Has anyone ever hosted or attended a Sharon Wilsie Horse Speak clinic? Thinking of hosting one and looking for feedback before making a decision to go for it.
I have attended both HS I and II. I have also watched the webinar on “Horse Speak in Motion.” Personally, it was a very transformative experience for me, a 64 year old woman, who has owned horses for close to 30 years. Sharon states in her book Horses in Translation, “Horse Speak is an honest attempt to authentically interact with horses in a manner similar to how they interact with each other, following the same protocols as they do.” It has made me a better, more intuitive and sympathetic horse person than I could ever have imagined. Sharon is an incredible person, who teaches with enthusiasm, kindness, and with the most positive spirit I have ever met. You will not regret it.
Have never heard of it? Is it on YouTube?
Thanks! My husband gave me the Horse Speak book for Christmas, and it has already changed the way we interact with our horses. We aren’t experts yet. When we try to speak their language, our horses are interested and patient, but I am sure we seem like complete dolts to them…we’re always “talking” too loud, or missing a crucial verb conjugation, lol! I am certain that attending a Horse Speak clinic is the right move for me, and I really want to host a clinic to introduce the amazing world of talking to horses in their own language to horse people in our area. However, we live in a very rural area with an extremely high poverty rate. I was hoping that somebody out there could reassure me that with good advertising, many people would flock to us from out of town.
I was in a “fly on the wall” position for one of the Horse Speak clinics and I was not impressed. Ms. Wilsea has come up with various gimmicks and interpretations of horse behavior and is very good at selling those interpretations.
4 Likes
Hi, AMackechnie: It is interesting and valuable to me to hear an opposite view of Horse Speak. Could you be more specific? I mean, obviously Ms. Wilsie is “selling” to everyone the interpretations of horse behavior that she calls Horse Speak. I don’t have stars in my eyes, but I also don’t have any problem paying money to someone who can teach me something I don’t know. I regularly write checks to my trainer, after all.
What I want to know is, did you think that Ms. Wilsie made the whole thing up and is laughing all the way to the bank, or did you get the impression that she absolutely believes she is communicating with horses? Was there a particular action she took or assertion she made that you took exception to, or do you find the whole idea of it unbelievable?
Thanks!
I do not know Ms. Wilsea personally, so I would not be able to give an opinion on whether she believes in her work or not.
I observed participants who were encouraged to believe that they were manipulating the actions of horses standing out at pasture, while in a building and looking through a window. One participant firmly believed she encouraged the horse to graze by using her mind. I also observed participants with dummies (binkies/pacifiers) in their mouths because Wilsea indicated their minds would be softer and more receptive to communicating with a horse if they sucked on one of those.
Ms. Wilsea had an interpretation for everything, indicating a horse standing in a field was in “a holding pattern” and that a horse brushing a fly off its leg was “self medicating.”
People obviously enjoy the clinics, as these participants appeared to be having a ball. Unfortunately they were also learning a great deal of, in my opinion, balderdash. They were novices to horses; in fact, the host of the clinic told me that she didn’t like “horse people” to attend, because then there were as she put it, “awkward questions.”
3 Likes
Oh, for god’s sake… :lol:
2 Likes
:lol: :lol: :lol: oh my
1 Like
I have never heard of this before, but after reading about your location and watching that video, I think if you are a follower of this, it would be far better for you to go to a clinic somewhere instead of trying to host a clinic yourself.
