Horses are simple (and I am pragmatist)!
Dr Shelley Appleton Dr Shelley Appleton

Horses are simple (and I am pragmatist)!

Horses are SIMPLE.

And SIMPLE is spectacular and beautiful—but we struggle to embrace that simplicity.

Why is it so hard?

Because we are complex creatures, with minds full of complicated ideas, beliefs, and perceptions.

Both humans and horses have evolved with their own superpowers of survival. Humans rely on our ability to think, adapt, and invent to navigate the world. Horses, on the other hand, have an incredible capacity to extract energy from plant fibre, paired with superior speed and athleticism. Horses don’t need our complex thoughts to survive, and we often fail to appreciate the beauty of their simplicity.

In modern times, particularly with the influence of social media, there’s been a surge in applying human-centric concepts—such as emotions, trauma, cognitive science, and neuroscience etc.—to horses. While these ideas may feel insightful, they can often do more harm than good if misunderstood or misapplied.

I’m fortunate to have a background in science and research, which gives me the tools to critically assess these ideas. I don’t rely on the authority of the person presenting the concept—I rely on evidence, my own understanding, and hands-on experience to determine whether an idea is valid or beneficial for horses.

This scientific literacy allows me to evaluate whether overlapping a human insight or theory with horses is a fair and accurate approach—or if it’s just oversimplified nonsense wrapped up as wisdom.

Working with horses and people directly has given me invaluable insights. I’ve witnessed first-hand what happens when certain ideas are tested in real-world situations.

Take, for example, an idea that circulated a couple of years ago: you could get a horse’s attention by making a loud noise (such as a clap) and retreating when they “faced up” to you. The concept suggested that this process would establish focus and connection.

In practice, this idea seemed to work well with about 70% of horses, provided it was paired with movement, such as asking the horse to move around a round yard. However, the remaining 30% responded very differently. These horses escalated, becoming defensive or even aggressive, pinning their ears and advancing towards the handler when an attempt was made to progress from facing up.

Why? Because without nuance, this method ignored the individual horse’s interpretation of the noise and retreat. Horses inclined towards a “fight” response (for various reasons) or those conditioned to push against people were prone to react negatively.

Thanks to my experience, I recognised the flaws in this approach and adjusted it. I now use noise selectively, understanding how, when, and where it can be beneficial. But for others without the same depth of experience, this method resulted in injuries, stressed horses and stalled progress.

I’m not here to complicate things. My goal is to simplify horse handling and riding in a way that builds your confidence and strengthens your relationship with your horse. Trust begins with mastering the basics—simple handling and rope skills that allow you to reliably influence your horse.

I’m not interested in impressing you with how much I know. The truth is having you stuck to your seats, entertained with my stories and insights whilst your horses stand outside in yards is an easy way to make money for a clinician.   Instead, I want you to discover how simple, practical techniques—applied consistently—can have a profound impact on your horse. My ultimate aim is to get you riding and enjoying all the incredible experiences the equestrian world has to offer.

When you attend one of my clinics, we focus on hands-on learning with horses. Yes, there’s important insights I need you to be aware of, but I provide that in a course you can access before the clinic—auditors included! This way, our time together is maximised for practical, real-world application.

I know my travel is limited, and I can only visit some communities in Australia once or twice a year. That’s why I ensure every clinic is a supercharged learning experience that delivers a good return on your investment! Clinics are expensive!

Horses are simple. And their simplicity is their beauty. By cutting through the noise of overcomplication and focusing on pragmatic, evidence-based approaches, we can create meaningful, lasting partnerships with our horses.

If you live in Australia, see if I have a clinic near you or one you can travel to so I can show you my pragmatic approach that improves your performance, overcomes problems or identifies what is interfering with progression.

My clinic schedule is now released with both participant spots to come along with their horse, but also auditors that can and watch. My clinics are small events and therefore bookings are limited. Click the button below to go to my booking schedule.

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I have a new app & it has free stuff on it!
Dr Shelley Appleton Dr Shelley Appleton

I have a new app & it has free stuff on it!

I have invested in an app - it is called Calm Willing Confident Horses. The app is FREE and if you download it you will find FREE presentations on it that I will continue to add to over time. There is also a discussion forum where I will pop up articles and blogs that you will not find on social media.

You can find it on both the App Store for iPhone or iPad users, and Google Play for Android devices.

If you have already enrolled in my courses - you can log in using your course account and access your courses from there.

If anyone has any trouble accessing, downloading or logging into the app just let me know and I can help you out. Just email me - admin@calmwillingconfidenthorses.com.au

Follow the directions below.

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Project Reboot – Boldly Facing the Messy Middle Together
Dr Shelley Appleton Dr Shelley Appleton

Project Reboot – Boldly Facing the Messy Middle Together

There is a price you must pay if you want to get good at something—you have to be prepared to be messy and even terrible before you improve.

When working with horses, this can be even more confronting, as they also struggle before they become confident and skilled.

When you begin your quest to work well with a horse, you must face your own imperfections while helping the horse work things out and deal with how they feel about the process. I’ve come out the other side, where it now feels effortless to do things I initially struggled with. Having worked with so many horses, I can confidently say their responses to learning are highly predictable. The truth is, both you and horses learn incredibly quickly with practice and coaching.

Starting 1st December, for six weeks, I’m leading Project Reboot. This program guides participants through my 22 essential exercises. These teach skills that I believe are the “vital few,” as described by the concept of the Pareto Principle or 80/20 rule. The Pareto Principle states that 80% of outcomes come from 20% of a skill set. Therefore, the 22 essential exercises develop the key skills that, once mastered, have a disproportionately large impact on your ability to positively influence a horse. The outcome? Rebuilding a horse’s foundation—which sets the stage for a strong, meaningful partnership.

Starting now means that instead of hoping for some New Year’s resolution inspiration to do something with your horse in 2025, you’ll already be most of the way through the reboot process, and things will be very different. You won’t feel stuck—things will be progressing, and you’ll see and feel the transformation in both you and your horse.

The project will run through my CWCH Society Members Group on Facebook. The group is a kind and supportive place. My membership is not particularly pricey ($19.95 AUD per month), and you can cancel at any time if I’m not your cup of tea.

I excel at getting people back on their horses rather than stuck on the ground. All I need you to do now is be prepared to boldly face the messy middle and give yourself and your horse the chance to learn. Plus, it’s only 22 exercises—you might already be familiar with them, but I’ll show you how to tweak and refine them for greater success.

Below is what I call my 22 Essential Exercises, which teach you my way of training the horse and the quality of performance I aim for (because that matters a lot)!

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This Question is a Test: If You Can’t Help, You’re Missing Key Skills
Dr Shelley Appleton Dr Shelley Appleton

This Question is a Test: If You Can’t Help, You’re Missing Key Skills

If I told you that outside I had a horse that wouldn’t get on a horse float (trailer), rearing up and rushing backwards, would you feel confident to help me?

I asked this question to an audience during a presentation on what I believe are the essential horsemanship skills everyone should learn. These skills are what I call the “vital few”—skills that have a disproportionately powerful effect on a person’s ability to positively influence a horse, helping the horse understand and gain confidence in what is being asked of them.

When mastering any skill—whether it’s playing a musical instrument, excelling in a sport, or advancing in a profession—certain skills are used more frequently and have a greater impact on performance. These are the “vital few.” The rest, while still relevant, are known as the “trivial many” because they are used less often.

Elite teachers and coaches understand the “vital few.” For a pianist, this could include scales. For a tennis player, it might be serving. For a medical practitioner, it’s methodical questioning. Whatever the discipline, identifying the “vital few” is crucial, as it determines where time and energy should be focused to develop mastery.

This concept is widely recognised in the development of expertise and is known as the Pareto Principle. It suggests that a small portion of actions or inputs (the "vital few") often produce the majority of results, while the rest (the "trivial many") contribute far less. For example, 80% of mastery might come from focusing on 20% of key skills.

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the ACCIDENTAL horse trainer
Dr Shelley Appleton Dr Shelley Appleton

the ACCIDENTAL horse trainer

The Accidental Horse Trainer

This is a slide from my webinar, which I’m presenting on Sunday and Monday (you’re all invited!). It’s the slide where I introduce myself and explain how I became a professional horse trainer and educator completely by accident.

I had zero intention of doing what I do today. It all happened because my overconfidence with horses was shattered by a series of lightbulb moments. These moments illuminated things I was doing wrong and gave me a few ideas on how to make things right.

I was amazed by how much I could accomplish with just a few new ideas and how they solved issues that had frustrated me for years. I was stunned that, after all my years with horses and the countless riding lessons I’d invested in, no one had ever taught me these essential and effective techniques.

This sparked a fire in me—but it was purely personal—and it went something like this:

I got curious. If just a few new ideas could have such a profound impact, what other ideas might I be missing?

So, I went on a mission to discover the ideas I didn’t know.

Well, I found so many, and I haven’t stopped finding them since!

With each idea I came across, I would experiment with it to determine its relevance. If it was useful, I set about mastering its application.

Throughout this journey, my adventure was purely personal. I was like someone tinkering with cars in their garage, meticulously restoring them to their former glory.

During this time, I withdrew from outside influences—coaches, competitions, riding clubs. I wanted the freedom to explore and the time to master what I’d learnt. I was deeply motivated to protect my horses from the mistakes of my past ignorance.

Then it happened: I found myself in a position where I had to step in and help a good friend solve an issue with her precious horse. She and Buckarri, her horse, are in the photo you see!

From there, I helped another friend, then another… then a whole group of friends, followed by their friends, relatives, neighbours… it got to a point where I left my career as a university academic to do this full-time!

What I discovered was that the things I hadn’t known were things most people didn’t know either.

And that reignited my curiosity—why, and what could I do about it?

This webinar is just one example of my many experiments in spreading good ideas!

You’re welcome to join and let me know how I go!

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The Sensitive, Spooky, Nervous Horse
Dr Shelley Appleton Dr Shelley Appleton

The Sensitive, Spooky, Nervous Horse

The Sensitive, Spooky, Nervous Horse

There are many other labels I could use—reactive, worried, distracted, scared of the world... and some less kind, like idiot, stupid, drama queen, chicken... and worse. But you get the idea.

They say the greatest pain we can suffer as humans is “uncertainty”… and the horses described above are all the pain of uncertainty in horse form!

They are not fun to ride or handle.

Some are predictable in what they tend to shy or spook at. Some go along fine until they don’t, and then they do that horrible spin-and-spook move at some "evil-looking" leaf or random thing. Some appear to have phobias about certain places (scary corners) or things that can be frustrating and shrink your riding area. In fact, I know someone who removed every bush, tree, and fence post from around their arena just to be able to practise riding dressage tests in a full-sized arena because her horse had so many phobic spots!

Anyway, it was one of these horses that shaped who I am today. His name was Skuda, and I often tell his story. He taught me my first lesson about horses labelled as “sensitive.”

Although he frustrated and depressed me, and his incredible athleticism in spinning unseated me countless times (I never got hurt, as he spun so low to the ground I wasn’t far from it! LOL)… he humbled my ego and showed me that all I had to do was change, instead of hoping and praying he would!

He set me on a path that has led to what I do today, and I’m proud of how I now help people with my understanding and approach to forming partnerships with horses.

Skuda was also the inspiration behind my deep dive into the root causes of why some horses turn out like him. Even though his problems stemmed from my well-meaning but innocent mistakes, I had ridden other horses who didn’t react as he did. What made him—and these other horses—different?

What I found is that there are a few key reasons. But they can be understood, and with awareness, you can navigate them and prevent a horse from becoming a Skuda, as well as transform those that are already this way.

I have written about aspects of my understanding in many blogs and articles. If you’ve attended my clinics, presentations, or my weekly Zoom Q&A sessions in the CWCH Society group, you’ll know I talk in depth about why horses can become like this and what you can do about it. But I’ve never put it all in one place.

Until now.

So this is my gift to everyone who has been frustrated, disheartened, or had their confidence eroded by a sensitive, spooky, nervous, reactive, distracted, worried, or phobic horse!

It’s a manifesto that will help you see horses differently and replace frustration with understanding, and hopelessness with a clear, pragmatic, and logical path forward.

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horses are a wicked problem
Dr Shelley Appleton Dr Shelley Appleton

horses are a wicked problem

Horses are far more complex than they appear. In this post, we explore how horses embody 'wicked problems'—complex, interconnected issues that have no perfect solutions. From their health and welfare to management and training, horse care often requires ongoing adjustments, trade-offs, and a deep understanding of each unique situation. Discover why there are no clear answers in equine care—just better or worse options

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“NEW HORSE SYNDROME”
Dr Shelley Appleton Dr Shelley Appleton

“NEW HORSE SYNDROME”

"New HORSE Syndrome”🆕🐴

Yesterday, I wrote about a new term I have coined called “New Home Syndrome.” The post has gone viral, and I am really glad about that because what horses experience when they move homes is incredibly significant and poorly understood. It sets off a pattern of behaviour due to the psychological and physiological impact of completely changing their environment and routines.

I wish to introduce you to my next term, which I hope is also accepted as widely because it is just as significant and goes hand in hand with “New Home Syndrome.” The term is “New HORSE Syndrome,” and it is to bring recognition, respect, and appreciation to what can happen to many PEOPLE when they get a new horse. I personally got stuck in the vortex of “New HORSE Syndrome” for nearly eight years after I bought a flashy young warmblood. I believe if I had known about “New HORSE Syndrome,” things could have been very different and I would have been better at identify better help and solutions.

I am calling it a syndrome because the psychological turmoil, loss of confidence, and sense of hopelessness that can manifest in an individual connected to the event of getting a new horse are common and predictable. The things that resolve “New HORSE Syndrome” are also predictable.

Let me explain.

When you get familiar with something, you perceive it as predictable and reliable. Your nervous system down-regulates, and you can relax. Familiar things are all part of our comfort zones. Familiar places, people, activities, and tasks are easy to be around, engage with, and navigate. The familiarity of these things makes you feel a sense of certainty and hence security.

Think about a horse you got on with really well. It might not have been perfectly behaved, but you were familiar with them, so you found them predictable.

If you are like me, before I got my warmblood, I was the typical amateur rider. Horses were my hobby, and although I had ridden for most of my life, it was only on a very small number of horses. I was always surrounded by people that helped me out, and the small number of horses I experienced were kind and, as I discovered, forgiving of me.

When my flashy young warmblood was delivered by the trucking company after a four-day trip across Australia, I had no concept of what he was being confronted with. I gave him a single day off before I eagerly jumped on board.

As soon as I got on him, I felt weird. He was taller than the other horse I had been riding and moved differently. His movement was so big and ground-covering. This is significant for our nervous system and proprioception, as the movement of horses we ride regularly gets locked into our proprioceptive circuits. If we don’t ride many horses, as I didn’t back then, feeling a new horse is confronting to our sense of balance in the saddle. Not only this, but I vividly remember him abruptly stopping and turning his head right around as if to eyeball me. It was most likely because I was hanging onto his mouth and giving him go-stop aids at the same time. He would have been completely confused and confronted by how I was communicating with him and how unbalanced I was on his back. It felt like he growled at me; what I probably felt was his tension lift. He then proceeded to spook and shy around the arena because I had just added an alarming and uncomfortable experience to what he was already dealing with. I had never had a horse spook so many times over nothing. It was not fun. After a week of this spooking and shying, my nerves were shot, and I started dreading getting on him. And so began my seven-year battle with “New HORSE Syndrome” as I became obsessed with trying to fix my “sensitive,” unpredictable, and unreliable horse. It took me that long to identify that I was causing him trouble. But when you are stuck in “New HORSE Syndrome” you cannot see this.

What is “New HORSE Syndrome”?

I define “New HORSE Syndrome” as what happens to a person when the way a new horse behaves, responds, and feels is different from what is known or expected. This difference and shattering of expectations creates a sense of distrust and lack of reliability and safety. The rider then becomes overly preoccupied with risk management, emotionally monitoring the horse, and finding solutions to fix them. When efforts to resolve the behaviour or gain a sense of harmony in encounters continue to fail, feelings of guilt, shame, and a sense of hopelessness can be overwhelming.

This can lead to the person experiencing anxiety and a destruction of confidence as a rider; prone to lashing out aggressively towards the horse; riding recklessly in an effort to push through fear; or creating excuses or distractions to avoid riding altogether.

Sometimes the horse might be sold and another new horse acquired, where the same issues will surface. However, other times to resolve the discomfort caused by the conflict between their desire to ride and their fear, they might change their expectations and activities with the horse, opting not to ride it for various reasons. This reframing is a coping mechanism that helps them deal with the perceived failure and alleviates the psychological discomfort of not feeling safe riding their horse.

“New HORSE Syndrome” can be overcome.

It can be solved by helping people understand how to help a horse adjust to a new environment, routines, and rider. By showing people how to introduce themselves to the horse's mind and body through imprinting what I call their signature. Everyone is a different height, weight, and will do things slightly differently. Therefore, the horse has to learn about you and be given time to develop and practice responding to how you handle them and ride. This includes how you sit, hold the reins, use your leg, and communicate direction and transitions. You need to allow your and the horse’s mind and body to adapt and grow proprioceptive circuits to allow the physical connection between horse and rider to feel familiar, for the communication to be familiar, and for the routines to become familiar. All so everyone feels a sense of security and healthy stress regulation can occur. It is important to respect that a sense of trust is built by time and experience, and it needs to be strategically approached.

“New HORSE Syndrome” may be a transient hiccup when the horse and rider can adjust to each other and trust is built. But for others, it can be a long suffering that is mentally, emotionally, and financially devastating. Not to mention all the horse accidents that happen when non-trusting riders make bad choices with non-trusting horses.

If this has struck a cord with you, please ask for some guidance, there are those of us out there that understand this very common yet poorly understood experience of what is really going on❤

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Please hit the SHARE to spread the idea if it resonates with you. ❤

‼However, please do not copy and paste and plagiarise my work as it happens all the time and it is really not cool. ‼

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“new home syndrome”
Dr Shelley Appleton Dr Shelley Appleton

“new home syndrome”

"New Home Syndrome"🤓

I am coining this term to bring recognition, respect, and understanding to what happens to horses when they move homes. This situation involves removing them from an environment and set of routines they have become familiar with, and placing them somewhere completely different with new people and different ways of doing things.

Why call it a syndrome?

Well, really it is! A syndrome is a term used to describe a set of symptoms that consistently occur together and can be tied to certain factors such as infections, genetic predispositions, conditions, or environmental influences. It is also used when the exact cause of the symptoms is not fully understood or when it is not connected with a well-defined disease. In this case, "New Home Syndrome" is connected to a horse being placed in a new home where its entire world changes, leading to psychological and physiological impacts. While it might be transient, the ramifications can be significant for both the horse and anyone handling or riding it.

Let me explain...

Think about how good it feels to get home after a busy day. How comfortable your favourite clothes are, how well you sleep in your own bed compared to a strange bed, and how you can really relax at home. This is because home is safe and familiar. At home, the part of you that keeps an eye out for potential danger turns down to a low setting. It does this because home is your safe place (and if it is not, this blog will also explain why a lack of a safe place is detrimental).

Therefore, the first symptom of horses experiencing "New Home Syndrome" is being unsettled, prone to anxiety, or difficult behaviour. If you have owned them before you moved them, you struggle to recognise your horse, feeling as if your horse has been replaced by a frustrating version. If the horse is new to you, you might wonder if you were conned, if the horse was drugged when you rode it, or if you were lied to about the horse's true nature.

A horse with "New Home Syndrome" will be a stressed version of itself, on high alert, with a drastically reduced ability to cope. Horses don't handle change like humans do. If you appreciate the comfort of your own home and how you can relax there, you should be able to understand what the horse is experiencing.

Respecting that horses interpret and process their environments differently from us helps in understanding why your horse is being frustrating and recognising that there is a good chance you were not lied to or that the horse was not drugged.

Horses have survived through evolution by being highly aware of their environments. Change is a significant challenge for them because they notice the slightest differences, not just visually but also through sound, smell, feel, and other senses. Humans generalise and categorise, making it easy for us to navigate familiar environments like shopping centres. Horses do not generalise in the same way; everything new is different to them, and they need proof of safety before they can habituate and feel secure. When their entire world changes, it is deeply stressful.

They struggle to sleep until they feel safe, leading to sleep deprivation and increased difficulty.

But there is more...

Not only do you find comfort in your home environment and your nervous system downregulates, but you also find comfort in routines. Routines are habits, and habits are easy. When a routine changes or something has to be navigated differently, things get difficult. For example, my local supermarket is undergoing renovations. After four years of shopping there, it is extremely frustrating to have to work out where everything is now. Every day it gets moved due to the store being refitted section by section. This annoyance is shared by other shoppers and even the staff.

So, consider the horse. Not only are they confronted with the challenge of figuring out whether they are safe in all aspects of their new home while being sleep deprived, but every single routine and encounter is different. Then, their owner or new owner starts getting critical and concerned because the horse suddenly seems untrained or difficult. The horse they thought they owned or bought is not meeting their expectations, leading to conflict, resistance, explosiveness, hypersensitivity, and frustration.

The horse acts as if it knows little because it is stressed and because the routines and habits it has learned have disappeared. If you are a new human for the horse, you feel, move, and communicate differently from what it is used to. The way you hold the reins, your body movements in the saddle, the position of your leg – every single routine of communication between horse and person is now different. I explain to people that when you get a new horse, you have to imprint yourself and your way of communicating onto the horse. You have to introduce yourself and take the time to spell out your cues so that they get to know you.

Therefore, when you move a horse to a new home or get a new horse, your horse will go through a phase called "New Home Syndrome," and it will be significant for them. Appreciating this helps them get through it because they are incredible and can succeed. The more you understand and help the horse learn it is safe in its new environment and navigate the new routines and habits you introduce, the faster "New Home Syndrome" will pass.

"New Home Syndrome" will be prevalent in a horse’s life until they have learned to trust the safety of the environment (and all that entails) and the humans they meet and interact with. With strategic and understanding approaches, this may take weeks, and their nervous systems will start downgrading their high alert status. However, for some horses, it can take a couple of years to fully feel at ease in their new home.

So, next time you move your horse or acquire a new horse and it starts behaving erratically or being difficult, it is not being "stupid", you might not have been lied to or the horse "drugged" - your horse is just experiencing an episode of understandable "New Home Syndrome." And you can help this.❤

I would be grateful if you could please share, this reality for horses needs to be better appreciated ❤

‼️When I say SHARE that does not mean plagiarise my work…it is seriously not cool to copy and paste these words and make out you have written it yourself

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Who is this Dr Shelley Appleton person…?
Dr Shelley Appleton Dr Shelley Appleton

Who is this Dr Shelley Appleton person…?

Every now and then one of my posts manages to go viral and I get a lot of information about who I am. I have an interesting story of how I transitioned from a quintessential amateur rider and university academic in pharmacy to a full-time horse trainer, coach, clinician, author, and podcast presenter of a popular equestrian podcast.

I had no desire to do what I do today; it just happened by accident. I was a dedicated amateur dressage rider, but in my university role, my research area of interest was in medical education and human learning. I was fascinated by how health professionals learned and developed their expertise, particularly how they learned to develop their critical thinking skills. How they combined their knowledge and skills to make decisions crucial to patients' lives. The two worlds of my life - my expertise in learning and my equestrian life - lived in two separate silos, most likely because my equestrian world had been there since I was a child. So, I had a lot of knowledge about all things learning, yet never transferred it into my equestrian life. It is weird when I look back at how it remained so separate. That was until I made my horse's mouth bleed, and it upset my equestrian beliefs so much that I listened to a voice I had never thought of listening to before - a guy in a cowboy hat.

I thought I had a “hard-mouthed” horse and just shopped for different bits. That was the advice I got from my equestrian world at the time. Then when I made his mouth bleed and my world was rocked, I heard the phrase “horses learn from the release of pressure” and saw a demonstration of lateral flexion by a horsemanship clinician. I went and saddled up my horse, flexed him to the right, he turned LEFT, and for the first time in my life, I saw my hard-mouthed horse just didn’t understand the bit. In 45 minutes, with just this one idea, I transformed my “hard-mouthed horse” to a “soft-mouthed horse” by TEACHING him because he just didn’t know how to respond to the bit. I was blown away by how, in my almost 30 years of riding horses and regularly coaching, no one had ever told me that.

That moment caused the floodgates to open between my worlds. This, along with an exceptional horseman as a mentor, exposure to many horses, and many hours practising my skills, experimenting, and studying everything I could lay my hands on. Even at this stage, I had no intention of helping anyone. While some people tinker with cars, I went around finding horses with different behaviour issues and stretched my skills by learning how to unpick the behaviour and transform them. It is purely what I did for my own enjoyment.

Then one day, I helped a friend - then another and another - then their friend…and within a short space of time, every evening and weekend, I was training horses and coaching people. While I was doing this, I was blogging and posting about what I had learnt and was working out. I was both intrigued and frustrated by what I had worked out and why I had never been told or shown it. It was what made me so effective at helping people because I had worked out what I had been ignorant about and was just showing them what I had discovered.

I have been coaching, delivering clinics, and training professionally for nearly 10 years. Five years ago, I left my 25-year academic career and started Calm Willing Confident Horses. I have never stopped learning, experimenting, and working things out. I discovered that my edge in the equestrian world is that the horse is actually not that difficult to train and influence. The only thing that can complicate a horse is its soundness, and experience has made me very good at identifying quickly when I need to refer a horse to an equine health professional. The tricky part of training horses and influencing them is the human hanging onto their lead rope or sitting on their back. What gives me an edge in the industry is that my research interest and PhD is centred around how humans learn and develop expertise, and I apply my deep knowledge of this to how people learn to work with horses.

Therefore, I am a very effective horse trainer, but I am also an expert in how people master their equestrian knowledge and skills.

If you are reading this blog, you may be interested in how I might be able to help you. While I do give clinics and workshops, I am restricted to the places I can get to, and my clinics tend to be pre-filled with long-term clients. The reality is my face-to-face coaching is limited. Therefore, to support both riders and professionals worldwide, I have created various resources and a community. For owners and riders, I have educational resources such as books and online courses where I share my insights and ways of understanding and working with horses while being aware of what we bring to the partnership with a horse. I identify three realms of horsemanship - we need a knowledge base, skill set, and self-awareness of our inherent humanness that is key for success.

For professionals, I share my insights into the human education side of equestrian pursuits to lift their teaching skills and ability to build resources to be more effective teachers to their clients. I also have a membership society where I unite owners, riders, and professionals. I am proud of this community; it is a special online space. It is backed up with resources and a positive, supportive, and interesting place where people share their knowledge and stories.

Membership Society and Community

If you want to engage with me and get my help, I am very active in my membership community. It is called the Calm Willing Confident Horse Society (CWCH Society Members group on Facebook). We have regular challenge weeks where we focus on learning about an interesting topic or skill, a suite of resources, weekly group Zoom chats which are really fun, plus I am always there to answer questions and give feedback and advice.

Here is the link to find out more and how to sign up and become part of our community. It is only $19.95 AUD per month:

https://www.calmwillingconfidenthorses.com.au/members

Online Courses

If you want to work with me privately one-on-one, then you can enrol in my online courses. These can be purchased as a bundle called my Complete Reboot program, or you can buy the courses one by one. All allow you to make a one-off payment for a discount or pay by instalment. Below is the roadmap and the way they have been designed to be worked through.

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THE intelligence TRAP
Dr Shelley Appleton Dr Shelley Appleton

THE intelligence TRAP

This is the title of an interesting book that points out something that may not be obvious, especially if you consider yourself "intelligent"; being intelligent comes with the downside that it does not necessarily mean you make good decisions😬

This is incredibly true, and I have lots of stories about how horses can really turn intelligent people upside down.

Before I go any further, I want to point out that everyone has the capacity to learn. The major difference between those that are labelled by society as "intelligent" have typically had some moons align that supported them thinking this.

I am one of those people and have been validated my whole life for being intelligent, with all the certificates on my wall to prove it.

........And then horses did a brilliant job at proving how dumb that made me!

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WHEN TO GIVE UP BEING A HORSEWOMAN?
Dr Shelley Appleton Dr Shelley Appleton

WHEN TO GIVE UP BEING A HORSEWOMAN?

"How do you know when to give up on being a horsewoman?" This was a question I saw today. I admire this person for asking because some people quietly kiss goodbye to their inner horsewoman when they face a sense of hopelessness in their situations, age, injury, and exhaustion.

My answer is that you should never give up if this is your dream. The thing that ignites interest, passion, and joy inside you. Even if I am lucky enough to become old and frail, I will still be a horsewoman. I might only be able to look, think, and dream of horses at that stage, but I will still be a horsewoman.

It is who I am and I know it, and if you are reading this you know what I am talking about. It's a calling and you feel it.

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RIDING CLUB EVENTS 2024
Dr Shelley Appleton Dr Shelley Appleton

RIDING CLUB EVENTS 2024

RIDING CLUB EVENT BOOKING 📣NOW OPEN‼️

Each year I am booked to present private talks, workshops and clinics at riding clubs. The talk and workshop topics I get asked to do include:

✅Building Confidence and Trust with Horses

✅Developing Good Contact & Connection

✅Re-training Thoroughbreds & Standardbreds

✅Understanding Groundwork

✅Practical Training Advice

✅Building Partnerships with Horses

This year I am focusing on less travel and more community building and sharing ideas.

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THE UNSPOKEN MAY BE THE MOST SIGNIFICANT
Dr Shelley Appleton Dr Shelley Appleton

THE UNSPOKEN MAY BE THE MOST SIGNIFICANT

There is something that changes you in profound ways.And if you are a woman, we don't talk about it...It is the thing that fogs your mind, makes you burn, makes your heart race, steals your shape and takes you on a roller coaster ride of change.It happens between the ages of 40-55 years old and you know what I am talking about. The thing that changes us so much yet we never join the dots of its impact on our horse riding.

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