Mind Set to Ride

• Fears and nerves following an accident

• Seemingly irrational fears

• General lack of confidence when riding (nervous rider)

• Fears on the ground e.g. when leading 

• Nerves getting in the way of competition success

• Spectators putting you under more pressure

• Top level competitors not performing to peak capability

Sue is based at Somerford Park Farm, Cheshire (see links page) and has a very comfortable, private room with separate car park to receive clients and carry out the therapy sessions. Visits could be combined with bringing your horse for flat schooling, show jumping, XC, lovely hacking or a lesson from your own trainer or the resident British Eventing Accredited Trainer (see links page) or just leave the horse at home and concentrate on yourself for a change!

Sue uses a unique concept called "Complete Mind Therapy" which was developed by Dr Jonathan Royle and draws from the most successful hypnotherapy techniques and makes best use of NLP (Neuro Linguistic Programming) techniques. and this combined with the understanding of the equine related issues, ensures that horse riders receive the best help possible which, in combination with their regular work with their horse will result in enjoying your horse or reaching those seemingly unachievable goals.

Everyone who rides horses wants to enjoy their time, be a confident rider, and achieve their goals. For some, that is simply to go for a hack with a friend and enjoy it, for others it is to move up the levels of British Eventing, either one day events or three day events, not be nervous in the show jumping phase of an event or to ride to your own and your horses peak performance to be picked for teams or even your country.  People who achieve these goals have two major things in common - CONFIDENCE and a POSITIVE MENTAL ATTITUDE. As 70% of successful riding is how you think and only 30% how you actually ride, having Confidence and a Positive Mental Attitude is going to go a long, long way to being the rider you want to be.

A Complete Mind Therapy session takes about an hour and just one session is enough for most people to change their thought processes, regain confidence, and be able to think more positively - in fact resolve most of their issues or develop a positive mental attitude! This can save significant amounts of money on the repeat sessions than many therapists say you need. Techniques are also given that can be used if necessary to re-enforce the messages to yourself in any situation.

Complete Mind Therapy does work.  As long as you fully co-operate and concentrate, this can not only transform how you feel about your horse, your riding, competing or other equestrian goals, but will also make you feel a much more positive mental attitude generally and feel on top of the world! Previous clients range from once a week riding school clients, to low level Eventers doing Intro One Day Events and Dressage Riders to International Top Event Riders and although the sessions are in complete confidence, the results speak for themselves even though the issues, fears or goals were completely different.

What is NLP - Basically NLP stands for Neuro Linguistic Programming and is a complex subject so without going into the technicalities it is about re-programming your mind to focus on the future, not the history and ensure the new messages become embedded and in effect become your reality. Obviously these messages would be positive and would replace the negative ones currently held. Originally NLP was used to treat problems but these days it is also extensively used in the worlds of sports and business. Put simply its main aim is to get people better at what they do in either a personal or professional capacity. Many NLP Practitioners use a lot of complex terminology and mystique, however most of it is based on age old psycology but using the techniques that do work for making future changes.

What is hypnotherapy - Again to break it down to its actual basics, it is really about being very relaxed and able to receive and retain new information in the subconcious mind. The subconcious is by far the larger percentage of the whole mind with the concious mind making up a tiny portion.  It is the concious mind we use to decide things, for example, I am going to jump that jump.  However, the concious mind is always checking its files in the subconcious via the "gatekeeper" between them (so quickly that you don't know its doing it) and its therefore the subconcious that "reminds" the concious that maybe this isn't a good thing to do for whatever reasons it can find in its files.  Nothing is ever forgotten even if you can't conciously remember it so there is a lot of information in there which may constantly remind you that you are scared or you can't do something very well.  So the hypnotherapy temporarily "switches off" the "gatekeeper" so the messages can go direct to the subconcious where they will remain and be "accessed" next time they are needed. So nothing scary about it - you just need to co-operate and do exactly what you are told and anything is possible to achieve.

Everybody can be a confident rider or achieve their peak performance through sports psychology -

So if we can help you achieve your Eventing, Dressage or just for fun riding goals and enjoy your horse more call and book a session at Somerford Park Farm in the lovely Cheshire countryside or home visits are available on request. 07814 578784.