Rupert Isaacson: Welcome to Equine Assisted World.
I'm your host, Rupert Isaacson, New York Times best selling
author of The Horse Boy, The Long Ride Home, and The Healing Land.
Before I jump in with today's guest, I just want to say a huge
thank you to you, our audience, for helping to make this happen.
I have a request.
If you like what we do, please like, subscribe, tell a friend.
It really helps us get this work done.
As you might know from my books, I'm an autism dad.
And over the last 20 years, we've developed several
equine assisted, neuroscience backed certification programs.
If you'd like to find out more about them, go to newtrailslearning.
com.
So without further ado, let's meet today's guest.
Welcome back to Equine Assisted World.
I've got Melissa Connor here with me from Holland in Michigan where she runs renew.
And I was actually just there.
It, and I was struck at Renew because there was a higher than usual, higher
than I'm used to seeing level of equine care going on which I would
like to see as the general standard.
And so I thought I would ask Melissa to come on and tell us how that
evolved because as a lot of, you know, I, I go around doing a lot of gigs
in a lot of therapeutic places and through nobody's fault, you know, the.
Frequently the state of horses that are being donated, well, maybe that
is somebody's fault when they're being donated, is you know, they often come in
with stiffnesses injuries, arthritis, you know, bangs and wear and tear, but then
there often isn't much emphasis on rehab.
And of course, as we all know, if a horse is going to be giving wellbeing to a
human, it has to have wellbeing to give.
And simply being quiet, of course, isn't enough.
So really, I was quite struck by this at at Renew.
So I thought I'd ask Melissa to come on and talk to us about it because
we would have something to learn.
So Melissa, thank you for coming on the show.
Tell us a little bit about who you are and what you do.
Melissa Connor: Sure.
Thank you Rupert.
It was so wonderful to have you at renew just a few weeks ago, and it was an,
an honor to introduce you to our horses and our people and, and learn, learn
the ticking equine integration method.
And thank you for your high praise.
It's it's, it's, it is rare to be able to have someone kind of come and
immerse in our center for a few days long enough to, to notice those things.
And so we, we highly value your opinion and your, and your praise.
We have 22 horses that live on our farm in Holland, Michigan.
We are on a 20 acre property.
And we have been at this location since 2020.
We purchased the property in 2018 and.
Made a plan to build it out.
So there's a, a few things that we've prioritized and personally
I've tried to prioritize.
So we are a therapeutic riding center serving children and
adults with disabilities.
About half of them with autism.
And we are an accredited center with PATH International.
And our, our instructors are certified.
I have have been a therapeutic writing instructor for 20 plus years and am a
master instructor with PATH as well.
One thing I tried, I've always believed in having had horses
since I was a little girl, was to give them the best care possible.
And as I was sharing with you, that has evolved really as, as.
I am continuing to learn, even though I'm, you know, 50 plus years into life
as a horse owner and 20 years into this industry in particular, there's,
there's so much to know and learn and continue to learn and explore with
horses that I don't feel like there's a formula that just plain works.
But a lot of it is listening to the horses, inviting them into the work that
we do, and then meeting their needs.
So I would say, especially over the last decade or so I have really learned
from you and a lot of your colleagues.
Some of the ones that stand out really are mark Schiller, Josh Nichol, Dr.
Steven Peters mark Rashid and, and others about prioritizing the.
Horses need friends, horses need freedom, and horses need forage.
And focusing on those three F's for their wellbeing and keeping them happy.
And then even just in the last six months or so, not even just looking at horses
wellbeing as as a scale, but even saying what does it mean for them to thrive?
Not just exist.
Mm-hmm.
Not just live, but how can they be just like we want for our humans, we want
our horses to be thriving in this work.
So one thing I've really come to believe in deeply is if a horse
is not supposed to be a partner in this work that we find out.
What their vocation should be and help make that possible for them.
So they don't stay, we don't say, this is the horse that showed up, so
this is the horse we're gonna use.
Even though the horse hates it and the horse isn't thriving or loving
their work, then we're gonna move them on to, to something else.
So I, I think, I love that all.
We have a variety of horses that have different personalities.
They're different ages, they're different breeds.
But we have really emphasized watching their body language,
watching their physical fitness level.
We're so excited to dive into the Teke method, just to, to really help them
with their conditioning, but we have had conditioning plans that haven't been as
intense as what we just learned with you.
Definitely every horse gets ridden by a, a competent rider once or
twice a week in addition to the therapy work that they're doing.
So we've tried to prioritize these things.
Some, some lunging, some groundwork.
And then we give them, we give them those three F's.
We make sure that their friend groups are set, and we have, I have a staff
that does that, and we've built out pasture groups and as we were building
our property, we put shelters out.
We put, we're in Michigan, so we put automatic waterers out.
We wanted to be able to leave them outside as much as possible,
which might seem ironic because we just built a new barn, but.
The barns are really for the humans, not really for the horses.
We need a place to bring them into, you know, to get them ready to work
with the equipment, to, to groom them and brush them and care for them.
So that's really what the barn is for.
But of course, it's also just a for them when they need to, to wait.
So that's kind of the overview I think of where.
Our thinking in terms of our horse care has evolved and then trying to,
we're constantly trying to educate the volunteers that come to our
center, our participants as well.
And then the, the staff just carries it on and we try to prioritize continuing
ed for our, our team because it's all, which is why we were able to bring
you in just to, to learn from you.
But we're open to, we're open to changing things if it doesn't work, not
just going to get in doing something because it's easiest for the humans.
Try to take in the mindset of what's best for the horse and we'll do
that thing In terms of their care,
Rupert Isaacson: was it always, so, I mean, you, you grew up
in horse country, Virginia.
I used to work in Virginia, so Yeah, I, I know it and it's, you know, a horse mecca.
I.
Many places I've been to in Virginia, actually, the horses are kept really
well because they do spend a lot of time outside, even if they're hunters
or competition horses or whatever.
But I have noticed of course, over the years that in many therapeutic barn horses
is what one would call over stalled.
And sometimes that can be simply because of the overwhelming
traffic that's coming through.
As most therapy barn owners know business is almost too good, you know?
There are just so many people with the need and it's very
hard to turn people away.
And this can end up in horses, you know, standing in perhaps more than they should.
And the idea of turning horses out in groups, I, I've often seen
resistance to that because saying, well, what if, you know, they kick
each other, or what if, or what if?
And although, you know, I usually say, well, I.
They might, but in the same way that kids in the playground might
push each other over, but at the same time, usually they don't.
And the mental health is important and this is what they need.
You know, it's a, it's a balance we have to do.
You must have come, you know, 'cause you came up through the sort
of ranks of the, of the sort of orthodox therapeutic writing thing.
There must have been an evolution with, for, so can you, can you talk
to us about where you began and then sort of gradually how it changed?
Because I think that would help a lot of listeners who might be in
situations where they're thinking, yeah, you know, I, I could see that
maybe we could make a change or should make a change, but I'm not entirely
sure how we might ch you know, begin to change a, an ingrained system.
So talk us through your evolution and I think that will be useful.
Melissa Connor: Oh, sure.
I started in, well, grew up in Virginia.
I grew up actually as a child in Hunter Jumpers and four H.
And we boarded our horses for a while, and then my family had a, a small farm of
our own where we did a lot of the chores.
And so turnout was always something that I grew up with horses kind of out during
the day and in their stalls overnight.
That was, that was, that's what I remember from my earliest childhood.
That was what you did, right?
You feed them their green breakfast in the stall, turn 'em
out, bring 'em in for dinner.
Grain install.
And I, I think that that worked for sure.
The horses got a good deal of turnout and that really happened.
Even I began as a volunteer at a center in Williamsburg, Virginia, and
that was really the practice there.
But I, I did come in, when I started there in 2005 as a volunteer, I
noticed that there were a lot of well-meaning people who didn't have
a lot of horse experience, who were drawn to this therapeutic riding world.
And maybe some of the decisions that they were making were well,
everybody was trying to do the best.
Everybody does their best until they know better and then they do better.
Mm-hmm.
So, the as we didn't have, as, that was a brand new center where
I wasn't at the time they didn't, they were building pastures but
didn't have a lot of pastures.
They were trying to onboard horses, but only had the couple that had
been donated, you know, that weren't, weren't necessarily ideal for the job.
And, and as I got in there and started helping to mold and shape some of
those, I've always come at this where the world of equine assisted services,
this world shouldn't get the leftovers from the real equestrian world.
And I noticed there was an attitude, from those who were into competitive
riding, whether it was dressage or western pleasure or, or hunter jumper, where they
thought, oh, this is therapeutic riding.
We'll give them our, you know, our, our lame horse who can't
show anymore or we'll do this.
And personally that always offended me in the sense of,
Rupert Isaacson: in so many ways.
Yeah, in
Melissa Connor: so many ways.
But I thought, why That makes no sense that the people that, that are
approaching the partnering with horses.
For their own wellbeing.
What I think the equestrian wheel doesn't know is they were getting some
of the benefits from being with horses.
The same benefits that we're trying to extend to people with autism and people
with cerebral palsy and people with
good point with
Melissa Connor: brain injury.
So it's, it's, they are not more important than the competitive.
They are just us.
So, I do think I was able, I, I was able to be a part of that center and
I became the operations manager and kind of oversaw over the eight years
that I was there in Virginia, the onboarding of horses and, and we were
able to recruit a team that thought similarly to that, to that where let's
do the best we can for this community and that means increase our turnout.
Excellent vet care, farrier care.
Let's not get somebody's leftover hay that they're given away because
it got moldy and they don't want it.
Let's invest in quality hay, quality feed even chiropractic
work if that makes a difference.
And that's what a horse needs.
So these things do cost money.
They cost, they take time, they take intentionality.
So as I was learning the field in those first really eight years or so at the
center in Virginia, really prioritizing without horses, we, we can't do our work.
So we, they have to be a priority.
They have to be invested in.
And so then I moved to Michigan in 2013.
Got to know, renew, which was a small center at the time, and very small budget
as well, working out of a boarding barn.
And it was very similar.
I remember the, my first trip to the tech shop, local tech shop here
in the western side of Michigan.
I went with a friend and we were looking at some of their consigned saddles, and I
noticed several of them had broken trees.
And they had a saddle fitter on staff and I think I said something to them like, I'm
pretty sure the tree on this one's broken.
You might wanna consider something.
She went, oh, well, we'll pass it on to a therapeutic riding center.
And I just remember being so upset I had to like, leave the tack shop because
I said, oh, please don't do that.
And then was just so emotional I couldn't you know, I struggled to be able to
say why, and I thought we have to start changing some attitudes and mm-hmm.
Like, this is, it's still very much there, there's still this thought
of, of if it's a therapeutic writing center, if it's a nonprofit well
you must be hurting for money.
So they should be grateful to get our saddle with a broken tree.
Or they should be grateful to get our three-legged horse that, you know,
isn't sounding, is that actually
Rupert Isaacson: gonna cost a fortune in Becca?
Melissa Connor: So I think just kind of flipping the whole thing
over and saying, no, we need.
As I know you, we learned from you when you came.
Like, our horses need to be conditioned.
We owe it to them to be in top physical shape, top mental shape.
Our equipment needs to be that and so much more because of what we're doing
with our equipment and with our horses.
And so the care of the horses really has always, for me been a
priority, but it's been a, a long, slow journey and that I'm still on
of learning and sharing kind of this
Rupert Isaacson: stuff.
Yeah.
One, I don't know if you, if you're at this point, I, I, I reached a point
in Texas, 'cause you know, people wanted to donate horses all the time
and we took some, but and, but we took ones that they didn't have to be.
Always sound because as you know, a lot of our work can be done on the ground too.
So if a horse couldn't be ridden or had, you know, kissing spine or something,
but had this wonderful attitude and this wonderful nature, we just rehab
them as horses that you could work in hand with, with an adult population
perhaps that wasn't going to ride.
But they could still be in their top amazing shape within those parameters
or something like that, you know?
Or we could have horses that, you know, we knew could only carry a certain weight.
Okay.
We, they were only get, but they could still be in their top shape.
But mostly actually I would buy, buy or breed my own horses because as you
say these horses are no less athletes than horses in the competition world.
And of course, all my horses did do everything anyway, and still do they
crossed the line between those worlds.
Okay.
But the.
The idea that somebody might have, I always thought was so strange
that it's basically I, competition rider have messed this horse up.
You know, he's now injured.
You know, they say, oh, we don't know how it happened.
And like, well, yeah, you do.
There was a time when he wasn't lame and there was a time when he was
and do the best of what you were doing and you probably can, you
know, come out with an answer of that's probably where it happens.
He was probably overstressed or overstressed.
Now, it's not always like that.
Of course some horses injure themselves in the field and whatever, but you
know, and I know that the vast majority of competition horses get broken.
Yes.
And that doesn't mean they're not rehab.
But the idea that, and of course that's what the whole tech in program is, but.
The idea that someone would say, oh, well, now that I have broken this
horse, here's what I'm gonna do.
I'm gonna make you feel like you're, I'm doing you a favor and I'm going to sort
of lie to myself that I'm doing you a favor by giving you a horse that is going
to require considerable vet care if he's going to, and, and rehab, skilled rehab.
If he's going to go on and do anything, rather than just retire in the field
at home, which I could do, but I don't really wanna feed that horse, even
though I love this horse so much.
That's what they always say.
And I, you know, and he's given so much and he deserves and blah, blah.
I said, well, if he deserves so much, why don't you keep him?
Right?
You know?
Rupert Isaacson: And I remember the last person who tried to give me a
horse, like, this is actually quite, quite a, a, a well known event.
And I, I said to her, you know, then if the horse is, if you love this
horse, like you say you love your this horse, keep him, you've got fields.
You know?
Yeah.
Rupert Isaacson: And then it's like, well, you know, I don't really wanna feed him.
It's like, you know, you want me to feed him?
So what, so, and you want me to take on the Vet Cat and you want, while I'm
also a nonprofit, while I'm also needing to prioritize spending on serving the
populations we serve, which by the way, could be one of your relatives, Mr.
Or miss horse owner that's trying to palm this, you know, broken horse off on me,
right?
Rupert Isaacson: So therefore, if I take this horse, you have to help
maintain him because you'd have to do it anyway if they were at home.
So what's the difference?
Just this way they're going to have more care.
And I had, have actually had some people go, you, you know
what, actually, fair enough.
And of course, plenty of others who say thanks, but no thanks.
Have you experimented with that at all?
When people want to donate because I, I think this is
something a lot of therapeutic program directors can relate to.
Melissa Connor: Absolutely.
We, I.
It's always a fine line though, walking with, dealing with horse owners.
Rupert Isaacson: So I hadn't noticed yet, myself included.
Probably
Melissa Connor: it.
So, we own about half of our herd and the other half are what we call
here in the states, a free lease.
Okay.
I know our accountant hates that term because a lease in the states,
it implies money is exchanged when money is not exchanged.
Mm-hmm.
And a free lease, it's a, we cover the cost of.
Of daily care.
And in order to have the horse in the program, but the, we cap put a cap
on the vet, the vet care, that would be considered normal or standard,
what we would do, and then if the owner wants above and beyond that
would be what they would pay for.
So we have written agreements we do a trial period, we do a 60 day trial.
We can extend it before we accept a horse.
If we're accepting a horse for donation, usually it's a circumstance
where the owner can't, they're paying board somewhere, right?
And they usually don't have another option,
right?
Melissa Connor: Not always the case, but usually they don't have another option.
Now, what has happened time and time again is we have a free lease agreement
with a horse where the horse is in our program for a few years, and then.
Normal course of aging, they develop a condition or they, or a
lameness that we can't overcome.
Laminitis, heart murmur, something where we stay in relationship with the
owner and then we say, are you like our agreement was that you would take the
horse back, you know, at this point.
And then they say, oh, it's been five years.
My life has changed.
I can't take the horse back.
Can you retire them, rehome them, and then it, it, we, they assume that it's
easy for us to function as a retirement or even a rescue, which we aren't.
So it's a, it's that fine line.
So I've tried to make it a priority to, to know our community well,
just the horse people in our area.
Mm-hmm.
So we have been able to rehome some horses just locally too, to
local farms or people who are.
Stakeholders with us, whether they're volunteers or donors or they have
those open fields and they're willing to, to take, take somebody on.
But it is interesting how the person that says, I was laughing when you said, oh,
I love them so much and I want them back.
That I just had this exact conversation with a, a person who said that five years
ago when we got the horse, I love them.
I want them back.
And I called her about a month ago and said, we're starting to make a plan
for retiring your horse, and we will.
And she said, oh, I'm, I can't take him.
You know, and, and she said, I can't take him.
You have my pre permission to euthanize.
Well, we said, well, we're not, they.
I mean, that's not what we are talking about right now.
Yeah.
Melissa Connor: So this particular horse is dealing with Laminitis
and a, and a heart murmur that is escalating, but he's not at the end.
Yeah.
He's just, we were just calling to kind of start the.
Conversation that it's moving in this direction.
So it, it does get tricky.
It really does.
And that, that's where having the ground programs and the equine assisted
learning programs and the things where the horse can still serve in that role.
Yeah.
Melissa Connor: It's, we can just at our, because we are on 20 acres and we right
now can accommodate about 24 horses.
So we serve a lot of people every week.
So I have try to vary the workload as we assign the work, and so we
just can only have so many horses in, in that unmounted category.
So, absolutely.
Rupert Isaacson: No, absolutely.
And I think, I think everyone can relate to this.
You know, I, I have a funny story.
Sometimes it goes the other way.
I remember being donated a, a very nice touch, warm blood who the person couldn't.
Sustain anymore.
And he was a fabulous horse in every way.
And so of course we kept his training advancing while he was serving,
you know, all of the autistic kids.
So he ended up with a nice massage and nice changes and the ex owner
came and saw it and wanted him back.
And and we hadn't done the paperwork as well as we should
have, and we had to let him go back.
And he was a horse that we were really relying upon at that point.
Oh, that
Rupert Isaacson: said, in retrospect I can see that the mental health of that person
would have been very negatively impacted.
I think it had already been negatively impacted at the time
where she let him go by other things.
And we sort of went in a bit of a huddle, you know, at Horse point and
went, well, it's not really fair, but.
Okay.
Because clearly it's going to have a very negative impact if we don't let him go.
But how are we gonna replace him?
Right?
So I then went and bought a very nice Spanish horse instead who
had a lot of the same qualities.
It's, it's something I think, which really, if listeners are coming into
the early stages of their career with this, you really, really, really do need
to make sure your paperwork is pretty cast iron and people like Melissa, I
think you'd be up for mentoring people, you know, in this kind of thing.
Because yeah, one can get
Melissa Connor: Absolutely.
Yeah.
Rupert Isaacson: And
Melissa Connor: I, as, as you know, Rupert, I have skin in the
game in that, two of my horses are free leased to my own program.
So I am a, even though I'm the executive director, I'm a horse
owner, and so I also wear that hat.
Yeah.
I've signed the same agreements and and I do, I love that you said that,
you know, you improve the horse.
I love that mentality.
I would hope that our horse owners and the horses unless there's, you know.
Age aging and wear and tear that maybe can't be rehabbed at a point.
But the idea is that we watch their body scores all the time.
We monitor their workloads constantly.
We ma try to make sure the horses in that happy and thriving.
So the horse owners generally stay happy with us if they, you
know, when they come and visit.
And we make a point.
And it does take time and intentionality.
That's what a lot of people in this world don't have, but to
maintain those relationships.
Rupert Isaacson: Right.
And also to do that work.
So that was actually intriguing to me because as you know, when people are
learning the Tke program, for example, one of the draws about it is that it
helps to end the time conflict between how on earth am I going to condition
these horses When I'm overwhelmed with a number of clients I've got,
and I'm sure staffed Dan, Dan, Dan.
Mm-hmm.
And of course with Taki we're saying, okay, you do it all at the same time.
The lunging session, the in hand session, the long raining session is
while you are serving your client.
And therefore these problems go away.
And then we also have the crazy time thing, so the horses get to go
nuts and express themselves as well.
Which, but that can also be a client session, you know, and there's
lots we can learn in that fine.
But of course not.
That took even us and we're, you know, seasoned horse people, it took us a
while to come up with that formula.
And we only came up with that formula because we had found
ourselves in that time crunch and sort of had a little panic.
And then them, the penny dropped, but Hold on, hold on, hold on.
A lot of our clients can actually.
Easily do this work and it would be really empowering.
Why don't we, and of course it took off.
When I came to your barn a few weeks ago and you pulled, there were three
geldings that you pulled out and they all displayed these like giant top lines.
And this is my bug always in therapeutic riding.
It's like, where's the top line?
And one of the reasons I'm so anal about it obviously is because in horse boy
method, we ride with a child in front.
So we are having to think about that small amount of extra weight.
Usually these are small children, it's minimal.
But nonetheless, you know, we, we, we really need to think about this.
And because we have to put horses into collection for
the oxytocin effect to happen.
We have to do a lot of training, which involves a lot of top line.
Okay, fine.
One of the things which I often notice in the therapeutic world is lack of top line.
And it, I won't say it doesn't bother me because that's where you sit.
And it, particularly if the horse is older and they usually
are to neglect, the top line is,
I don't wanna say negligent, but it's hard to find another word
because that's where the client sits.
And the client is not going to sit well, they often cannot sit.
Well, that's the whole point, is that we're giving them a horse
which can accommodate their needs, but it means we have to be extra
vigilant about the horse's needs.
So I'm usually going like a top line.
You pull out these three horses, I'm like.
Saying, you know, damn, in the southern way, where, where you, you put a
y in the middle dam, it was like, wow, I'm not used to seeing that.
And I'm like, okay, what's she doing?
So for listeners, these, these three ings came out and they
were three distinct breeds.
One was a apart Farian, one was an Irish Old Irish draft.
Gorgeous.
Yeah.
And the other was an Anglo Norman, I think.
Melissa Connor: A Spanish Norman.
Spanish Norman.
Rupert Isaacson: Right.
And they just came out glowing with attitude and fun and spice and top line.
And it was.
I was like, okay, what are you doing?
And this is before I've touched these horses, by the way, listeners, I cannot
claim any, we were there to teach em, but I was like, okay, I dunno why I need
to go to teach these people because, you know, clearly I'm doing fine.
So, so talk us through what went into the building of those
top lines as therapy horses.
I think that would be something really useful for listeners.
Melissa Connor: Great question.
So I, I have always thought, and even from early days in this, in this
work that the horses need for their mental and physical wellbeing to be
worked correctly under saddle in a discipline that they were familiar with.
So in, in the cases of those three like Will, he's the Irish draft,
he was an inventor who developed a roar, couldn't compete anymore.
His, his owner graciously thought of us, reached out, was afraid he was too big.
You know, we love him.
He's a goofball, he's powerful.
He's a goofball.
He really shines in our veterans program.
Our veterans are really drawn to him, you know, big, big, powerful horse.
Mm-hmm.
But he gets at, I would say two, one or two conditioning rides a week by my
daughter is actually his exercise rider, but just, she knows what she's doing.
She knows the classical dressage.
She knows how to get him into self carriage.
And so that keeps him strong.
That keeps his back strong.
Scout is our 12-year-old, f Friesian cross crossed with a paint.
So he's he's stunning people.
Yeah, he's gorgeous.
Yeah.
He's, he that's almost
Rupert Isaacson: everyone wants, is like, I want that.
Melissa Connor: I know.
He's flashy.
He's very flashy.
And he same thing.
We have one of our staff members who is committed to working with him weekly.
So, and then the same with Mick.
Mick is the Spanish.
Norman just came in in December, but had a dressage background.
He's in his early twenties.
He looks the same as Scout or Will who are in their early teens.
But he had a dressage background and the family was moving on.
They were actually moving south and he was donated to us.
We happily accepted him because he came in just not only mentally fit, but physically
fit, but really we have developed, conditioning program with riding.
We do, we have a trainer.
We have a local trainer who comes over three Fridays a month and, and gives
lessons to our staff or our volunteers who are, are our ride conditioning
riders to help everybody work on.
With their horse.
I love having outside eyes on her horse.
She's an accomplished trainer.
It's Erica Peterson is her name, and she, I think she likes coming to our barn too,
because we're not a competition barn.
That's what she's used to training.
She travels around and goes to competition barns and she just enjoys
coming to us because our goal is how can we help our horses be better?
How can we help them stay physically fit?
How can we improve their flexibility, their balance, their strength?
So, and we just do this in the context of, of, you know, a classical dressage lesson.
I say classical dressage, but you know, the, they could be
riding an all-purpose saddle or a western saddle or whatever, right?
It's the, it's those same.
Components.
So that we've been doing that for a couple of years, that has really helped to keep
our, our crew of instructors who are our staff and our volunteers who help us
condition the horses help keep them sharp.
It, it keeps their.
Riding skills sharp, but of course everybody comes in with a baseline.
There.
So this is, we ex the people who we have approved to work with our horses, we make
sure that they know what they're doing.
We don't, we have, believe me, we get asked all the
time, can I ride your horses?
Can I ride your horses?
No, we don't just let anybody ride our horses for conditioning.
They have to be approved.
So, we have a, we have a method of doing that and then we just make that
a priority so the horses get that work.
That's why I'm so excited to add, to keen into what we're already doing, to just
add the benefit, the groundwork, right?
Rupert Isaacson: Well, right, because you know, when, when one is relying upon
riding, there are some issues there.
One is the rider has to be competent to work a horse over the back, obviously.
So.
Most riders dunno how to do that.
The riders that do know how to do that may or may not be in your program.
Right.
And then of course, it, it, it, it's whether or not the horse can be ridden.
And it also, if, if we're relying upon riding, then even if you have those
riders in your program, as you, as you've pointed out, only a very small
number of your personnel can do that.
Whereas with the lunging and the long reigning, obviously we
can now get everybody doing it.
Um Right.
Regardless of their equestrian skill, but Right.
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That brings me actually to another question, which is
I know how busy you are.
Finding the time to get the horses ridden over the back in this way is not easy.
How do you manage that time?
Melissa Connor: That's, that's another great question.
And we really blocked out one morning a week.
So we don't do programming on Friday mornings.
That's where it, that's where it landed for us.
That's our conditioning time.
And so we just have it blocked out on our schedule.
We don't pro, we don't provide services.
Okay.
Now, every now and then, there's a special thing where we have to shift.
That's why I say it's about three Fridays a month that, that, that actually happens.
And then those, we assign person to horse.
So, you know, I'm assigned a horse, various people are assigned a horse.
If we can't get to that horse that week, like travel meetings.
It's our responsibility to assign, to get, make sure somebody else
works the horse so that they get it.
We have a, we have a checklist, you know, we have a Google document.
We all go in and write notes.
You know, if somebody didn't get a canner lead or if somebody was stiff in
one direction, we make notes on that.
And all of us who are conditioners can see what we're doing with with our
horses and with each other's horses and make suggestions and help each other.
But like you said, it is, there's a baseline of riding ability and that
that is something that we have struggled with, but we also want to develop and,
Rupert Isaacson: well, that, that's the question.
Again, most places don't have access to those riders.
How did you okay.
Your daughter's part of the program granted, but nonetheless, I mean,
you're lucky that she enjoys riding.
But.
Even with that with that many horses, it's, it's very difficult to find
that number of people anywhere who have the ability, you know, if one's
lucky, if one finds one or two, you know, let alone five or six.
So how do you, how do you find those good riders and bring them into your program?
Melissa Connor: Such a good question.
I wish I, I wish I knew the answer other than, here's, I'll give you my best
answer, which is, I think because we and as the leader of the organization,
I've tried to set it as a priority.
I think we set the bar where we want the bar to be and then wait
for people to come meet us there.
Mm-hmm.
So it's not a perfect system.
Even, even now when I tell you we have, we have, 22 horses.
Well, I'll take out the minis, you know, 'cause we don't ride the minis,
but, so say we have 18 horses that need to get conditioned every week.
I think we have 12 approved riders currently.
That's a lot.
Rupert Isaacson: I mean, I think a lot of places would dream of
having that many good riders.
Yeah.
Melissa Connor: Yeah.
We have we have nine instructors, which is also a high number of instructors.
Not saying every instructor is in a different spot in their career.
Mm.
But
Melissa Connor: every instructor has come in with an equestrian background.
So they've, we always encourage them.
If people come to me and say, I wanna be an instructor, I usually
say, go take writing lessons.
Go like, what is your background?
Because you, you need five plus years of writing instruction with a good trainer.
Usually at another barn riding different horses, not, not
starting on our therapy horses.
Yeah.
And get your base level of skills so that you know what that feel is.
You understand what balance is.
They understand how the horse moves they understand the weight shifts that happen,
the bending that needs to happen, that crossing over, bearing weight on that
inside hind, all the things that, that you bring, you brought to us in groundwork.
The hope is that our, our conditioning riders have that, and then we,
they're, they start as volunteers.
I think every person that we've hired on our staff maybe with one exception
because she came from outta state, but had started with us as a volunteer and we get
to know them and we see their work ethic.
We see their abilities and then their, and then their, over time have been hired.
We have we have a staff of 13 right now.
Not everybody is a rider and that's completely fine.
But they participate in the program or are responsible for different parts of
the program in, in some way or another.
And then that's circle gets bigger with that handful of volunteers that we find.
So I, I have I'll give you an example of a good friend of mine.
I met her soon after I, I moved here to this area.
But she was a trainer.
She was a trainer.
She's now doing something else, working in schools, actually in a autism classroom.
But she exercises our horses.
In fact, she exercises Mick, that Spanish Norman, but.
She was a person hanging out with an, she's an incredible rider,
understands all of those things, but doesn't currently own a horse
had kind of moved out of that world.
And so the gift of her coming back into our program and she can
be a conditioning rider for us.
Like there's, you just gotta find those people and it's not easy, but
I think when we set the bar and build those relationships, it, it will come.
Rupert Isaacson: It, there's also, sometimes it can be a matter of geography.
I've been traveling to that Grand Rapids, Michigan area for a couple
of years now, and I've been, first I was surprised and I'm very, in a very
pleasant way by the kind of level of education of a lot of riders in that area.
It was very interesting to me.
You know, we both know, for example Leanna tank who, which also just
done a podcast with who came and obviously was part of this training.
She's in Grand Rapids and.
She in her barn.
There's a very high level of knowledge there.
And I was, you know, you expect these things in places like Northern
Virginia or certain parts of the Carolinas or around the Denver area,
you know, places that are known hubs.
Do you think that, is Western Michigan just a particularly good
hub, or do you have a particularly good way of just attracting these
people and, and finding them?
Because I've gotta admit, when I was in Texas, it was, it was tough to find.
Melissa Connor: Hmm.
I, I do think there's, there, there probably is a, something with a geography.
I.
And these hubs, it, it, it, this, this part where I am, and of course
I grew up riding Hunter jumpers as an adult, have ridden dressage.
There are a lot of dressage trainers in our area, so now they're not all of the
same caliber because again, anybody can call themselves a dressage trainer, start
a website, throw it out there, right?
Yes.
Melissa Connor: So I, I have noticed just as I've gotten to know
people, that there's people that I resonate with more than others.
And so I think trying to again, it goes, kind of goes back to building
those relationships, but Right.
Letting them know what we're looking for.
Even the, the trainers in our area, but maybe because we're
in a, a higher dressage area in this greater Grand Rapids area.
There is a lot, there are a lot of people, there's a lot of
trail riders in our area too.
And, and I have met, and even in the process of trying to mentor people
in therapeutic riding sometimes I'm surprised people who say they're lifelong
riders or I've been riding for 40 years and they don't know how to post
the trot, you know, or they don't know how, because they hop on their horse
in their backyard and it'll go off on a 10 mile trail ride through the woods
and come back and they didn't fall off.
So that was, that was, that's the extent of it.
So there's, there's still a range, but I, I do think there is an emphasis
on classical dressage in our area.
And I do think that that helps that there, that trickle down effect
of just understanding the movement of the horse, understanding the
muscular development and how they, I.
Power themselves.
And all of that feeds into what we're talking about, having that nice top
line, having happy horses and horses that are able to then do this work.
But I try to prioritize knowing people because those are the
pipelines for the horse kinds of horses we want in our program.
And so people need to trust you.
People need to know about renew.
People need to know who we are.
People need to know about our high standard of care and our conditioning.
And so these are conversations we try to have.
I'm always surprised when they seem surprised by those things.
Yeah.
I just think they're not educated about our equine assisted world.
So true.
Rupert Isaacson: Which is getting better, but we all, I think, can
admit that, we are bringing it up from a place where perhaps it wasn't
as good as it could have been.
Right?
But it gets better year by year.
The, and I can picture a lot of listeners now scribbling down, recruit
my writers from Grand Rapids era.
You know, Melissa's there two years now.
I, I just don't seem to be able to find the riders I used to be able
to feel to Texas to work here.
Melissa Connor: No, I'll tell, I'll tell you something else about this area.
People love this part of the country and they don't leave.
Maybe they'll leave for winter, you know, the, the snowbirds go south.
Yeah.
But there is when I moved here from Virginia and, and
there's not a lot of turnover.
People tend, once they live here, tend to stay here.
And it's a, it's a, it's a great place.
Just that, you know, we have the lake, we have the lake shore.
Mm-hmm.
There's land I, I might have shared with you, I love the area where I live
because I'm 10 minutes from absolutely everything that I need in my life.
A 10 minute drive.
So I don't really have to, you know, it's not a stressful
place to live in that sense.
And there's plenty of open farmland still around for people
who look looking for horse farms.
So
Rupert Isaacson: it's very true.
It's very true in the real estate prices are attractive folks.
Mm-hmm.
As is the landscape.
But you do have to contend with February.
Yes.
Yeah.
Okay, so down to the horse welfare aspect too.
One of the other things that really struck me when I came to you was the horses
live out, as you say, you, you had built this very beautiful barn which smelled
great, of new pine wood and everything.
And had no horses in it because the horses were all outside and that was great.
You also grew up though with horses being stalled and stable.
So at what point did you begin to make that shift?
And, and because it's, it's quite a big one to make.
I think a lot of us grew up with horses being stalled.
It was a hard habit to break, you know, I, I broke it myself at a certain
point, but I do remember a certain amount of internal resistance again.
But it's quite nice to have the horse in the, but then I just saw how happy my
horses were when they were just in that perma herd and I was like, okay, fine.
They're gonna be out.
Yeah.
Rupert Isaacson: But so talk us through how that evolved.
'Cause you don't see it in a lot of therapeutic places.
Melissa Connor: Really, I feel like I discovered it in a, in a sense by
accident because like I said, I moved here from Virginia, used to having horses
stalled at night, or at least shelter.
I had, I had my horses at home and they were in overnight and out during the
day, which is nice to do in Virginia.
We would reverse the turnout in the hot, hot, hot, humid summer, you know,
where they're out overnight and in under fans during the day in Michigan.
It's, it, we didn't reverse the turnout really just kind of had 'em.
So I moved here with that mentality.
I think it happened over time and sort of out of necessity as.
Renew was originally located, literally across the street from where I live.
There's a boarding barn across the street.
We were working, we were had horses boarded there.
I had horses at home.
I would walk them across the street to go to work and, and
be part of the, the program.
And we had a limited number of stalls.
And I, we had an agreement with after I'd been here a year or
two, we made an agreement with the property owners to lease three acres.
And we really kind of had our own pasture.
And we had a small covered arena where we could do lessons and we threw
up a couple of stalls over there.
Our program was growing so rapidly we had more.
Horses and more people to serve than we had room for.
Hmm.
So, so I, we started kind of rotating pastures or leaving them out as much
as possible really with the intent of we could serve more people.
Now this was, I.
12 years ago or so, and the horses were doing great, being out all the time.
So I, I, we were just noticing, you know, our older guys,
it's better for them to move.
They're happier.
And even the younger ones coming in, they were happier in their pasture groups.
So we had a couple different options over there.
We had a smaller paddock.
We added on, we had one big field and we added on another field, but we had
some gates, you know, we could close and kind of, so we just shifted to
where they were out almost all the time.
So if they were in a stall, there was a reason for them to be in a stall.
Either it was they were waiting for a lesson, they were waiting for
the vet, they were waiting for the farrier, you know, or even had a
horse that we got who had equine.
Narcolepsy.
Rupert Isaacson: Oh.
Is one of those.
Yes.
Melissa Connor: Yeah.
And our vet said, keep him outside.
He's not, he was not comfortable.
Basically he would not sleep.
We were bringing him in every night and he was sleep deprived 'cause he wasn't
comfortable sleeping in his stall.
Ah.
He was a big, he was a big guy and our stalls weren't huge and so we had to
get really creative with him and and, but really turned him out was better.
We didn't have the issues that we had.
I once had him, he fell asleep while being groomed with a student and,
you know, he forgot to lock his legs.
I mean, he went down.
So it was he was definitely sleep deprived, which, which I've since
learned is way more common than we think.
Mm-hmm.
Melissa Connor: But again, keeping them out where they figure out their
herd dynamic, let them sort through it.
They get their rest time, their work time, kind of trust the horses.
They know how to do this better than we do.
And so that was, is really over time it evolved.
So even as we were building this barn, we wanted, we built a 24 stall barn.
We put paddocks, as you saw Rupert when you were there.
We put large paddocks outside of every stall with a Dutch door.
So if the horse does need to be in, they have the, they can opt in
or out with their small paddock.
And, and really it's they come in every morning for breakfast.
That's our, that's our routine now.
So they're in, they're in as close to 24 hours a day as possible, but they
come in for breakfast, we feed them, and that gives us a chance to do.
Body checks, notice any behavior changes.
If there's any treatments that need to be done they can be
done by that morning crew.
And then they go back out.
So they're in the barn an hour, maybe two, depending on what,
what's happening that day.
If they're working, then they might stay in for their lesson.
Those not go back out.
And then we just rotate through the day.
So they come in, they often don't go to their stall.
Sometimes they go to their stall to wait for a lesson, but it might be
15 minutes in a stall, and then it's time to move 'em to the grooming area.
Mm-hmm.
Melissa Connor: The cross tie area where they're, they get ready for their work.
So it's, it, it really, I think we have a good rhythm now, but people sometimes
are surprised to say in Michigan, you leave them out 24 hours a day.
I, I remember hearing you speak in Grand Rapids last summer and to the
dressage barn Leanna's barn there, and, and you said, well go out and ride
the hills, you know, even in the snow.
And I remember the, the ladies going, what in the snow?
You want us to go outside and trot up and down hills?
And you were like, yes, go.
So it's funny, we have, in some senses, we have covered arena.
We have a, we have a heated arena.
But we can, which I
Rupert Isaacson: did, I did, I did appreciate when it started to snow there.
Melissa Connor: But I think then we forget, but we can still go outside.
Yeah.
And there is value.
It just gives us options.
So we are, we are blessed that we've been able to build a facility.
All from donated money to, to meet our needs, our horses'
needs, our rider's needs.
And, but, but we can still go outside.
I, I try to have that mentality too, of we don't have to stay in this temperature
controlled indoor arena even in February.
There are times it can be okay to go outside for half an hour.
Yeah,
exactly.
Melissa Connor: The horses are fine.
They're better for it.
It's the humans that need to bundle.
Rupert Isaacson: Right.
And, and just to be fair to, you know, to you as well to listeners,
if you're thinking, well, if it's that cold and windy Yeah.
But they, what they do have in these, in these paddocks is in these
pastures is very nice shelters to get outta the wind, out of the snow,
out of the rain, out of the wet.
So they are sheltered.
But yes, in large groups, and we have the same setup here in Germany
the horses can wander from pasture into the sort of open area where
there's free feeding hay and then.
From there into large, long sheds with a nice sandy bottom if they want
to get out of the weather whether it's hot or whether it's cold.
And it's so interesting to me what they choose and when they choose
and when they really don't choose.
You're like, you sure you don't want to go in?
Melissa Connor: Yep, yep.
I know it is.
And then there's sometimes we, we try to build, you know, large shelters, but
then, you know, if there's three in a pasture, you know, and two are in and
one's out, you wonder like, is did they tell him he couldn't come in there?
Is there a little dynamic going on?
But, so we do blanket our horses or put rain sheets on,
but not everybody all the time.
It really, it varies by horse.
We watch them, we want them to.
Have a coat develop their natural coat.
But if they get overly sweaty and work and we might need to clip them,
then we'll do a blanket, or it's just, it's very individualized.
We make a chart for who needs to be covered when and we, and we watch.
So it's not always a, oh, the human is cold, it's below 50 degrees.
Every horse gets, gets their coat on today.
It's, it's much more individualized.
Rupert Isaacson: It's, but the proof's in the pudding, Melissa, because
the horses look fabulous and, and I saw them at the end of the winter.
Which is always, that's the telltale time, right?
If, if you're gonna see horses looking not good, that's when you're gonna see it.
My own included, you know.
So, hats off to you.
Oh,
Melissa Connor: thank you.
Rupert Isaacson: Now this talk about, as you said, you had to build the
whole thing with donated money.
And renew obviously started.
From very small beginnings in a boarding barn, and it's now
quite an impressive facility.
Funding is the big challenge that faces everybody, especially in the
USA, where there is no government assistance for any of this stuff.
We're on our own.
We know it.
Even Path International is just a standalone nonprofit.
You know, here in Germany, for example, the Curatorium for therapeutic riding,
it's actually part of government, it's part of the Ministry of Health.
It's part, you know, there is a certain amount of funding, there's a certain
amount of funding for those programs through government, et cetera, et cetera.
Now,
the big question I'm always being asked is how do you do the funding?
And of course there's so many ways to approach this.
We had our ways of approaching it at new trails.
How do you do it?
Because you, you really are having to fundraise quite significant sums there.
And you, you did a really big build.
You, you are continuing, I know you're adding a, a, a non mounted
learning center, which very exciting 'cause of movement method.
I'll be wanting to get in there and yeah.
You know.
So tell me how you do your fundraising, because I think people do need
guidance on this, mentorship on this.
Melissa Connor: Absolutely.
I wish there was a secret formula that I knew and that I could just say, but you
know, it, it's similar to the pipeline that we need to keep open for bringing
in quality horses and quality equipment.
It's the same for just funding which comes down to relationships,
reputation, and doing excellent work that is changing people's lives.
So.
It's my role to keep broadcasting those things in our community and even the
greater community through people I know people I meet organizations that
I can partner with tell the stories, tell the stories of transformation
that happen at Renew on the horses with our staff, with our volunteers.
We have, we maintain a waiting list for services.
We serve over a hundred people, about 120 people weekly at Renew.
Currently, we are constantly talking about how to increase that
number, how can we serve more, how can we bring more people here?
So those are things I talk about with poten donors and potential donors.
We are unique.
There's not another center in our town.
There are some in our region an hours drive north or an hours drive west.
But in our area, no one else is offering what we are offering.
I say that there's no competition in terms of a therapeutic
riding center necessarily, but there's a lot of nonprofits.
There's a whole lot of nonprofits, and especially serving the
disability and the autism community.
Another great thing about our area, it it is a very philanthropic area.
There are people here who have means, who are willing to support programs like ours.
So, but it takes years.
It takes years to.
Build that reputation.
One of our core values is excellence.
So going back to we do excellence in our horse care.
We do excellence in our staffing model.
We do excellence in our service model, and so we have to demonstrate that excellence.
And so I'd like to think we do excellence in our fundraising,
in our marketing as well.
And it, we're never done, we're never done fundraising.
I actually had a phone call yesterday with a a center director in Ohio who
shared with me that she, she made her payroll here at the end of the
month and has $20 left to spare.
And just was like, how do you do it?
How do we not constantly live on the edge?
And that's such a hard question because yes, I.
Here in the States, when we depend on the donated dollar to offer these
services, it takes strategic planning.
It takes it takes leadership from a board of directors or from
people willing to have that vision.
And then people saying, this needs to be, be in this community.
I've, I've said over and over again, renew needs to be in this community because we
are serving 120 people a week and we have a waiting list and we are not gonna stop.
And also my vision is beyond me.
I, I want renew to be here 50 years from now.
I want it to have the same standard of excellence that it has
today, or be even better, right?
We wanna build for our future, for our children, our grandchildren,
our great-grandchildren.
So I want there to be systems in place for onboarding horses, for onboarding
staff, for onboarding volunteers, for serving those families who need this
help that is truly transformative and is making a difference in our
community in our community and beyond.
So, you know, those stories of trans transformation, tell those
anywhere and everywhere we can.
I, when
Rupert Isaacson: and how do you tell them?
Melissa Connor: Yeah, good question.
I love to get people to our farm because that's the best place is to, to show them.
Mm-hmm.
But I start by, we are members of our local Chamber of Commerce.
In fact, talking about Grand Rapids.
The Grand Rapids Chamber just reached out to me yesterday just to, and said, we
wanna meet you and hear about what's up.
So I'm like, okay, great.
So I'm going there to talk to them about who we are.
So it, I look for any and op any and every opportunity, but this is, this is
Rupert Isaacson: quite what I'm hearing is that your way of telling
the story is actually person to person with, with a, a larynx and a tongue
rather than just on social media.
Melissa Connor: Absolutely.
Now we do that too.
Rupert Isaacson: Mm-hmm.
Melissa Connor: We, we try to do all the things and I do have on our staff, very
talented communications coordinator, Cassie, who does our website, our social
media and our print materials, and helps with our events, which I shared with you.
We just had an, an event last week, which is our fundraising event.
But the biggest thing is having a person or multiple people
face-to-face time with anywhere.
I, I, I want the average person living in our town to know us, to know our logo,
to, to hear about the work we've doing.
We're doing, like you said, to, they, everybody knows somebody with a disability
who can benefit from these services.
So.
We need to be a household name.
And that takes time to develop.
And then we can't be shy about the fact that we also rely on
donations to offer these services.
But we don't wanna compromise with our, our equipment, our horses.
So if, if, if it ever felt like, we needed to compromise because we had didn't have
funding you know who it's similar to.
Say there's a night.
This hasn't happened to us in a while.
We're very lucky, but say there's a night, Wednesday night, we can't do programming
because all our volunteers canceled.
I used to think, who loves us enough to show up to make this happen?
Who can I call with 10 minutes notice to say, I need you to show up?
To make this happen for these students.
And I used to just have a short list.
Now, you don't wanna live that way every day, every night,
but those moments happen.
So that was kind of the advice I shared with this colleague yesterday
was, who do you know who you can say, we barely made payroll.
Payroll's coming again in two weeks.
I, I need you, I need you to step up and this is our need.
How can we do this?
So I try not to live in that you know, it's on fire way.
I think a lot of therapeutic writing centers do live in that space.
Hmm.
And maybe the growth was too fast.
Maybe the growth was, sometimes it's when we bought our property, we were bursting
at the seams out of the boarding barn.
I told you we had hor, I had horses at my house.
We were borrowing neighbor's horses, we were borrowing boarded horses.
We had horses of our own.
We had three acres, but it was part of this larger farm.
When I think about the things that we did for those few years, like it was
nuts and we shouldn't it, it was not, but I brought people to the property
and said, we are bursting at the seams.
And I had, I think I shared with you, Rupert, I had a volunteer,
asked to have lunch with me who, who said, we've noticed, I've
noticed, what's your 10 year plan?
What's your 20 year plan?
And I was able to share that with her.
And she
Melissa Connor: gave us a significant donation, which became our down payment on
our farm that Renew was able to purchase.
Rupert Isaacson: To have that plan.
Melissa Connor: Yeah.
So to be able to, 'cause I was thinking about it all the time.
I knew what we had wasn't sustainable.
Mm-hmm.
Melissa Connor: But it, it, we also had to demonstrate the need.
We had to demonstrate that this is worth investing in.
We have a plan.
Worked hard to have a good reputation in the community.
Happy to share the mission, vision, values with anybody who wanted to know.
And then the right people are drawn to us, and it's not for lack of initiating.
I tried to, there's, there's some generous families in our town
and some of them are our donors.
Not all, you know.
Now there's some that I wish were our donors that aren't, but you never know
what's gonna pique their interest or their how you get their attention.
So you never stop trying.
I remember sending just a letter of introduction to.
People I hadn't met before, but saying, I would like to invite
you to learn about our mission.
You know, I think I sent out a hundred letters.
I think I had two responses.
Yeah.
Rupert Isaacson: But
Melissa Connor: one of those became one of our major donors.
Rupert Isaacson: Absolutely.
I have a story to tell about that, and it's actually not to do with
the therapeutic riding part of my career when I, as you know, I was
a an activist human rights activist in Africa for quite a while.
And when I was first getting going with that, because I'd made the mistake of
agreeing on, while sitting on top of a sand dune during a conversation with a,
a sand bushman hunter gatherer called David Kpa to, he said, we need, you're
a journalist, Rupert, assuming that I had all this power, which I didn't.
You, we, you need to get us to the west so that you know, we can tell
our story and get our lamb back.
Get us to the un.
And I went, okay.
Then afterwards I'm like, oh my gosh, what did I promise in the event we did?
And we got into the State Department in all sorts of places in the end
and actually got the job done.
Okay, great.
But I remember at the very beginning I was thinking, okay, what am I gonna do?
And I recently published a book called The Healing Land, which told
the story of, of my time there, at least the early part of my time there.
And so I thought, well, I got this book and so I can use that as a
bit of a platform, but you know, it's 50,000 books published a year.
Just 'cause you've published a book doesn't mean a whole lot.
And so, and I'd actually just recently moved to Austin, Texas where I didn't
really know anybody, but we'd moved from Denver where we had some friends and
had been active in the horse community.
So that, well, if I go there and perhaps do a little fundraiser at the
big tattered cover, that's the big independent bookstore there, you know.
I think a few people would show up and probably, you know, maybe
get some, some donations going and I'd, I'd started a little
nonprofit under the, someone else's.
So anyway, I thought I, I've gotta start somewhere.
So I started with that.
So I had to fly from Austin back to Denver with money I couldn't really afford to do.
And so let's say the whole thing cost me five, 600 bucks to put on, which at
that, that time I didn't really have.
And five people showed up.
However, one of those people subsequently went and talked to a friend of theirs,
and about three months later I got an anonymous phone call saying, okay,
we've recent, you don't even know who I am, blah, blah, blah, but I've
researched what you were talking about.
It's legit.
We are gonna back you for a third of the budget, and if you tell other
people that we are backing you, you'll, you'll get others as well.
And sure enough that, so what that really hit home to me is.
Exactly what you said.
Get out there and tell the story.
And don't worry if only a couple of people show up mm-hmm.
Because you just don't know who they are or who they might go talk to.
But it sure as hell won't happen if you don't do it.
Right.
So one of my strategies used to be go talk to all the rotary clubs.
Like I would draw a circle
Melissa Connor: Yep.
Rupert Isaacson: At two hour radius and say everyone, all the rotary clubs,
because they've gotta have speakers.
Right,
Melissa Connor: right.
Yeah.
And so they're
Rupert Isaacson: crying out for speakers and usually the speakers
they get are like, crushingly boring.
So if you go in there with a lovely PowerPoint of kids having an amazing
time with ponies, I mean, it is like absolutely get heavy back.
Melissa Connor: I I, I think you'll like this because you're such an engaging
speaker, but I always and people think this is crazy in these rotary clubs, but
I always have people sit on their hands.
And feel their seat bones, you know?
Yeah.
And then just describe the three planes of movement of the horse and get them
rocking in their seats and shifting their weight and they feel their pelvis move.
And then I can draw that line to, we can provide that movement
and this is what it does for the people and these are the stories.
And then people were like, wow, that was so great.
I'm like, all you did was have them sit on your hands.
I used to joke that I'm the youngest of, of three girls in my family.
And you know, we had the, the old station wagon in the seventies growing up, and
I remember my mom saying, sit on your hands back there, like in the backseat.
So I used to say,
no, I don't know.
I had to do this as a little girl, so we didn't pick on each other or nobody picked
on me, but sit on your hands, indulge me for a second and, you know, feel those
seat bones and understand the movement.
But yeah, I've said I've done that talk at, at multiple times at Rotary
Clubs, but I, similar to you after I spoke, I think the first time at
a rotary club here in a neighboring town of Saugatuck here in Michigan.
I had a couple days later, a man give me a call and say, heard you speak.
Loved what you said.
I would love a tour.
So set up a tour, met his wife.
They are major donors and have become good friends.
Mm-hmm.
And I met them from speaking at now this is a little small town rotary.
I think there were 20 people there, you know, at this luncheon.
But most of the rot rotaries
Rupert Isaacson: I would go to would be like that.
Melissa Connor: Yeah.
As
Rupert Isaacson: well.
But I mean, but sometimes that's actually where I feel you get
the, a better response because you are, there's less clamor.
You're not, if you go to a Roastary club in the middle of New York or London,
there's a lot of interesting stuff around.
You're just one of many.
Melissa Connor: Yeah.
Rupert Isaacson: It's sometimes better to be a big fish in a small pond.
Yeah.
Melissa Connor: Right.
Absolutely.
And so sometimes it doesn't have to be anything fancy, but like you said,
just getting the word out there, look for, I have been a lunch speaker,
even for some local businesses, like a financial investment group.
They do a lunch, lunch and learn once a month, you know, and I've,
they invited me to speak and that was because I met somebody at a Chamber
of Commerce networking event, which I go to those and take my, you know,
take all my my cards, brochures, and
Rupert Isaacson: yes.
Melissa Connor: So those kinds of things do, take, take, it takes
time, but getting that word out so that you can invite people in.
And I think that's the way to go, tell the story, get it out there.
But then if people could come to the writing center and actually see with
their own eyes and see the students and it, how powerful is it to see?
Either a child on the autism spectrum go from you know, getting out of the
car, entering the barn to being on the horse and seeing that empowerment
and that pride and how they glow when they're on, on the horse.
I think the donors need to see that and need to see.
We also serve people with physical challenges.
And we have a, you know, a wheelchair lift system, a sure hands lift system.
And so that's the, that's a very physically obvious one where the horse
becomes the person's legs and their, their pelvis, their spine gets to
move as if they were walking because the horse is creating that movement.
That's, that's always a powerful visual tool too.
And so just to bring people into the space and show them.
Then they, they usually get one over.
Rupert Isaacson: Well, luckily also the, the horses are always the best
ambassadors and, and the kids themselves.
It's like, yeah.
But one of the things I often encourage people to do, I mean, everything
we're talking about is, is, is local, but I always also encourage people
to go outside their area as well.
Like you say with lunch and learns, you know, they could
be not actually in your area.
Perhaps you haven't got the budget to travel, but often they can happen by Zoom.
I just did one for example, for UPS oh.
And they were like 2000 people on that employees.
Wow.
Rupert Isaacson: Guess what?
There's a ton of employees with special needs.
if you're a horse nerd, and if you're on this podcast, I'm guessing you are, then
you've probably also always wondered a little bit about the old master system.
of dressage training.
If you go and check out our Helios Harmony program, we outline there step by step
exactly how to train your horse from the ground to become the dressage horse
of your dreams in a way that absolutely serves the physical, mental and emotional
well being of the horse and the rider.
Intrigued?
Like to know more?
Go to our website, Helios Harmony.
Check out the free introduction course.
Take it from there.
Yeah.
Or, or family members with special needs.
Yeah.
So the Lunch and Learn people at UPS, they look for, and they actually have
all these different clubs within UPS of, they have a whole special needs.
Section, I'll gladly hook you up, you know?
And wow.
So people were just coming, I was doing it from Germany, but most of
the people were in the US but actually they were further afield as well.
And then what happens is, I think this is where we can really
help each other as a community.
So I had people at the question saying, well, I'm sitting here
in North Carolina, or I'm sitting here in Colorado, what can I do?
And I could say, oh, well we've actually got these three practitioners over here,
or those four practitioners over there.
Or if there's no one in your area, you could at least do the movement method
course yourself and work at home.
Yeah.
But you know, that's why I'm always excited to.
Places like yours, like renew?
'cause I can sort of just add them to the list of resources.
Yeah, I think it always comes across very well when you are fundraising,
if you recommend other people.
I, I think that's often, often a winning thing.
One of the things that I, I think is a really big turnoff, which happens, and
I'm always surprised that people do it, is when people badmouth other people,
and I think your average donor that has been successful enough in life to be in a
position where they can be a donor that's.
A massive red flag right there.
It's like, oh, you're someone who causes conflict in your community.
Yeah.
You're not someone who causes, all right, well, mm.
And one sees a surprising amount of this still in the therapeutic riding world.
It, it, it never ceases to amaze me.
It actually made me very sad at the beginning.
'cause I, I came into it a little bit, starry-eyed, you know, having worked
with my, my own son and stumbled into something good and thought, oh, well,
you know, and whoa, it was, it wasn't
environment.
Rupert Isaacson: And and I thought, well that makes me a bit sad as
the father of an autistic boy.
Because that means that you all don't really prioritize the
kids, even if you say you do.
'cause if you did, you wouldn't indulge in that kind of negative behavior because
you would know, it would always, it would inevitably rebound on the kid, right.
I mean, but yeah.
Hey, humans to humans, so.
You know, one of the things I've noticed about you is I've never heard
you talk that way about anybody.
And I do think that there is a lesson there.
I think people, particularly donors, are often listening more closely than
one might think to what you, not to what you say, but to what you don't say or
to the things that you say that are not perhaps directly to do with the work.
Yeah.
What, you know, could you speak to that a little bit?
Because I know, you know, you've, you've, you've had some experience in this, but
both in the sort of going outside of your community and just also in the sort of
community, I guess what we are really talking about is community building and
community building within our industry, within our, within our field, if you like.
Where really we're all colleagues, right?
I mean Right.
Should be treated absolutely.
That way, you know, it's, it's.
Melissa Connor: Yeah, I, I, I know I have a, a good friend and
colleague who just says it's crazy.
We bring horse people and we bring advocates for people with disabilities.
Both tend to have intense personalities and we just throw them together.
And so is there a surprise that we have a difference of opinion sometimes?
Fair enough.
No.
Melissa Connor: But I do, I, I, I resonate with what you're saying.
Absolutely.
Because people do have intense feelings about equine assisted services and they
have intense feelings about this work.
They have intense feelings about their horses, about their son, daughter,
nephew, grandchild, neighbor, friend, you know, who's receiving services.
Mm-hmm.
Melissa Connor: And so I think everything does get magnified in our world and
Rupert Isaacson: Fair point.
Melissa Connor: So, yeah, so conflict happens.
Conflict is part of life.
Conflict is is a natural outcome of people working together.
So I think one of the things that I've definitely learned and is not to, the
worst thing you can do is avoid conflict or run away from it, or shy away from it,
but rather just dive in and in a, have a culture, which we, we intentionally
talk about our culture at Renew, where we want to care for one another.
We care for our horses with excellence.
We care for the people we serve.
We want people to feel like they're heard and they're important.
And so we make a concerted effort to.
Talk about things.
I want people to understand if, if I, as the executive director have to make
a decision, like, we're doing this program, we're not doing this program.
I don't just make the decision and walk away and boom, drop it, but
want everybody to know why or how we arrived there or there was buy-in.
I had a family come to our barn dedication last fall, who I had known from Virginia.
They had been donors and I had been friends with their children
in, in that, in that space.
And we had lived in the same town and they chose to, to come and, and support
renew really, because I was there and they knew me, but we, I was walking around
showing them the property, looking at the horses, kind of like what you did.
They said, how come this.
Place seems so amazing, or how did you think to do this?
And I said, first of all, it was not me.
I try, I involved other people every step of the way.
So when we got the first donation for what became our permanent
home, we set, we did a town hall.
I invited volunteers, parents, you know, I said, what do you want
in a therapeutic writing center?
And we sent out surveys.
We did this more than once.
Rupert Isaacson: Oh, good idea.
Melissa Connor: We formed a, a task force, a committee.
Basically, I made sure that I was a part of it, but we had other staff members,
board members, volunteers, parents that were, that were committed to meeting
together so that we could design.
The 20 acres, what's the flow?
Where do we want the horses?
Where do we want the riders?
How do we wanna welcome them?
What values need to be evident and obvious?
And you know, we want people to feel accepted and they had great
ideas that were not my ideas.
So I had some ideas, other people had other ideas, but we threw 'em
all up there and we talked about 'em and we involved the builder.
And then when we kind of had a plan, that's when I could take the plan to
the donors and say, will you fund this?
This is how we came up with the plan.
So I think that sometimes smaller nonprofits have a founder or have
a designated leader who and maybe it's even on their own property.
I never wanted the writing center on my own property, just for some.
Separation of home and work life.
So I knew that wasn't something I wanna renew to have their own property
because I think realistic enough to know that, you know, I am may not be here
in five or 10 years, but I want renew to still be here in five or 10 years.
You know, nobody, we all are, we are mortal.
So, but I want renew I to invest in this organization to live beyond me.
Rupert Isaacson: Yeah, sure.
So
Melissa Connor: I have to try to plan it that way.
Create, buy-in, actively listen to people and what they care about.
I have even called donors and I, I did this, we had a mor, we have a mortgage
on the property and I was asking for funds to build, you know, the new barn
and we hadn't paid off our mortgage.
And I reached out even to donors and said, I'm leaning towards.
Keeping the mortgage right now, when we got the mortgage, money was cheap.
We have like a 2% interest on our mortgage.
So I said, are you okay if we carry this mortgage a few more years and go
ahead and build our barn because this is gonna make it an easier space to
serve our students in every donor I called said, absolutely, if this is what
you feel you're ready for, I support you and I will give to build the barn.
So, but I had to ask the question, so had to have the trust, the relationship.
Those are just examples of, it's not just me.
I think there's, if a person, if one person or a small group of people makes
all the decision without asking the questions or getting that community buy-in
I think conflict is more likely to happen.
Or people may be off put that they weren't invited in and I think that's where.
Conflict can happen.
So now we did have disagreements and I'd shared with you, yeah,
we had some disagreements.
We don't have, every staff member didn't stay with us from our transition from
the smaller property to the larger one.
And that's okay.
This is a world where people all have choices and not everybody liked us going
from a small center to a big center.
Rupert Isaacson: Right.
Melissa Connor: Not everybody could make that jump.
And that's also okay.
I felt like I had been given a vision and placed in this role as a leader where if
there were enough people with a shared vision and the community was gonna get
behind it, we were gonna go with the idea of serving as many people as possible.
So I.
Yeah, that just made some people uncomfortable and you, so naturally, there
are some people that fall by the wayside.
And my hope, I can't say I've done this a hundred percent because nothing is ever
a hundred percent, or if I could do over, maybe I do some of that differently.
But I can say that I have tried my best to maintain relationships with the
people that wanted to be part of what we were doing in the community and,
and try to always have an open door.
Anyone can reach out and say, request a meeting, or, I, I try to tell my
staff too, anything's on the table.
We talk, we make sure we encourage each other, appreciate each other.
We meet together, we ride together.
I've done things.
Even talking, talking about riding.
Our instructors are doing it overnight next week, but we all went and took
a hunter jumper lesson together at a, at a local barn like two years ago.
They loved it.
We just took a day and you met Ellis, even Ellis wrote a third red named
Betty and jumped a three foot fence.
You know, I mean, it was great.
So we try to, we try to build in experiences at every level where we can
still share life together, share our work together, have fun together, but
all of that works to set a stage where conflict isn't, isn't gonna ruin us.
Rupert Isaacson: Well, that's you had mentioned earlier in the conversation
excellence in staffing, and I was actually gonna ask you about that.
So I think you just sort of answered my question a little bit there.
But I do think that that's something which.
It doesn't always happen and it's entirely forgivable because as you say, I think
the majority of places that do our work are often in a state of overwhelm.
Mm-hmm.
And one needs a little bit of a pause and a perspective to be able to come up with
ideas like, let's not only all go and have a hunter jumper lesson, but how do we set
aside the time and the budget for that?
And in order to do that, that means a certain amount of efficiency must have
taken us outta the overwhelm phase.
You have been in overwhelm.
Mm-hmm.
Talk to us a little bit about how you went from overwhelm to non overwhelm so
that you could be in a position to staff in the way that you wanted to staff.
Melissa Connor: What a great question.
So it was from 2014 to 2019, we had a five year lease agreement for
that little three acre parcel, which I mentioned at the boarding barn.
Happens to be across the street, literally at the end of my driveway,
across the street from where I live.
So I think I dove in.
I was so excited for one thing to have sort of our own space for
renew to exist and operate in that five years we grew exponentially.
I knew by 2016, definitely 2017.
We had so much interest.
We had schools reaching out to us.
We had parents, families, eager for our services.
We started a waiting list, I think in 2016.
I knew it was temporary.
I think I was willing to put in the work because I knew at the,
at, when 2019 rolled around, we had to go somewhere else.
We could not stay where we were.
We were not going to.
It was a five-year lease that I had signed, you know, in 2014.
And it, it was not sustainable,
Rupert Isaacson: right?
Melissa Connor: So I think I saw that there was gonna be a light at the
end of the tunnel so I could work really hard for those few years.
And yes, overwork myself for those few years.
Learned a lot along the way, but then we knew that something
better was going to happen.
But like I said, I, I knew we needed an answer.
It was in 2017 that a volunteer noticed, you know, who, who ended up being our
donor, who gave us the down payment for the property that we have now.
That's our permanent home.
I didn't initiate that.
I was just trying to stay focused on the mission and do good work.
Mm-hmm.
I was trying to do good work and I was willing to, to work hard to do that
good work for that period of time.
If, if if that had not happened, you know, where would we be?
I pro I would've preferred to move to a different property that would've
better served our needs, but I, we were just gonna wait and see.
So for us it was, divine intervention, the stars aligned anyway, the donor
stepped up and we were able to, to, to make that move and make that plan.
But I always knew it was temporary.
Mm-hmm.
So five years might not feel like a long time, but it was, it
was, you know, it was a while.
Rupert Isaacson: It was five years.
Overwhelm can be,
yeah.
It's well, the proof's in the pudding, Melissa, you know, what, what you've
achieved is is beautiful to see.
Mm, thank you.
Rupert Isaacson: What I would encourage listeners to do is reach out to Melissa
and even consider going up there because it's a beautiful facility, but it's also
not a ridiculously overwhelming facility.
It's not the Kentucky Horse Park.
You know, it's it's on a scale that one could imagine.
Doing oneself once one had a certain amount of momentum rolling.
But I think that I would like to see a lot more mentorship within our field
because most of us bootstrapped it.
Most of us fell into it.
Most of us.
We certainly didn't get into it for the money.
And we, we found ourselves here.
Now I think it's changing.
It's now becoming a really viable career path.
We are really seeing this in Ireland, for example, where the government really
got behind Horse Boy and movement method.
Once it, it was very clear that at a place called Li Skint Farm man, David Doyle,
who I've talked about before sort of proved that they could take very violent.
People who had up to three minders with them at any one time, each of
which is very expensive, and bring that down to one, you know, consistently
over five years of this thing.
And of course, this got government attention.
And eventually they said, okay, we'll, we'll back it.
Now suddenly we're looking at having a different type of problem, which is how do
we staff these large new facilities that are coming up with the government backing?
Because yes, sure there's a lot of good horse people in Ireland, but now
that there's government stamp on it, they've gotta have these qualifications.
They gotta have this, they gotta have that.
And the pool narrows.
You can't just have your friend from down the road who's good with ponies right.
That's not gonna fly anymore.
So
the industry's shifting.
And it's good because the, when you and I began.
We were lucky if we could find volunteers, the people that we ended
up employing or that you still employ.
We had to really scramble to find that budget.
Now as things change, it, it's not a thing that people have to think about begging
themselves to do or just volunteering or perhaps working for a ER's wage.
It's shifting.
Mm-hmm.
With that shift, however, comes the next set of challenges, which
are good challenges to have.
How to find the staffing, how to put the strategies in place, how to deal with
conflict, how to deal with entitlement.
You know, because if people are coming into an actually an assured job, you know,
rather than something that they've sort of created themselves, that does sometimes
create a slightly different mentality.
That's not always a healthy mentality, da, da, da.
They're gonna need to turn to people like you, Melissa, I think for guidance
that this next generation coming up.
So do you have any thoughts that way in terms of creating
those sorts of symposiums?
Official, unofficial, there was just one in Ireland, for example, last week
we're doing this in a, just at the end of April, April, 2025, the Equine Assisted
services Ireland sort of working group.
We're getting together with a lot of the key players there.
Some of whom.
Think more highly of each other than others, but yet they're beginning to
be able to sort of bury those hatchets and actually get in the same room
and do it because we are realizing, no, we're going to the next level.
Now we can't be a bunch of kindergartners.
The US is obviously a much bigger
organism divided into regions, but are you starting to think along these lines
as well of, of, of starting to create these, if you like, think tanks, really?
Melissa Connor: Yeah.
I, I am, I believe you have nailed it on the head that mentorship is what
our industry needs more than anything.
And we do, we tend to have doers, people that like to be.
Part of the magic that happens in the arena, the magic that happens
between participant and horse.
But we do need people
excited to go out in the community and tell stories, people who know
how to plan strategically, people who know how to do something, like create
a budget, raise a budget, balance the books, write job descriptions
Rupert Isaacson: and watch calling from the room.
Yeah,
Melissa Connor: I know those are skills that people don't get into equine
assistance services to do those things.
They think, oh, that's the business side.
I, I have, have at times feel torn because I love the direct service.
That's why, that's what drew me to the field.
I, I grew up loving horses, riding horses, but when I saw.
The transformation that happened with children with disabilities.
I, I, that just became my passion.
There was nothing else I wanted to do.
But I had a, a background that did prepare me for nonprofit work, and that
did prepare me to understand the, those other things, how to fundraise, how to
write a grant, how to develop a board the difference between governance and doing.
And I, so I feel, and so I've created my role at Renew.
So I am in both worlds.
Yeah, I'm res fully responsible for both worlds, but I have people
around me supporting me so that I'm not the only one doing that.
But in that sense I also recognize that most people aren't able
to keep a foot on both sides.
And that's completely fine because I think everyone should.
Like, I, I think we should be recruiting people into equine assisted services who
are, who are MBAs, who are accountants, who are, you know, know that side
and but, but get so excited about our mission that they wanna, they wanna help.
That's who our board.
Yes.
It's because at the
Rupert Isaacson: moment we get those people, if they have, if they have
kids that we're serving and then they become part of the organization.
But we don't necessarily get them if, if we don't.
Yeah.
Melissa Connor: If we don't.
No, you and you're exactly right.
But I do think, and I'll, I'll, I'll use my, I.
My son really quickly 'cause he just shared this with me over
the weekend and my, my son is 29 and he had a stroke during birth.
He is, he really helped open my eyes to help people learn differently and hit
developmental milestones differently.
And but anyway, Tommy is a, a, a web designer is in the IT world
now in his late twenties, but, and he's working for a company.
He enjoys his job.
He is great at his job, but he did just share with me, he's like, I'm
just helping this company get richer.
So feeling a little like, I wish I was spending my days doing something.
That was making a difference in the world, other than just
making this company richer.
So, which, you know, as a mom, I was like, oh, I love that.
I want you to get, you know,
Rupert Isaacson: tell them to make that donation to renew
all in Michigan.
Melissa Connor: But I, I love that in his generation that he was feeling that.
And now he does vol, you know, he does some volunteer work and
he volunteers some IT stuff.
And believe me, he was my IT support for many, many, many years.
I bet just you know, our, did our first website and all of that, but it, I think
we need to tap into that, wanting to give back what gives meaning to life.
Mm-hmm.
People most people feel good making a financial donation, a donation
of their time, talent, treasure.
And, but we, we need to be networking with people and giving
them opportunities so that.
A center, a riding center can develop in a balanced way so that you can
have a budget, so you can be able to hire the right people at the right
time and pay them a living wage.
And not just a living wage, a competitive wage.
And yeah, I mean, we could talk for days, so this is needed.
I've been part of just kind of a movement within path, trying to educate some
people on how to think strategically.
Mm-hmm.
Melissa Connor: And some of these business side.
I'm always happy to talk to people, love connecting with people around the country
or around the world if, and so would love to continue those conversations.
But I think you're right, more of a think tank is needed.
A, a greater support system is needed so that people aren't just
out on their own trying to do it.
And then all of a sudden they realize, wait, I didn't, I didn't do X, Y,
and Z and now I'm in danger of, you know, losing my 5 0 1 C3 nonprofit
status here in America, or, you know, or something like that because I
forgot to file a right piece of paper.
So there needs to be somebody paying attention to that side of things too.
And thinking 10, 20, 50 years down the road, because this industry
is growing is the fastest growing.
It really is in one industry.
Rupert Isaacson: No, it really is.
It really is.
And it's only going to grow more.
Melissa Connor: Yeah.
So we just need to equip people to, to sustain it into the future.
Rupert Isaacson: So their listeners where, where's, what's your five year plan?
What's your 10 year plan?
What's your 20 year plan?
Actually, let's not use the word plan.
Let's use the word dream.
Dream.
Yeah.
Because yeah.
What are you excited?
Where are you excited to go?
Not where do you feel you ought to go?
Or I guess we should go over here.
What, what makes your heart light up?
With, because I've generally found that.
Effectiveness seems to follow excitement.
Mm-hmm.
Anything that I've not been so excited about, I might have been able to pull
it off, but it always felt that it came at a massive cost of energy.
You know?
And as you know, that the stuff one's excited about, one just doesn't even
notice really, the work one puts in.
It's just like, it almost feels recreational.
Melissa Connor: Absolutely.
And that's, that's what happened to me.
I was so excited when I started as a volunteer.
I found myself thinking about the horses, thinking about the students, thinking
about how, what if I was the instructor in that class, what would I teach?
How would I do that?
How would I, yeah.
How would I condition this horse?
How would I, what would I, so then just grad doors start opening up,
you know, when there's a need.
And then I had a chance to, to fill some of those needs.
And it, it, it did, it felt like a, it was a passion.
I couldn't not do it.
Rupert Isaacson: Yes.
That, that grabbing by the
collar, that seems to happen with life and we get pulled in.
Yeah.
I'm very glad it happened to you because you're doing extremely,
extremely good work out there.
And work I look for, I just look really look forward to seeing how you develop it.
And you're sort of in that geographic hub in the Midwest there that what you
do can really radiate out and influence.
So we are sort of right now at the two hour mark.
Do you have any last thoughts?
Do you do, is there anything that you would like listeners to go away with from
their time with you or that you would really encourage them to think about?
Not every, you know, there's newbies listening here, there's seasoned
campaigners and all points in between.
What would your closing,
Melissa Connor: Another great question.
I, I love I've loved getting to know you.
I've loved the Horse Boy method since I learned about it, you know, 15 years
ago or so when your book came out.
And even though I was in Path International, I think there's a so
much that we can learn from each other.
So I choose to continue to learn, continue to kind of keep an open mind.
Hmm.
I loved learning the Teke method and I'm so excited to incorporate that more
fully into our conditioning program and.
Into our service offerings at Renew.
And that is a whole new thought.
Like, I didn't know that that was gonna be something I'd be excited about.
So I think just being open to learning from those who have
paved the way ahead of us.
I also know when something doesn't resonate with my core values and.
And, and that's okay.
But I also think just sharing, having having your people, have
your team, have your community.
And it can be, it can be global, like you said.
It doesn't have to just be geographically in one location, but people that
you can lean on, discuss with bounce ideas off of keep learning, keep
growing because I'm excited about the future of equine assisted services.
I think, I think we're just at the tip of the iceberg.
I think.
I think that these program offerings, every person who deals with a disability
or a challenge to their daily living, I think deserves the chance to have a
meaningful interaction with a horse and that can potentially change their life.
And our vision statement at Renew is positive life change
with every horse experience.
Mm-hmm.
And we try to have that.
Caring environment, positive energy, so that there's a chance for that life
transformation because of what we do.
And I think we all, all of us in this world have the opportunity
to offer that out to the world.
And that just excites me.
Rupert Isaacson: Brilliant.
Yeah.
Stay curious.
Basically.
Melissa Connor: Basically, yeah.
Rupert Isaacson: Keep challenging yourself, keep learning new stuff.
Yeah.
I couldn't, I couldn't agree more.
Absolutely.
Couldn't agree more.
And there's so much new, exciting stuff happening out there, like the stuff with
Lynn Thomas with Arenas for Change and
Melissa Connor: Oh yeah.
Rupert Isaacson: The mental health and the, the, the way which the,
I, I, I, I feel that the field is both broadening and each Yeah.
It's like there is now much more cross-fertilization happening and I
think that's people voting with their feet, you know, where some of the
organizations were some years ago, quite.
Not so open to that sort of thing.
But I think a lot of the members were just like, well, hold on.
We are interested in everything.
That's why we sort of got into you in the first place, you know, because we
are generally interested, why wouldn't we be interested in five or six things?
And I always encourage, you know, any place I go to do trainings, it's,
please don't just do horse boy tech and stuff, please do 5, 6, 7, 8 other
things because you just don't know who's gonna walk through that door.
You need more resources than my stuff you need, you know, that's just common
sense 1, 1 1 needs a, a sort of faculty of, of, of, of resources, you know,
just like a university would or, yeah.
So
absolutely.
Rupert Isaacson: I think you sort of represent that to me, I think that that
positive outlook 'cause that that positive outlook's actually the effective outlook.
It's actually the practical outlook that just, I
Melissa Connor: like it, like you said, it's a, it's a.
Service driven.
It's about the child, it's about the adult, it's about the the
person coming to us for services.
It's not about us.
So have to stay humble and curious.
Rupert Isaacson: So how do people find you?
Give us the website.
Melissa Connor: Oh, sure.
It's renew, R-E-N-E-W-T-R-C dot org.
Rupert Isaacson: Renew trc.org.
We'll have that obviously in the notes.
Mm-hmm.
Any other stuff?
Instagram's Facebooky things.
Melissa Connor: Yep.
We're on, we're on Facebook and Instagram.
Renew Therapeutic Writing Center.
Rupert Isaacson: Perfect.
Fall into
Melissa Connor: Michigan.
Yep.
Rupert Isaacson: Alright.
And they can email you through there.
Contact you through, yep.
Brilliant.
Melissa Connor: Yep.
Alright.
Absolutely.
Well,
Rupert Isaacson: we'll do this again.
Hopefully let's, let's see how things go in a year.
Come back on.
Tell us where you're at.
Melissa Connor: Alright.
Sounds great.
Thank you so much, Rupert.
I enjoyed it.
My pleasure.
Rupert Isaacson: Thank you for coming on.
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