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Rupert Isaacson: Welcome
to Equine Assisted World.

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I'm your host, Rupert Isaacson,
New York Times best selling

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author of The Horse Boy, The Long
Ride Home, and The Healing Land.

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Before I jump in with today's
guest, I just want to say a huge

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thank you to you, our audience,
for helping to make this happen.

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I have a request.

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If you like what we do, please
like, subscribe, tell a friend.

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It really helps us get this work done.

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As you might know from my
books, I'm an autism dad.

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And over the last 20 years,
we've developed several

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equine assisted, neuroscience
backed certification programs.

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If you'd like to find out more
about them, go to newtrailslearning.

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com.

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So without further ado,
let's meet today's guest.

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Welcome back to Equine Assisted World.

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Today I've got Helen Sharp.

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Helen writes for the Irish
Field Farmers Weekly.

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She's a big fish in the Irish
equestrian world, but she also runs

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Groundwork, which is a, an equine
assisted charity up in Northern Ireland.

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Those of you who listened to my podcast
with Terry Brosnan know that the

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work she does in Ireland is largely
informed by her childhood in the

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North and growing up in the troubles
against that background of violence.

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And I was very lucky through Terry
to meet Helen who works in the North.

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Not just in the equine assisted field,
but in the art field and pulling the

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therapeutic value of art and horses
together in a rather extraordinary way.

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And she of course, has her own story
that has brought her to a point of

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compassion where she can help the
people that come in front of her.

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So up in county firma, which is
about as north as you can get

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there she is doing amazing stuff
and also helping Thoroughbreds.

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I think I'm right.

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Coming off the track.

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So she's helping in multiple fields and
it's very easy to forget that Northern

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Ireland is a bit like the Balkans in
that the violence can erupt at any time.

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And the tensions that have existed there
for centuries, simmer below the surface.

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Even though we are in a peace process
now, those old tribal divisions,

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those old cultural conflicts

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remain.

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And it takes a brave person to
stand in that and offer love.

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So Helen, welcome to Equine Assisted.

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Well, thank you for coming on.

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Tell us who you are and what you do.

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Helen Sharp: Thank you very
much for having me on it.

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It really is truly an honor.

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So my, yeah, my name's Helen Sharp.

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I think I would say I'm
fundamentally an equine journalist.

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Horse, woman.

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And I founded alongside, and I have
to say, whenever I'm talking about

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groundwork, EQU assisted services,
I'm also talking about Fiona

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Butchart, who I set up groundwork
with, and she's a horse woman.

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She's interested in actually western
riding and training, and she would

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describe herself as the horse
person, not the, not the person

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person, not the people person.

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So, yeah, we set, we set that up together.

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And we are just on the border actually
of Ireland and Northern Ireland, and

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it puts us in a very unique place.

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Rupert Isaacson: Why do you do what you do
and what do you do up there at groundwork?

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Helen Sharp: So groundwork
is quite specific.

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I think in the grand scheme of
equine assisted services, we're

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quite specific because we very much.

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Do cater for the Northern Irish
community and the border community.

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I suppose there's a lot of shock, shock
and statistics really in Northern Ireland.

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39% of the, like, what
39% of the population have

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recorded mental health issues.

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There's a 25% higher rate of
mental health disorders than

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there is in the rest of the uk.

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12.6

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percent of kids and young people
experience depression anxiety, which is a

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25% higher rate than the rest of the uk.

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Police and military veterans
remain a significant concern.

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Actually that's just been
detailed in a very recent report

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with the Royal College of.

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Psychiatrists in a report just in January
there said Mental health crisis in

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Northern Ireland cannot be overstated.

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So that gives you a kind
of vibe of how things are.

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But groundwork really set up because I
have a collection of my own horses and I

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breed a few horses, and my yard is part of
an estate that is, there's two neighboring

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estates run by the Brook family.

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And Lord Brook Brooke set up a charity
on his land called Brook House.

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Now, Brook House are a charity
for veterans and military military

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and police veterans and serving
police officers actually, and

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their family and their carers.

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And I was working away with my own
horses and I've done you know, an equine

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therapist and things and I, but I've got
an interest in EQU assisted services too.

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And I've been working with a
charity in France, which we'll

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probably talk about later.

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And I was sitting having a cup of tea with
Fiona one day and the power of the cup

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of tea and talking about her interests
and she wasn't expressing an interest.

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And we literally just put
together a proposal and pitched

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it to Brooke House and said.

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You are offering these guys
already holistic sort of,

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services, massage and things.

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But the interesting thing
about it is there's also a

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psych, a psychologist on site.

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There are wellbeing managers on site.

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They have a therapeutic garden,
so there's a walled garden that's

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a working kitchen garden, but
the head garden is the counselor.

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And I was kind of thinking, well,
the only thing missing here is horses

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obviously, you know, so we just
pitched an idea and thankfully that

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Brook house bit our handoff actually.

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So that gave us the
incentive to build a program.

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So that would be about, I
think it's about two and a half

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years ago to build a program.

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And then Brooke House funded some
brilliant programs and that's

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how it kicked off actually.

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Rupert Isaacson: How long ago was that?

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Helen Sharp: It was about probably three
years that we started talks and then

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started about two and a half years ago.

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Rupert Isaacson: Okay.

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So it's relatively recent.

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Helen Sharp: Yeah.

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Yeah, it is.

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And

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Rupert Isaacson: talk us
through the work you do now.

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Who do you work with mostly?

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What are your approaches?

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Helen Sharp: Yeah,

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Rupert Isaacson: what are
the successes you've seen?

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Helen Sharp: So I kind
of describe it right.

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You're wrongly like a deconstructed eg.

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Gala model, I suppose, in that I have,
you know, I've done a qualification

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for equine assisted learning.

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Fiona is a qualified, you know, BHS,
everything and all those boxes ticked.

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But then our clients also have their
own wellness managers from behi.

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And then we also have the psychologist
who talks to us as well as the clients.

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Okay.

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So it's kind of a, it's kind of
spread out over this thousand acres.

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We do mainly groundwork.

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So we do group sessions
and 10 week group sessions.

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And they're really interesting
because we get such a mix.

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So you might have in the same group,
you might have someone who's can't

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see, you might have someone who's
deaf, you might have someone who's

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had their heels blown off in action.

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You might have someone with Parkinson's
and you have this group of people.

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But in the main, this group of people
all have one thing in common, which

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is the Northern Irish troubles.

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So even if they're Northern Irish and
they've gone and served in Afghanistan

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or whatever, everybody has a resonance
of the Northern Irish troubles.

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So we kind of start from there.

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We are very bespoke in the way we work.

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So it just depends.

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We really gauge.

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We have a very specific way of working
that revolves around a cup of tea.

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To start with, we always sit
down space time, quietness, that

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magic of a nonclinical setting.

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And we talk, we always talk
for half an hour or so.

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We'd check in how the week was, but
a good half an hour, you know, at

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least sometimes it runs to an hour.

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And then we usually go
into be very, very lucky.

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We've got a large indoor
arena for our private use.

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So then we go in and, you know, some
may, I mean, we're in Ireland, so

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a lot of people have had experience
with horses when they were kids,

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you know, negatively or positively.

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Rupert Isaacson: Mm-hmm.

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Helen Sharp: Everyone's got
story been bitten and we.

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We do the introductions.

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So we introdu, we introduce
them to horses, we introduce

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them how to approach a horse.

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We in, you know, we, we do
the circle in the quarter.

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We, you know, we we introduce them to
the horses, how to approach them gently.

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We start, like, everybody probably
starts, so we, so we do grooming.

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I'm a equine therapist, so I teach
them as part of the 10 weeks massage.

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Because one of the things that we
find a lot, especially with the

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men, the military and the police
men, is tactile, soft touch.

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It's a huge thing.

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And the amount of times I've seen just
men burst into tears when they, when

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they're touching an animal softly.

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Rupert Isaacson: Mm-hmm.

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Helen Sharp: It's kind of, you
know, it'll blow your mind.

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Blow your mind.

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And that can be from a first touch.

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Rupert Isaacson: Mm-hmm.

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Helen Sharp: We go on to do a
sort of we have a, a set of it's

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like an obstacle course and we
have it set out at the start.

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Because at the start, I think most of them
can't believe that they're gonna be able

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to do that with a 16 two horse by the end.

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And we're a great believer, as a friend
once said to me about, you know, the

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hands can heal what the mind can't.

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And I've heard lots of negative
talk within EAS about it shouldn't

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involve horsemanship skills, and
I'm just completely disagree.

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You know, if they're being taught

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Rupert Isaacson: in a funny
way, what else would it involve?

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Yeah.

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Helen Sharp: Yeah.

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Rupert Isaacson: Right.

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Helen Sharp: So the way you approach
a horse is a horsemanship skill,

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you know, so we find that those
those exercises and the achievement

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of those exercises along with.

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Other like reflective space
and other maybe more equine

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assisted learning, if you like.

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The combination of the two is really
working because we have chief, you

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know, chief constables, we have people
that have had really high up jobs,

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you know, and it's not all about just,
just rooming, like the challenges

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are really, really paid dividends.

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And I have so many stories to
tell and I know everyone, everyone

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hears good stories all the time.

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But men in particular, I have to say like
we've had incredible, you know, women too.

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It's, there's, there's very few, well, no
negative stories so far, but the change

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in men and men with aggression, you know?

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Rupert Isaacson: Well, right.

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Because I mean the, the troubles
Northern Ireland, it, it, it was war.

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Yeah.

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And it's still a cold war.

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But it was a hot war.

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Yeah.

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And a hot war involves men committing.

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Acts of violence and atrocity upon other
men, and sometimes women and children too.

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And that's what war is.

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It's easy to forget.

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In Europe, you know, we, we think of
war is something that happens elsewhere.

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I mean, now we're learning
differently of course with Ukraine,

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but it's still a long way away.

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And World War II is now distant memory.

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I'm sitting here in Germany, you know, 80
years ago things were very different here.

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Mm-hmm.

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But my own childhood was set
against, to some degree a background

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of colonial wars in Africa.

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And then my journalistic career,
I encountered that firsthand.

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So I know what it is.

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So it's interesting that you say
for men, because the men were the,

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in some ways, I don't wanna say it's
easier, but if you're the victim of

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violence,

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it, it's very clear what the role is.

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You, something was done to you,
but you were not the aggressor.

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Morally you are clear.

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The men who went in

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to war,

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the morality is not clear at all.

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Even if you perceived yourself as
being on the side of the goodies.

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And in a situation like Northern
Ireland, both sides did.

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It's as close to the Middle
East as we've had really.

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So it's very interesting when you
said, well, when men can touch

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gently with tenderness, then suddenly
they break because for 45 to 60

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years of their lives, they've been
required to be effectively vikings.

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Talk to us a bit more about that.

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Helen Sharp: I think, so maybe
I should give you an example.

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Just one, one guy that sticks in my
mind who had been an RECA police officer

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during the troubles had, without a doubt,

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Rupert Isaacson: but for, for
those people who don't know the

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troubles, what does RUC mean?

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Helen Sharp: Well, lost a consta.

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Rupert Isaacson: Royal Alst
constabulary, who were they?

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Helen Sharp: So they were the police
force in Northern Ireland, but I suppose

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in simple terms, they would've been.

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Against the nationalist,

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Rupert Isaacson: there would've been
the Protestants on the British side.

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Helen Sharp: Yes.

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Rupert Isaacson: Defending the
existing government against the IRA.

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Helen Sharp: Pretty much,

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Rupert Isaacson: right?

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Pretty much,

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Helen Sharp: yeah.

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So the r so this guy he came and he
basically told us that he'd been referred

00:14:33.544 --> 00:14:38.014
by the psychologist to the program
and he thought it was a pile of shit.

00:14:38.884 --> 00:14:39.214
Okay.

00:14:39.454 --> 00:14:40.564
Which I love actually.

00:14:40.564 --> 00:14:42.694
I love a bit of just straight talks.

00:14:42.694 --> 00:14:42.754
Yeah.

00:14:42.904 --> 00:14:43.444
Great.

00:14:43.864 --> 00:14:44.374
Brilliant.

00:14:44.434 --> 00:14:48.154
That gives me something to, you know,
I think because of the experience I

00:14:48.154 --> 00:14:52.564
had with doing 12 years of community
arts in Northern Ireland, I came

00:14:52.564 --> 00:14:54.154
up against that a lot of times.

00:14:54.154 --> 00:14:58.684
Like a lot of people saying, we don't
want a sculpture, we don't want a public

00:14:58.684 --> 00:15:00.424
sculpture, we want our bins emptied.

00:15:00.514 --> 00:15:03.664
You know, so there was a lot
that I learned so much about.

00:15:04.894 --> 00:15:07.774
How to ask people, how to ask
people what they don't want.

00:15:08.074 --> 00:15:13.114
But so yeah, so he, this one particular
guy came in and, and he did tell us that

00:15:13.114 --> 00:15:17.644
he thought it was a pile of shit, but
that he'd, he, he'd give it a go, which I

00:15:17.644 --> 00:15:19.744
thought, fair, fair play to you, you know?

00:15:21.184 --> 00:15:25.474
So instead of week two, his daughters,
I must add actually, his daughters

00:15:25.614 --> 00:15:28.944
his daughter rode horses, like
at a decent level show jumping.

00:15:28.944 --> 00:15:33.684
So he also knew everything about
horses, you know, which is fair enough.

00:15:33.684 --> 00:15:38.844
So he's, and by the way, he pulled the
horse around, you know, he went straight

00:15:38.844 --> 00:15:42.054
into I'm a police officer and pulled
the horse around the arena, you know.

00:15:42.054 --> 00:15:44.154
So then me and Fiona were
definitely like, well, we've

00:15:44.154 --> 00:15:45.354
got something to work with here.

00:15:45.354 --> 00:15:50.814
You know, so like, so how do you start
teaching about, about partnership?

00:15:51.504 --> 00:15:54.144
So really we had to sort of start
at the beginning, and it started

00:15:54.144 --> 00:16:00.444
with breathing, and it started with
teaching him to ground himself and.

00:16:01.179 --> 00:16:02.589
He started to talk.

00:16:02.769 --> 00:16:09.399
So then he, he would be grooming
the horse and in between telling

00:16:09.399 --> 00:16:12.279
us what his daughter did and
things, and you just get glimpses.

00:16:12.279 --> 00:16:18.279
He'd suddenly start to talk about how
he was held at gunpoint at one stage.

00:16:18.789 --> 00:16:21.369
And what we do is with our
groups, we always get one group

00:16:21.369 --> 00:16:25.149
member to hold the horse and we
get one of them to be grooming.

00:16:25.329 --> 00:16:27.969
And usually conversations
happen over the withers.

00:16:28.419 --> 00:16:33.039
That's a really great, and we try not to
interrupt those conversations if possible,

00:16:33.039 --> 00:16:34.719
if they're starting to happen naturally.

00:16:35.139 --> 00:16:38.049
But, so you get a lot
of that sort of talk.

00:16:38.139 --> 00:16:41.739
Sometimes there's a, you have to get
through a couple of weeks of bravado

00:16:41.739 --> 00:16:44.709
and what I did in, in the police
and what you did in the police.

00:16:45.219 --> 00:16:48.759
But anyway, I suppose a long story
short of, of this guy was through

00:16:48.759 --> 00:16:51.819
Fiona's amazing teaching 'cause
she's an incredible teacher.

00:16:52.629 --> 00:16:55.959
He learned to build a
partnership with, with a horse.

00:16:56.369 --> 00:16:58.019
He slowed everything down.

00:16:58.829 --> 00:17:03.629
He learned, he was so quick, quick
to get frustrated and things,

00:17:03.629 --> 00:17:05.549
you know, hypervigilant too.

00:17:05.549 --> 00:17:07.889
So he was never quite
concentrating in things.

00:17:07.889 --> 00:17:10.079
One of the things we do at Gram
work, because most people that

00:17:10.079 --> 00:17:11.369
come through are hypervigilant.

00:17:11.859 --> 00:17:15.999
So we always have to explain who's on the
yard, you know, if the, if the handyman's

00:17:16.029 --> 00:17:19.569
there or if my husband's there mucking
out or we always introduce everyone.

00:17:19.569 --> 00:17:21.709
So, that's just an aside.

00:17:22.009 --> 00:17:24.139
But eventually, anyway, we
were teaching him this and he

00:17:24.139 --> 00:17:25.579
had horses at home, you see.

00:17:26.599 --> 00:17:30.919
So he came in on about, I think
it was about week eight, and he

00:17:30.919 --> 00:17:35.509
pulled us to the side and he cried
and he cried and he basically told

00:17:35.509 --> 00:17:40.039
us that he had s anger issues that
always spilled out to his wife.

00:17:41.360 --> 00:17:44.959
And he said he, the horses at
home, they would get wound up.

00:17:45.019 --> 00:17:47.870
He would get wound up, then
the horses would get wound up,

00:17:48.049 --> 00:17:49.309
which would wind him up more.

00:17:49.309 --> 00:17:52.580
And then he would usually get so
frustrated he'd go for his wife.

00:17:53.674 --> 00:17:54.904
Verbally, I presume.

00:17:55.504 --> 00:17:58.714
Or it'd be as in his words, he'd be
screaming or shouting at his kids.

00:17:59.794 --> 00:18:06.874
But we, he said that we had taught him
how to diffuse that situation by knowing

00:18:06.874 --> 00:18:11.464
to slow his body down as he approached
the horse by knowing how to come around

00:18:11.584 --> 00:18:17.434
and approach the horse by knowing not
to do X, y, and z kept the whole thing

00:18:17.434 --> 00:18:21.964
calm, which he just said, kept the horse
calm, kept him calm, and then would

00:18:21.964 --> 00:18:25.324
stop him from having a go at the family.

00:18:25.474 --> 00:18:28.144
It just kept his whole
thing on the low down.

00:18:28.714 --> 00:18:32.214
And yeah, that was kind of his, and
he was in floods of tears saying this.

00:18:32.214 --> 00:18:37.194
It was a revelation to him that
slowing his body down could, the ripple

00:18:37.194 --> 00:18:41.514
effect of that is he wouldn't go in
and scream at his wife, you know?

00:18:41.694 --> 00:18:43.524
And it was beautiful actually.

00:18:43.524 --> 00:18:46.614
It was really, really
beautiful how that worked.

00:18:47.889 --> 00:18:49.389
Rupert Isaacson: You know, it's
interesting, I, I dunno if you

00:18:49.389 --> 00:18:54.399
remember when I met you at cre, the
agricultural college in Northern

00:18:54.399 --> 00:18:59.849
Ireland a year or so ago with us
was somebody called ke Sullivan.

00:19:00.154 --> 00:19:00.844
Yeah, I know Kevin.

00:19:01.529 --> 00:19:01.679
Yeah.

00:19:01.769 --> 00:19:01.979
Right.

00:19:01.979 --> 00:19:03.179
Who works at University of Bournemouth.

00:19:03.179 --> 00:19:08.939
She's a researcher and she had done
a, a research study into domestic

00:19:08.939 --> 00:19:13.589
violence outcomes from an equine
assisted program in the west of England.

00:19:14.279 --> 00:19:21.249
And the outcome was extraordinary
that a year after the program was

00:19:21.249 --> 00:19:29.889
done, there was still a 51%, 51%
decrease in domestic violence.

00:19:30.999 --> 00:19:32.109
Helen Sharp: I totally believe it.

00:19:33.429 --> 00:19:35.289
We have another, if I can give another

00:19:35.349 --> 00:19:35.859
Rupert Isaacson: please

00:19:36.069 --> 00:19:39.219
Helen Sharp: example, it's
not, it was actually from the

00:19:39.219 --> 00:19:40.929
other perspective in that.

00:19:42.969 --> 00:19:48.069
We had a woman who was the wife of,
of a a military veteran actually.

00:19:48.699 --> 00:19:51.369
And he battered her so badly
that she'd had a stroke.

00:19:51.609 --> 00:19:58.839
So she was having problems walking and
her anxiety was just off the scale,

00:19:58.839 --> 00:20:04.419
sort of, you know, this woman just,
it was so tangible of her, you know.

00:20:04.659 --> 00:20:08.049
She actually ended up, did something
like, I think about 18 weeks.

00:20:08.259 --> 00:20:13.704
She came as part of a group and
then, and then got funding to,

00:20:13.804 --> 00:20:15.729
for her to come for one-on-ones.

00:20:15.729 --> 00:20:18.549
And she, she fell in love
with this yearling of mine.

00:20:18.549 --> 00:20:23.229
So I don't always, we don't always
use the kind of quiet, I like

00:20:23.229 --> 00:20:25.009
to use the young stock as well.

00:20:25.489 --> 00:20:28.399
We actually involve pregnant
mares sometimes as well.

00:20:28.399 --> 00:20:31.339
You know, there's a couple on the yard
or there was last year, and actually

00:20:31.339 --> 00:20:34.459
that's sort of amazing one for some
of the women because the immediately.

00:20:35.179 --> 00:20:38.239
It became about family and
discussion about family and

00:20:38.239 --> 00:20:39.949
birth and pregnancy and things.

00:20:39.949 --> 00:20:40.999
It was really interesting.

00:20:41.329 --> 00:20:45.939
But yeah, this woman was just she
was completely unpacked by this

00:20:45.939 --> 00:20:49.509
relationship that she built with
a couple of the horses actually.

00:20:49.509 --> 00:20:53.409
And all she wanted to do was
groom them and she, she would be

00:20:53.409 --> 00:20:55.059
brushing their hair like a child.

00:20:55.569 --> 00:20:57.969
She was holding it and brushing
it and talking and talking

00:20:57.969 --> 00:20:59.079
and talking to this horse.

00:20:59.439 --> 00:21:02.559
And the more she was with us, the
more we, we just left her, you know,

00:21:02.559 --> 00:21:04.539
to a private time with the horse.

00:21:04.539 --> 00:21:06.339
I mean, she really,
that's what she wanted.

00:21:06.819 --> 00:21:10.749
And the change around in her, more
in her confidence, you know, I can't

00:21:10.749 --> 00:21:15.249
presume to know what was going on at home
necessarily, but her whole demeanor and

00:21:15.249 --> 00:21:19.749
her softness, and it was as if there was
some sort of outlet for love and affection

00:21:19.749 --> 00:21:22.089
that she wasn't able to express at home.

00:21:22.359 --> 00:21:26.679
And she would be, this was the thing that
used to make me nearly well up, is that.

00:21:27.369 --> 00:21:32.619
By the time she'd done sort of six weeks
or so, this stick, she was so reliant

00:21:32.619 --> 00:21:37.029
on, you know, she used to throw it,
thankfully it was a quiet yearling,

00:21:37.029 --> 00:21:39.369
you know, out of the stable door.

00:21:39.369 --> 00:21:43.449
And there was something literally
stabilizing in her body about

00:21:43.449 --> 00:21:46.659
being around this horse that she
just wasn't able to do before.

00:21:47.439 --> 00:21:48.159
Unbelievable.

00:21:48.159 --> 00:21:54.339
Like, it was just, you know, the
way, the way these things work with

00:21:54.339 --> 00:21:58.899
violence, just that correlation that the
things I'm seeing is just incredible.

00:21:58.899 --> 00:22:01.119
It's, it blows my mind every, every week

00:22:03.699 --> 00:22:05.319
Rupert Isaacson: you are
there in Northern Ireland.

00:22:07.149 --> 00:22:11.429
For those listeners who are not British
the accent you're hearing is Scottish.

00:22:12.109 --> 00:22:15.499
Which can be confusing because
Scots and Northern Irish are not a

00:22:15.499 --> 00:22:18.559
thousand miles away from each other,
but they're somewhat distinct.

00:22:18.979 --> 00:22:20.389
I know that you grew up in Scotland.

00:22:20.389 --> 00:22:21.799
I know you grew up on the Heese.

00:22:22.039 --> 00:22:25.939
Those listeners who don't know where
the Hebrides is, if you look at a map of

00:22:25.939 --> 00:22:28.399
the uk, you'll see a sort of a triangle.

00:22:28.399 --> 00:22:30.229
That's the main bit.

00:22:30.289 --> 00:22:34.009
You'll see Ireland off to the left,
and then you'll see a bunch of sort of

00:22:34.429 --> 00:22:37.339
fluttery things off to the northwest.

00:22:37.709 --> 00:22:40.799
That a bit like the gills on a fish
or something, or the, the crest

00:22:40.799 --> 00:22:44.909
on a dragon that, that crest on
the dragon is a series of islands

00:22:45.299 --> 00:22:47.039
heading up towards sort of Iceland.

00:22:47.579 --> 00:22:51.569
Getting towards the fringes of
civilization and they're called the heide,

00:22:52.559 --> 00:22:54.179
Helen Sharp: getting to
the heart of civilization.

00:22:54.449 --> 00:22:55.409
Rupert Isaacson: Oh, apologies.

00:22:55.619 --> 00:22:58.999
I remember that when I was in
Mongolia, and they would laugh at me

00:22:58.999 --> 00:23:03.339
and say, oh, we know that you guys
in the west say outta Mongolia to

00:23:03.339 --> 00:23:04.849
mean you know, the end of the world.

00:23:04.849 --> 00:23:05.959
And this is where we live.

00:23:05.959 --> 00:23:06.529
This is home.

00:23:06.559 --> 00:23:06.829
Yeah.

00:23:07.159 --> 00:23:10.549
So where you guys live
is out in Mongolia to us.

00:23:10.669 --> 00:23:11.119
Fair.

00:23:11.149 --> 00:23:11.719
Fair enough.

00:23:12.799 --> 00:23:16.009
Yet it is remote and wildly beautiful.

00:23:16.159 --> 00:23:20.709
And wild coastlines and amazingness.

00:23:21.639 --> 00:23:22.899
That's where you grew up.

00:23:24.909 --> 00:23:27.219
Not everybody grows up in the He Halen.

00:23:28.179 --> 00:23:29.469
Why did you grow up there?

00:23:30.639 --> 00:23:32.649
How did you grow up there and how
did you get into horses there?

00:23:32.889 --> 00:23:35.859
Because it's not exactly horse
country, it's Viking country, but

00:23:35.859 --> 00:23:36.999
it might not be horse country.

00:23:37.479 --> 00:23:39.219
I think they actually
have elves there too.

00:23:39.489 --> 00:23:42.309
They've exported them subsequently
to New Zealand, obviously since

00:23:42.309 --> 00:23:43.599
the Lord of the Rings movies.

00:23:43.599 --> 00:23:46.149
But, you know, original stock,
you know, from the ties.

00:23:47.019 --> 00:23:53.109
Talk us through that childhood
and how that informed a little

00:23:53.109 --> 00:23:54.219
bit of where you are now.

00:23:55.389 --> 00:23:57.549
Helen Sharp: I think it definitely
informed there's, there's something

00:23:57.549 --> 00:24:03.129
about an island mentality that
everything is because of the,

00:24:03.129 --> 00:24:07.209
because of the, the circular horizon.

00:24:07.539 --> 00:24:09.369
Everything's possible and
everything's a threat.

00:24:10.899 --> 00:24:10.929
Okay.

00:24:10.929 --> 00:24:13.269
And that's something I think I've
just, it's just stayed with me.

00:24:13.269 --> 00:24:13.479
Fun.

00:24:13.479 --> 00:24:17.409
I actually live on an island now
in Ana with three houses on it.

00:24:17.619 --> 00:24:20.109
So I live on an island which is never

00:24:20.109 --> 00:24:21.694
Rupert Isaacson: an island in
a sea or an island in a lake

00:24:21.909 --> 00:24:22.659
Helen Sharp: in La Urn.

00:24:22.659 --> 00:24:22.989
Yeah.

00:24:23.379 --> 00:24:23.529
Rupert Isaacson: Okay.

00:24:23.919 --> 00:24:24.249
Helen Sharp: Yeah.

00:24:24.639 --> 00:24:28.369
It's a source of never ending
joy and humor to my mom that I've

00:24:28.729 --> 00:24:32.209
tried, spent my life trying to get
off an island and not back on one.

00:24:32.444 --> 00:24:33.279
But yeah, but you can see the

00:24:33.279 --> 00:24:33.999
Rupert Isaacson: enemy coming.

00:24:33.999 --> 00:24:34.179
Yeah.

00:24:34.184 --> 00:24:34.544
It's useful.

00:24:34.749 --> 00:24:35.109
Helen Sharp: Yeah.

00:24:35.139 --> 00:24:35.919
Yeah, completely.

00:24:36.459 --> 00:24:37.179
Rupert Isaacson: Do you have cannons?

00:24:37.269 --> 00:24:37.509
Sorry,

00:24:40.479 --> 00:24:41.079
Helen Sharp: max out the back.

00:24:41.079 --> 00:24:41.619
We're fine.

00:24:42.999 --> 00:24:45.069
Yeah, it's the heberty was incredible.

00:24:45.129 --> 00:24:48.549
I think the thing was, we, we moved
there when I was, I think just before

00:24:48.549 --> 00:24:52.389
my 10th birthday, and we had been
in England and I had had a series of

00:24:52.389 --> 00:24:56.589
really badly behaved ponies that my
mom had got off some dodgy farmer.

00:24:57.489 --> 00:24:57.969
And

00:24:59.439 --> 00:24:59.949
Rupert Isaacson: where in England?

00:25:00.254 --> 00:25:00.604
Helen Sharp: Comia.

00:25:00.704 --> 00:25:02.409
So right on the border again.

00:25:02.409 --> 00:25:02.619
Is that

00:25:02.619 --> 00:25:03.339
Rupert Isaacson: where you were born?

00:25:03.879 --> 00:25:06.279
Helen Sharp: I was born in Northumberland,
but when I was six months old.

00:25:06.279 --> 00:25:06.309
Okay.

00:25:06.309 --> 00:25:06.579
So you're a

00:25:06.579 --> 00:25:07.479
Rupert Isaacson: Northumbrian girl.

00:25:07.479 --> 00:25:07.959
You're, you're a.

00:25:09.234 --> 00:25:10.464
Helen Sharp: Jordy family actually.

00:25:10.464 --> 00:25:10.734
Yeah.

00:25:10.764 --> 00:25:10.884
So

00:25:10.884 --> 00:25:13.854
Rupert Isaacson: you, okay, so
Jordy across Te Cumbia Yeah.

00:25:13.944 --> 00:25:15.324
Other side of the Pennines.

00:25:15.534 --> 00:25:15.654
Helen Sharp: Yeah.

00:25:15.684 --> 00:25:15.924
Wow.

00:25:15.924 --> 00:25:17.094
Rupert Isaacson: For
the Americans, you know.

00:25:17.214 --> 00:25:17.484
Okay.

00:25:17.484 --> 00:25:19.884
So you've got to look at, okay.

00:25:19.884 --> 00:25:26.334
If you watch the series Vikings when
Ragnar Brook does the eagle execution

00:25:26.334 --> 00:25:31.224
where he opens the ribcage of, of the,
the king who, no, actually, sorry.

00:25:31.224 --> 00:25:34.404
He's put to death by the king of
North Umbr in a pit of snakes.

00:25:34.734 --> 00:25:39.334
It's his son who comes and kills
the king of Northumbria above.

00:25:39.454 --> 00:25:40.384
That's where it all goes on.

00:25:40.384 --> 00:25:43.024
So you, you can understand that
it's, it's hard country, but

00:25:43.024 --> 00:25:44.224
it's very beautiful country.

00:25:44.914 --> 00:25:45.124
Yeah.

00:25:45.124 --> 00:25:47.944
That you're born up there, you go
across the pens into Cambridge,

00:25:47.944 --> 00:25:48.994
it's even more beautiful.

00:25:49.654 --> 00:25:50.014
Helen Sharp: Yeah.

00:25:50.014 --> 00:25:50.979
And you have some dodgy

00:25:51.139 --> 00:25:51.299
Rupert Isaacson: ponies.

00:25:51.799 --> 00:25:53.569
Helen Sharp: Pony, mad
loads of dodgy ponies.

00:25:53.659 --> 00:25:56.599
And then we went on, my dad was
actually in the Merchant Navy.

00:25:56.869 --> 00:25:56.989
Rupert Isaacson: Okay.

00:25:57.079 --> 00:25:57.409
So

00:25:57.409 --> 00:25:58.909
Helen Sharp: we used to see
him once or twice a year.

00:25:59.509 --> 00:26:03.799
And my mom was a nurse and midwife, but
we went, my mom organized a holiday,

00:26:03.799 --> 00:26:05.654
a camping holiday to the Heberty sw.

00:26:05.749 --> 00:26:10.389
We went and then I think at some
sort of beach barbecue, my mom

00:26:10.389 --> 00:26:13.389
met the head of nursing in the
Hebrides who offered her a job.

00:26:14.364 --> 00:26:15.264
So then that was it.

00:26:15.264 --> 00:26:17.664
So we were all decamped
up to the outer heide.

00:26:18.354 --> 00:26:19.584
Rupert Isaacson: And which island was it?

00:26:19.584 --> 00:26:20.664
As many islands in Heide.

00:26:21.074 --> 00:26:25.154
Helen Sharp: Vater se, so we're actually
not quite so north, the heide are more

00:26:25.154 --> 00:26:30.804
west, but we were on the southerly,
most inhabited island with 48 residents.

00:26:30.984 --> 00:26:31.014
Okay.

00:26:32.719 --> 00:26:36.399
Yeah, I remember waking up and I, and
I went to bed and I woke up and I could

00:26:36.399 --> 00:26:38.079
hear the sea and I didn't understand it.

00:26:38.079 --> 00:26:41.649
And we'd arrived in the dark and I
opened the skylight of my bedroom

00:26:41.649 --> 00:26:44.229
and the sea was just at the front
and it kind of blew my mind.

00:26:44.374 --> 00:26:47.739
I remember, but I spent the rest of
my life on that seashore actually.

00:26:47.739 --> 00:26:51.149
But yes, we moved there, but of course,
the thing, I was pony mad, but the

00:26:51.149 --> 00:26:54.449
thing about the Heberty was there,
there isn't, there's a few now, but

00:26:54.449 --> 00:26:57.839
Air Escape ponies are very famous
and they're just a few islands up.

00:26:57.839 --> 00:27:00.469
But where I lived, there were no horses.

00:27:01.039 --> 00:27:06.679
So obviously it took me 30 years to
forgive my mother for, so in a way,

00:27:06.679 --> 00:27:11.959
I became more obsessed with something
I couldn't have, I think, you know,

00:27:12.019 --> 00:27:16.849
and so always just remained because,
because as everybody knows, when you

00:27:16.849 --> 00:27:18.859
have ponies as a kid, it lights a fire.

00:27:19.339 --> 00:27:23.119
And that's probably never extinguished
if you're a horse lover, you know?

00:27:23.989 --> 00:27:28.039
But yeah, the Berties was brilliant and
I suppose I was kind of a wild kid and.

00:27:28.434 --> 00:27:29.544
So that was great.

00:27:29.574 --> 00:27:34.824
I spent a lot of time with like
collecting sea urchins and razor

00:27:34.824 --> 00:27:39.234
clams and you know, my dad was lobster
fishing and all that kind of thing,

00:27:39.234 --> 00:27:41.424
you know, so it was really beautiful.

00:27:41.724 --> 00:27:43.854
But also the schools were
really, really small.

00:27:44.214 --> 00:27:50.304
So I think probably where I would've
been naturally, badly behaved, but I was

00:27:50.304 --> 00:27:54.094
actually the schools were small enough
that it held my concentration and things.

00:27:54.094 --> 00:27:56.644
So I, so I was, did very well in school.

00:27:57.044 --> 00:28:00.014
I was loved learning
so it was a good thing.

00:28:00.014 --> 00:28:03.014
But there was enough, there was problems
enough at home and I think I spent a lot

00:28:03.014 --> 00:28:07.824
of time trying not to be in the house
and just sitting, watching the rabbits,

00:28:07.824 --> 00:28:11.934
I got really fascinated with the rabbits
'cause they had mixing mitosis in the

00:28:11.934 --> 00:28:13.734
Hebert and it was a really mad landscape.

00:28:13.734 --> 00:28:18.654
It was kind of the macker we call it,
which is a kind of sandy grassy with

00:28:18.654 --> 00:28:21.244
flowers in the summer Atlantic coast line.

00:28:21.244 --> 00:28:25.054
But I would spend hours
watching these rabbits kind of.

00:28:26.074 --> 00:28:27.904
Toiling with mixed mitosis.

00:28:28.804 --> 00:28:30.484
Strange, strange child.

00:28:30.484 --> 00:28:33.694
But yeah, that was kind of what I did.

00:28:35.314 --> 00:28:36.334
Rupert Isaacson: Feral childhood.

00:28:36.694 --> 00:28:36.934
Yeah.

00:28:36.934 --> 00:28:37.594
First to nature.

00:28:37.894 --> 00:28:38.224
Helen Sharp: Yeah.

00:28:38.574 --> 00:28:46.674
Rupert Isaacson: Resilience beauty,
how, where do you go from the heide?

00:28:48.744 --> 00:28:51.144
Helen Sharp: Well, despite my
love of nature and everything,

00:28:51.144 --> 00:28:56.004
I also just loved, like popular
culture and fashion and music.

00:28:56.004 --> 00:28:59.934
And I suppose if you're, if you're
smart enough, you wanted to do your

00:28:59.934 --> 00:29:08.124
A-levels in the heide you had to fly
on Europe's only beach runway, so

00:29:08.364 --> 00:29:10.734
it'd be you, the 16 seater twin Otter.

00:29:11.034 --> 00:29:12.504
So you and your mates.

00:29:12.804 --> 00:29:17.274
In this twin Otter flying up every weekend
to the next island up to do a levels

00:29:17.694 --> 00:29:18.354
Rupert Isaacson: fantastic.

00:29:18.504 --> 00:29:21.834
Helen Sharp: And the geniuses
that designed the school, they

00:29:21.834 --> 00:29:23.274
called it the boarding school.

00:29:23.274 --> 00:29:26.564
It, you know, put the boys on
the bottom and the girls on

00:29:26.564 --> 00:29:28.004
the top with the sloping roof.

00:29:28.034 --> 00:29:29.924
And then you had like 12 miles of beach.

00:29:29.924 --> 00:29:32.174
So we just used to slide
down the roof, see?

00:29:32.264 --> 00:29:35.174
And just, we had an amazing
time doing a levels.

00:29:35.654 --> 00:29:38.744
So yeah, I decided I wanted
to go off to art school.

00:29:39.174 --> 00:29:43.074
So that's, I was studying towards art
school and that's what my aim was.

00:29:43.074 --> 00:29:47.245
And then, yeah, I got into Edinburgh
Art school, which was fancy and

00:29:47.354 --> 00:29:49.034
yeah, studied sculpture there.

00:29:49.034 --> 00:29:51.254
So that was kind of my trajectory.

00:29:54.044 --> 00:29:55.784
Rupert Isaacson: At what point
do you rediscover ponies?

00:30:00.579 --> 00:30:03.674
Helen Sharp: I, I sought them out a
couple of times, I think in Edinburgh.

00:30:03.674 --> 00:30:03.734
I.

00:30:04.334 --> 00:30:08.324
But I think more in those
university years it faded a bit.

00:30:08.894 --> 00:30:12.404
I was far too interested in kind
of clubbing and, you know, being

00:30:12.404 --> 00:30:17.504
fantastic, you know, and fashion
and high heels and stuff like that.

00:30:17.504 --> 00:30:21.074
So, so horses didn't come back
into my life until I went down

00:30:21.344 --> 00:30:23.804
to study a master's in Devon.

00:30:24.584 --> 00:30:28.634
So I went to a college called, a very
famous college called Dartington College.

00:30:29.684 --> 00:30:29.714
Rupert Isaacson: Oh

00:30:29.744 --> 00:30:30.317
Helen Sharp: yeah, I know Dartington.

00:30:30.317 --> 00:30:32.714
Yeah, so it's in Devon and
it's in a beautiful area.

00:30:32.714 --> 00:30:37.514
And that's when horses came back into
my life just because they were around,

00:30:38.024 --> 00:30:41.774
you know, so they started to creep into
my work and stuff a bit actually then.

00:30:41.774 --> 00:30:46.574
And yeah, but I didn't get seriously back
at horses until I moved back to Ireland.

00:30:46.624 --> 00:30:51.964
I moved to Belfast and I got an
art residency at Belfast and I was

00:30:51.964 --> 00:30:53.794
running away from DE at the time.

00:30:54.274 --> 00:30:54.754
And,

00:30:54.804 --> 00:30:55.889
Rupert Isaacson: so back to Ireland.

00:30:55.979 --> 00:30:57.209
We haven't been to Ireland yet.

00:30:57.509 --> 00:30:58.019
Helen Sharp: Yeah, I know.

00:30:58.019 --> 00:30:59.639
It's funny to Edinburgh

00:31:00.569 --> 00:31:01.019
Rupert Isaacson: to, apparently

00:31:01.019 --> 00:31:03.839
Helen Sharp: I've got in the 17th
century I've got relatives and me,

00:31:03.839 --> 00:31:05.069
so it's always back to Ireland.

00:31:05.579 --> 00:31:05.909
Rupert Isaacson: Okay.

00:31:07.049 --> 00:31:09.109
And why were you running away from Daven?

00:31:09.979 --> 00:31:11.479
Helen Sharp: Oh, I had a terrible husband.

00:31:12.889 --> 00:31:13.069
You got

00:31:13.069 --> 00:31:14.299
Rupert Isaacson: married as an undergrad?

00:31:14.659 --> 00:31:19.099
Helen Sharp: Yeah, I got married, yeah,
I got married just after, yeah, I got

00:31:19.099 --> 00:31:25.069
married between sort of graduating in
my undergraduate and doing a master's

00:31:25.729 --> 00:31:26.479
Rupert Isaacson: also in art.

00:31:27.439 --> 00:31:28.069
Helen Sharp: Yes.

00:31:28.129 --> 00:31:33.889
And I, and my husband at the time then
used my undergraduate portfolio to get

00:31:33.889 --> 00:31:35.779
himself into art college at darting.

00:31:36.769 --> 00:31:37.069
Clever man.

00:31:37.789 --> 00:31:39.889
Yeah, so like

00:31:40.099 --> 00:31:40.609
Rupert Isaacson: Shameless.

00:31:40.759 --> 00:31:42.199
Helen Sharp: Yeah, totally shameless.

00:31:42.199 --> 00:31:43.399
Yeah, he wasn't a great guy.

00:31:43.399 --> 00:31:45.349
Unfortunately, he wasn't a good guy, so I.

00:31:45.904 --> 00:31:48.424
Yeah, I had to, had to find
my way out of that one.

00:31:48.964 --> 00:31:49.264
Rupert Isaacson: Okay.

00:31:49.264 --> 00:31:52.874
So, but why you could have
gone any direction why did

00:31:52.874 --> 00:31:54.104
that direction lead to Ireland?

00:31:55.544 --> 00:31:57.764
Helen Sharp: I was on my way
to, I was on my way to Glasgow.

00:31:57.854 --> 00:31:57.944
Okay.

00:31:59.174 --> 00:32:00.674
That was my escape plan.

00:32:00.794 --> 00:32:05.484
And but actually I got, I got a residency,
so I was doing a PhD in Devon actually.

00:32:05.584 --> 00:32:08.524
But I started a PhD there and I just at

00:32:08.644 --> 00:32:09.214
Rupert Isaacson: Daton College.

00:32:09.274 --> 00:32:09.844
Helen Sharp: Yeah.

00:32:10.504 --> 00:32:14.854
And I was teaching a little bit there
and then I decided I want, didn't want

00:32:14.854 --> 00:32:19.594
to stick around there any longer, so
I got awarded a residency in an art

00:32:19.594 --> 00:32:23.914
gallery in Belfast and I thought,
great, I'll go for three months there.

00:32:24.274 --> 00:32:26.464
24 years later, we're still here.

00:32:26.644 --> 00:32:26.944
Yeah.

00:32:26.944 --> 00:32:27.574
Rupert Isaacson: Perfect.

00:32:28.894 --> 00:32:31.654
Alright, so you.

00:32:32.659 --> 00:32:39.679
Have this wonderful if po list feral
childhood in the heide, which are the

00:32:39.679 --> 00:32:41.719
outer heide, which are extraordinary.

00:32:42.139 --> 00:32:44.929
You then go to Edinburgh,
which is amazing.

00:32:45.379 --> 00:32:46.759
Then you go down to Devon.

00:32:46.819 --> 00:32:51.439
Okay, there's a bad husband, but it's
amazing and you've got horses there.

00:32:52.249 --> 00:32:53.569
Then you end up in Belfast.

00:32:54.139 --> 00:32:57.709
Now is Belfast where you do your PhD?

00:32:59.599 --> 00:32:59.809
Helen Sharp: Hmm.

00:32:59.839 --> 00:33:03.289
It is where I did, it's where
I did the third and final PhD.

00:33:03.949 --> 00:33:03.979
Okay.

00:33:03.979 --> 00:33:04.819
So I was very lucky.

00:33:04.904 --> 00:33:08.899
I, I had in between that time gone
back to Edinburgh and started, I

00:33:08.899 --> 00:33:11.859
had been offered a PhD at Edinburgh
University which I started, but I

00:33:11.859 --> 00:33:13.389
couldn't make it work financially.

00:33:14.229 --> 00:33:21.099
But then Belfast offered me a scholarship,
so that's like 45 grand over three years

00:33:21.099 --> 00:33:23.199
to do a scholar to do a PhD with them.

00:33:23.199 --> 00:33:23.499
So I.

00:33:24.489 --> 00:33:25.449
I said yes.

00:33:25.479 --> 00:33:28.179
Moved promptly to Forman
and bought a horse.

00:33:28.344 --> 00:33:28.634
Rupert Isaacson: Okay.

00:33:28.904 --> 00:33:29.949
What horse did you buy?

00:33:30.369 --> 00:33:34.359
Helen Sharp: I bought a national Annette,
a former National Hunt, thoroughbred

00:33:34.359 --> 00:33:37.119
16 three with Ring Bone for a pound

00:33:37.449 --> 00:33:38.049
Rupert Isaacson: as we all do.

00:33:38.049 --> 00:33:38.109
Yeah.

00:33:38.559 --> 00:33:38.949
Helen Sharp: Yes.

00:33:39.939 --> 00:33:42.129
Rupert Isaacson: How do you
work out the wrong horse?

00:33:45.159 --> 00:33:47.679
Helen Sharp: And he told me everything
about horses I ever need to know.

00:33:47.799 --> 00:33:48.789
Rupert Isaacson: I am sure he did.

00:33:48.789 --> 00:33:49.179
Yes.

00:33:49.179 --> 00:33:49.239
Yeah.

00:33:49.349 --> 00:33:53.639
My first horse was off the
track and he, that's why I'm

00:33:53.759 --> 00:33:55.409
able to do what I'm able to do.

00:33:55.409 --> 00:33:59.399
'cause every horse after him was easy, so.

00:33:59.729 --> 00:34:00.209
Okay.

00:34:00.549 --> 00:34:05.769
I want to touch on something now that
you've talked to me about which I

00:34:05.769 --> 00:34:09.069
think gives you a real qualification
for the work that you do in terms

00:34:09.069 --> 00:34:11.559
of compassion and open-heartedness.

00:34:11.619 --> 00:34:14.049
And it's one of my not beefs, but.

00:34:16.074 --> 00:34:20.094
Queries Sometimes when people are
getting into the equine assisted world,

00:34:20.094 --> 00:34:24.774
particularly when they've come in from,
you know, horsey backgrounds, okay,

00:34:24.774 --> 00:34:29.814
everybody has their, their shit and every
family has its shit, et cetera, et cetera.

00:34:29.814 --> 00:34:35.034
Granted, and at the same time people
that grew up in very horsey families

00:34:35.724 --> 00:34:40.194
often are growing up in some degree
of privilege and perhaps some

00:34:40.194 --> 00:34:41.814
degree to some degree sheltered.

00:34:44.124 --> 00:34:47.604
You went through a phase with heroin.

00:34:48.264 --> 00:34:54.834
Yeah, and I think this is really
important to talk about because those

00:34:54.834 --> 00:35:00.534
of us who have checkered pasts, and
I'm certainly one I think it allows

00:35:00.534 --> 00:35:06.654
us a certain non judgmentalism and
an ability to say that for the grace

00:35:06.654 --> 00:35:09.174
of God, go I, or that I have gone or.

00:35:10.149 --> 00:35:14.589
We're certainly not going to judge the
person that comes in front of us and we're

00:35:14.589 --> 00:35:20.619
not standing in front of people pretending
to be the good boy or the good girl,

00:35:21.009 --> 00:35:25.779
which means that when the person who's
standing in front of us who's facing the

00:35:25.779 --> 00:35:27.339
same thing, they're certainly not gonna

00:35:29.559 --> 00:35:30.309
find judgment.

00:35:31.599 --> 00:35:35.109
I think it's important that you have
this background 'cause I think it

00:35:35.109 --> 00:35:38.589
qualifies you, you know, for doing
this work with trauma that you do.

00:35:40.029 --> 00:35:43.089
Can you, do you feel comfortable
talking to us about that and, and

00:35:43.089 --> 00:35:45.309
how it evolved and what you learned?

00:35:46.334 --> 00:35:46.689
Helen Sharp: I do.

00:35:46.689 --> 00:35:46.929
Yeah.

00:35:46.929 --> 00:35:50.859
And I'm comfortable about talking
about it because I think that it is

00:35:50.859 --> 00:35:52.779
exactly what it's about, what I learned.

00:35:53.439 --> 00:35:57.759
And it's always one of those things
when people ask, do you regret it?

00:35:57.759 --> 00:36:00.819
Well, if sort of sensibly you think,
yeah, I regret it 'cause I worried a

00:36:00.819 --> 00:36:02.859
lot of people or I, but actually I.

00:36:03.774 --> 00:36:07.134
I'm really glad to be alive because
it did nearly kill me in all honesty.

00:36:07.404 --> 00:36:10.674
So I'm very lucky that I didn't
lose my life then, but it did.

00:36:13.704 --> 00:36:17.454
I had gone down that route for a reason
because I wasn't, despite all of the

00:36:18.024 --> 00:36:23.764
bucolic kind of island life and all
that stuff I wasn't happy, you know, I

00:36:23.764 --> 00:36:28.384
was quite, a lot had gone on and I was
quite sensitive and quite smart kid and

00:36:28.444 --> 00:36:30.634
I just, it was, I just felt overwhelmed.

00:36:31.144 --> 00:36:34.684
Actually looking back now as well, I
realized I've gone from an island of 48

00:36:34.684 --> 00:36:40.294
people to a really busy city and as a
lot of people would say, you're sensitive

00:36:40.294 --> 00:36:43.984
or an empath or whatever word you wanna
use, like overwhelm is a real thing.

00:36:44.584 --> 00:36:49.054
But there was I in the heart of sort
of early nineties Edinburgh dancing

00:36:49.054 --> 00:36:50.469
and clubbing and yeah, that was the

00:36:50.469 --> 00:36:52.709
Rupert Isaacson: train spotting years
for those people who saw that movie.

00:36:52.899 --> 00:36:53.189
Yeah.

00:36:53.189 --> 00:36:53.469
Yeah.

00:36:53.974 --> 00:36:55.834
Helen Sharp: And it was kind
of, actually, it didn't suit.

00:36:56.464 --> 00:36:57.964
Me, me at all.

00:36:57.964 --> 00:37:02.674
And so I can look back and see lots of
reasons why it happened and yeah, I'm

00:37:02.674 --> 00:37:05.974
sure I, part of me thought, you know,
I was experimenting with all sorts of

00:37:05.974 --> 00:37:09.629
drugs that I thought it was kind of
cool and, you know, but it's, no, we all

00:37:09.634 --> 00:37:09.814
Rupert Isaacson: did.

00:37:09.904 --> 00:37:10.655
Helen Sharp: Yeah, yeah.

00:37:10.774 --> 00:37:12.604
Very quickly became not that cool.

00:37:13.144 --> 00:37:17.344
And but it did teach
me what was important.

00:37:17.434 --> 00:37:22.174
It taught me, I had a huge moment,
which is gonna make me sound,

00:37:22.174 --> 00:37:24.364
possibly, oh, I don't even know.

00:37:24.364 --> 00:37:29.464
I can't presume to what listeners are
gonna think, but I did overdose and

00:37:29.464 --> 00:37:34.664
I had a bizarre incident when I was
overdosing, whatever it was, whatever

00:37:34.664 --> 00:37:37.514
you wanna believe it is, whether
it's chemical or bigger than that.

00:37:38.174 --> 00:37:44.474
But it was kind of an experience
of like a million voices kind of

00:37:44.474 --> 00:37:46.514
light and voices at the same time.

00:37:46.604 --> 00:37:48.704
And it just kept saying,
you've got a great brain.

00:37:48.704 --> 00:37:49.964
You've got a great brain.

00:37:50.294 --> 00:37:51.194
But that's what I remember.

00:37:51.194 --> 00:37:53.774
And I remember coming round with
everyone standing round me above.

00:37:54.344 --> 00:37:55.544
Really, really clearly.

00:37:55.964 --> 00:37:59.324
And something had come fundamentally
changed in me from that moment.

00:37:59.984 --> 00:38:03.554
It fell out of my control what
had fundamentally changed, but

00:38:04.244 --> 00:38:08.444
possibly it was, you know, I
dunno, shock or I don't know.

00:38:08.444 --> 00:38:11.504
But anyway, something fundamentally
changed and I'll stand by that.

00:38:11.564 --> 00:38:13.334
And then I changed everything.

00:38:14.174 --> 00:38:15.074
Rupert Isaacson: What did you change?

00:38:15.074 --> 00:38:16.484
And this was in Edinburgh, this happened?

00:38:17.244 --> 00:38:17.514
Helen Sharp: Yes.

00:38:17.514 --> 00:38:20.664
Well, I was actually in a
brief saur in Liverpool, which,

00:38:20.664 --> 00:38:22.224
which was a rough enough place.

00:38:22.944 --> 00:38:24.144
Tiff was a rough place.

00:38:24.234 --> 00:38:28.754
And yeah, I was with the said
not great husband at the time.

00:38:29.204 --> 00:38:32.474
And it changed everything
because I was completely focused

00:38:32.594 --> 00:38:35.534
on doing good with my brain.

00:38:36.074 --> 00:38:39.644
If that doesn't sound bananas,
I'm just telling you my truth

00:38:39.794 --> 00:38:41.084
and that's what my truth was.

00:38:41.084 --> 00:38:42.854
So, so then I.

00:38:43.334 --> 00:38:46.244
That's when I sort of decided I
was gonna go and do a master's.

00:38:46.244 --> 00:38:48.374
That's when I decided I was
gonna, and it wasn't easy.

00:38:48.374 --> 00:38:51.194
I'm not gonna kind of go and, and
then suddenly everything was lovely.

00:38:51.194 --> 00:38:55.099
It wasn't, I had to come off heroin,
you know, I had to spend a lot of

00:38:55.099 --> 00:38:56.619
time being sick into a plastic bag.

00:38:56.799 --> 00:38:57.099
How did

00:38:57.099 --> 00:38:57.579
Rupert Isaacson: you come off heroin?

00:38:57.649 --> 00:38:59.144
Talk to us about that process.

00:38:59.384 --> 00:39:04.724
Helen Sharp: I watched a box set of I
watched the 24 box set of friends in

00:39:04.724 --> 00:39:06.974
a bed in Liverpool and was sick a lot.

00:39:07.334 --> 00:39:10.544
And, you know, it was, it
was proper movie stuff.

00:39:10.544 --> 00:39:15.104
It was shake and illness and sick and
laughing at friends at all the same time.

00:39:15.104 --> 00:39:19.934
So it was, it was, and other dog,
because I had, you know, things

00:39:19.934 --> 00:39:21.374
had got a bit harder as well.

00:39:21.374 --> 00:39:23.714
I'd started to try crack
and all that kind of thing.

00:39:23.714 --> 00:39:27.914
So it was a lot, it was a lot
to get through physically.

00:39:28.454 --> 00:39:30.494
I wasn't as robust obviously as I am now.

00:39:30.494 --> 00:39:32.534
I'm quite sort of fit now.

00:39:32.534 --> 00:39:36.574
But yeah, so, so it was, I did
it myself basically is the story.

00:39:36.724 --> 00:39:37.534
And then.

00:39:37.939 --> 00:39:39.799
The clarity that came after that.

00:39:40.249 --> 00:39:41.179
I just think, how long did that

00:39:41.179 --> 00:39:42.199
Rupert Isaacson: take
and how old were you?

00:39:42.949 --> 00:39:45.739
Helen Sharp: It's funny when people ask
me how old I was, 'cause it's so sort of

00:39:45.739 --> 00:39:48.769
hazy, I think I was about 29, maybe 28.

00:39:49.249 --> 00:39:55.369
And it took a couple of weeks for
the, for the main bit to sort of

00:39:55.549 --> 00:39:58.609
self, you know, self isolation
and kind of getting through it.

00:39:58.609 --> 00:40:00.319
But I was just so determined.

00:40:00.349 --> 00:40:02.689
I just thought, this is not my trajectory.

00:40:02.989 --> 00:40:06.229
You know, it was really, really
powerful, not my trajectory.

00:40:06.799 --> 00:40:10.599
And funnily enough, there was a few
horses on the outskirts actually, of

00:40:10.779 --> 00:40:12.879
Liverpool and I used to go down there.

00:40:12.879 --> 00:40:16.449
Were just in kind of fields, you know,
and I used to go down there and it's

00:40:16.449 --> 00:40:18.069
funny, I'd forgotten that until just now.

00:40:18.909 --> 00:40:23.729
And yeah, horses were always there, but
it started a, a more positive trajectory

00:40:23.729 --> 00:40:28.859
and back to that sort of clarity that
I really enjoy now, like these days.

00:40:29.009 --> 00:40:30.119
I don't drink a lot or anything.

00:40:30.119 --> 00:40:31.229
Like I love clarity.

00:40:31.499 --> 00:40:32.849
I really treasure clarity.

00:40:32.964 --> 00:40:34.254
Rupert Isaacson: Clarity over claret.

00:40:34.284 --> 00:40:34.574
Yeah.

00:40:34.644 --> 00:40:35.974
Helen Sharp: Yeah, yeah.

00:40:37.499 --> 00:40:37.919
Yeah.

00:40:38.429 --> 00:40:41.219
So that was, that was that kind of
episode, but I don't regret it and I

00:40:41.219 --> 00:40:44.749
don't mind talking about it because as
you say, lots of people have been there

00:40:44.749 --> 00:40:48.829
and you know, I don't really care if it's
an eyebrow razor for some, it's my job.

00:40:48.829 --> 00:40:48.994
No, no.

00:40:48.994 --> 00:40:49.114
I

00:40:49.114 --> 00:40:51.079
Rupert Isaacson: think, I think
it's a job qualification, honestly.

00:40:51.189 --> 00:40:53.859
My feeling is that if you haven't
gone through things like this,

00:40:54.999 --> 00:41:00.969
what tools have you got for helping
somebody else go through something?

00:41:01.509 --> 00:41:05.409
When I'm doing trainings, for example, in
Horse Boy Method or Movement Method or ta,

00:41:05.889 --> 00:41:13.199
one of our programs sometimes what I will
ask people is, look, you are asking these

00:41:14.249 --> 00:41:17.279
kids or adults to make a major change.

00:41:19.019 --> 00:41:21.899
From say, non-verbal to
verbal or non-communicative

00:41:21.899 --> 00:41:23.609
to communicative or whatever.

00:41:24.119 --> 00:41:26.129
Or let's say it's a horse training thing.

00:41:26.229 --> 00:41:29.289
You are asking this horse
to learn this thing.

00:41:29.709 --> 00:41:32.259
It could be a movement thing
or it could be going into a

00:41:32.259 --> 00:41:34.389
trailer, but this is a big deal.

00:41:36.459 --> 00:41:38.199
What change are you making?

00:41:40.719 --> 00:41:42.909
What fundamental fear are you facing?

00:41:44.079 --> 00:41:45.429
Are you learning a new language?

00:41:45.429 --> 00:41:48.969
Are you forcing yourself
to go learn programming?

00:41:48.969 --> 00:41:50.739
Are you, what, what, what are you doing?

00:41:51.189 --> 00:41:52.209
And it's so interesting.

00:41:52.269 --> 00:41:54.849
So often with horse people,
it's like, well, I don't need

00:41:55.029 --> 00:41:57.219
to do anything because I'm cool.

00:41:57.219 --> 00:42:00.339
I'm a horsey person and I
worked it all out, you know?

00:42:00.339 --> 00:42:03.729
And I could do, even if that's not what
they say, that's often the subtext.

00:42:03.729 --> 00:42:07.599
It's like, well, oh man, you're
gonna come across people and horses

00:42:07.599 --> 00:42:14.169
that are gonna demand that you
have tools personally that you've.

00:42:14.544 --> 00:42:18.654
Developed, you know, and that you can't
just say, well, I did that one thing

00:42:18.654 --> 00:42:21.114
and now I don't need to let you know.

00:42:21.144 --> 00:42:24.084
We, we know that we don't
get off that easily, sadly.

00:42:24.474 --> 00:42:27.024
We gotta be continually doing this.

00:42:27.024 --> 00:42:29.654
But I, I think this is often not
really addressed in the horse

00:42:29.654 --> 00:42:31.154
and in the equine assisted world.

00:42:31.264 --> 00:42:35.314
That said, an awful lot of people that
do come into it, like you actually

00:42:35.314 --> 00:42:36.964
do have these very solid stories.

00:42:37.544 --> 00:42:42.224
But I think we need, we need to talk
about them and celebrate them because

00:42:42.224 --> 00:42:45.524
those are the job qualifications.

00:42:45.884 --> 00:42:50.474
When that person or that horse comes
in front of you to say, I accept you.

00:42:50.474 --> 00:42:54.424
I see who you are without judgment, and
absolutely have your back and help you,

00:42:54.664 --> 00:42:56.074
you know, get where you want to go.

00:42:56.404 --> 00:43:00.814
So, whether you raise eyebrows
or not isn't the, isn't the

00:43:00.814 --> 00:43:02.434
question what the question is.

00:43:02.434 --> 00:43:02.884
What do you do?

00:43:02.884 --> 00:43:04.144
What do you do with that skillset?

00:43:04.714 --> 00:43:08.164
And it's interesting you talk about
heroin, 'cause I never got into heroin.

00:43:10.369 --> 00:43:12.979
Except I overdosed on morphine and died.

00:43:13.579 --> 00:43:19.640
So, and it happened in a hospital and it
happened because I smashed my leg up, my

00:43:19.640 --> 00:43:24.259
left leg, which is a, if you ever see me
ride, you'll notice that my left heel,

00:43:24.950 --> 00:43:26.870
when I think it's down often isn't down.

00:43:27.539 --> 00:43:29.879
If you look at pictures of me jumping,
I think, oh, I've got great form.

00:43:29.879 --> 00:43:32.099
And I look at the picture, I
was like, my, he's like, way up.

00:43:32.939 --> 00:43:34.799
I, I just don't have a
lot of feeling in it.

00:43:34.799 --> 00:43:39.569
And so I smashed that leg in six places,
but the horse came on top of me over

00:43:39.569 --> 00:43:43.979
a cross country jump and he rolled
over my body and I remember thinking,

00:43:46.379 --> 00:43:52.379
you know, big horse, big warm blood,
and he rolled off and I could feel

00:43:53.369 --> 00:43:55.259
everything breaking like twigs down there.

00:43:55.619 --> 00:43:58.799
And this feeling of relief of going,
oh, thank God it's only my leg.

00:43:59.639 --> 00:44:02.039
And passing out and then
thinking, oh, no problem.

00:44:02.039 --> 00:44:02.579
I'll just get up.

00:44:02.669 --> 00:44:05.579
And I couldn't get up
and, you know, but anyway.

00:44:05.984 --> 00:44:09.104
After they put metal rods in
my leg and things like that.

00:44:09.284 --> 00:44:15.994
In the recovery room, in this hospital
in Texas, the morphine machine, they

00:44:15.994 --> 00:44:19.594
give you this morphine machine to manage
your own pain so you can give yourself a

00:44:19.594 --> 00:44:22.834
little shot with your thumb malfunctioned.

00:44:24.389 --> 00:44:25.324
And I died.

00:44:25.954 --> 00:44:26.464
Oh my God.

00:44:26.524 --> 00:44:27.394
I overdosed.

00:44:27.394 --> 00:44:30.154
I overdosed myself, and I can
thoroughly recommend it, by the way.

00:44:30.154 --> 00:44:31.234
It's like, great way to go.

00:44:31.774 --> 00:44:34.624
And I, I was down the
tunnel talking to God.

00:44:34.624 --> 00:44:36.889
I was talking to the light and yeah, okay.

00:44:37.049 --> 00:44:39.184
I, I had the most beautiful experience.

00:44:39.364 --> 00:44:40.834
So, and then

00:44:43.444 --> 00:44:49.624
I could go into this, but I, when I saw
my body there, I'm, you know, over there.

00:44:49.624 --> 00:44:53.644
And then I see my body there, and
then there's this sense of, okay,

00:44:53.644 --> 00:44:55.744
I'm being allowed to, to go back.

00:44:55.744 --> 00:44:57.004
In fact, I'm being sent back.

00:44:57.004 --> 00:44:59.974
And there's even a, this
feeling of, oh, God, really?

00:45:00.034 --> 00:45:01.654
Because I felt like I just came home.

00:45:02.944 --> 00:45:05.164
But Rowan, my son, scrubbed shit.

00:45:05.194 --> 00:45:06.724
Okay, fuck, gotta gotta go back.

00:45:06.724 --> 00:45:11.494
And it was this feeling of
wading through viscous ectoplasm

00:45:11.554 --> 00:45:13.414
almost to get back into my body.

00:45:13.414 --> 00:45:19.084
And then I was there, and then as my wife
Ia, who's German looking at me like this,

00:45:19.264 --> 00:45:21.064
and she had noticed that I'd gone blue.

00:45:21.064 --> 00:45:23.104
Luckily thank, I owe her my life.

00:45:23.194 --> 00:45:25.084
She had called the emergency services.

00:45:25.354 --> 00:45:25.414
Wow.

00:45:25.444 --> 00:45:27.244
And I tried to talk to her.

00:45:28.969 --> 00:45:32.464
I went, I thought, oh
my God, I'm brain darn.

00:45:32.674 --> 00:45:33.004
You know?

00:45:33.064 --> 00:45:37.084
And then luckily I managed to
get it because I said, am I okay?

00:45:37.174 --> 00:45:38.644
And of course, she's
German, she can't lie.

00:45:38.644 --> 00:45:39.154
So she went,

00:45:41.584 --> 00:45:44.284
I'm like, couldn't you just like
one time, like just this one time,

00:45:44.374 --> 00:45:47.494
just like one time just maybe go
back because I didn't say this.

00:45:47.494 --> 00:45:48.604
That's what was going on in my brain.

00:45:48.844 --> 00:45:49.204
So, okay.

00:45:49.204 --> 00:45:50.344
My sense of humor's intact.

00:45:50.344 --> 00:45:50.704
That's good.

00:45:51.064 --> 00:45:52.264
And then I down the thing.

00:45:52.444 --> 00:45:56.944
But it's, it's a very
interesting way to go.

00:45:56.944 --> 00:45:58.534
I, I, in that moment.

00:45:59.314 --> 00:46:02.434
Absolutely understood why
people get into heroin.

00:46:02.854 --> 00:46:03.274
Hmm.

00:46:03.394 --> 00:46:09.394
Because it takes away that little voice
in your head that tells you you are shit

00:46:10.174 --> 00:46:11.044
Helen Sharp: that a hundred percent.

00:46:11.044 --> 00:46:15.304
It's a, I used to call it, you
know, it was just a, it was warmth

00:46:16.714 --> 00:46:18.274
where a daily feeling was cold.

00:46:18.274 --> 00:46:20.434
You know, it was always a warmth.

00:46:20.434 --> 00:46:21.784
And yeah.

00:46:22.804 --> 00:46:25.624
It's funny, I, when I talk about it, it's
like I'm talking about somebody else.

00:46:25.624 --> 00:46:28.354
Like, I had no connection.

00:46:28.354 --> 00:46:30.994
It, it's so far away, you know?

00:46:30.994 --> 00:46:34.624
So I think that's why it's, it's easy
to talk about, you know, I think I

00:46:34.624 --> 00:46:39.124
was embarrassed for so many years
and I'm so not embarrassed now.

00:46:39.814 --> 00:46:40.324
You know?

00:46:40.664 --> 00:46:42.669
It, it was a big experience.

00:46:43.299 --> 00:46:43.479
Yeah.

00:46:43.509 --> 00:46:43.749
Rupert Isaacson: Yeah.

00:46:43.749 --> 00:46:47.469
And if you, if you've grown up
with this inner critic, which was

00:46:47.679 --> 00:46:51.159
put into all of us very early and.

00:46:51.714 --> 00:46:54.054
People jump off bridges
because of this voice.

00:46:54.324 --> 00:46:55.164
Helen Sharp: Mockingbird,

00:46:56.470 --> 00:46:58.800
Rupert Isaacson: If you're in the
equine assisted field, or if you're

00:46:58.800 --> 00:47:03.230
considering a career in the equine
assisted field, you might want to consider

00:47:03.300 --> 00:47:07.570
taking one of our three neuroscience
backed equine assisted programs.

00:47:07.630 --> 00:47:13.210
Horseboy method, now established
for 20 years, is the original

00:47:13.805 --> 00:47:20.115
Equine assisted program specifically
designed for autism, mentored by and

00:47:20.115 --> 00:47:22.785
developed in conjunction with Dr.

00:47:22.785 --> 00:47:25.665
Temple Grandin and many
other neuroscientists.

00:47:26.005 --> 00:47:29.275
We work in the saddle
with younger children.

00:47:29.770 --> 00:47:34.720
Helping them create oxytocin in their
bodies and neuroplasticity in the brain.

00:47:35.380 --> 00:47:36.820
It works incredibly well.

00:47:36.820 --> 00:47:38.540
It's now in about 40 countries.

00:47:39.250 --> 00:47:40.000
Check it out.

00:47:40.680 --> 00:47:44.830
If you're working without horses,
you might want to look at movement

00:47:44.840 --> 00:47:48.210
method, which gets a very, very
similar effect, but can also be

00:47:48.210 --> 00:47:49.960
applied in schools, in homes.

00:47:50.160 --> 00:47:55.150
If you're working with families, you can
give them really tangible exercises to do

00:47:55.150 --> 00:47:56.690
at home that will create neuroplasticity.

00:47:58.045 --> 00:47:59.325
when they're not with you.

00:47:59.835 --> 00:48:03.275
Finally, we have taquine
equine integration.

00:48:03.635 --> 00:48:06.255
If you know anything about our
programs, you know that we need a

00:48:06.255 --> 00:48:10.255
really high standard of horsemanship
in order to create the oxytocin

00:48:10.285 --> 00:48:14.575
in the body of the person that
we're working with, child or adult.

00:48:15.015 --> 00:48:18.355
So, this means we need to train
a horse in collection, but this

00:48:18.375 --> 00:48:22.615
also has a really beneficial
effect on the horse's well being.

00:48:22.815 --> 00:48:27.105
And it also ends your time conflict,
where you're wondering, oh my gosh, how

00:48:27.105 --> 00:48:30.405
am I going to condition my horses and
maintain them and give them what they

00:48:30.405 --> 00:48:33.500
need, as well as Serving my clients.

00:48:33.740 --> 00:48:38.240
Takine equine integration aimed
at a more adult client base

00:48:38.570 --> 00:48:40.220
absolutely gives you this.

00:48:40.280 --> 00:48:44.260
you know, when I'm doing trainings
for autism, you know, and, and

00:48:46.270 --> 00:48:49.600
you know, people are saying, gosh, I
wish my kid was neurotypical or whatever.

00:48:49.600 --> 00:48:52.420
I'm like, dude, that's no holy grail.

00:48:52.960 --> 00:48:56.830
You know, people are topping themselves
every day who are neurotypical

00:48:57.070 --> 00:49:00.640
because of this voice in your head
telling you your shit all the time.

00:49:00.640 --> 00:49:03.460
That's the curse of being neurotypical.

00:49:03.460 --> 00:49:08.140
And if we ramp, if we amplify
that voice, something like heroin

00:49:08.140 --> 00:49:10.600
becomes incredibly attractive.

00:49:11.170 --> 00:49:16.120
And it's interesting too, I've met
heroine addicts who are long-term heroine

00:49:16.120 --> 00:49:17.920
addicts, like 30 year, 40 year heroin

00:49:17.920 --> 00:49:18.100
Helen Sharp: addicts.

00:49:18.130 --> 00:49:18.190
Yeah.

00:49:18.190 --> 00:49:19.060
Functioning as they function.

00:49:19.150 --> 00:49:19.360
Right.

00:49:19.360 --> 00:49:19.630
And they

00:49:19.630 --> 00:49:22.120
Rupert Isaacson: would say, honestly,
Rupe, it made me a better person.

00:49:22.210 --> 00:49:22.270
Yeah.

00:49:22.350 --> 00:49:27.600
You know, if I could survive to
I have now and I'm not having to

00:49:27.600 --> 00:49:29.790
resort to criminality to get my fix.

00:49:31.125 --> 00:49:35.145
I'm a better person than
I would be without it.

00:49:35.595 --> 00:49:42.725
And I think that what is has entered
the conversation luckily since COVID,

00:49:44.075 --> 00:49:45.875
you know, is, is mental health, right?

00:49:45.935 --> 00:49:45.995
Hmm.

00:49:46.295 --> 00:49:54.635
Which means that the value of altered
of consciousness is suddenly a

00:49:54.635 --> 00:49:58.535
conversation where it was not before
suddenly like every, everyone in

00:49:58.535 --> 00:50:02.375
generation Z or whatever they are right
now is doing ayahuasca or whatever.

00:50:02.975 --> 00:50:07.025
But that was not the case
before even about 2020.

00:50:07.505 --> 00:50:08.375
So

00:50:10.985 --> 00:50:16.265
if something like ayahuasca with a decent
shaman had been available to you and you'd

00:50:16.265 --> 00:50:24.965
been living out there on the Celtic Fringe
with a good healer with plant medicines.

00:50:27.050 --> 00:50:33.800
I would hazard that maybe you would've
found some of that sanctuary, that

00:50:33.800 --> 00:50:39.950
spiritual sanctuary without the need for
the other shit that went along with it.

00:50:40.490 --> 00:50:43.130
But you must be able to
look back at that and, and

00:50:45.530 --> 00:50:56.120
give value and validation and respect in a
funny way to the sanctuary that the poppy,

00:50:56.480 --> 00:51:01.190
which is it's just a plant heroin, it's
poppy provided the red poppy provided,

00:51:02.060 --> 00:51:03.950
but sadly it was without guidance.

00:51:03.950 --> 00:51:04.250
Right.

00:51:04.970 --> 00:51:05.150
Helen Sharp: Yeah.

00:51:05.150 --> 00:51:07.460
I think that's really
beautifully put actually.

00:51:07.820 --> 00:51:13.460
Yeah, it's, I mean, I mean, you
know, I suppose my psychologist,

00:51:13.520 --> 00:51:17.300
my former psychologist would've
said, you know, it was, it was an

00:51:17.300 --> 00:51:20.660
intelligent self-medicating strategy.

00:51:21.410 --> 00:51:21.800
You know, it was.

00:51:23.300 --> 00:51:26.210
It wasn't really because it was cool,
it was because I was a really, I was

00:51:26.210 --> 00:51:30.170
quite a damaged young person because,
you know, there had been things in my

00:51:30.170 --> 00:51:34.340
earlier life that had been a problem and,
you know, I was, I just wasn't very well,

00:51:34.400 --> 00:51:40.880
you know, and it, it did, it served its
purpose, but it also, at the same time,

00:51:40.880 --> 00:51:45.380
I wouldn't advocate for it be no, you
know, for what it, for for the upset.

00:51:45.380 --> 00:51:45.770
I suppose.

00:51:45.770 --> 00:51:48.560
It caused my loved ones, my
friends and things and my, my

00:51:48.560 --> 00:51:50.180
family that did know at the time.

00:51:50.180 --> 00:51:54.560
And and I saw a lot of really awful
things that actually still want me.

00:51:54.560 --> 00:51:59.870
And funnily enough, full circle actually,
you know, when, when you're in that,

00:51:59.930 --> 00:52:04.730
in those sort of depths, you in, in
Liverpool there, there was quite a lot of

00:52:04.730 --> 00:52:07.250
veterans who were, who were using drugs.

00:52:07.730 --> 00:52:10.880
And one in particular who I would
give all my money in the world

00:52:10.880 --> 00:52:15.950
to go and find was a, was a was
a, was a, a Falcon's veteran who.

00:52:16.610 --> 00:52:21.890
Obviously just saw this young
girl in this kind of situation.

00:52:21.890 --> 00:52:25.370
She shouldn't be in, in a shooting gallery
in wherever I was, you know, on the

00:52:25.370 --> 00:52:27.380
Outskirt Chester or somewhere, you know?

00:52:27.385 --> 00:52:31.700
And, and this guy lived not too far
from me, and he just used to, he just

00:52:31.700 --> 00:52:34.970
kept, he just, he'd be so much more
upset from me than himself, you know?

00:52:35.000 --> 00:52:36.050
But he was hiding too.

00:52:36.050 --> 00:52:39.710
He was, he was dealing with
his PTSD through heroin and,

00:52:39.710 --> 00:52:41.150
and he stayed with me forever.

00:52:41.150 --> 00:52:44.600
And truth be told, there's a bit
of him in everything I'm doing now.

00:52:45.350 --> 00:52:50.540
I think when I really put it together,
because it was so sad to see this man

00:52:50.540 --> 00:52:55.100
who'd done so much, and he'd done tours
of Northern Ireland as well, and he

00:52:55.100 --> 00:52:57.230
was a really beautiful human being.

00:52:57.230 --> 00:53:00.710
But he was just, that was his only,
you know, that was his escape.

00:53:00.795 --> 00:53:04.790
And, and I hope he is
around still, but you know.

00:53:05.540 --> 00:53:10.880
Of course we see, we see veterans with
substance abuse problems now here, you

00:53:10.880 --> 00:53:15.700
know, and there's definitely echoes
of, of that in the work I'm doing now.

00:53:16.810 --> 00:53:19.210
Rupert Isaacson: And you remember a
particular conversation with this man?

00:53:19.690 --> 00:53:21.760
Something that he said to
you at a particular moment?

00:53:25.150 --> 00:53:28.390
Helen Sharp: I think he
said, don't lose yourself.

00:53:30.040 --> 00:53:33.310
You know, I mean, he said, you know,
he'd sort of, and it wasn't in a sleazy

00:53:33.310 --> 00:53:36.070
way because I was there with my partner
at the time, or you know, my husband

00:53:36.070 --> 00:53:39.130
at the time, whatever, you know, we'd
be all, but, you know, he was very much

00:53:39.130 --> 00:53:40.720
like, you're a beautiful young girl.

00:53:40.720 --> 00:53:43.690
You know, you're, you're, you've
got, you've got everything

00:53:44.170 --> 00:53:44.380
Rupert Isaacson: ahead of

00:53:44.380 --> 00:53:44.590
Helen Sharp: you.

00:53:44.595 --> 00:53:47.950
You know, don't get caught in,
don't get trapped in this, you know?

00:53:48.250 --> 00:53:53.010
And I think that was, it was that don't
lose yourself, I think was the thing.

00:53:53.010 --> 00:53:53.190
Where

00:53:53.190 --> 00:53:54.870
Rupert Isaacson: was your
partner in this, at that time?

00:53:55.620 --> 00:53:57.840
Helen Sharp: Well, he was
there, but he was a, he was.

00:53:58.905 --> 00:54:00.795
18, 18 years older than me.

00:54:01.185 --> 00:54:03.165
I thought I was marrying Sge Gainsborough.

00:54:04.880 --> 00:54:06.090
Rupert Isaacson: Well,
perhaps you were, but

00:54:07.125 --> 00:54:07.425
Helen Sharp: Yeah.

00:54:07.865 --> 00:54:12.035
You know, bad poets, good snake skin
shoes, you know, one of them guys.

00:54:12.335 --> 00:54:12.695
Right.

00:54:12.695 --> 00:54:16.345
And yeah, so like we met on the first
night and decided to get married, you

00:54:16.345 --> 00:54:20.035
know, on these ridiculous kind of like,
isn't it romantic nonsense really.

00:54:20.035 --> 00:54:23.195
But so he was there, but obviously
he was part and parcel of it.

00:54:23.195 --> 00:54:27.365
And he, he, although I was old
enough to know better, I suppose, he

00:54:27.365 --> 00:54:31.595
introduced me to intravenous drug use
and sort of started a trajectory that

00:54:31.595 --> 00:54:33.395
I, I found it very hard to get off.

00:54:33.695 --> 00:54:38.075
So he was around, but you know,
I had to get clarity before I

00:54:38.075 --> 00:54:40.385
could make him not be around.

00:54:42.425 --> 00:54:43.805
Rupert Isaacson: I want to just, okay.

00:54:44.075 --> 00:54:45.965
Intravenous drug use
is an interesting one.

00:54:46.025 --> 00:54:46.085
I.

00:54:46.730 --> 00:54:49.160
Most of us have a fear of needles and

00:54:49.200 --> 00:54:49.950
Helen Sharp: I'm terrible now.

00:54:49.950 --> 00:54:50.460
Oh my God.

00:54:50.460 --> 00:54:51.000
I can't, oh,

00:54:51.415 --> 00:54:53.280
Rupert Isaacson: it, it, it's
so, it's so interesting what

00:54:53.280 --> 00:54:54.330
we choose to be afraid of.

00:54:54.330 --> 00:55:00.390
Like, I'll hurt myself at a big cross
country jump and, you know, do what I

00:55:00.390 --> 00:55:04.600
did with my leg or whatever and think
that that's perfectly reasonable.

00:55:04.960 --> 00:55:07.810
But if you come near me with
a needle, I'll, I'll, you

00:55:07.810 --> 00:55:09.160
know, hide under the chair.

00:55:09.580 --> 00:55:13.360
Or if you try to make me eat an egg,
you know, I'll throw myself out.

00:55:13.360 --> 00:55:13.450
Well,

00:55:13.450 --> 00:55:13.810
Helen Sharp: me too.

00:55:13.810 --> 00:55:14.560
I hate eggs.

00:55:14.710 --> 00:55:14.920
Rupert Isaacson: Oh God.

00:55:14.920 --> 00:55:15.460
I can't remember.

00:55:15.460 --> 00:55:19.030
My mom said I spit them out
when I was 18 months old.

00:55:19.570 --> 00:55:25.180
I always think that the people that
can inject themselves, and I'm not

00:55:25.180 --> 00:55:28.750
just saying that the heroin users also
like the people with diabetes and so

00:55:28.750 --> 00:55:31.000
on, it's an act of massive bravery.

00:55:31.190 --> 00:55:35.780
And I always remember thinking, you know,
when I was living in squats in Montreal

00:55:36.590 --> 00:55:39.440
and Toronto and London, when I was.

00:55:40.055 --> 00:55:44.955
500 years ago a young man, and there
was a lot of it going on around me.

00:55:44.955 --> 00:55:47.865
I remember always thinking about
the people that stuck the needles

00:55:47.865 --> 00:55:49.605
and going, man, you're so brave.

00:55:49.770 --> 00:55:50.865
I, I couldn't do that.

00:55:51.465 --> 00:55:53.145
What gave you the bravery?

00:55:53.145 --> 00:55:54.495
Because there's so many way other ways.

00:55:54.495 --> 00:55:58.125
You could do heroin, you could
smoke it, you could, there's

00:55:58.125 --> 00:55:59.170
lots of ways to get fucked up.

00:55:59.405 --> 00:56:04.910
Why that and, and what gave you the
courage to, to go through the pain?

00:56:04.980 --> 00:56:05.380
Helen Sharp: I think it,

00:56:08.660 --> 00:56:11.780
I just keep laughing about people
listening to this, but actually I, I

00:56:11.780 --> 00:56:18.285
think it's my natural inquisitive nature,
you know, cut to the journalist today.

00:56:18.285 --> 00:56:23.385
But like, I have never really seen a limit
to what I want to know and experience.

00:56:24.195 --> 00:56:24.375
And

00:56:24.375 --> 00:56:25.035
Rupert Isaacson: unless it's eggs

00:56:26.055 --> 00:56:27.075
Helen Sharp: fucking, sorry.

00:56:27.255 --> 00:56:28.275
Keep your eggs.

00:56:28.515 --> 00:56:30.375
Oh, I can't do eggs.

00:56:30.405 --> 00:56:30.795
No.

00:56:31.195 --> 00:56:31.435
Yeah.

00:56:31.465 --> 00:56:33.025
I think that's partly it.

00:56:33.850 --> 00:56:40.630
Was partly also, if I'm really, really
honest, I was really deeply unhappy

00:56:41.350 --> 00:56:45.790
and overwhelmed by every life universe.

00:56:45.820 --> 00:56:47.560
Like the, the scale of everything.

00:56:47.560 --> 00:56:49.240
I just couldn't, I remember

00:56:49.240 --> 00:56:49.535
Rupert Isaacson: that feeling.

00:56:49.565 --> 00:56:49.855
Yeah.

00:56:49.925 --> 00:56:50.215
Yeah.

00:56:50.395 --> 00:56:50.895
Had it today.

00:56:51.565 --> 00:56:51.855
Helen Sharp: Yeah.

00:56:52.870 --> 00:56:54.880
And then actually it becomes
a lot more practical.

00:56:54.910 --> 00:56:57.430
'cause I'm already quite a pragmatic,
I'm also a pragmatic person.

00:56:57.880 --> 00:57:02.740
And as most junkies would tell you quite
often, routine is what it gives you.

00:57:02.980 --> 00:57:04.120
And ritual routine.

00:57:04.120 --> 00:57:04.750
And ritual.

00:57:05.680 --> 00:57:07.000
So that just becomes the thing.

00:57:07.000 --> 00:57:10.360
So you, you are balancing yourself,
you know, around, you know, your,

00:57:10.360 --> 00:57:13.570
your, it's your compass for the day.

00:57:13.570 --> 00:57:14.410
It's your compass.

00:57:14.410 --> 00:57:17.590
I was actually listening to Nick
Cave did an interview recently.

00:57:17.760 --> 00:57:21.000
And he touched on that, that
it's sort of, it's your job

00:57:21.960 --> 00:57:23.370
if you are lost in the world.

00:57:24.540 --> 00:57:27.690
Intravenous drug u drug
use can become your job.

00:57:27.690 --> 00:57:29.190
Now, funnily enough, you ground it's, it

00:57:29.190 --> 00:57:29.760
Rupert Isaacson: grounds you.

00:57:29.760 --> 00:57:30.510
Yeah, I could see that.

00:57:30.510 --> 00:57:30.600
Yeah.

00:57:31.050 --> 00:57:32.280
Helen Sharp: It's a central thing.

00:57:32.285 --> 00:57:32.385
But,

00:57:32.610 --> 00:57:35.790
Rupert Isaacson: but I, I could,
but it's the intravenous thing that

00:57:35.790 --> 00:57:38.730
I'm intrigued by, because again,
you could chase the dragon, right?

00:57:38.730 --> 00:57:42.270
You could smoke heroin off
a piece of aluminum foil.

00:57:44.370 --> 00:57:44.820
So it's,

00:57:45.060 --> 00:57:47.400
Helen Sharp: it's self, it's har it's
harmful in a way as well, isn't it?

00:57:47.400 --> 00:57:47.910
It's a bit like the

00:57:47.910 --> 00:57:48.720
Rupert Isaacson: cutting in a way.

00:57:48.720 --> 00:57:49.050
Yeah.

00:57:49.140 --> 00:57:51.060
Helen Sharp: So it's not,
it's not dissimilar to that.

00:57:51.060 --> 00:57:53.910
And there, and there's a kind
of, you know, there, there's

00:57:53.910 --> 00:57:55.260
something that comes with it.

00:57:55.290 --> 00:57:58.920
It's, it is funny now though, the minute
I've got, I've had this diagnosis of

00:57:58.920 --> 00:58:02.410
rheumatoid arthritis this year and it
I've had to start this medication, but you

00:58:02.410 --> 00:58:04.810
have to have bloods taken every two weeks.

00:58:05.320 --> 00:58:08.230
And I just, every time, every two
weeks I go in, it's like, I just

00:58:08.230 --> 00:58:10.480
think, God, if only they knew
because I'm about to pass out.

00:58:10.480 --> 00:58:11.470
I can't bear it.

00:58:11.470 --> 00:58:12.820
I just can't bear it, you know?

00:58:12.820 --> 00:58:15.670
And I just, my mind is
always racing, thinking.

00:58:15.670 --> 00:58:21.160
If this nurse only knew, yeah,
those things actually, funnily

00:58:21.160 --> 00:58:24.130
enough, is I suppose this is what's
coming out from talking to you.

00:58:24.130 --> 00:58:28.960
It's, those things remain really important
for me, which is a sort of exploratory

00:58:28.960 --> 00:58:32.950
nature, but also routine and ritual.

00:58:32.950 --> 00:58:37.210
I'm really, I have a lot of, suppose
my beautiful husband that I have

00:58:37.210 --> 00:58:42.910
now would testify that I have ways
that have to be the way they are.

00:58:43.870 --> 00:58:44.830
Rupert Isaacson: Little bit OCD.

00:58:45.580 --> 00:58:46.030
Helen Sharp: Yeah.

00:58:46.270 --> 00:58:46.600
Yeah.

00:58:46.600 --> 00:58:49.750
It was di it was given
the title selective OCD.

00:58:51.460 --> 00:58:54.190
So like the cups are all going the
same way in the kitchen, but my

00:58:54.190 --> 00:58:56.245
desk is a tip, you know, like, it's

00:58:56.245 --> 00:58:58.960
Rupert Isaacson: like, could we
call that Priestess syndrome?

00:58:59.440 --> 00:59:00.700
Helen Sharp: Oh, just give it, yeah.

00:59:00.700 --> 00:59:01.480
That's great.

00:59:04.060 --> 00:59:04.930
Rupert Isaacson: Temple Guardian.

00:59:05.380 --> 00:59:05.770
Helen Sharp: Love it.

00:59:06.350 --> 00:59:08.600
Rupert Isaacson: Okay, so
where does journalism come in?

00:59:10.655 --> 00:59:12.275
Helen Sharp: So writing
was always my thing.

00:59:12.275 --> 00:59:13.895
I should never have gone to art college.

00:59:13.900 --> 00:59:13.980
Okay.

00:59:13.985 --> 00:59:16.385
I wasn't even that good at
drawing, as my dad pointed out

00:59:16.385 --> 00:59:18.635
in one of my school meetings.

00:59:18.995 --> 00:59:19.885
But writing

00:59:21.145 --> 00:59:22.015
Rupert Isaacson: mind you,
you don't need to be good at

00:59:22.015 --> 00:59:23.185
drawing anymore at art college.

00:59:23.185 --> 00:59:23.305
No,

00:59:23.455 --> 00:59:24.025
Helen Sharp: exactly.

00:59:24.025 --> 00:59:26.995
I got into, I got into performance
art, so you definitely didn't need to.

00:59:27.175 --> 00:59:30.785
But yeah, so I always wrote,
well, I wrote well as a kid.

00:59:31.115 --> 00:59:33.095
I wrote well through college.

00:59:33.515 --> 00:59:36.035
I did a PhD in art because I
didn't want to do the art bit.

00:59:36.035 --> 00:59:37.625
I wanted to do the writing bit.

00:59:37.775 --> 00:59:41.030
You know, writing has just
always been there, so why

00:59:41.030 --> 00:59:41.910
Rupert Isaacson: not
do a creative writing?

00:59:41.970 --> 00:59:42.995
Why, why do what?

00:59:43.265 --> 00:59:46.535
Helen Sharp: Oh, because at 15 I decided
it was cool to go to art college.

00:59:46.565 --> 00:59:47.015
Okay, fair enough.

00:59:47.315 --> 00:59:48.150
It's like you're more likely to

00:59:48.155 --> 00:59:48.815
Rupert Isaacson: end up in a band.

00:59:48.935 --> 00:59:49.325
That's true.

00:59:49.580 --> 00:59:49.870
Helen Sharp: Yeah.

00:59:50.030 --> 00:59:50.510
I did then,

00:59:50.780 --> 00:59:51.070
Rupert Isaacson: yeah,

00:59:51.230 --> 00:59:52.775
Helen Sharp: I did end
up in a band, of course.

00:59:53.525 --> 00:59:56.185
But yeah, writing, I suppose, and
I didn't have confidence in writing

00:59:56.185 --> 00:59:59.455
it in some sort of ways, but it
always came really, really naturally.

00:59:59.905 --> 01:00:04.735
And even the artworks I was making
quite often involve text and words and.

01:00:06.025 --> 01:00:09.265
I'm not a good speaker, but I'm a
better writer than I am speaker.

01:00:09.265 --> 01:00:12.115
So I just fell in love with writing.

01:00:12.115 --> 01:00:18.745
And then in my, yeah, I just, at one point
I decided just I was, I was traveling.

01:00:18.745 --> 01:00:21.325
I traveled all over the world
making artworks and performance art.

01:00:21.325 --> 01:00:24.925
I was in Belarus, I was in
Boston, and I was everywhere as a

01:00:24.925 --> 01:00:26.515
performance artist, you know, kind of

01:00:26.515 --> 01:00:28.825
Rupert Isaacson: when,
when, oh God, in this story.

01:00:29.005 --> 01:00:30.415
Helen Sharp: So we're in
my early thirties now.

01:00:31.315 --> 01:00:32.605
Rupert Isaacson: You've kicked the heroin?

01:00:32.905 --> 01:00:33.235
Helen Sharp: Yeah.

01:00:33.355 --> 01:00:34.345
Rupert Isaacson: You've moved to Belfast.

01:00:34.345 --> 01:00:35.995
You got yourself this job.

01:00:36.000 --> 01:00:36.250
Helen Sharp: Yeah.

01:00:36.475 --> 01:00:36.805
Yeah.

01:00:36.925 --> 01:00:38.965
Rupert Isaacson: As a, well
no, you're doing your PhD.

01:00:39.295 --> 01:00:39.415
Helen Sharp: Yeah.

01:00:39.415 --> 01:00:39.565
And

01:00:39.565 --> 01:00:42.530
Rupert Isaacson: now you're getting
jobs, doing installations or something.

01:00:42.600 --> 01:00:43.045
Well, it was

01:00:43.045 --> 01:00:44.965
Helen Sharp: before, it was
actually before the PhD.

01:00:44.965 --> 01:00:49.855
It was sort of, it was in my early
thirties, so my, the final PhD

01:00:49.855 --> 01:00:53.215
was a little bit, it was a bit
closer to my mid to late thirties.

01:00:53.215 --> 01:00:57.265
But yeah, I was doing performance art
and, and I did performance art because

01:00:57.265 --> 01:01:02.065
I saw, when I did my undergraduate,
I saw a very beautiful, tall.

01:01:02.305 --> 01:01:07.135
A woman from Hungary, I think she was,
and she did a performance art piece and I

01:01:07.135 --> 01:01:08.815
didn't really know about performance art.

01:01:08.875 --> 01:01:11.275
And she did this piece and
she got her first class honors

01:01:11.275 --> 01:01:13.195
and she had her boobs out.

01:01:13.375 --> 01:01:15.685
And I remember kind of getting
really annoyed just going, yeah,

01:01:15.690 --> 01:01:16.070
Rupert Isaacson: I could do that.

01:01:16.730 --> 01:01:21.535
Helen Sharp: All those, all those tutors,
you know, but it kind of intrigued me.

01:01:21.565 --> 01:01:25.045
I was sort of jealous and
intrigued and kind of like,

01:01:25.315 --> 01:01:26.395
what is that that she's doing?

01:01:26.395 --> 01:01:26.485
Mm-hmm.

01:01:27.145 --> 01:01:29.905
So I decided that's why I decided
to go and study a master's in it.

01:01:29.935 --> 01:01:31.790
'cause it annoy, it
had annoyed me so much.

01:01:31.790 --> 01:01:32.190
Mm-hmm.

01:01:32.275 --> 01:01:34.675
So I went and studied it
and then I realized, oh, you

01:01:34.675 --> 01:01:35.665
can do whatever you want.

01:01:35.665 --> 01:01:38.425
And then I sort of learned how
to do it and, but it did take me,

01:01:38.425 --> 01:01:40.015
it did take me to lots of places

01:01:40.645 --> 01:01:42.295
Rupert Isaacson: so that
this was performance art at

01:01:42.295 --> 01:01:43.225
this point, not sculpture.

01:01:43.630 --> 01:01:45.580
Helen Sharp: Yeah, I did
sculptures my undergraduate and my

01:01:45.580 --> 01:01:47.200
master's was in performance art.

01:01:47.230 --> 01:01:49.990
Rupert Isaacson: So what performance
art were you doing in Belarus in Boston?

01:01:50.260 --> 01:01:51.220
Helen Sharp: Oh, I did some great one.

01:01:51.790 --> 01:01:52.120
Rupert Isaacson: Tell me.

01:01:52.990 --> 01:01:55.900
Helen Sharp: Well, I did a piece where
I act, I accidentally got knocked

01:01:55.900 --> 01:01:57.610
out, which was not supposed to happen.

01:01:57.610 --> 01:01:59.110
And it wasn't like for cool points.

01:01:59.110 --> 01:02:04.060
I was doing a piece where I
would wear a motorbike helmet and

01:02:04.180 --> 01:02:05.940
there'd be so I'd suspend a bot.

01:02:05.940 --> 01:02:07.320
This was in Belarus, actually.

01:02:07.860 --> 01:02:08.820
Rupert Isaacson: Good
place to get knocked out.

01:02:08.940 --> 01:02:09.090
Yeah,

01:02:09.450 --> 01:02:11.940
Helen Sharp: it's not a lot of
horses in this podcast for me, is it?

01:02:12.780 --> 01:02:15.090
But yeah, anyway, it was the place
where I was doing this piece, and

01:02:15.150 --> 01:02:17.550
obviously it was about mental health
actually, obviously when I was looking

01:02:17.550 --> 01:02:19.920
back, it was expressing therefore

01:02:19.920 --> 01:02:21.015
Rupert Isaacson: taking
a big bang on the head.

01:02:21.255 --> 01:02:21.375
Absolutely.

01:02:21.380 --> 01:02:21.510
But I

01:02:21.510 --> 01:02:23.610
Helen Sharp: kept, but I was using
the reference of the image of

01:02:23.610 --> 01:02:27.480
launching the ship with a bottle of
champagne, so when someone wax flings

01:02:27.480 --> 01:02:29.040
it at the, at the bow of a ship.

01:02:29.550 --> 01:02:32.100
But I was the bow of the ship, basically.

01:02:32.280 --> 01:02:32.550
Rupert Isaacson: Why?

01:02:32.550 --> 01:02:32.670
To

01:02:33.000 --> 01:02:37.080
Helen Sharp: get someone in the, in the
audience to, to, to fling this bottle.

01:02:37.260 --> 01:02:38.430
Anyway, the Belarusian.

01:02:39.135 --> 01:02:42.675
The be the Belarusian helmet wasn't
great and it gave me such a clunk,

01:02:43.700 --> 01:02:46.635
Rupert Isaacson: but the Belarusian person
entered into the spirit of the thing.

01:02:46.695 --> 01:02:47.595
Helen Sharp: Yeah, it wasn't great.

01:02:47.595 --> 01:02:48.615
But anyway, that was the one.

01:02:48.615 --> 01:02:50.595
But yeah.

01:02:50.955 --> 01:02:51.435
Why?

01:02:51.435 --> 01:02:53.325
I dunno, I swung off an anchor.

01:02:53.325 --> 01:02:58.455
I, I hadn't anchored suspended from the
ceiling in a gallery of Find contemporary

01:02:58.455 --> 01:03:02.805
art gallery in Boston and I swung off
that and used to have big slides, a

01:03:02.805 --> 01:03:04.455
lot of horses in the imagery actually.

01:03:04.455 --> 01:03:11.295
And why the long face kind of written
and spray paint across, you know, kind

01:03:11.295 --> 01:03:13.845
of, I dunno, madness, but really fun.

01:03:14.050 --> 01:03:16.380
Rupert Isaacson: Yeah, A lot of
fun getting paid to have a laugh.

01:03:16.620 --> 01:03:16.820
I mean,

01:03:17.085 --> 01:03:21.915
Helen Sharp: yeah, people and ultimately
I do frivolity really well, but actually

01:03:21.915 --> 01:03:26.895
I really mean it like frivolity is, you
know, frivolity you talk about joy a lot,

01:03:26.925 --> 01:03:30.225
but like frivolity and laughter frivolity

01:03:30.225 --> 01:03:31.335
Rupert Isaacson: is, is a form of joy.

01:03:31.365 --> 01:03:32.055
Absolutely.

01:03:32.085 --> 01:03:32.415
Helen Sharp: Yeah.

01:03:34.005 --> 01:03:36.855
Rupert Isaacson: In fact,
there's, there's a, there's a

01:03:38.605 --> 01:03:40.555
there's a great quote on Folly.

01:03:40.985 --> 01:03:43.025
I'm looking it up on my
cell phone right now.

01:03:43.655 --> 01:03:45.575
If I can't find it, I'll paraphrase it.

01:03:54.875 --> 01:03:56.885
I don't want to hold the thing up.

01:03:56.885 --> 01:04:04.145
But basically it's that there's no great
endeavor that humans undertake that does

01:04:04.145 --> 01:04:08.255
not involve a large degree of folly.

01:04:08.255 --> 01:04:09.065
Mm-hmm.

01:04:09.280 --> 01:04:16.895
And Folly is this idea of, it's
not the crack, you know, in, in

01:04:16.895 --> 01:04:23.015
Ireland or joy for the sake of
itself, almost like a divine mania.

01:04:23.330 --> 01:04:23.720
Helen Sharp: Yeah.

01:04:23.960 --> 01:04:26.810
Rupert Isaacson: In order
to access certain treat, or

01:04:26.870 --> 01:04:32.090
again, back to altered state of
consciousness, I think shamanic joy.

01:04:32.510 --> 01:04:32.720
Hmm.

01:04:32.810 --> 01:04:37.250
Where you will make yourself the fool,
you'll make yourself the butt of the joke.

01:04:37.280 --> 01:04:41.720
I think I always have the utmost
respect for people who make themselves

01:04:41.720 --> 01:04:44.330
vulnerable, especially to judgment.

01:04:45.050 --> 01:04:52.160
Knowing that there's a sort of job
to be done with it in a funny way.

01:04:52.850 --> 01:04:57.050
And it's something I, I can spot in
people and it's like, oh, you have

01:04:57.050 --> 01:05:00.890
that courage and it's fun, you know?

01:05:00.890 --> 01:05:01.100
Yeah.

01:05:01.160 --> 01:05:04.250
But I always have massive
respect for those people because

01:05:04.430 --> 01:05:05.720
life is so short, you know?

01:05:05.720 --> 01:05:12.560
And to not occasionally stick your neck
out when somebody could take a swing

01:05:12.560 --> 01:05:14.570
with the ax is also not to be alive.

01:05:15.500 --> 01:05:15.890
Yeah.

01:05:15.890 --> 01:05:15.891
Yeah.

01:05:16.820 --> 01:05:16.880
Helen Sharp: Yeah.

01:05:17.195 --> 01:05:17.855
A hundred percent.

01:05:18.095 --> 01:05:21.635
I remember actually just briefly, I
suppose there was one performance I did

01:05:21.635 --> 01:05:26.435
and I, I was sitting for about three
hours in a gallery and I was just twisting

01:05:26.435 --> 01:05:28.715
Marino cherries onto the end of my nose

01:05:28.985 --> 01:05:29.525
Rupert Isaacson: As you do.

01:05:29.885 --> 01:05:30.035
Yeah.

01:05:30.095 --> 01:05:30.545
Helen Sharp: Yeah.

01:05:30.755 --> 01:05:33.275
But of course forward in the pub,
the clown's nose, it was just the

01:05:33.275 --> 01:05:35.045
clown's nose, but it never would stick.

01:05:35.045 --> 01:05:37.685
So it was just continuously the
clown's and it was falling off.

01:05:37.865 --> 01:05:41.645
And I remember, I thought it was kind of
funny and a little bit melancholy, but I

01:05:41.645 --> 01:05:43.715
remember kind of looking up and floods.

01:05:43.775 --> 01:05:45.275
People were in floods of tears.

01:05:45.335 --> 01:05:45.425
Rupert Isaacson: Yeah.

01:05:45.725 --> 01:05:46.415
Helen Sharp: In the gallery.

01:05:46.415 --> 01:05:49.115
It was incredibly sad.

01:05:49.115 --> 01:05:51.605
I an image of this g you know, and of

01:05:51.605 --> 01:05:53.105
Rupert Isaacson: this, it
sounds sad to me actually.

01:05:53.435 --> 01:05:53.795
Helen Sharp: Yeah.

01:05:53.795 --> 01:05:56.575
It was kind of, failing and
failing and failing and failing

01:05:56.635 --> 01:05:57.685
kind of thing, you know?

01:05:57.785 --> 01:05:58.775
Rupert Isaacson: And trying to be happy.

01:05:59.075 --> 01:05:59.645
Helen Sharp: Yeah.

01:06:00.335 --> 01:06:03.395
Rupert Isaacson: So why did
you stop doing that stuff and

01:06:03.395 --> 01:06:04.595
why did you go into journalism?

01:06:04.835 --> 01:06:06.425
It sounds like you're
quite good at that stuff.

01:06:07.595 --> 01:06:08.855
Helen Sharp: Yeah, I just had enough.

01:06:08.855 --> 01:06:10.325
I just had had, you know, it was everyone.

01:06:10.775 --> 01:06:13.205
People say it's brave all the
time to sort of suddenly go.

01:06:14.675 --> 01:06:18.515
I just, I was working in galleries as
well and I was curating other people's

01:06:18.515 --> 01:06:20.855
work and things and I just, you'd

01:06:20.855 --> 01:06:22.355
Rupert Isaacson: enter
the industry, right?

01:06:22.355 --> 01:06:23.165
Helen Sharp: Yeah, exactly.

01:06:23.165 --> 01:06:23.495
Right.

01:06:23.585 --> 01:06:27.815
So I, but I just had enough, but I've
never been scared to, to make changes

01:06:27.815 --> 01:06:32.885
where I required and I just thought,
I really love, I bought this horse,

01:06:32.885 --> 01:06:38.075
obviously for a pound king, and I, and
I loved him and I thought, like horses,

01:06:38.105 --> 01:06:42.155
I love horses because as I said it to
my husband recently, I feel like when

01:06:42.155 --> 01:06:46.745
I'm on my deathbed and taking my final
breath, I'll never know everything

01:06:46.745 --> 01:06:48.275
about horses that there is to know.

01:06:49.325 --> 01:06:52.265
And I can't really say that
about that much else that I've,

01:06:53.105 --> 01:06:54.575
Rupert Isaacson: well
except everything in life.

01:06:54.605 --> 01:06:55.175
I mean,

01:06:55.475 --> 01:06:56.255
Helen Sharp: yeah, I don't know.

01:06:57.275 --> 01:06:57.575
I feel like I've gotten to

01:06:57.575 --> 01:06:58.625
Rupert Isaacson: the heart of some stuff

01:07:01.085 --> 01:07:03.095
Helen Sharp: collectively,
selectively o cd

01:07:03.125 --> 01:07:04.985
Rupert Isaacson: we clearly dunno
about, but I agree with you.

01:07:04.985 --> 01:07:06.395
Horses are definitely one that

01:07:06.935 --> 01:07:07.055
Helen Sharp: Yeah.

01:07:07.055 --> 01:07:07.295
Is the

01:07:07.295 --> 01:07:09.155
Rupert Isaacson: lifetime
many lifetimes of study?

01:07:09.155 --> 01:07:09.515
Yeah,

01:07:09.995 --> 01:07:12.065
Helen Sharp: it just, yeah, the
interest just took me over and

01:07:12.065 --> 01:07:13.565
so I was with, I was kind of.

01:07:14.045 --> 01:07:17.225
And I was obviously trying to learn about
horses more and more and more as well.

01:07:17.255 --> 01:07:21.605
'cause it had been a long time since I'd
been around them and, and then I'm good

01:07:21.605 --> 01:07:24.515
at research and I'm, you know, when I was
putting all together and then I just got

01:07:24.515 --> 01:07:27.905
an opportunity, I was writing for free for
people for a while, for a few magazines

01:07:27.905 --> 01:07:31.655
and then, and then actually it was Hos
and Hound was my first actually paid gig.

01:07:31.895 --> 01:07:32.945
So I was That's hilarious

01:07:32.945 --> 01:07:37.385
Rupert Isaacson: that you go from being
knocked out in BEUs in a motorcycle

01:07:37.385 --> 01:07:39.425
helmet as performance art to Orson hard.

01:07:40.925 --> 01:07:42.215
Helen Sharp: It seems normal to me.

01:07:43.620 --> 01:07:45.125
Yeah, yeah.

01:07:45.125 --> 01:07:45.905
Like, yeah.

01:07:46.775 --> 01:07:50.165
And that then from there, then it
kind of went on and then I, I am.

01:07:50.555 --> 01:07:52.205
Eternally and forever.

01:07:52.505 --> 01:07:56.015
The Irish field, to me, was the
pinnacle of great journalism in, in

01:07:56.015 --> 01:07:57.845
horse, in, in equestrian writing.

01:07:57.845 --> 01:07:58.805
And why?

01:07:59.305 --> 01:08:01.015
I think they're brilliantly talented.

01:08:01.245 --> 01:08:04.365
I think the racing writers
whether you like racing or not,

01:08:04.365 --> 01:08:05.955
they're incredible writers.

01:08:05.955 --> 01:08:08.055
I think the editors have been fantastic.

01:08:08.055 --> 01:08:12.195
I think the quality of what's put out
on a small team of eight, a hundred and

01:08:12.195 --> 01:08:17.085
twenty five pages a week covering every
single aspect of Equestrianism, you know,

01:08:17.625 --> 01:08:19.575
I just always thought it was fantastic.

01:08:19.575 --> 01:08:20.685
And it's the absolute.

01:08:20.715 --> 01:08:24.615
And I, and I wrote for them for
five years, once a month, and

01:08:24.615 --> 01:08:28.095
then a job came up and I didn't
get it, you know, full-time.

01:08:28.095 --> 01:08:30.975
And then I went for the
job again a year later.

01:08:30.975 --> 01:08:31.695
And I did get it.

01:08:31.695 --> 01:08:34.755
And it's the privilege of my life, I have
to say, to write for the Irish field.

01:08:34.785 --> 01:08:38.325
I went freelance this year because
I wanted to grow the charity,

01:08:38.955 --> 01:08:42.465
but I was full-time with them
for four, nearly four years.

01:08:42.675 --> 01:08:43.185
And.

01:08:43.770 --> 01:08:47.250
I just, and I, and I still, I
just, I love them as human beings

01:08:47.250 --> 01:08:48.570
and I love the publication.

01:08:48.990 --> 01:08:52.740
And I still get a kick of, like,
tonight we went to print five minutes

01:08:52.740 --> 01:08:55.770
before we started, and tomorrow
morning I'll go into town and I'll

01:08:55.770 --> 01:08:57.030
be able to pick it up in the shop.

01:08:57.030 --> 01:08:58.440
And I still love to read it.

01:08:58.440 --> 01:08:59.310
I've read half of it.

01:08:59.310 --> 01:09:00.210
I've written some of it.

01:09:00.690 --> 01:09:00.780
Yeah.

01:09:00.780 --> 01:09:02.340
Cup of tea in the Irish field.

01:09:03.060 --> 01:09:03.450
Pleasure.

01:09:05.100 --> 01:09:05.670
Rupert Isaacson: Okay.

01:09:06.000 --> 01:09:15.840
So you get over to Belfast, you're doing
performance art, and people are showing

01:09:15.840 --> 01:09:18.420
up saying, what's all this bollocks?

01:09:18.510 --> 01:09:22.410
You know, we want, as you said,
we want the bins changed and

01:09:22.410 --> 01:09:23.940
we want people to stop dying.

01:09:24.420 --> 01:09:28.030
And here are you swinging from
anchors or whatever you're doing.

01:09:28.450 --> 01:09:28.540
Mm-hmm.

01:09:28.990 --> 01:09:29.620
Fuck you.

01:09:29.890 --> 01:09:31.570
Probably that was a little bit there.

01:09:31.840 --> 01:09:33.940
And at the same time, I can
also imagine that they were

01:09:33.940 --> 01:09:36.490
like, but also welcome because.

01:09:37.285 --> 01:09:43.195
The Irish North or south value,
art value divine Madness.

01:09:43.975 --> 01:09:44.125
Helen Sharp: Yeah.

01:09:44.125 --> 01:09:48.055
Well, if I learned very soon from,
from a, an example that I love sharing

01:09:48.055 --> 01:09:54.445
is that because it shows there's
different ways, there's always something

01:09:54.445 --> 01:09:55.825
can always come from something.

01:09:55.825 --> 01:10:00.025
So a sculptor whose name I, I can't
remember now, but he had, he had,

01:10:00.025 --> 01:10:04.135
in the very early days of the peace
process, he had made a sculpture in a

01:10:04.135 --> 01:10:07.885
place called Carlisle Circus, which is
right on an interface in North Belfast.

01:10:08.395 --> 01:10:11.275
And he had done a great big dove of peace.

01:10:11.695 --> 01:10:16.435
And I'll never not laugh at the
fact that, that the community,

01:10:16.465 --> 01:10:19.945
the two communities from each side
came out in unison to destroy it

01:10:21.835 --> 01:10:22.465
Rupert Isaacson: on that one thing.

01:10:22.465 --> 01:10:23.125
They could agree.

01:10:23.845 --> 01:10:24.295
Helen Sharp: Yeah.

01:10:24.295 --> 01:10:28.165
So that was, so to me that was
like an aha moment kind of thing

01:10:28.165 --> 01:10:29.575
of, you know, ways and means.

01:10:29.575 --> 01:10:30.955
But yeah, you.

01:10:32.530 --> 01:10:38.170
I look, I'm a di, I'm quite direct
and I'm quite sort of adventurous and

01:10:38.170 --> 01:10:41.920
I'm not, I'm perhaps not as floaty.

01:10:42.100 --> 01:10:44.710
Well, I'm gonna off fend loads
of people, but I, I just always

01:10:44.710 --> 01:10:50.200
came in with a very kind of open
and, and real way of discussing

01:10:50.200 --> 01:10:52.900
things and I was told to fuck off.

01:10:53.140 --> 01:10:56.080
And at times when I went in to
try and pitch a sculpture that the

01:10:56.380 --> 01:10:59.920
council had employed me to go in and
said, look, here's 50,000 pounds.

01:11:00.190 --> 01:11:03.850
Can you make a sculpture or a piece
of artwork with this community?

01:11:03.910 --> 01:11:07.810
You know, here's, here's a
quarter of a, you know, here's a

01:11:07.810 --> 01:11:09.730
quarter of the side of a pavement.

01:11:10.000 --> 01:11:13.780
Can you design something with the
community that means something to them?

01:11:13.780 --> 01:11:19.090
And, you know, you have, you have to
learn to do things differently and to look

01:11:19.090 --> 01:11:20.680
at the truth of what's in front of you.

01:11:20.680 --> 01:11:21.010
So the.

01:11:21.535 --> 01:11:26.155
One of the brilliant projects we did
with a community that said no to, to

01:11:26.155 --> 01:11:27.835
what the council wanted us to build.

01:11:27.835 --> 01:11:30.115
So I got in a really good
friend of mine who's an art.

01:11:30.235 --> 01:11:30.325
What

01:11:30.400 --> 01:11:31.375
Rupert Isaacson: did the
council want you to build?

01:11:32.215 --> 01:11:34.615
Helen Sharp: They wanted, we used to
call 'em community lumps, you know,

01:11:34.615 --> 01:11:38.095
something no one could hang themselves
on or a kid couldn't, you know, nothing

01:11:38.095 --> 01:11:40.345
connect, nothing can, like nothing.

01:11:40.345 --> 01:11:41.160
They could be used as

01:11:41.160 --> 01:11:41.440
Rupert Isaacson: a weapon

01:11:43.380 --> 01:11:46.345
Helen Sharp: and like nobody could, you
know, climb it and nobody, so there was

01:11:46.345 --> 01:11:51.565
like, the options were always just, so
I remember having a brainstorm with a

01:11:51.565 --> 01:11:53.395
friend of mine who's an artist, Nikki Q.

01:11:53.485 --> 01:11:58.465
And what we did instead was we
gave the kids loads of cameras

01:11:59.605 --> 01:12:03.385
and the site where the artwork was
supposed to be was a piece wall.

01:12:03.595 --> 01:12:06.865
So this had like, you know, bits
where mortar bombs had been in it

01:12:06.865 --> 01:12:08.965
and sort of gunshot marks on it.

01:12:08.965 --> 01:12:12.355
And we took the kids down there
and we were like, right, we're

01:12:12.355 --> 01:12:13.645
gonna photograph what's here.

01:12:13.645 --> 01:12:15.145
And they were like, well,
there's nothing here.

01:12:15.715 --> 01:12:17.335
And we're kind of like,
you know, are you sure?

01:12:18.010 --> 01:12:20.230
And we'd given them micro
lenses on the cameras.

01:12:20.230 --> 01:12:24.250
So we went on a wildlife hunt
on this wall, and of course

01:12:24.250 --> 01:12:25.420
we got 'em to take pictures.

01:12:25.420 --> 01:12:28.840
So there's like centipedes,
snails, you know, we found a frog.

01:12:28.840 --> 01:12:32.140
We found all this stuff on the
verge by this long piece wall.

01:12:32.650 --> 01:12:36.910
And then we blew where we blew
their photographs up massive and

01:12:36.910 --> 01:12:38.410
put them onto the peace walls.

01:12:38.410 --> 01:12:41.950
So it became alive with the
wildlife of this dead space.

01:12:42.670 --> 01:12:46.600
And I remember just watching the
kids, just their minds just kind

01:12:46.600 --> 01:12:50.470
of going, what this thing had
represented before to what it became.

01:12:51.310 --> 01:12:52.510
It was just wonderful.

01:12:52.510 --> 01:12:57.220
Like it was brilliant, you know, but
just teaches you a way of you don't

01:12:57.220 --> 01:12:58.870
have to do things A to B, you know?

01:12:59.395 --> 01:12:59.635
Mm-hmm.

01:12:59.740 --> 01:13:02.680
You can go a ZB, you know,

01:13:04.750 --> 01:13:05.650
it's okay.

01:13:05.650 --> 01:13:06.010
So

01:13:06.010 --> 01:13:09.970
Rupert Isaacson: you, you, you find
yourself in the community there.

01:13:10.300 --> 01:13:16.120
And obviously it's a troubled community
because it's the troubles and.

01:13:16.825 --> 01:13:20.665
At the same time, you're rediscovering
horses and you're discovering riding.

01:13:21.025 --> 01:13:24.745
How do you go from there to where
you are now with groundwork?

01:13:26.795 --> 01:13:31.340
Helen Sharp: Actually, I, so I went and
did a, I went as a mature student to cre.

01:13:32.170 --> 01:13:32.460
Rupert Isaacson: Okay.

01:13:32.560 --> 01:13:35.225
Who, I just, what is CRE for
those, those people who are

01:13:35.225 --> 01:13:36.905
listening from Montana or Dubai?

01:13:37.295 --> 01:13:42.855
If you're a horse nerd, and if you're on
this podcast, I'm guessing you are, then

01:13:42.865 --> 01:13:47.855
you've probably also always wondered a
little bit about the old master system.

01:13:48.320 --> 01:13:49.630
of dressage training.

01:13:49.670 --> 01:13:58.240
If you go and check out our Helios Harmony
program, we outline there step by step

01:13:58.310 --> 01:14:04.590
exactly how to train your horse from
the ground to become the dressage horse

01:14:04.600 --> 01:14:11.120
of your dreams in a way that absolutely
serves the physical, mental and emotional

01:14:11.170 --> 01:14:13.940
well being of the horse and the rider.

01:14:14.000 --> 01:14:14.740
Intrigued?

01:14:14.940 --> 01:14:15.800
Like to know more?

01:14:16.670 --> 01:14:19.500
Go to our website, Helios Harmony.

01:14:21.200 --> 01:14:22.890
Check out the free introduction course.

01:14:23.450 --> 01:14:23.970
Take it from there.

01:14:24.474 --> 01:14:28.499
Helen Sharp: It's the College of
Agriculture in there's, there's two,

01:14:28.499 --> 01:14:31.829
but this is the equine department
and handily for me, it's 12 miles

01:14:31.829 --> 01:14:33.029
down the road from where I live.

01:14:33.239 --> 01:14:36.149
It's a fantastic college,
amazing props to them.

01:14:37.109 --> 01:14:38.039
So I just.

01:14:38.564 --> 01:14:42.224
Wasn't afraid to be humiliated, and it
was really humiliating because you're in

01:14:42.224 --> 01:14:46.784
a class of 16 and 17-year-old girls who
just think, you're like, oh God, what is

01:14:46.784 --> 01:14:48.824
this fat middle-aged woman doing here?

01:14:48.884 --> 01:14:52.154
You know, who was really keen and
wanted to ask loads of questions

01:14:52.154 --> 01:14:53.114
and they just wanted to kill you.

01:14:53.114 --> 01:14:53.474
Enthusiastic.

01:14:53.474 --> 01:14:53.924
All the attack.

01:14:54.134 --> 01:14:54.824
Yeah, like

01:14:55.064 --> 01:14:55.904
Rupert Isaacson: a cardinal sin.

01:14:55.994 --> 01:14:57.224
Helen Sharp: The worst, you know?

01:14:57.794 --> 01:15:01.364
So I did that just as a kind of,
you know, it was just a, it was

01:15:01.364 --> 01:15:02.834
just to do something differently.

01:15:03.014 --> 01:15:04.814
Anyway, I did that and I kept writing.

01:15:05.264 --> 01:15:08.894
Then I decided I was really
interested in muscles and horses.

01:15:08.954 --> 01:15:13.034
So I went off to the College
of Physiotherapy in England and

01:15:13.634 --> 01:15:16.124
learned to be a massage therapist.

01:15:16.344 --> 01:15:18.084
Before, or before.

01:15:18.084 --> 01:15:21.804
It was kind of, there wasn't a lot of
it about, it was like selling voodoo

01:15:21.804 --> 01:15:25.644
when I came back and was trying to,
but I actually did that for three

01:15:25.644 --> 01:15:27.804
years and I ended up treating.

01:15:28.209 --> 01:15:30.939
Olympic horses right down to pony school.

01:15:31.119 --> 01:15:32.169
And I loved it.

01:15:32.169 --> 01:15:36.069
But what I learned doing that this is,
this is a roundabout way of seeing what

01:15:36.069 --> 01:15:40.779
I learned most about, that I learned
about energy and I learned about owners

01:15:41.169 --> 01:15:44.019
and people and people around horses.

01:15:45.069 --> 01:15:49.599
And I had to stop doing, my hands
actually gave out with this rheumatism,

01:15:49.599 --> 01:15:53.319
so I, my hands kind of gave out 'cause
it's really hardcore doing the massage.

01:15:53.319 --> 01:15:58.319
And so then I had to find something
else to do and I took a bit of time out

01:15:58.619 --> 01:16:02.639
and then just wrote and wrote and wrote
and then just decided three years ago.

01:16:03.329 --> 01:16:05.099
But I was gonna put everything together.

01:16:05.459 --> 01:16:07.199
That's genuinely how I felt it was.

01:16:07.229 --> 01:16:12.089
I put everything together, the community
work, the equine therapy work, my

01:16:12.089 --> 01:16:16.949
own experiences, and it just all felt
like the river had run to that point.

01:16:18.449 --> 01:16:20.519
And it felt natural in
the right thing to do.

01:16:24.629 --> 01:16:27.419
Rupert Isaacson: So now there you
are, you're working with, you've

01:16:27.419 --> 01:16:33.329
told us about veterans and police
who've come up through the troubles.

01:16:33.329 --> 01:16:38.159
These are the people who are carrying the
shoulders of that violence or carrying

01:16:38.159 --> 01:16:39.509
that violence on their shoulders rather.

01:16:39.779 --> 01:16:39.869
Mm-hmm.

01:16:40.199 --> 01:16:41.429
You also work with teens.

01:16:41.879 --> 01:16:41.969
Mm-hmm.

01:16:42.899 --> 01:16:48.719
Who, okay, it's a bit of a cold war
there, but it's not the hot war that

01:16:48.749 --> 01:16:50.519
those 60 year olds grew up with.

01:16:51.149 --> 01:16:52.079
Talk to us about them.

01:16:52.079 --> 01:16:54.899
What are they facing and
what are you doing with them?

01:16:56.759 --> 01:16:59.039
Helen Sharp: Yeah, it's a little bit of
a different approach and I think this

01:16:59.039 --> 01:17:05.849
is actually where I think I probably am
a little bit more delicate around them.

01:17:05.849 --> 01:17:07.829
I mean, intergenerational trauma, right?

01:17:07.829 --> 01:17:08.849
It's huge here.

01:17:08.899 --> 01:17:08.959
I.

01:17:10.954 --> 01:17:15.064
There's a lot of, as I was saying,
there's, it's a 25% higher rate for,

01:17:15.244 --> 01:17:19.604
for kids and young people in than
the, here, than than the rest of

01:17:19.874 --> 01:17:22.424
the UK for mental health problems.

01:17:24.464 --> 01:17:25.364
We laugh a lot.

01:17:26.504 --> 01:17:29.774
I mean, I do, I laugh a lot with
the adults anyway, but we laugh a

01:17:29.774 --> 01:17:33.254
lot and you know, we've got one kid
that's been with us a long time now

01:17:33.254 --> 01:17:37.154
who doesn't, hasn't been to school
in a year and a half, I think this is

01:17:37.244 --> 01:17:41.714
skateboarding and this is pretty much
the thing that is the only thing we

01:17:41.714 --> 01:17:44.654
can get her parents can get her to do.

01:17:45.374 --> 01:17:47.864
And they've written a couple of
letters to us to say they just can't

01:17:47.864 --> 01:17:51.164
believe because she was really non,
almost nonverbal when she came to us.

01:17:52.244 --> 01:17:55.724
And just through making her
kind of laugh while we go along,

01:17:56.564 --> 01:17:57.494
it's been really different.

01:17:57.494 --> 01:17:59.654
But watching her use our voice.

01:17:59.654 --> 01:18:05.774
So to create partnership and as you
know, and to, and to ask horses to

01:18:05.774 --> 01:18:07.694
work with you, sometimes you have to.

01:18:08.144 --> 01:18:09.104
Give voice.

01:18:09.109 --> 01:18:11.564
Voice, you know, and, and it helps.

01:18:11.929 --> 01:18:12.219
Yeah.

01:18:12.404 --> 01:18:13.394
Yeah, it does.

01:18:14.804 --> 01:18:15.584
Really helps.

01:18:15.704 --> 01:18:19.244
But actually, if you're not used
to being loud or using your voice

01:18:19.244 --> 01:18:21.914
or you've been timid, or you've
been bullied, you've been silenced.

01:18:22.214 --> 01:18:22.454
Rupert Isaacson: Yeah.

01:18:22.664 --> 01:18:22.814
Helen Sharp: Yeah.

01:18:22.814 --> 01:18:24.014
Really hard thing to do too.

01:18:24.014 --> 01:18:24.914
To learn to do.

01:18:25.124 --> 01:18:27.104
We always tell her it's
her death, metal voice.

01:18:28.094 --> 01:18:29.264
She likes heavy metal, you know?

01:18:29.264 --> 01:18:31.694
So it's kind of like she's,
she's asking her stop.

01:18:31.724 --> 01:18:33.284
Yeah, she's going stop.

01:18:33.794 --> 01:18:38.474
But she needs to, you know, but actually
her family were telling us that now she,

01:18:38.474 --> 01:18:43.424
she has started to use authority with
a really badly behaved dog they have

01:18:43.424 --> 01:18:45.434
at home, which she'd never done before.

01:18:45.434 --> 01:18:49.634
But the dog is responding because
she's learned to use her voice.

01:18:51.224 --> 01:18:55.184
And the parents, it's kind of blowing
their parents' mind and also her

01:18:55.304 --> 01:18:56.744
obviously where, where we are based.

01:18:56.744 --> 01:18:57.764
It's very beautiful.

01:18:57.824 --> 01:18:59.924
It's an estate and it's
green and it's gorgeous.

01:18:59.924 --> 01:19:03.449
And part of what we do with a
lot of the kids is they just take

01:19:03.449 --> 01:19:04.814
the horse for the, for a walk.

01:19:06.224 --> 01:19:10.694
Suddenly the, the, the kid starts
commenting on the light, like

01:19:10.694 --> 01:19:11.954
on the way home, in the car.

01:19:11.954 --> 01:19:12.164
Yeah.

01:19:12.164 --> 01:19:15.974
And the parents can't leave it because
she's been in her room for the last five

01:19:15.974 --> 01:19:18.974
days, but she's coming back in that hour.

01:19:18.974 --> 01:19:21.614
They always say the hour after in the
car, when they're on the way home,

01:19:21.614 --> 01:19:23.354
when she's, when after the thing.

01:19:23.924 --> 01:19:27.494
She's noticing the world in
a way that she never did.

01:19:27.794 --> 01:19:30.964
And is so those two things, I always
still say that the, the nonclinical

01:19:30.964 --> 01:19:32.884
setting is hugely important to us.

01:19:33.214 --> 01:19:36.964
And one of the things I must just put
in there is that the, the feedback

01:19:36.964 --> 01:19:40.474
we are getting from the psychologist
at Brook House that we work in

01:19:40.474 --> 01:19:44.704
partnership with, he is saying to
us he actually wants to run a pilot.

01:19:44.704 --> 01:19:50.344
But he is saying to us that what he is
finding with the, with the veterans is

01:19:50.344 --> 01:19:56.374
that any of the veterans that he, that,
that are closed to talk therapy, once

01:19:56.374 --> 01:20:00.844
they've done the horse program, they
become a lot more open to talk therapy.

01:20:01.384 --> 01:20:04.414
It's quite funny because they usually
land down to us and don't want to talk.

01:20:04.414 --> 01:20:06.214
That's one of the things
a lot of them admit to.

01:20:06.664 --> 01:20:09.694
I've talked it all out, you know,
anybody who's been through a lot

01:20:09.694 --> 01:20:10.954
of therapy knows how that feels.

01:20:10.954 --> 01:20:12.874
It's like, I just don't
wanna talk about it anymore.

01:20:13.654 --> 01:20:16.414
I wanna groom this horse
and just not say anything.

01:20:16.804 --> 01:20:17.194
You know?

01:20:17.584 --> 01:20:21.454
But it's really interesting that it's
that this psychologist feeding back that,

01:20:21.514 --> 01:20:26.494
and he's, he's to be convinced, you know,
he's not like necessarily on a on side.

01:20:27.094 --> 01:20:28.114
He's becoming that way.

01:20:28.144 --> 01:20:28.684
Thankfully.

01:20:28.714 --> 01:20:31.384
We're proving him that it's, you
know, it's worth his attention.

01:20:31.934 --> 01:20:34.814
But he is saying it's, it's
becoming a definite pathway.

01:20:35.054 --> 01:20:38.264
And then I have a friend who runs
the, the Castle Re Prison Project,

01:20:38.264 --> 01:20:42.794
which was the first horse project in
Europe, in the prison in Ross Common.

01:20:43.424 --> 01:20:46.754
He was up visiting us the other day, but
I've been down to see him and he has said

01:20:46.754 --> 01:20:48.584
the prison have reported the same thing.

01:20:48.914 --> 01:20:54.524
So prison prisoners that refuse talk
therapy in the prison, if they do

01:20:54.524 --> 01:20:58.544
the 12 week horse course, they're
more open to doing it after it.

01:20:59.174 --> 01:20:59.894
Interesting.

01:21:00.779 --> 01:21:01.529
Rupert Isaacson: Yes, it is.

01:21:02.939 --> 01:21:07.949
I mean, as you might know with Horse
Boy Method what we stumbled into was

01:21:08.729 --> 01:21:11.819
the production of oxytocin in the body.

01:21:11.849 --> 01:21:19.559
And so with my son, for example, who's
nonverbal, suddenly he was verbal and

01:21:19.589 --> 01:21:21.209
we were like, oh, well why is this?

01:21:21.209 --> 01:21:24.929
And then little by little with working
with other kids, then going back to the

01:21:24.929 --> 01:21:28.529
neuroscientists and having them explain
to us what was going on, they're like,

01:21:28.919 --> 01:21:33.299
ah, when you're working with the horse in
these rhythms, you're getting oxytocin.

01:21:33.479 --> 01:21:35.999
This is with small kids
mounted in front of us.

01:21:36.059 --> 01:21:38.519
But of course, oxytocin
comes in many ways.

01:21:38.519 --> 01:21:45.539
And it can come with empathetic touch and
mammal to mammal, mammalian caregiving

01:21:45.539 --> 01:21:49.469
system, stroking your dog, having a
hug getting a smile from somebody.

01:21:52.604 --> 01:21:53.084
That.

01:21:53.384 --> 01:21:53.864
Okay.

01:21:53.894 --> 01:21:57.464
We know that's gonna open the doors
to communication because oxytocin

01:21:57.464 --> 01:21:59.234
is the hormone of communication.

01:21:59.474 --> 01:21:59.564
Yeah.

01:22:00.164 --> 01:22:03.134
It's interesting though that you,
you said nonclinical setting.

01:22:03.644 --> 01:22:03.884
Hmm.

01:22:04.454 --> 01:22:08.444
As much as possible, we train
people to work in nature.

01:22:08.444 --> 01:22:11.894
We say get out of the arena
because the arena is sterile.

01:22:12.644 --> 01:22:16.154
If you have to be in the arena,
the weather's terrible, whatever.

01:22:16.214 --> 01:22:16.394
Yeah.

01:22:16.424 --> 01:22:19.994
Or you have to be inside,
bring the outside inside.

01:22:20.474 --> 01:22:24.824
Can you get a bunch, a hundred
little trees from the nursery and

01:22:24.824 --> 01:22:26.324
create a forest in your arena?

01:22:26.564 --> 01:22:28.544
Can you paint a forest on
the walls of your arena?

01:22:28.544 --> 01:22:31.064
Can you be imaginative this way?

01:22:31.604 --> 01:22:32.624
The answer is of course, yes.

01:22:32.624 --> 01:22:35.474
If you wanna be, not if
you don't want to be.

01:22:35.714 --> 01:22:40.814
And can you create within your
indoor therapy setting the feeling

01:22:40.814 --> 01:22:43.544
of nature plants, even if they're.

01:22:43.949 --> 01:22:49.019
Fake plants, you know, whatever
you are on this beautiful estate.

01:22:49.649 --> 01:22:49.739
Mm-hmm.

01:22:50.339 --> 01:22:54.809
So you are on, you are, you
are in a position to observe

01:22:56.069 --> 01:22:57.959
the agency that nature gives.

01:22:58.439 --> 01:22:58.529
Mm-hmm.

01:22:58.799 --> 01:22:59.640
Can you talk to us about that?

01:23:03.449 --> 01:23:09.119
Helen Sharp: Yeah, I think it's
a bit like space and air and kind

01:23:09.119 --> 01:23:11.069
of fundamental elemental stuff.

01:23:11.399 --> 01:23:15.359
I suppose we've gone a little bit
of a step further than bringing it

01:23:15.359 --> 01:23:19.109
inside necessarily in those forms,
although it is a brilliant idea.

01:23:19.409 --> 01:23:23.189
I know you do that, but we've actually
just devised and we've just had the

01:23:23.189 --> 01:23:24.719
go ahead that it's gonna be funded.

01:23:24.719 --> 01:23:28.499
So we've got together with the
head gardener, who's counselor,

01:23:28.979 --> 01:23:35.189
and we've devised a 10 week program
where clients do we meet in the

01:23:35.189 --> 01:23:39.959
walled garden, we do garden nature
therapy, and in the forest one week.

01:23:40.544 --> 01:23:42.524
Then we go down to the yard the next week.

01:23:42.554 --> 01:23:44.444
But we carry the themes through.

01:23:45.224 --> 01:23:49.004
So we do five weeks of garden and five
weeks of horse basically intertwined.

01:23:50.324 --> 01:23:54.404
We're really interested to see that,
how, how, how that goes, how that goes.

01:23:54.974 --> 01:23:57.554
But it just seemed like a
really natural collaboration.

01:23:57.734 --> 01:23:58.034
Rupert Isaacson: Yeah.

01:23:58.334 --> 01:24:01.964
Helen Sharp: Do gold dormant is the
counselor and he is absolutely fantastic

01:24:02.054 --> 01:24:05.984
and very knowledgeable and he's actually
going through his paces now with

01:24:05.984 --> 01:24:07.424
horses 'cause he wasn't a horseman.

01:24:07.424 --> 01:24:11.444
So we're, we thought that Fiona's
teaching him because it's important

01:24:11.444 --> 01:24:13.754
that he knows what's going on, you know?

01:24:14.024 --> 01:24:20.204
So we're trying to sort of like do
it on a macro level of let's take the

01:24:20.204 --> 01:24:23.984
horses up to the wall, up to the wall
garden and let's bring the gardeners

01:24:23.984 --> 01:24:25.514
down into the arena, you know?

01:24:25.514 --> 01:24:28.064
So, yeah, it's a cool program.

01:24:28.754 --> 01:24:32.834
It's a summer program, you
know, but also we do hard work.

01:24:32.894 --> 01:24:36.764
I was telling you about the young
stock and mine have, you know, I know

01:24:36.764 --> 01:24:41.864
how to raise a, a, you know, a, a
good, a good full and a youngster.

01:24:41.864 --> 01:24:46.544
And I quite often, I really like the brood
mares to work with, with, with people.

01:24:46.574 --> 01:24:50.714
Women in particular actually,
because they're quite, you know,

01:24:50.924 --> 01:24:54.674
breed mares can be difficult and
opinionated and brilliant in that way.

01:24:54.674 --> 01:24:57.584
And once you start teaching 'em about
to watch their ears and how they're

01:24:57.614 --> 01:25:01.364
managing the whole household, as
we call it, the herd with the ears.

01:25:01.364 --> 01:25:03.854
And you can have great discussions
standing in the fields with some

01:25:03.854 --> 01:25:07.064
breed mares, you know, and I've
seen it, I've seen a lot of good

01:25:07.064 --> 01:25:08.504
work that we've done there with,

01:25:08.739 --> 01:25:09.029
Rupert Isaacson: with

01:25:09.074 --> 01:25:10.034
Helen Sharp: women as well.

01:25:10.274 --> 01:25:12.074
So you're, so you're
doing that in the field?

01:25:12.644 --> 01:25:15.074
The horses are in the natural
environment, you know, people

01:25:15.074 --> 01:25:16.244
do hard work all the time.

01:25:16.244 --> 01:25:18.794
But I find the Brime herd really
interesting because they're so

01:25:18.794 --> 01:25:19.844
opinion, you know, they're so, I.

01:25:20.579 --> 01:25:25.649
The alpha female is, is pretty obvious
usually, or the, the current, the

01:25:25.709 --> 01:25:27.659
whoever's, whoever's managing the herd.

01:25:27.659 --> 01:25:33.149
But women open up a lot about
the burdens of managing a family

01:25:33.299 --> 01:25:35.309
in that situation, you know?

01:25:35.309 --> 01:25:35.429
I can

01:25:35.429 --> 01:25:35.879
Rupert Isaacson: imagine.

01:25:36.179 --> 01:25:36.479
Helen Sharp: Yeah.

01:25:36.479 --> 01:25:36.869
It's cool.

01:25:36.899 --> 01:25:37.229
Rupert Isaacson: Yeah.

01:25:37.229 --> 01:25:41.939
And for, for for a large
herbivore life or death, right.

01:25:41.999 --> 01:25:46.499
I mean also for carnivore, honestly,
if you, but it just as for a human

01:25:47.069 --> 01:25:50.429
mother, once you've got kids, that's it.

01:25:50.849 --> 01:25:50.999
Yeah.

01:25:51.119 --> 01:25:52.019
It's life or death.

01:25:52.589 --> 01:25:56.129
To see that reflected, I could
absolutely see the value.

01:25:56.759 --> 01:25:57.029
Helen Sharp: Yeah.

01:25:57.899 --> 01:26:01.379
Or, or like at the minute, I've got
a couple of, they're at that age and

01:26:01.379 --> 01:26:04.469
a quite cheeky cults, you know, a
thoroughbred cult and a sports horse cult.

01:26:04.469 --> 01:26:08.819
But like, how many women are coming
through this course with teenage boys?

01:26:08.879 --> 01:26:09.389
Loads?

01:26:10.439 --> 01:26:13.079
And it's not about, you
don't have to, you know, I'm.

01:26:13.469 --> 01:26:15.359
Absolute master of the clean question.

01:26:15.359 --> 01:26:19.079
I know my place, I'm not a therapist,
I'm not a, but as soon as you put

01:26:19.229 --> 01:26:25.019
someone who's got an unruly son, you
know, even it's outside the stable door

01:26:25.019 --> 01:26:28.589
with these, we have huge triple size
stables, you know, all our horses have,

01:26:28.589 --> 01:26:32.309
or big pens, and they can stand there
and watch them interact in them, you

01:26:32.309 --> 01:26:35.639
know, and, and it'll be so quick that
they start talking about their son.

01:26:35.644 --> 01:26:35.914
Mm-hmm.

01:26:35.919 --> 01:26:38.249
Or the problems that they're having
with their son or their son's on

01:26:38.249 --> 01:26:40.799
drugs or their son is, and these
concerns that these women had.

01:26:40.799 --> 01:26:45.929
So I think using different stock is,
is something that I'm quite proud of.

01:26:46.619 --> 01:26:47.159
Rupert Isaacson: Yes.

01:26:47.219 --> 01:26:48.209
Helen Sharp: In our program.

01:26:48.749 --> 01:26:49.559
Rupert Isaacson: I, I would agree.

01:26:49.559 --> 01:26:55.829
When we were in Texas, we had
three stallions and initially we

01:26:55.829 --> 01:26:58.439
thought, oh, we'll never use those,
you know, in the therapy program.

01:26:58.589 --> 01:27:01.229
We totally ended up using
them in the therapy program.

01:27:01.289 --> 01:27:07.469
And what was so interesting about
them was they absolutely had the

01:27:07.469 --> 01:27:09.419
discernment to have one set of rules.

01:27:10.109 --> 01:27:12.989
For the kids and the clients and
a whole other set of rules for us.

01:27:12.989 --> 01:27:14.279
We were fair game, you know?

01:27:14.369 --> 01:27:14.639
Totally.

01:27:14.939 --> 01:27:18.659
As we should be because they, their
attitude was, oh, I see you want us

01:27:18.659 --> 01:27:21.809
to be your professional partners here.

01:27:22.349 --> 01:27:23.189
We can do that.

01:27:23.699 --> 01:27:26.129
And we'll show some balance.

01:27:26.129 --> 01:27:29.459
We'll push a little bit, we'll trigger
a little bit, but we'll also, you know,

01:27:29.489 --> 01:27:31.109
validate and we'll do all of that.

01:27:31.529 --> 01:27:32.639
And you'd watch them come out.

01:27:32.639 --> 01:27:34.679
You're like, dude, that was awesome.

01:27:34.979 --> 01:27:36.899
And they'd be like,
gimme some food, bitch.

01:27:37.409 --> 01:27:40.349
You know, it was, it was so interesting.

01:27:40.349 --> 01:27:41.939
And we also worked with young stock.

01:27:42.049 --> 01:27:43.219
I so agree with you.

01:27:43.249 --> 01:27:47.409
Of course, the difficulty is that
that's a hard, that's a tall order.

01:27:47.639 --> 01:27:47.699
Yeah.

01:27:47.729 --> 01:27:53.339
For most therapeutic places, it's,
it's not possible because there isn't

01:27:53.339 --> 01:27:57.359
the manpower, there isn't perhaps
the space and there isn't perhaps

01:27:57.359 --> 01:28:00.919
the intellectual capital among
the people who know how to handle.

01:28:00.994 --> 01:28:01.534
That kind of stuff.

01:28:01.534 --> 01:28:02.374
Yeah, it's definitely not,

01:28:02.434 --> 01:28:03.544
Helen Sharp: yeah, it's definitely not.

01:28:03.544 --> 01:28:06.634
I can't, you know, I can't
necessarily advocate for that.

01:28:06.634 --> 01:28:11.044
I just know that with Fiona's
horsemanship and my own experience,

01:28:11.194 --> 01:28:12.754
we're never gonna put anyone in danger.

01:28:12.754 --> 01:28:14.194
Like, no one's going past the door.

01:28:14.194 --> 01:28:16.474
But you can watch two
Colts for 20 minutes.

01:28:16.599 --> 01:28:16.919
Rupert Isaacson: Absolutely.

01:28:17.374 --> 01:28:18.034
Absolutely.

01:28:18.034 --> 01:28:18.604
You can.

01:28:18.604 --> 01:28:23.844
And I think to see, to, to, to be able
to have the luxury to be able to expose

01:28:23.844 --> 01:28:33.834
people to the full range of authentic,
her behavior is going to absolutely

01:28:33.864 --> 01:28:37.464
serve as an allegory for the monkeys.

01:28:37.854 --> 01:28:38.424
Helen Sharp: That's it.

01:28:38.424 --> 01:28:42.294
Like, if I was gonna write, if you
asked me to write down, you know, what's

01:28:42.294 --> 01:28:46.704
your model like, I just couldn't do
it without a ra, without an age range.

01:28:46.734 --> 01:28:51.684
You know, we've got a 27-year-old deaf,
former international show jumper who's

01:28:51.744 --> 01:28:55.254
does his, who's the most incredible, and
we've got these young cults and we've got,

01:28:55.404 --> 01:28:57.414
you know, and a little baby, she like.

01:28:58.404 --> 01:29:01.824
The variety is incredible, but it serves.

01:29:01.824 --> 01:29:02.964
It's so powerful.

01:29:02.964 --> 01:29:04.254
It's so useful.

01:29:06.234 --> 01:29:08.184
Rupert Isaacson: Where
are you going with this?

01:29:08.264 --> 01:29:11.804
In your perfect world, let's
project forward a little bit.

01:29:11.954 --> 01:29:15.254
Five years, 10 years, where do you wanna
bring it and where would you like to

01:29:15.254 --> 01:29:17.684
see the equine assisted world get to?

01:29:19.754 --> 01:29:23.034
Helen Sharp: Probably the same answer
that most people have in terms of, I would

01:29:23.034 --> 01:29:26.154
love it in Ireland, the island of Ireland.

01:29:26.154 --> 01:29:32.094
I suppose it, for it to be prescribable
from every possible angle that it can

01:29:32.094 --> 01:29:37.134
be prescribable from, you know, and
I keep making the argument as well.

01:29:37.134 --> 01:29:40.014
It's not just for people
in crisis, you know?

01:29:40.314 --> 01:29:41.514
Sure, sure.

01:29:41.514 --> 01:29:41.574
I.

01:29:42.519 --> 01:29:47.049
I ended up here also because horses
were really helpful for me too.

01:29:47.924 --> 01:29:48.939
Rupert Isaacson: Yes, yes.

01:29:48.969 --> 01:29:50.379
Helen Sharp: 12 years of horses.

01:29:50.439 --> 01:29:53.619
If you ask me what they did for me, well
they probably changed everything, you

01:29:53.619 --> 01:29:56.889
know, I'm just trying to share that, I
suppose in a lot of ways, like most of,

01:29:57.789 --> 01:30:01.569
a lot of people in EAS have gone into
it because horses have helped them, but

01:30:02.169 --> 01:30:09.009
access to horses, you know, access to
access to these animals that we have such

01:30:09.519 --> 01:30:11.169
a long standing and basically make it part

01:30:11.169 --> 01:30:12.129
Rupert Isaacson: of the
national health system.

01:30:12.669 --> 01:30:13.389
Helen Sharp: A hundred percent.

01:30:13.719 --> 01:30:13.899
Rupert Isaacson: Yeah.

01:30:14.859 --> 01:30:19.839
Helen Sharp: It's a no brainer to me,
but you know, also I'm very realistic

01:30:19.839 --> 01:30:24.369
in terms of is, is this business
model that we have in terms of, it's a

01:30:24.369 --> 01:30:27.969
charity like, can I not do another job?

01:30:27.969 --> 01:30:31.959
Well, no, I have to have another
job, which means that I'm restricted

01:30:32.829 --> 01:30:37.239
because the money that we do
get for will pay for the horses.

01:30:38.349 --> 01:30:41.619
You know, but I'm always gonna
have to have another job at the

01:30:41.619 --> 01:30:43.419
minute because I can't afford to.

01:30:44.199 --> 01:30:48.129
And I think there's a lot of pressure
and really getting really high horsey

01:30:48.129 --> 01:30:53.589
about the pressure that the equine
assisted services practitioners are

01:30:53.589 --> 01:30:55.479
putting, almost putting on themselves.

01:30:55.479 --> 01:30:57.939
It's like, don't eat yourself as a sector.

01:30:57.939 --> 01:31:02.709
Like, you know, social license is not your
responsibility because you're doing EAS.

01:31:02.979 --> 01:31:08.859
We can all try our best, but
like, and be nicer to each other.

01:31:08.859 --> 01:31:12.999
It's a bit like you said in cre, I think
your talk, it resonated with me so much.

01:31:12.999 --> 01:31:15.519
I just thought, God, that's the
first time I've heard someone say,

01:31:16.239 --> 01:31:17.769
you know, let's not be competitive.

01:31:17.769 --> 01:31:21.219
Like, let's work together and let's
not be shitty with each other.

01:31:21.279 --> 01:31:21.759
You know?

01:31:23.019 --> 01:31:25.869
But also we have to, we have to
look out for the mental health

01:31:25.929 --> 01:31:31.779
of the ES EAS practitioners
because they're not all great.

01:31:31.839 --> 01:31:33.129
You know, they're not all.

01:31:34.239 --> 01:31:35.649
Big organizations.

01:31:35.709 --> 01:31:36.969
It's mainly in Ireland.

01:31:36.969 --> 01:31:40.269
Anyway, one person, honestly,
that's, that's everywhere.

01:31:40.509 --> 01:31:45.459
Rupert Isaacson: It's it, it, it's
the, it's only very recently, certainly

01:31:45.459 --> 01:31:50.769
in my work that we've started to
work with larger organizations.

01:31:50.769 --> 01:31:52.359
It was all Backyard.

01:31:52.959 --> 01:31:53.229
Yeah.

01:31:53.259 --> 01:31:59.349
Things like You, like Me, you know, that
may change in 20 years, but you're right.

01:31:59.459 --> 01:32:03.179
It does need to be part
of Standard Healthcare.

01:32:03.719 --> 01:32:03.989
Yeah.

01:32:04.229 --> 01:32:07.249
I dunno if you've listened to
the podcast that we did with

01:32:07.249 --> 01:32:10.809
Nor On, nor on Cota from Norway.

01:32:11.529 --> 01:32:12.009
Helen Sharp: Not yet.

01:32:12.099 --> 01:32:14.109
Rupert Isaacson: It is
part of it up there.

01:32:14.559 --> 01:32:14.859
Helen Sharp: Wow.

01:32:14.859 --> 01:32:14.949
Cool.

01:32:14.979 --> 01:32:15.459
And it's really

01:32:15.459 --> 01:32:16.389
Rupert Isaacson:
interesting to talk to her.

01:32:16.389 --> 01:32:19.929
She's a, she's a, a physician, but
she's also a psychiatrist and she

01:32:19.929 --> 01:32:22.329
runs this amazing program up there.

01:32:22.329 --> 01:32:26.259
And it's interesting to talk
to her about the history of why

01:32:26.259 --> 01:32:27.489
it evolved that way in Norway.

01:32:28.009 --> 01:32:31.849
Why they value nature's therapy and
sort of have a tradition of that.

01:32:32.419 --> 01:32:36.949
I guess they weren't under the thumb
of the church in quite the same way.

01:32:37.309 --> 01:32:44.719
And interestingly away from the
church in western culture, science

01:32:44.719 --> 01:32:47.239
has replaced religious zealotry.

01:32:47.839 --> 01:32:48.139
Hmm.

01:32:48.319 --> 01:32:55.069
So now that we can begin to prove, now
that the neuroscientists are behind us,

01:32:55.069 --> 01:33:00.094
you know, we, we had this extraordinary
experience last September in America

01:33:00.224 --> 01:33:06.759
where for the first time a medical school
asked us to come in and as new trails,

01:33:06.759 --> 01:33:11.259
learning systems, movement method,
horse by method to put on a neuroscience

01:33:11.259 --> 01:33:13.149
conference at the medical school.

01:33:13.149 --> 01:33:13.209
I.

01:33:14.664 --> 01:33:16.794
Only because Dr.

01:33:16.794 --> 01:33:22.044
Meghan McGovern, a well-respected
physician and autism mum in that

01:33:22.044 --> 01:33:28.344
area of Virginia, has been running
an amazing program now with

01:33:28.854 --> 01:33:31.644
autism and horses for some years.

01:33:32.124 --> 01:33:32.454
Amazing.

01:33:32.664 --> 01:33:36.884
And kind of word gets round and so I,
I do see the thing moving forward, but

01:33:36.884 --> 01:33:41.444
I love that you're saying yes, it needs
to be part of standard healthcare.

01:33:41.444 --> 01:33:44.384
It needs to be preventative,
not just crisis.

01:33:44.654 --> 01:33:46.334
And we, practitioners of it

01:33:48.434 --> 01:33:51.434
need to stop nipping
at each other's heels.

01:33:53.684 --> 01:33:58.129
Whether or not that
will happen is another.

01:33:58.229 --> 01:33:58.729
Helen Sharp: Oh yeah.

01:33:58.989 --> 01:33:59.289
Go on.

01:33:59.289 --> 01:34:02.144
Also to be, also to be brutal
and I'm gonna be brutal.

01:34:02.144 --> 01:34:06.734
I think it is like also think about.

01:34:08.309 --> 01:34:11.009
It's like, think about
yourself as a business too.

01:34:11.009 --> 01:34:12.089
Like don't think,

01:34:12.359 --> 01:34:14.384
Rupert Isaacson: yeah, it's a little
bit, don't Marty yourself hand.

01:34:14.384 --> 01:34:15.689
Helen Sharp: Like don't Marty yourself.

01:34:15.689 --> 01:34:16.379
Exactly.

01:34:16.379 --> 01:34:19.499
And I think that's something
that we could talk about more.

01:34:19.499 --> 01:34:21.179
I think everybody could talk about more.

01:34:21.179 --> 01:34:25.499
It's a subject for a symposium or
it's a, it's like why are you putting

01:34:25.529 --> 01:34:27.719
yourself in this kind of luer position?

01:34:27.719 --> 01:34:30.839
Oh, I've got, is it because
you've got an old discard pony?

01:34:30.989 --> 01:34:33.479
I'm always thinking about
can we, how would you breed?

01:34:33.569 --> 01:34:36.139
How would you breed an
equine assisted horse?

01:34:36.919 --> 01:34:38.629
Like what, what were the traits?

01:34:38.629 --> 01:34:41.779
It's a bit of a side discussion, but
it's kind of, you know, a lot of people

01:34:41.779 --> 01:34:45.259
just because they're, they're horse is
secondhand, if you like, or discarded

01:34:45.259 --> 01:34:49.819
that they're already, you know, oh, I'm
just doing this thing here with, well,

01:34:49.819 --> 01:34:51.739
Rupert Isaacson: and also, yeah, I
think, I think when you're involved

01:34:51.739 --> 01:34:57.909
in equine assisted work if you've been
in it for many years, you are used to

01:34:57.909 --> 01:35:00.049
that approach from people saying, oh.

01:35:00.454 --> 01:35:00.754
Either.

01:35:00.754 --> 01:35:01.264
Oh, that's nice.

01:35:01.264 --> 01:35:04.084
You play with ponies
or kind of arms folded.

01:35:04.864 --> 01:35:06.724
Explain to me why this doesn't suck.

01:35:07.084 --> 01:35:07.384
Yeah.

01:35:07.484 --> 01:35:10.904
Well now the neuroscience is pretty
clear on why it doesn't suck.

01:35:10.904 --> 01:35:17.114
But nonetheless, I think we've all had to
run that gauntlet and come up through that

01:35:17.174 --> 01:35:26.684
thing of trying to ask for attention for
what we all know works and is necessary.

01:35:28.604 --> 01:35:31.844
Probably we'll look at the, we'll
all be, you know, 85 looking at the

01:35:31.844 --> 01:35:34.244
next generation, coming up going,
oh, you guys have it so easy.

01:35:34.244 --> 01:35:35.564
You have no idea what we went through.

01:35:35.719 --> 01:35:38.174
Helen Sharp: I've just gonna say, oh
yeah, you guys have all paved the way.

01:35:38.174 --> 01:35:41.624
So it's all very well me sitting
here going like, you know, you

01:35:41.624 --> 01:35:43.294
know, but yeah, confidence.

01:35:43.324 --> 01:35:46.834
Yeah, confidence comes because of the
foundation that you guys have all set, but

01:35:46.834 --> 01:35:48.814
it's like, I still just see a lot of it.

01:35:49.354 --> 01:35:49.564
Rupert Isaacson: Yeah.

01:35:50.524 --> 01:35:51.304
Yeah, no, for sure.

01:35:51.664 --> 01:35:54.994
And you know, also, 'cause it's
female led, it's, it's a female driven

01:35:55.234 --> 01:35:56.794
Helen Sharp: estrogen assisted services.

01:35:57.064 --> 01:35:57.574
Rupert Isaacson: Right.

01:35:57.784 --> 01:36:03.634
So, you know, the medical
establishment is still largely male.

01:36:04.054 --> 01:36:04.384
Yeah.

01:36:04.484 --> 01:36:08.414
I'm not saying that when it's no longer
male, it will be any easier for equine

01:36:08.414 --> 01:36:13.544
assisted services, but it might be
and certainly it's interesting to me,

01:36:13.694 --> 01:36:17.474
for example, what happened to us at
Eastern Virginia Medical School there.

01:36:17.954 --> 01:36:21.884
Well that was through a female
doctor talking to another female

01:36:21.884 --> 01:36:24.494
administrator in that college.

01:36:25.604 --> 01:36:27.254
Would that have happened 15 years ago?

01:36:27.614 --> 01:36:29.529
I dunno dunno.

01:36:30.434 --> 01:36:32.414
Different generation, different genders.

01:36:33.464 --> 01:36:36.854
Maybe, maybe not, but I don't think
so because it, it, it didn't Right.

01:36:36.854 --> 01:36:37.454
Happened now.

01:36:38.324 --> 01:36:38.834
Helen Sharp: Yeah.

01:36:40.469 --> 01:36:44.954
I think the respect for equine assisted
services kind of has to go hand in hand.

01:36:46.409 --> 01:36:49.499
The equine assisted services
has to have respected itself.

01:36:49.739 --> 01:36:49.889
Rupert Isaacson: Mm-hmm.

01:36:50.129 --> 01:36:50.249
You know

01:36:50.249 --> 01:36:50.669
Helen Sharp: what I mean?

01:36:50.669 --> 01:36:54.689
And that's, some have it and,
and, and, but I'd say the majority

01:36:54.689 --> 01:36:56.909
are still a little bit tentative.

01:36:56.999 --> 01:36:59.489
And I suppose that's my more bold, almost

01:36:59.489 --> 01:37:00.779
Rupert Isaacson:
apologetic for what we do.

01:37:00.809 --> 01:37:01.169
Helen Sharp: Yeah.

01:37:01.169 --> 01:37:02.399
Like, let's stop doing that.

01:37:03.179 --> 01:37:03.389
Yeah.

01:37:03.989 --> 01:37:04.379
You know?

01:37:04.499 --> 01:37:04.739
Rupert Isaacson: Yeah.

01:37:06.299 --> 01:37:06.659
Yeah.

01:37:09.089 --> 01:37:09.629
Brilliant.

01:37:10.799 --> 01:37:11.189
Okay.

01:37:11.369 --> 01:37:13.919
If people wanna find out
more, how do they contact you?

01:37:15.029 --> 01:37:17.279
Helen Sharp: Well, we don't
really do social media.

01:37:17.519 --> 01:37:20.429
I do have a thing, but probably
the website is the best.

01:37:20.429 --> 01:37:23.039
So it's www dot grand work.

01:37:23.729 --> 01:37:25.169
E s.org.

01:37:25.979 --> 01:37:27.479
Rupert Isaacson: Grand work or ground?

01:37:27.539 --> 01:37:27.989
Helen Sharp: Ground.

01:37:27.989 --> 01:37:29.939
That's my accent ground.

01:37:29.984 --> 01:37:30.344
I was gonna

01:37:30.344 --> 01:37:32.304
Rupert Isaacson: say, I,
I thought you fe grand.

01:37:32.924 --> 01:37:33.914
So, groundwork.

01:37:33.914 --> 01:37:34.514
Groundwork,

01:37:35.994 --> 01:37:38.209
Helen Sharp: Groundwork, EAS org

01:37:38.509 --> 01:37:39.619
Rupert Isaacson: groundwork.

01:37:40.759 --> 01:37:41.659
EAS

01:37:41.749 --> 01:37:42.139
Helen Sharp: Yeah.

01:37:42.379 --> 01:37:43.549
Rupert Isaacson: Dot org.

01:37:43.789 --> 01:37:44.089
Helen Sharp: Yeah.

01:37:45.259 --> 01:37:46.489
Rupert Isaacson: They
can contact you there.

01:37:46.819 --> 01:37:47.149
Helen Sharp: Yeah.

01:37:47.929 --> 01:37:51.879
Rupert Isaacson: Alright, now we are
making this we are making this podcast

01:37:51.909 --> 01:37:58.959
in March of 2025 in May of 2025.

01:37:59.379 --> 01:38:04.709
That is the first European gig of
something called Seen Through Horses,

01:38:05.009 --> 01:38:10.559
which is the work of Lynn Thomas who used
to run EG gala and is now running horses

01:38:10.559 --> 01:38:12.479
for mental health and arenas for change.

01:38:13.229 --> 01:38:14.759
Talk to us a little bit about that.

01:38:14.759 --> 01:38:17.889
She selected you guys to tell your story.

01:38:17.889 --> 01:38:20.319
Why, how and how can we help?

01:38:21.549 --> 01:38:24.819
Helen Sharp: Well, I, I, we, I
followed the campaign last year

01:38:24.819 --> 01:38:28.029
and I followed horses for mental
health in the beginning and.

01:38:29.199 --> 01:38:33.759
Being an athlete, I really, it was
beautifully put together, so it caught

01:38:33.759 --> 01:38:38.709
my attention and I had joined Arenas for
Change failed miserably in keeping up

01:38:38.859 --> 01:38:40.209
with what I was supposed to be doing.

01:38:40.209 --> 01:38:43.339
But had chatted to Lynn then,
and Lynn had been recommended to

01:38:43.339 --> 01:38:47.089
me by my friend Jennifer Barker
that runs Racing To Relate.

01:38:47.329 --> 01:38:50.089
Also you'd mentioned her as well,
that she'd be a good person to

01:38:50.089 --> 01:38:53.209
talk to, but I, I sort of hadn't
put those two things together.

01:38:53.209 --> 01:38:56.689
And then I saw that they'd done the call
out for the scene through Horses campaign

01:38:56.689 --> 01:38:58.969
this year, and I just kind of thought,

01:38:59.029 --> 01:38:59.389
Rupert Isaacson: Hmm,

01:38:59.899 --> 01:39:02.509
Helen Sharp: that's all in America,
but is it all in America and does

01:39:02.509 --> 01:39:03.889
it have to all be in America?

01:39:03.889 --> 01:39:05.179
So I just emailed them.

01:39:05.329 --> 01:39:10.789
I wrote them a letter and said, you
know, I'd really love to be involved

01:39:10.789 --> 01:39:14.899
and, and I dunno how, and maybe it
won't be until next year, or maybe I

01:39:14.899 --> 01:39:21.769
can just follow along or, and they got
back in touch and we talked a bit and

01:39:21.879 --> 01:39:25.539
yeah, then they said that, they were
gonna go ahead and, and we were gonna

01:39:25.539 --> 01:39:29.649
be the pilot project for the scene
through horses for the global campaign.

01:39:29.649 --> 01:39:32.019
So we'd be the first
European one, as you said.

01:39:32.079 --> 01:39:37.179
And really on the back of that, I suppose
if we do well in our fundraising, which

01:39:37.179 --> 01:39:41.439
is part of the scene through horses
project, everyone raises money, it goes

01:39:41.439 --> 01:39:46.599
into a pot, and then it's divided by the,
I think it's 106 EAS things this year.

01:39:47.469 --> 01:39:51.459
Then, then I'm hoping that
the, then seeing through horses

01:39:51.459 --> 01:39:53.049
will become a thing in Europe.

01:39:53.049 --> 01:39:57.459
So it's kind of, I feel like I, I've
gotta do a really good job because if

01:39:57.459 --> 01:40:02.749
I do well for groundwork and me and
Fiona managed to raise the money and

01:40:02.749 --> 01:40:06.439
then hopefully it'll open the door for
everybody else in Europe to be part of

01:40:06.439 --> 01:40:12.559
the project or be able to be selected for
the project and everybody wins, you know?

01:40:13.999 --> 01:40:14.359
Rupert Isaacson: Yeah.

01:40:14.364 --> 01:40:17.599
It's, I think, I think what I'd
like people to take from what

01:40:17.599 --> 01:40:19.699
you just said is don't be afraid.

01:40:20.464 --> 01:40:25.684
To send an email, send a letter,
even if you think you haven't got a

01:40:25.684 --> 01:40:28.174
chance or it's not relevant to you.

01:40:28.504 --> 01:40:32.444
If you, back to what you were
saying about don't be timid that

01:40:32.444 --> 01:40:33.914
you just thought, you know, sold it.

01:40:33.914 --> 01:40:37.304
I'm just gonna contact
them and well, boom.

01:40:37.784 --> 01:40:41.264
And I've, I've spent my life doing that
and I've also had people say no to me

01:40:41.264 --> 01:40:42.914
a bunch of times, and that's all right.

01:40:43.424 --> 01:40:46.724
Sometimes though there's same
people that said no, said yes later.

01:40:47.264 --> 01:40:47.534
Yeah.

01:40:47.634 --> 01:40:51.354
Then at least you're on the radar and then
at least you're having a conversation.

01:40:51.864 --> 01:40:54.324
Don't worry if people say no, don't worry.

01:40:54.354 --> 01:41:00.954
If the first contact is not the ideal Hmm.

01:41:01.764 --> 01:41:02.604
Take it from there.

01:41:02.844 --> 01:41:04.764
So, okay.

01:41:04.764 --> 01:41:09.984
I suggest that we come and do a
fundraiser of some sort at groundwork

01:41:10.674 --> 01:41:12.504
and we'll be talking about that.

01:41:12.504 --> 01:41:17.124
So any of you lad's listening, why
don't we give it a go and come.

01:41:17.234 --> 01:41:20.984
Have a little fun in the north of
Ireland now also, because this is

01:41:20.984 --> 01:41:27.434
2025, the Horse Boy Tribe Day will
be happening actually at Kil Coon.

01:41:27.984 --> 01:41:33.154
Our mutual friend Terry Brosnan's place
Stewart's Care, the equine unit there

01:41:33.154 --> 01:41:36.094
outside of Dublin, August 9th to 11th.

01:41:36.364 --> 01:41:42.544
So maybe we should tag something
onto that and come on up and so Cool.

01:41:42.574 --> 01:41:43.114
Do something.

01:41:43.654 --> 01:41:43.954
All right.

01:41:44.434 --> 01:41:44.644
Really cool.

01:41:44.644 --> 01:41:48.574
And any of you people listening who might
want to come to Tribe Day and then come

01:41:48.574 --> 01:41:50.524
on up to Helen's place in county Firma.

01:41:51.334 --> 01:41:54.874
I mean, we might have
fun if we go to Ireland.

01:41:54.874 --> 01:41:57.399
I mean, you know, it's
possible I suppose, you know,

01:41:57.699 --> 01:41:58.559
Helen Sharp: any of probity,

01:41:58.899 --> 01:41:59.344
Rupert Isaacson: you know, if

01:41:59.344 --> 01:41:59.644
Helen Sharp: we,

01:42:00.994 --> 01:42:03.214
Rupert Isaacson: I think, I think you
could not have fun in Ireland, but

01:42:03.214 --> 01:42:05.014
you'd have to put some effort into it.

01:42:05.494 --> 01:42:06.844
Why don't we, let's go up there.

01:42:06.844 --> 01:42:09.544
So that's my challenge, throwing
it out there to all y'all.

01:42:10.354 --> 01:42:10.894
Okay.

01:42:10.984 --> 01:42:14.434
So give us the website one
more time, then we'll sign off.

01:42:14.434 --> 01:42:16.934
And I'm gonna have you
back on in a few months.

01:42:16.934 --> 01:42:20.144
We're gonna talk about where, where
the scene through Horses campaign went.

01:42:20.744 --> 01:42:21.194
Helen Sharp: Cool.

01:42:21.794 --> 01:42:22.244
Rupert Isaacson: So yeah,

01:42:22.664 --> 01:42:27.524
Helen Sharp: you can get, so you can
have a look at what we do at www dot

01:42:27.734 --> 01:42:32.654
groundwork, all one word, EA s.org.

01:42:33.614 --> 01:42:34.124
Rupert Isaacson: Perfect.

01:42:34.784 --> 01:42:35.114
Helen Sharp: Yeah.

01:42:35.534 --> 01:42:36.374
Rupert Isaacson: Helen, thank you.

01:42:36.749 --> 01:42:37.399
It's been brilliant.

01:42:38.114 --> 01:42:39.224
Helen Sharp: Thank you so much.

01:42:39.224 --> 01:42:42.434
Less horses than other people
possibly, but a fantastic chat.

01:42:42.434 --> 01:42:43.244
I've enjoyed it.

01:42:43.244 --> 01:42:44.444
So thank you so much.

01:42:44.894 --> 01:42:47.984
Rupert Isaacson: It's all
about getting the job done.

01:42:49.364 --> 01:42:52.004
We all do it in the
different ways that we do.

01:42:52.034 --> 01:42:55.784
The important thing is that we
do it and we help each other out.

01:42:57.589 --> 01:42:57.879
Okay.

01:42:58.034 --> 01:42:58.694
It's been an honor.

01:42:58.904 --> 01:42:59.414
Thank you.

01:43:02.308 --> 01:43:05.428
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01:43:05.968 --> 01:43:10.868
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01:43:10.878 --> 01:43:15.048
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01:43:15.048 --> 01:43:16.928
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01:43:31.238 --> 01:43:34.758
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01:43:35.108 --> 01:43:38.618
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01:43:51.363 --> 01:43:54.753
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01:44:06.553 --> 01:44:10.663
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01:44:10.663 --> 01:44:13.473
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01:44:13.743 --> 01:44:15.363
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01:44:15.483 --> 01:44:15.813
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01:44:16.073 --> 01:44:17.263
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