three quarter horses to start my program.
• 1:01:13
  We were growing.
• 1:01:15
  I was like, I need three more, but I don't want to just like take anything.
• 1:01:22
  And I put quietly the word out and a woman who has a horse rehab program
• 1:01:30
  in Grand Junction said, Oh my gosh, call so and so, she has cancer and
• 1:01:37
  needs to get rid of six horses.
• 1:01:40
  So I went up with my veterinarian and my first working student.
• 1:01:44
  Lily and we looked at these six horses and they wanted me to take all six,
• 1:01:50
  but I didn't have room for all six.
• 1:01:52
  So we took three.
• 1:01:54
  And Dakota Prince and Leia and Dakota, I need to do a DNA on him the're.
• 1:02:02
  Some kind of draft, 'cause PMUs they picked.
• 1:02:06
  The big horses so that they're, they could harvest more urine.
• 1:02:11
  And Takoda has some kind of draft in him, but also something else.
• 1:02:17
  He's the most graceful, incredible dressage horse.
• 1:02:22
  But he has that draft horse, steady Eddie as they go mentality.
• 1:02:29
  We taught him how to pull a cart during COVID and I mean, he does sensory work.
• 1:02:35
  He does back riding.
• 1:02:37
  You can do anything with this horse.
• 1:02:40
  He does not like to be a leader on the trail rides though.
• 1:02:42
  He does not like going through water obstacles, but anyway, back
• 1:02:46
  to the main event, they asked us to do a back riding demo.
• 1:02:51
  And I asked Kaylee, our rec therapist, I said, will you do
• 1:02:57
  the back riding while I narrate?
• 1:02:59
  So, we show up with our pool noodles.
• 1:03:02
  And what I didn't realize, like, I thought there'd be, you A mixed age
• 1:03:08
  group to play tag, to show the game of tag, and now we teach kiddos on
• 1:03:15
  the spectrum the concepts of tag.
• 1:03:18
  So we had Kaylee back ride with a young girl who was neurotypical because she
• 1:03:24
  really, really, really wanted to do this.
• 1:03:27
  So we said, okay, Mela, you can be our back riding kiddo.
• 1:03:31
  We'll give you a pool noodle.
• 1:03:33
  Well, my team had brought all of our pool noodles and you can imagine at
• 1:03:38
  a public event where there are 300 people, there are lots of children.
• 1:03:42
  We had eight kids in the arena.
• 1:03:45
  All with pool noodles playing tag with Dakota while I'm narrating and
• 1:03:51
  I'm telling the audience who is not, they're not, they don't know horses.
• 1:03:58
  Like you do not realize how spectacular this is.
• 1:04:01
  There are eight kids running at Dakota with pool noodles tagging him and Kaylee's
• 1:04:08
  doing walk to counter transitions.
• 1:04:11
  Absolutely.
• 1:04:12
  Beautifully.
• 1:04:13
  I need to send you the videos.
• 1:04:15
  They're spectacular.
• 1:04:16
  And I was so proud of our horse and him doing this so gracefully, so kindly.
• 1:04:24
  And so like there wasn't one moment that he balked, bucked or spooked.
• 1:04:32
  And that says a lot.
• 1:04:34
  There is music playing.
• 1:04:36
  We've got an announcer system.
• 1:04:38
  300 people watching, like, it was pretty special.
• 1:04:42
  And then Petey and I got to do the classical dressage.
• 1:04:46
  I was living my best life, like, he's doing passage and Spanish
• 1:04:51
  walk and flying lead changes.
• 1:04:55
  And I was like, who knew that at this later point in my life
• 1:05:01
  that this would be happening.
• 1:05:02
  It was pretty special.
• 1:05:04
  Yeah.
• 1:05:05
  And we just got to promote Smiling Goat.
• 1:05:08
  Rupert Isaacson: And happening, these dreams coming true because
• 1:05:10
  of autism, not in spite of them.
• 1:05:12
  Because of your son's autism.
• 1:05:14
  Sheryl Barto: Absolutely.
• 1:05:15
  Rupert Isaacson: The person who really opened the door.
• 1:05:18
  Sheryl Barto: There is no question.
• 1:05:19
  And so many people ask me, does your son participate in the program?
• 1:05:25
  And I always pause and take a breath and say, Well, not as you might
• 1:05:32
  expect, but there are ways that he has.
• 1:05:37
  And it's been so interesting, again, going back to your advice and Dr.
• 1:05:44
  Temple Grandin's advice of follow the child, follow the person.
• 1:05:49
  James never wanted to be identified as having autism.
• 1:05:54
  And to this day, he does not.
• 1:05:58
  Tell people that when he meets them, his obsessions growing
• 1:06:03
  up were cars and trucks.
• 1:06:05
  So as a 4 year old, he could tell you every make and model on a road
• 1:06:09
  trip that what was going by you from cars to semis to whatever it was.
• 1:06:16
  And taking a page from the horse boy method is let's figure out how we're going
• 1:06:22
  to turn an obsession into a vocation.
• 1:06:27
  How do we do that?
• 1:06:29
  And our first autism families, I don't know if you'll remember this Rupert,
• 1:06:34
  but they came to the demo at the rodeo grounds, little miss Mia and her parents,
• 1:06:40
  Maribel and Diego Latino family, bilingual Diego, very into cars and trucks and
• 1:06:47
  worked at a body shop and James would come out whenever that family was on the
• 1:06:53
  property and start talking with Diego and I was like, okay, this is cool.
• 1:06:59
  Well, then we had two different families, Latino boys who were obese.
• 1:07:09
  Nine year olds that weighed 150 pounds.
• 1:07:14
  I, I couldn't get them on the horse myself.
• 1:07:18
  So I would say to James, Hey, Carlos is coming today.
• 1:07:23
  Will you just help me get him on to Dakota?
• 1:07:27
  And of course, Dakota was trained to stand next to you.
• 1:07:30
  We have a giant homemade mounting block.
• 1:07:33
  That's more like a platform, like a diving board platform.
• 1:07:38
  James would come out and help me.
• 1:07:40
  And so there were little ways where he participated and then one time I was
• 1:07:48
  out of town and there was a storm and Adobe, our other quarter horses only 14
• 1:07:57
  to jump the fence spooked in the storm.
• 1:08:00
  So she was out.
• 1:08:02
  James called me, said Adobe's out, and Adobe's a mare mare.
• 1:08:07
  She's beautiful.
• 1:08:08
  Loves James, like has always loved him.
• 1:08:12
  Like just, so he would often help me halter horses, move
• 1:08:18
  pastures help with turnout.
• 1:08:20
  And when she got out, I told him go get Gates.
• 1:08:26
  Go get Gates.
• 1:08:28
  To her with gates and I bet she'll come to you and he did and he got her and
• 1:08:35
  he was so Empowered that he did this without any help and that I was if I was
• 1:08:43
  there I would have done the whole thing.
• 1:08:45
  So yes, he has participated but has been in a very Ancillary way.
• 1:08:51
  And just to add, I'm so proud of him.
• 1:08:54
  He just celebrated seven years with FedEx as a van driver.
• 1:09:01
  He has been a driver.
• 1:09:03
  He goes in 45 minutes early every day for seven years because he doesn't like how
• 1:09:08
  the package handlers arrange his truck.
• 1:09:11
  And I said, why don't you just tell them how you want it?
• 1:09:15
  He said, no, it's way easier if I just go in and do it myself.
• 1:09:19
  So for seven years, that's what he's done.
• 1:09:22
  Yeah.
• 1:09:22
  Yeah.
• 1:09:23
  I
• 1:09:23
  Rupert Isaacson: was going to ask you, obviously, where he's at now.
• 1:09:26
  That's, that's wonderful.
• 1:09:28
  And it's, it's so interesting to how we live in a day and age where really
• 1:09:34
  only white collar jobs are valued.
• 1:09:37
  And as you know, we were just doing a a neuroscience conference with Dr.
• 1:09:41
  Temple Grandin down at Eastern Virginia Medical School.
• 1:09:44
  And one of the points she was making is.
• 1:09:46
  This doesn't prepare anyone for any kind of life.
• 1:09:48
  I mean, you might end up in some sort of white collar job at some
• 1:09:52
  point in your life, but if you don't know how to do the real jobs,
• 1:09:59
  what kind of skills can you build?
• 1:10:01
  And, but now people have been sold a kind of bill of goods, particularly more and
• 1:10:08
  more with social media that, you know, you've, you've got to live a certain
• 1:10:11
  lifestyle and blah, blah, blah, blah.
• 1:10:13
  One of the gifts, as you said, of autism is That's not a thing that kind of
• 1:10:18
  judging yourself by others yet run the same, but I think back to myself, you
• 1:10:22
  know, coming out of college, I didn't have a job that was not a manual job,
• 1:10:28
  whether it was construction or horse training or window cleaning or whatever
• 1:10:31
  I needed to do to keep body and soul together so that I could become a writer.
• 1:10:36
  I worked only manually for, I'd say, almost 10 years.
• 1:10:42
  And then little by little, I began publishing things and so on.
• 1:10:46
  And it gave me.
• 1:10:48
  Well, all the things you'd expect it to give me.
• 1:10:52
  Of course, James is lucky because he's coming out of the ranching background,
• 1:10:56
  and who knows where he'll end up.
• 1:10:58
  But the skills involved in being a FedEx driver, that's huge.
• 1:11:04
  Huge, huge, huge, that the responsibility is massive, the just killing people
• 1:11:09
  on the road, let alone, you know, all of the logistics involved.
• 1:11:12
  It's,
• 1:11:13
  Sheryl Barto: I'm so proud of him.
• 1:11:15
  Like, it's, it's, he has to take care of that truck.
• 1:11:20
  He has the perfect amount of human interaction.
• 1:11:23
  It's not too much.
• 1:11:24
  Sometimes it's none at all.
• 1:11:26
  Sometimes it's, and he's got.
• 1:11:28
  Animal buddies on his route, so he tells me about the Calico cat and
• 1:11:34
  he'll send me selfies of the cat on his shoulder because it jumped in his
• 1:11:38
  truck and he's got other dogs that he knows and all their breeds and all their
• 1:11:44
  like, he's connected with like, The pet shop owner that's next to Walmart
• 1:11:48
  and it's, it's been perfect for him.
• 1:11:52
  He also says he wants to start his own business someday.
• 1:11:56
  So maybe he will, he thinks he wants to be a tow truck driver.
• 1:12:01
  And I said, well, maybe you should ride around with one for a while
• 1:12:05
  and see, you know, he originally wanted to be a long haul trucker.
• 1:12:11
  And after life skills school, his after school care person
• 1:12:19
  was married to a truck driver.
• 1:12:20
  So I said, Hey, Deb, do you think Chris would let James go with him?
• 1:12:25
  She's like, absolutely.
• 1:12:27
  So James went on this adventure with him and when he came back, he's like,
• 1:12:31
  Oh, I didn't realize like how much work that it's not just driving.
• 1:12:36
  Like they have to load, they have to unload, they have to
• 1:12:39
  like show up at 4am at places.
• 1:12:41
  Like it really opened his eyes.
• 1:12:44
  And it, I think, you know, I said, you probably should do
• 1:12:49
  that with a Toe truck driver too.
• 1:12:53
  I have no idea what it's like to be a tow truck driver, but I'm
• 1:12:56
  guessing like I've called to be rescued a few times and I'm imagining
• 1:13:04
  there's a lot of problems goes on with that.
• 1:13:09
  Rupert Isaacson: So the fact that he's even able to do that and speaking of
• 1:13:11
  other problem solvers, you haven't really spoken about Mark your other
• 1:13:13
  son, but just, and then I want to bring you back to that second part of
• 1:13:17
  my question, which is as a PR person, what is your advice to people who are
• 1:13:22
  starting, but just tell us a little bit about Mark because that and how he's
• 1:13:27
  been involved in, in basically how this is sort of a tribal thing that you do.
• 1:13:33
  Sheryl Barto: It really is.
• 1:13:34
  So Mark.
• 1:13:36
  20 months younger than James, neurotypical played varsity sports football, baseball,
• 1:13:46
  wrestling all through high school, hockey, went on to college, went into ROTC, which
• 1:13:56
  Rupert Isaacson: ROTC
• 1:13:57
  Sheryl Barto: is for, Reserve Officer Training Corps, I think is
• 1:14:02
  the C, I might be wrong on that.
• 1:14:04
  But it is for college students who want to enter the military as officers.
• 1:14:13
  So he went into the Air Force ROTC.
• 1:14:18
  And graduated as a 2nd Lieutenant, and now he is a captain and he's
• 1:14:26
  in special ops, which the Air Force speaking of PR really does not toot
• 1:14:33
  their horn about their special ops team.
• 1:14:37
  But they are very alive and well, and he just got married to another
• 1:14:46
  fellow ROTC captain, and she is a pilot, and she flies C 130s, and I
• 1:14:58
  think one of the things They are cargo planes and she does search and rescue.
• 1:15:04
  So in theory, she could be rescuing Mark's unit if they got into trouble.
• 1:15:13
  Like it's, it's kind of crazy.
• 1:15:15
  And they just got married October 10th.
• 1:15:19
  I'm like over the moon.
• 1:15:21
  She is an amazing human.
• 1:15:23
  Her, First weekend visiting with us.
• 1:15:26
  She volunteered.
• 1:15:28
  She got out there and helped me do sensory work with a family.
• 1:15:32
  Like she's an amazing human.
• 1:15:34
  They both are.
• 1:15:36
  And I think for Mark being the younger son of having a special needs, older
• 1:15:42
  brother, Almost moves you into the older child's position in the family
• 1:15:50
  and Mark is a very stoic human with an enormous heart and doesn't show a lot
• 1:16:01
  of emotions and Ella, his wife, which is so fun to say his wife She brings
• 1:16:10
  out the absolute best in him and she is super outgoing and very, very driven.
• 1:16:16
  She is studying for her master's while she's getting all her
• 1:16:21
  hours in for flight school.
• 1:16:23
  They both are stationed now in Tucson.
• 1:16:27
  He just got transferred to Tucson and Mark is, he's a really deep, you know,
• 1:16:33
  Deep thinker, and I really believe that growing up with a special needs brother,
• 1:16:41
  he, I don't think I realized the level of compassion Mark has because of.
• 1:16:50
  That experience, and I'm so incredibly proud of both of them there.
• 1:16:56
  I could cry
• 1:16:57
  Rupert Isaacson: down in Colorado Springs.
• 1:17:01
  Or spoil our other method to keen, which we do.
• 1:17:04
  Well, with veterans is actually there on the US Air Force Academy
• 1:17:08
  grounds working with veterans and I can't help wondering if they'll
• 1:17:11
  end up somehow connected with that.
• 1:17:13
  Sheryl Barto: I wonder that too.
• 1:17:16
  Who knows.
• 1:17:17
  But
• 1:17:18
  Rupert Isaacson: let's go, let's go back just quickly.
• 1:17:21
  Where I'm going with this as I think a lot of people listening would probably
• 1:17:25
  quite like some mentorship from you because so, As a PR person, you've,
• 1:17:32
  you've, you've had this parallel track with the equine assisted work.
• 1:17:36
  What's your, what are your like checklist things that you would say to someone
• 1:17:42
  who's going to go into this or is in this and is wondering how to build it
• 1:17:47
  further or is wondering, okay, you know, I've been kind of doing this myself.
• 1:17:53
  How do I now get funded?
• 1:17:54
  Like you've addressed and faced all these things single handed.
• 1:18:00
  You know something about PR.
• 1:18:02
  What's your advice to us?
• 1:18:05
  Sheryl Barto: Okay, that's such a great question.
• 1:18:07
  I, I think, one is philosophical and it's saying yes, and it's saying yes
• 1:18:19
  to networking opportunities and that's anything from having a coffee with
• 1:18:26
  somebody to Going to an event and tabling at an event and the reason I say that
• 1:18:35
  is you just never know where that is going to lead you and and yes, some
• 1:18:45
  can be time wasters, but if you ask the right questions And ask for names
• 1:18:54
  and follow up and meet with people.
• 1:18:57
  It's just amazing what doors start opening.
• 1:19:01
  Honestly, with smiling goat, it is almost impossible to run into
• 1:19:06
  somebody who's not affected by autism.
• 1:19:09
  Or has a veteran in their life or somebody who is in recovery or affected by trauma.
• 1:19:17
  Like we're humans and this is what connects us all.
• 1:19:22
  And the other big piece of advice is taking names and keeping
• 1:19:29
  track of them and having lists.
• 1:19:32
  And this is where It's easy to let that slip.
• 1:19:37
  And here's an example.
• 1:19:41
  Was it 2 weeks ago?
• 1:19:42
  3 weeks ago?
• 1:19:43
  The Arc of the Central Rockies did something similar to that Virginia medical
• 1:19:51
  conference you were at, not that Virginia medical conference you were at, not
• 1:19:54
  White at that level, but they basically invited pediatricians from Denver to
• 1:20:01
  Grand Junction to come for a, a medical conference talking about neurodiversity.
• 1:20:10
  And they asked us, Smiling Goat, along with several other Therapeutic services
• 1:20:18
  to, so a syndicate was there, for example, the other autism group and they asked
• 1:20:24
  us to be there for the lunch hour where the doctors could come out, go around
• 1:20:30
  the tables and understand what resources they could refer their patients to.
• 1:20:37
  And so I met.
• 1:20:40
  I think I got 11 names from that.
• 1:20:44
  I would engage in conversation with people.
• 1:20:47
  And then, you know, two of them were doctors from
• 1:20:50
  Children's Hospital in Denver.
• 1:20:53
  And I thought, I said to one of them, Do you remember so and so?
• 1:20:58
  He used to work in your unit.
• 1:21:00
  He was a special needs dad, a nurse practitioner who moved out of town.
• 1:21:06
  And he said to me, Cheryl, I would like to figure out a way where
• 1:21:12
  we can diagnose kids in a ranch setting rather than in an office.
• 1:21:18
  Yes.
• 1:21:19
  And how much nicer, right, would that be than having kids having to
• 1:21:24
  go into the scary doctor office?
• 1:21:27
  It's freaking brilliant, right?
• 1:21:29
  Rupert Isaacson: The message that says to the family, it's like, Ooh, your
• 1:21:33
  autism diagnosis might get you this life,
• 1:21:37
  Sheryl Barto: right?
• 1:21:38
  Rupert Isaacson: Rather than, yeah.
• 1:21:40
  Amazing.
• 1:21:41
  Yeah.
• 1:21:41
  That is brilliant.
• 1:21:42
  That is brilliant.
• 1:21:44
  Sheryl Barto: So this man moved away.
• 1:21:46
  I said to this doctor, I don't know if you remember John, so and so.
• 1:21:49
  She's like, I do.
• 1:21:50
  Cause he had adopted two kids, I think from the Dominican Republic
• 1:21:55
  that were both special needs.
• 1:21:56
  He drove them from Denver to come to Smiling Goat.
• 1:22:01
  That's three and a half hours.
• 1:22:03
  He brought them three times and that idea died when he left.
• 1:22:09
  And I said to this doctor, so I have her name in my, I never go anywhere with, this
• 1:22:15
  is so old school notebook, but my little spiral ring notebook, I had every one
• 1:22:21
  of those doctors and nurse practitioners write their email addresses down.
• 1:22:26
  So I will be following up and saying, Hey, so great to meet you.
• 1:22:31
  So that's the other thing is follow through is another tip.
• 1:22:35
  It's like, if you have to make notes to yourself to follow up,
• 1:22:40
  it's so I have this 11 people.
• 1:22:44
  So for me being in PR, plugging in 11 emails is not a big deal, but for
• 1:22:50
  some people that could be a project.
• 1:22:53
  So creating like some kind of either an Excel spreadsheet or a MailChimp
• 1:22:59
  database where you're storing these names so you can segment your list.
• 1:23:04
  Here are your doctors, here are your volunteers, here are your donors,
• 1:23:09
  here are and it's knowing like I am a little obsessive about my lists, but
• 1:23:15
  I really believe it is it pays off.
• 1:23:21
  The other tip is the news media.
• 1:23:27
  that are in your marketplace, make friends with them, invite them to
• 1:23:31
  your, see your organization in action.
• 1:23:35
  I guarantee you'll get a story and that's free publicity.
• 1:23:39
  And it's not hard.
• 1:23:41
  Rupert Isaacson: It's so true.
• 1:23:42
  You know, it's funny as a journalist, one of the things that,
• 1:23:44
  you know, people often, when you.
• 1:23:46
  Suggest this people say oh, but you know, why would they be interested in me?
• 1:23:49
  It's like because they need stories, you know Yeah, they
• 1:23:53
  they are constantly looking for content And desperately need it.
• 1:23:58
  So you are actually doing them a favor By showing them your cool thing that
• 1:24:03
  you're doing never think that you're not worth looking at quite the opposite.
• 1:24:08
  Yeah Yeah, yeah but you know, we make gods of the media, don't we?
• 1:24:12
  So I think a lot of people are quite intimidated to approach.
• 1:24:15
  For sure.
• 1:24:15
  What's the best way for them to approach their local TV, radio, whatever.
• 1:24:20
  Sheryl Barto: Yeah, which can also, I mean, it's Called tenacity keep on trying.
• 1:24:27
  So the TV stations love visuals.
• 1:24:32
  And so if you and also, if you can do a little research on the
• 1:24:37
  anchors, like, are any former.
• 1:24:40
  Worst people or rodeo queens like 9 News in Denver.
• 1:24:44
  Kathy Saban was a rodeo queen.
• 1:24:47
  I wrote her.
• 1:24:48
  She didn't answer me.
• 1:24:49
  It's okay.
• 1:24:50
  I planted a seed.
• 1:24:52
  Maybe someday she will.
• 1:24:54
  Our local media, and here's what I mean by not saying no to things.
• 1:24:59
  We were asked to table at a volunteer fair For the local public radio station
• 1:25:06
  in Aspen, I was like, yes, of course.
• 1:25:09
  So we go up, we take a goat with us, we're at the booth.
• 1:25:13
  And so I have a very simple marketing booth.
• 1:25:16
  It's not, it doesn't even need to cost money.
• 1:25:19
  It's a table.
• 1:25:20
  With a tablecloth, we have a brochure and I literally, like,
• 1:25:24
  we print out sign up sheets.
• 1:25:27
  Like, give me your email.
• 1:25:29
  What's your interest?
• 1:25:30
  Would you like to be on our mailing list?
• 1:25:32
  Would you like to be a volunteer?
• 1:25:34
  And you engage in conversation with people.
• 1:25:37
  Well, guess what?
• 1:25:38
  One of their arts and culture reporters was walking around.
• 1:25:42
  She came up to us and said, I've never heard of you guys.
• 1:25:46
  I'd love to come down and do a story.
• 1:25:48
  So she came down and did an NPR style story where she was, We had a family that
• 1:25:55
  said it was okay for her to be there.
• 1:25:58
  She's interviewing mom and dad.
• 1:26:00
  She's interviewing the child.
• 1:26:02
  She's interviewing Kaylee about being a rec therapist.
• 1:26:05
  I mean, I could not have dreamed of a better piece and it was right
• 1:26:09
  before one of our fundraisers.
• 1:26:11
  It was brilliant.
• 1:26:13
  The other tactic I will sometimes use, especially when you're,
• 1:26:18
  So, newspapers, radio stations, everybody's changed since covid.
• 1:26:23
  They are short staffed and sometimes they don't have time to come see your place.
• 1:26:29
  So, we were part of Horses for Mental Health Month last May and
• 1:26:38
  I wanted to kick off the month, of course, with this big media splash.
• 1:26:42
  So I typed up a news release and the news release was like.
• 1:26:48
  the perfect story of what I wanted to see published.
• 1:26:52
  In Aspen, believe it or not, we still have two printed newspapers that are free.
• 1:27:00
  And everybody reads them.
• 1:27:03
  And we landed on the front page with a photo that I supplied, Kicking Off Horses
• 1:27:09
  for Mental Health Month, on one of them.
• 1:27:12
  And then the other one, because they're competitors, but they're free.
• 1:27:15
  Took a different angle, but we had already had a relationship with both papers.
• 1:27:21
  So that's also part of it's don't think of it as once and done, but
• 1:27:27
  think of it as building a relationship.
• 1:27:30
  And I swear you bring a person onto your property and they meet your animals.
• 1:27:36
  They'll fall madly in love and they will.
• 1:27:39
  We put them through the horse boy sensory work.
• 1:27:42
  Try this.
• 1:27:42
  See how you feel.
• 1:27:43
  See how this makes you feel.
• 1:27:46
  It's well worth your time.
• 1:27:48
  So those would be my main tips to get you started.
• 1:27:52
  I also, we do a lot of grant writing and it's with our local municipalities.
• 1:28:02
  So that would be the local cities and towns.
• 1:28:05
  And then the counties, they all have health and human services
• 1:28:09
  grants and, they are very generous.
• 1:28:13
  If you put together the right story about your funding needs.
• 1:28:20
  And so we have been funded by 2 counties in our valley and 3
• 1:28:26
  towns consistently for 9 years.
• 1:28:29
  So,
• 1:28:31
  Rupert Isaacson: I, I so agree with that.
• 1:28:32
  And 1 of the things I think.
• 1:28:36
  One could add to that is, when you're going out for the grant
• 1:28:39
  writing, do you not agree, the winning wicket is not to say, If you
• 1:28:46
  give me money, I'll do this thing.
• 1:28:48
  You have to actually put your ass on the
• 1:28:51
  Sheryl Barto: line and say that we
• 1:28:53
  Rupert Isaacson: are already doing this thing and actually you have to be
• 1:28:56
  Sheryl Barto: Yes,
• 1:28:56
  Rupert Isaacson: but we'd like to do it better
• 1:28:58
  Sheryl Barto: Yes
• 1:28:59
  Rupert Isaacson: So you have to take that risk Or first self funding
• 1:29:03
  it or funding it bootstrapping it.
• 1:29:04
  However, you can I've seen this definitely work for smiling gope and for so many
• 1:29:10
  others When you put that there that sends a very strong message to any funder
• 1:29:15
  saying well, they're not waiting You For us, they're, they're already doing it.
• 1:29:20
  Why wouldn't we bet on them?
• 1:29:23
  Sheryl Barto: Absolutely.
• 1:29:25
  Absolutely.
• 1:29:26
  Yes.
• 1:29:27
  So,
• 1:29:28
  Rupert Isaacson: so you've got to go, you've got to
• 1:29:29
  white knuckle it a bit first.
• 1:29:32
  Sheryl Barto: You do.
• 1:29:33
  Yes.
• 1:29:33
  There's definitely blood, sweat and tears involved, but it's so worth it.
• 1:29:39
  It's so worth it.
• 1:29:40
  And I think that this.
• 1:29:44
  fields of animal assisted therapy is doing nothing but grow.
• 1:29:49
  And, you know, I look at that whole field and I think, where was
• 1:29:54
  that when I was going to college?
• 1:29:56
  Cause it didn't even exist then.
• 1:29:58
  And now it's, it's a thing.
• 1:30:00
  It is, it is,
• 1:30:01
  Rupert Isaacson: it is.
• 1:30:02
  And of course, now it's the thing that young people want to go into.
• 1:30:04
  And of course, to do this work meaningfully, you need.
• 1:30:09
  Some life skills and some life experience.
• 1:30:12
  This is difficult, of course, when you're just coming out of college and that's
• 1:30:14
  where people need somebody like you, a mentor to help them find their way.
• 1:30:19
  And that was actually going to be, we're sort of heading
• 1:30:21
  now past the two hour mark.
• 1:30:23
  And I know you have to one things I wanted to ask you before I let you go
• 1:30:28
  is can people contact you for mentoring?
• 1:30:30
  Because you've really shown what can be done.
• 1:30:34
  When you have to hold down a job.
• 1:30:36
  Okay.
• 1:30:37
  Some of the time that you've been doing this, you've had partner.
• 1:30:39
  Sometimes you haven't.
• 1:30:40
  Sometimes you've been single mom, you know, also your special needs mom.
• 1:30:45
  You've had to hold down multiple careers at the same time.
• 1:30:48
  But you made a real go of it and you are without a doubt, we've seen it the cutting
• 1:30:53
  edge of this work in the Western states.
• 1:30:57
  You know, there's you there's obviously Joel Dunlap up out at Square Peg and some
• 1:31:02
  others, but you know, there's people who really stand out as the gold standard.
• 1:31:06
  You are definitely out there.
• 1:31:07
  And how to.
• 1:31:09
  Integrate these other worlds of therapy, rec therapy and so on and so on into
• 1:31:13
  that the horse training side the funder Can people come and train with you?
• 1:31:17
  Can people reach out to you for consultancy?
• 1:31:20
  can people allow Cheryl Bartow to mentor them because I As you say
• 1:31:25
  this is a growing field and I meet so many young people now who are wanting
• 1:31:31
  to go into this But they're lost.
• 1:31:32
  They don't quite know how all for people that are running their show, but are
• 1:31:37
  wondering, and they're a little bit stuck, how do they get to the next, how do, what,
• 1:31:41
  what can, can you do things for them?
• 1:31:43
  How do they contact you?
• 1:31:44
  Can they, can you mentor them?
• 1:31:46
  I'll shut up and let you answer now.
• 1:31:49
  Sheryl Barto: Absolutely.
• 1:31:50
  And I would love to.
• 1:31:51
  So I can be contacted at Cheryl at smiling goat, ranch.
• 1:31:58
  com and Cheryl's with an S S H E R Y L.
• 1:32:04
  I also have A kind of an offshoot to Oh, communications called.
• 1:32:10
  Whoa, communications.
• 1:32:12
  How perfect is that?
• 1:32:14
  Right?
• 1:32:15
  And even have a unicorn in my logo because I just couldn't help myself,
• 1:32:20
  but really, it's just designed for that.
• 1:32:24
  So, whether you're somebody who already has a program and wants an extra
• 1:32:30
  set of eyes or advice mentorship.
• 1:32:34
  In like the horse piece or the running the nonprofit piece
• 1:32:39
  or running the business piece.
• 1:32:41
  I am here to help.
• 1:32:43
  I would love to on the smiling goat side.
• 1:32:46
  We do have an internship program and a working student program and with the
• 1:32:54
  Rupert Isaacson: Colorado.
• 1:32:56
  Sheryl Barto: Yes, you go to Colorado and hang out with us and we are year round.
• 1:33:02
  So if you're a skier and a horse person, we are nirvana because you can do it all.
• 1:33:10
  If you are not a skier, it doesn't matter.
• 1:33:12
  You probably don't want to be here in the winter, but we there's
• 1:33:17
  so much recreation activity.
• 1:33:20
  People come from all over the world.
• 1:33:22
  We have gold medal fly fishing waters.
• 1:33:25
  We have the skiing, the mountain biking, the hiking we have, we're
• 1:33:31
  surrounded by Colorado's 14ers.
• 1:33:35
  It is very, very beautiful here.
• 1:33:38
  Really so, with the internship program, that's really driven
• 1:33:43
  by the universities themselves.
• 1:33:46
  So we have agreements right now with 7 different universities nationwide for
• 1:33:53
  either social work or recreation therapy, and then the working student program
• 1:33:59
  can really be anybody who wants to focus more on the horse side of things.
• 1:34:05
  But also still helps deliver sessions to our kiddos and our veterans.
• 1:34:12
  And those.
• 1:34:14
  Are they can be designed based on your needs and your timeframes.
• 1:34:20
  We get a lot, we've had a handful that of gap year kids.
• 1:34:27
  So, that works.
• 1:34:28
  It could even be post college if, if somebody wanted to do that.
• 1:34:33
  I'm always willing to look at anything and, and see if it's a good fit.
• 1:34:39
  So.
• 1:34:40
  Rupert Isaacson: Brilliant.
• 1:34:40
  Okay.
• 1:34:41
  So they give us again how they contact you and tell us what your website is.
• 1:34:45
  Sheryl Barto: Oh, okay.
• 1:34:46
  I've got two websites, smilinggoateranch.
• 1:34:50
  com and woecommunications.
• 1:34:54
  net.
• 1:34:56
  And my emails are both of those cheryl at smilinggoateranch.
• 1:35:02
  com or cheryl at woecommunications.
• 1:35:06
  net.
• 1:35:06
  Rupert Isaacson: Fantastic.
• 1:35:07
  And we will of course put these in the after bits so that people can find them.
• 1:35:11
  Sheryl Barto: Awesome.
• 1:35:12
  Rupert Isaacson: Yeah, it's brilliant.
• 1:35:13
  I mean, Cheryl.
• 1:35:16
  You're an inspiration.
• 1:35:18
  You're also a massive and very necessary resource.
• 1:35:24
  Before we go, where do you want the future of this equine assisted world to go?
• 1:35:31
  Sheryl Barto: Wow.
• 1:35:35
  Oh, I, I would just love to see it grow and grow and grow and for everyone
• 1:35:47
  who needs therapy to have access to it without cost being a barrier.
• 1:35:55
  So if I could, as I am Gaining this experience and moving through life,
• 1:36:03
  if I could help others start centers in their locations, it would feel
• 1:36:10
  like I am just expanding the services that we started here, that we started
• 1:36:18
  through the whole horse boy method.
• 1:36:21
  And I would love to see it go all over the world, which I feel like
• 1:36:26
  you have started that already.
• 1:36:31
  Rupert Isaacson: I, where I'm with you is this thing of costs not be a barrier.
• 1:36:36
  Sheryl Barto: Yes.
• 1:36:37
  Rupert Isaacson: And I think we're all collectively working on that.
• 1:36:40
  You know, the Irish government has just come in backing.
• 1:36:45
  Certain equine assisted things.
• 1:36:47
  It's, it's happening.
• 1:36:48
  It's beginning to happen.
• 1:36:49
  Germany's there.
• 1:36:51
  The Scandinavian countries are there, but we need more.
• 1:36:54
  And I think particularly in the USA post COVID now, you know,
• 1:36:57
  as you said that there are.
• 1:36:59
  Many more grants out there than they used to be around mental health.
• 1:37:03
  Oh, and by the way, the horses for mental health week or month that you
• 1:37:06
  referred to also for people looking for mentorship, do check out our previous
• 1:37:13
  podcast with Lynn Thomas, who runs that if you are running a program and you need
• 1:37:19
  some help with your PR, that's exactly what the horses for mental health thing.
• 1:37:23
  Is there to do and it's there to help you get your story out So do
• 1:37:27
  check out the lynn thomas thing because this happens every year.
• 1:37:31
  Listen to what she has to say on that podcast and and
• 1:37:34
  Profit from it But absolutely.
• 1:37:36
  Yeah
• 1:37:37
  Sheryl Barto: Provided so many resources last year was our first year.
• 1:37:41
  We will absolutely do it again e I learned a lot It was really
• 1:37:51
  Rupert Isaacson: I can't wait to, it's been a long time since I came
• 1:37:53
  out to the Roaring Fort Valley.
• 1:37:54
  I'd love to come and see.
• 1:37:56
  It all again.
• 1:37:57
  Cheryl, thank you so much for coming on sharing with us.
• 1:38:03
  Sheryl Barto: Thanks for having me.
• 1:38:04
  I'm incredibly honored, really.
• 1:38:07
  Why
• 1:38:08
  Rupert Isaacson: wouldn't we rush after you begging you to come on this show?
• 1:38:15
  Really for listeners do reach out to Cheryl.
• 1:38:17
  She, she, she is one of the people out there who really does know
• 1:38:21
  how to put these things together.
• 1:38:23
  If you are sitting there scratching your head wondering what the next phase
• 1:38:28
  is going to be allow her to mentor you as she mentors a lot of people.
• 1:38:33
  If you can be even one hundredth as effective as Smiling Goat,
• 1:38:37
  you'll be on the right track.
• 1:38:40
  Sheryl Barto: Thank you.
• 1:38:41
  Rupert Isaacson: All right.
• 1:38:42
  So until the next time, Cheryl.
• 1:38:44
  thank you for joining us.
• 1:38:45
  We hope you enjoyed today's podcast.
• 1:38:47
  Join our website, new trails learning.com, to check out our online
• 1:38:53
  courses and live workshops in Horse Boy Method, movement Method, and Athena.
• 1:38:58
  These evidence-based programs have helped children, veterans, and people
• 1:39:03
  dealing with trauma around the world.
• 1:39:05
  We also offer a horse training program and self-care program
• 1:39:09
  for riders on long ride home.com.
• 1:39:13
  These include easy to do online courses and tutorials that
• 1:39:17
  bring you and your horse joy.
• 1:39:19
  For an overview of all shows and programs, go to rupert isaacson.com.
• 1:39:24
  See you on the next show.
• 1:39:25
  And please remember to press, subscribe and share.