With the consent of my client, I am allowed to give you a sneak peak into what happens in a session. Full disclosure, my client has read and approved all materials below!!
One of my younger clients, Tom came to me for his weekly session. We always start by checking in and see what has been going on in his world for the week. I like to catch up, see where we are at that moment in time and what has been going on for each of my clients. When I started working as a life coach, I didn't think that I would be life coaching my kid clients, however, of course I would be!!!! None of us have all the answers to questions, but we have a habit of solving problems for others. This is not what a life coach does. We work together, solve the problems together, I ask questions, but never give solutions.
So, Tom and I checked in and he explained that he had a friend that didn't have any boundaries and was on top of him the whole time. I asked what that meant, he said that he would grab him, be in his space, in his face, touching him. I asked him how that make him feel in his body, he said nervous, it over whelmed him and he didn't like it. I asked him what would happen if he asked him to stop, asked him not to come into his space. He said he hadn't done that and I asked why. He said he didn't want to upset him. OK, so how could we figure something out that both parties would be happy? How about, we take the minis to the round pen and play with boundaries. Tom was up for that. We are going to use Clyde, hmmm, I prefer Lightening said Tom, yep, but Clyde is a better mirror for this. OK.....
We lead the minis up to the arena and let them have a little run around and roll. Now they are ready for work. So when working with any of my horses, we make sure they are happy and ready to work. So we do what they need. Generally, they like to have a run around and a big roll. Maybe a little munch of grass. That is OK, whilst they do that, we do a little breathing and sensing in. What is that? We take some breaths into our body, sense into our surroundings, listening to the sounds, smelling the air, feeling the earth beneath our feet and the air on our face. It allows us to relax, come into our body, be in the present. Magic happens when we take that breathe.
Once the minis have had their little run around, we catch them, again through our previous session, there is a complete science behind it. Looking at their body language, watching them, not running up to them, taking our time and breathing in between. Once lead ropes are on, we take Clyde into the round pen, whilst Lightening hangs out with Tom's mum. The exercise is all about boundaries. How comfortable are we when our pony approaches us, when do we feel safe and can we ask our pony to stop and how does our pony feel about that?
I asked Tom to stand one end of the round pen and I would walk Clyde to him. Tom had to put his hands up when he wanted Clyde to stop. As I walked towards Tom with Clyde, I could see Tom's body language changing, but he was not asking Clyde to stop. We came right up to Tom with Clyde's nose touching Tom's chest. I asked him if he was comfortable with Clyde right there. He squeaked yes, I asked, really?? Erm, maybe not..... OK, lets try that again. This time, I brought Clyde around and watched Tom's body language, as I could see it changing I stopped Clyde. I asked him if that was comfortable, he said yes it was. I then took a step closer and asked if he still felt comfortable. He did. I took another step forward and asked again, I could see that Tom's body language was changing again. I checked in with him, and he squeaked it was OK. I took a step back with Clyde and asked how that felt. Oh much better thank you. So this time, I said I would walk Clyde round and for Tom to ask him to stop. This time, stand tall, raise our body energy and put our hands up, so we almost had a force field around us and lets see what Clyde would do. We did the exercise again and Tom did as I suggested and this time he grew and put his hands up and Clyde stopped in his tracks. Yay, perfect. Now, as I asked Tom what he thought Clyde felt about being asked to stop. I asked him to take a look at Clyde's body language and tell me what he thought Clyde was feeling. He said his ears were forward, so that is good. He was standing still and looking at him and that was OK. I asked did he look sad that he has been asked to stop. He said no, he didn't look too bothered. Awesome!! So, I asked Tom, can you do that with you friend this week and come back to me and let me know how that goes. Yep he replies.
Roll forward next session and Tom comes bouncing in. I did it, I did it!! Did what Tom? He said I did the boundary thing with my friend. Oh, how did that go. It was awesome he said. His friend came running towards him and he put his hands up and grew his energy, just like he did with Clyde and his friend just kind of ran around him, just like he had a force field around him. Great I responded. So how did his friend feel about that? He didn't care he said, he just kept going and didn't even notice. He wasn't upset then? No!!! See, I said, it is boundary magic, we just need to change our body language a little, grew our energy and set our boundaries and our friends do not really notice.
So with a lot of kids, they get physical, loud, push, shout, get frustrated when someone comes into their space. They are not being bad, not being rude, they are just needing more time to adjust to someone coming up close and personal. Figuring out their boundaries, do they even know what a boundary is? However, it can be the other way, where they can burst into tears, allow their friends and family in their personal space and not have the courage to say no. It is so important we listen to our kids boundaries, not only to validate their personal body space, but give them the choice of saying yes and no to anyone coming into their space. Equate this to consent.
Thank you to Tom for allowing me to share and also for being him. Trusting me and my herd to help him and then actually taking our lessons and using them.
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