Equine Assisted Coaching.

Transformational coaching brings concepts to life to maximize professional and organizational growth.

Bonita Eby is a professional fully accredited:

Equine Assisted Personal Development Coach

Equine Assisted Organizational Development Coach

Equine Assisted Corporate Facilitator

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What is Equine Assisted Coaching?

Equine Assisted Learning | Equine Assisted Personal Development | Equine Assisted Corporate Facilitation

How does Equine Assisted Coaching work?

man-petting-horse-in-equine-assisted-corporate-development-with-bonita-eby — The Horses

Horses cannot lie, hold grudges, or judge based on appearance or past mistakes. They care only about the present moment and require authenticity for engagement. They discern immediately when a person is disengaged, inauthentic, or in conflict. They give clear and immediate feedback via their body language. A skilled equestrian can read the horses’ feedback with clarity.

woman-and-horse-looking-at-each-other-in-equine-assisted-learning-with-bonita-eby — Horses Mirror People

As highly social, acutely perceptive, and highly tuned prey animals, horses can provide effective biofeedback. They are highly skilled at reading facial expressions, body language, and energy. Through their body and movements, they mirror even the most carefully hidden emotions of people within their proximity with grace. Their quick and accurate feedback allows the coach to ask critical questions and guide exercises to bring about self-awareness and the potential for ground-breaking change.

man-with-horses-during-equine-assisted-coaching-with-bonita-eby — Horses Understand Leadership

Horses live in herds, where leadership is determined through fair and consistent competition. Leaders take responsibility for the safety and wellbeing of the herd. Herd members feel safe, secure, and valued under a strong leader. Horses teach us the qualities of leadership, team dynamics, responsibility, and healthy boundaries.

Equine Assisted Coaching and Burnout

“Horses are naturals at perceiving emotion. A recent study has found that horses can detect positive and negative emotions in humans based on facial expressions (Grounds, McComb, Proops, Smith, & Wathan, 2016). This characterization forces the participant to be conscious of their mental state when they enter the arena, or workplace. Horses are also adept at using emotion to facilitate thought. Horses are prey animals, which means they are consistently hyper-vigilant in assessing their surroundings through sight, smell, hearing and kinesthetic sense (Pohl, 2015). Since they are very large animals, a successful session requires a human that is present and aware as the horse. A pilot study suggests that EAL can increase the presence of individuals in fields such as nursing, thus increasing the quality of care for their patients (Walsh & Blakenley, 2013). Finally, in their own way, horses have demonstrated the ability to understand emotions by detecting intention and authenticity in people, gaining the ability to “mirror” behaviours they are picking up from others (Roberts, 1997). Authentic Leadership Development Theory highlights the importance of Authentic Followers. Defined as “followers who follow leaders for authentic reasons and have authentic relationships with the leader” (Avolio & Gardner, 2005, p. 332), the horse is the perfect representation of a human authentic follower due to this natural ability to “mirror” the authentic emotion inside people. These three abilities force the human to develop their own ability to manage emotions, pushing the horse at the right times and showing the correct energy for the activity. In the arena this results in a positive, productive experience between the two and in the real world it is a positive relationship between leadership and staff.”

The Effects of Equine Assisted Learning on Emotional Intelligence Competencies and Leadership Skills, Rauen, Jade E