Category: Habits

How To Change Your Life In One Step

Posted on by Mary Derbyshire

Would you like to make a change in your life but worry that you do not have the strength or the courage to do so?

What if it isn’t about strength or courage? Maybe you just don’t know how.

Let’s take exercise as an example. Would you like to change your life by starting an exercise regimen? Do you want to commit to more exercise and movement in your day and yet you don’t know how?

Perhaps you don’t know where to start because the whole idea of exercising is intimidating.

I get it!

I have taught fitness and exercise for over 30 years so I have a lot of experience with the fitness industry.  Believe me when I say my first observation is IT CAN BE INTIMIDATING!!!!

How do you get past that intimidation?

May I suggest by just starting.

Starting is the key. “A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step,” said Chinese philosopher Laozi.

That one step can move you past the intimidation and onto a whole new way of living.

I always tell my students that they don’t have to do a one hundred and eighty-degree turn in order to change. Changing course ever so slightly puts you on another trajectory and that trajectory is the change.

That one step ushers in change.

I want to tell you this story about how a simple change had a profound effect on my horse Asherah.

Asherah is a combination of an Appaloosa and a Thoroughbred.

Asherah and her friend Mo one foggy morning.

Appaloosa’s are known to be opinionated, stubborn and often times infuriating.

Here’s a common Appaloosa joke “Why did Native People ride Appaloosa’s into war? Because they wanted to be good and mad when they got there.”

Thoroughbred’s are flighty and nervous.

So Asherah can be a handful of flighty, nervous and enraging all at the same time- but I love her.

So to deal with all of this anxiety Asherah does this horse thing called cribbing.

Cribbing is when a horse grips anything hard with her teeth and at the same time sucks air into her stomach. It is like biting your nails for humans and it releases an endorphin high except it can lead to all sorts of problems like colic.

Colic, abdominal distress, is the leading cause of death in domestic horses. A horse in colic puts fear into every horse owner. Horses cannot vomit so anything that causes intestinal distress can and often is lethal.

Asherah has cribbed so much over her lifetime that she has no front teeth. The endorphin high is so desirable that sometimes she would rather crib than eat. That sounds like an addiction to me. Asherah was addicted to cribbing and because of this, she was at a higher risk for colic.

Then this happened one cold rainy day just before Thanksgiving.

I got to the barn to feed the horses breakfast. My usual perky friendly mare was standing with her head towards the back wall of her stall.

Her stall was a mess and she was covered in shavings or horse bedding.

Often horses that are colicking roll in a frantic effort to get rid of the pain.

Clearly, she had been rolling and thrashing in her stall so this was a sure sign that Asherah was colicking.

I looked at my miserable friend and knew that there were several things that I needed to do.

Trying to control my panic I had to get her out of the stall. If she went down in the stall it would be very difficult to get her up and she might become trapped.

I put on her halter and slowly led her out of her stall and into the barnyard. Her head was low and her eyes were dull with no affect.

I placed my ear on her abdomen to listen for any gut activity and there was silence. Normally a healthy horse’s tummy sounds like a symphony but not today.

My next task was to walk Asherah and pay close attention that she didn’t lie down and roll. When a horse is in this condition if they roll sometimes they will twist their intestine and that can be a very serious situation or even fatal.

Asherah’s head was low and every few steps she would slow down and start to bend her knees a clear indication that she wanted to roll. I had to keep her moving so I grabbed a whip and gently coerced her to keep walking.

Round and round we went in the barnyard.

By this time the light drizzle had turned into a hard, cold New England rain. I pulled out my phone to call my vet but my phone screen got wet and so I couldn’t place the call. Damn cell phones!

My heart was in my throat as I wiped off the screen and tried again, and again and still nothing went through.

By this point, I am crying. Sorry folks I cannot claim grace under fire. In fact, I am shouting to the sky “Help! Help! Please, will someone help me!”

There was no one within earshot.

I knew that if I had this horse medicine called Banamine that I could at least ease her discomfort. Think Pepto Bismal with a muscle relaxant and a dose of painkillers. Unfortunately, I had recently given my only tube of Banamine to another horse friend and so I was out.

Note to self- never be without Banamine when you own a horse.

I looked at my phone again and right under the vet’s number was the number of a fellow horse owner who lived up the road. I pressed her number and the call went through!

Within five minutes Missy was standing in my barnyard Banamine in her hand, a big smile on her face and an offer to grab a blanket to cover my sopping wet horse.

We gave Asherah the medicine and she was immediately better- not out of the woods but not experiencing such pain.

I called my amazing vet Dr. Becky and her always helpful and cheerful assistant Melanie.

After a thorough vet check, Dr. Becky determined that Asherah was colicking because she had ulcers.

For the next few weeks, I gave her the human antacid Zantac- I ground it up and put it in her food. Lots and lots of Zantac.

The proud Asherah in her stall.

And I changed her feed from grain to fodder.

For three years now she has been off of grain and she has been great!

I made this simple change from grain to fodder and not only has she had no belly pain or colic but she has also stopped cribbing!

Turns out the sugar in the grain was causing her great distress to the point that she cribbed incessantly trying to relieve the pain.

When I tell this story to horse people they are astonished.

A small simple change can change your life.

You don’t have to do a 180-degree turn. You just have to move the dial.

Go for a walk. Take the stairs. Walk to your mailbox. Don’t use the remote control for your TV. Run 10 steps during your walk. Wear bigger sized shoes with a pliable sole.

Simple changes. It worked for Asherah and it will work for you!

How You Move Matters! You can learn how to move better with my Amazon bestselling book  Agility at Any Age: Discover the Secret to Balance, Mobility, and Confidence.  My book is illustrated with 40 videos that you access with your iPad or smartphone!


You can purchase it here. 

Teaching people how to move well is my passion. Sign up for posts that teach you how to be more comfortable in your body! Click here to sign up or use the form to the right of this post!

My name is Mary Derbyshire. I am a fitness and movement coach. My methodology is the Alexander Technique, a mindfulness practice that teaches you how to move better. When you move better you feel better and when you feel better your whole life improves! Let me know what you think or ask a question! I love to hear from my readers! Feel free to post in the comments section below and feel free to share this with your friends!

Rats and Cats and You!

Posted on by Mary Derbyshire
My Barn Rat

Something happened at my barn last summer that I have been desperately trying to be philosophical about. It’s what I do. I always try to find the meaning in an event.

I’m always asking myself,  what can I learn from this?

This is hard for me to write about. But, here goes. (If you are squeamish you may not want to read this post)

Last July on a bright sunny summer’s day I walked into my barn to feed my horses.

I opened my mare Asherah’s stall door and slid in her shallow dish of food. She snickered and greeted me with her lovely horse sounds.

When I returned to give her some hay I was SHOCKED to find a very large rat sitting in her food dish eating her breakfast alongside her!

I don’t know if I can express how upset I was. I screamed, slammed her door shut and ran out of the barn.

I think I did some dance in the barnyard like jumping up and down and wailing with clenched fists.

I felt revulsion towards the rat but I also felt betrayed by my horse, as crazy as that might sound. How could she share her breakfast with a rat? Plus, she looked so serene with the rat’s company. Obviously, the horse had been two-timing me with this very well fed rat for some time.

And what about my cats? I can’t describe the depth of my disappointment towards my two barn cats.

Really, cats? What do I feed you for?

(In their defense this  was a very large rat – about two-thirds the size of my cats – so I really couldn’t blame them for not going after it.)

Why did I have such a strong reaction to this rat?

I’ve had plenty of mice and voles in my barn. I have even had a rabid raccoon. We have lots of wildlife on the farm- why did this rat put me over the edge?

Why did I have such a primal reaction to this rodent?

When I posed this question to my friend Cathy she laughed and said that she had just had a similar discussion with a mutual friend who saw a mouse in her house and she jumped up on her counter and squealed EEK!

I did some online research into rat symbolism and I learned that most cultures see the rat as a  symbol portending good fortune. The Chinese zodiac calendar starts off with the rat, which guarantees good fortune in business. The native American shamanic traditions look on the rat as security and survival.  As an animal spirit guide or totem, the rat represents foresight and cunning.

For me? The rat represented a huge problem and all I could think about was that old saying:  “You never have a mouse. You always have mice!” I didn’t have a rat:  I had rats – plural. This thought brought about only more panic and revulsion.

But I had to go back in the barn and finish feeding the other ponies.

The rat had scampered away for now. It must have jumped down the rat hole.

So I made a lot of noise and very reluctantly went back into the barn and finished my chores.

I filled up the water buckets and hauled them down to the paddocks.  I pulled the leaves of hay apart and carried them down as well. I put halters on the horses and lead them down to their grassy fields.  All the while I was asking myself why my reaction was so strong?

Remember, I am always searching for the lesson

I came to think that my rat represented that situation, thing or person that you absolutely cannot abide.

The stone in your shoe if you will.

For me, the rat represented Chaos. Any barn owner knows that you cannot tolerate rats because they will multiply, take over your barn, and eventually spread disease.

Left unchecked, rats will overtake you and I knew that at a very deep and primal level.

So the rat had to go. 

But how?

My daughter Eliza was home for the weekend and she came over. She had been a wrangler on a ranch in Wyoming for a while and was not fazed by rats. When she went into Asherah’s stall not only was the big rat there but also all of her five babies!  Momma Rat was teaching her babies how to enjoy horse food.

Like I said: they will overwhelm you if they get the chance.   

We left the barn for a bit so we could plot our next move.

When we returned with rat poison, we couldn’t believe our eyes.

Greyson the Great Barn Cat

Sitting in the middle of the barnyard between two very smug cats was Momma Rat. A dead momma rat.

It was a nasty deed but it had to be done. 

I have never seen two prouder cats in my life. I was proud of them.

Boo The Brave Barn Cat

When I thought back over the week I realized that the two cats had spent a lot of time crouched in Asherah’s stall. In hindsight, I realized they were probably stalking the rat.

We all have rats in our lives…the things that you shouldn’t bear. The person who is toxic who you must no longer tolerate. The habit that is not constructive. Maybe it’s a soul-crushing job? Maybe it’s that closet in a bedroom jam packed with stuff. Perhaps it is being a couch potato and not going for a daily walk?

What is your rat? We all have them.

It’s amazing how the toxic energy still lingers. 7 months later I still walk in the barn with my eye out for a rat. Luckily it has only been me and my cats and ponies.

How You Move Matters! You can learn how to move better with my Amazon bestselling book  Agility at Any Age: Discover the Secret to Balance, Mobility, and Confidence.  My book is illustrated with 40 videos that you access with your iPad or smartphone!


You can purchase it here. 

Teaching people how to move well is my passion. Sign up for posts that teach you how to be more comfortable in your body! Click here to sign up or use the form to the right of this post!

My name is Mary Derbyshire. I am a fitness and movement coach. My methodology is the Alexander Technique, a mindfulness practice that teaches you how to move better. When you move better you feel better and when you feel better your whole life improves! Let me know what you think or ask a question! I love to hear from my readers! Feel free to post in the comments section below and feel free to share this with your friends!

 

About Changing Your Habits

Posted on by Mary Derbyshire

If you are like me, you resist change.   

So do my ponies, Mo and Pip.  

Mo and Pip happy with their hay!

This is what happened to me over the weekend.

One morning I decided not to put the ponies’ breakfast hay near their gate, where I normally leave it.  Instead, I put it closer to the fence that runs between their paddock and my mare, Asherah.

Asherah has been feeling a little needy these cold winter days and I thought that she would appreciate the ponies’ company.

But I didn’t expect this.

When I went to bring the ponies in for the night, they were not standing near the gate where they normally wait when it is time to come in. They were standing where I had left their breakfast hay.

When I clipped on their lead ropes to take them toward the gate, they refused to budge and even tried to go straight through the fence.  It finally dawned on me that they were associating the location of their breakfast hay with the gate and the way out of the pasture.

What happened next floored me.

When I was finally able to lead them to the gate, Pip started bucking and ran through the open gate, dragging me behind him. Mo got in on the action and suddenly 500 pounds of angry miniature horses were dragging me up to the barn. They were furious that I had changed their routine.

This episode reminded me of Spencer Johnson’s book Who Moved My Cheese? but in this case, it was Who Moved My Hay?

It got me thinking about habit and change.

Why do we resist change so much?

Change is hard and it is scary.

When we change, we go from the known to the unknown.

We creatures, horses as well as humans, like to know where we are and what we are about.

We don’t like to swim in unchartered waters. It scares us. It unsettles us and it makes us feel not like ourselves.

This is where the power of habit comes in.

Your habits are who you are. I’m not only talking about habits such as brushing your teeth or nodding your head when you speak. I’m talking about a much broader interpretation of habit.

Habit covers a very wide range of behavior, including things like your tempo. For instance, do you rush or do you saunter when you move? Do you have the habit of taking a long stride when you walk or a shorter stride? Perhaps you have the habit of speaking very fast and loud?  Habit is pretty much everything about you, but it is often almost impossible to see how large a role it plays in your life.

The amazing thing is that once you recognize a habit with attention and thought, you can stop the old habit and decide to proceed in a different way.

This process of managing change is a cornerstone of the Alexander Technique.

Developed by FM Alexander, the Alexander Technique is a mindfulness practice that teaches you how to move, think, and “be” better. You can learn more about the Alexander Technique here and here.

FM Alexander said, “ Change involves carrying out an activity against the habit of life.”

This little exercise illustrates a lot about habit and change.

Where you are now, lace your fingers like you would if you were going to pray or clasp your hands. Unlace them and then lace them again the exact same way.

Now re-lace them but move your fingers one finger over.

Your fingers are still laced but in a different way.

How does this feel?

For most, it will feel strange and different and maybe even wrong.

But look at your clasped hands or laced fingers.  They aren’t “wrong,” they are just different.

You would probably never lace your fingers the second way because the first way is your habit and we almost always default to our habit.

Your habit felt right.

Any other way felt wrong.

We like to feel right.

What this means is that we do the same thing over and over again because it feels “right” without ever stopping to ask ourselves if it is right.

So back to Mo and Pip and the Who Moved My Hay episode.

What felt right to them was to the habit of eating their hay by the gate. What was out of their habit and what felt wrong and what ultimately made them very angry and upset was to eat their hay away from the gate. They were so habituated that they got confused and they mistook the fence for the gate.

Their reaction to the moved hay reminded me of the old saying ( attributed to Alexander Graham Bell) “When one door closes another door opens.” 

But did you know that there is more to that quote? 

The whole quote says “When one door closes another door opens, but we so often look so long and regretfully upon the closed door, that we do not see the ones which open for us.”

Our habits keep us looking “long and regretfully” at the closed door. We are so habituated to our past experiences that we are blind to new opportunities.

One ubiquitous habit is clenching or holding ourselves when we sit, stand or move.

Most of us use way too much muscular tension to get through the day. We may clench our jaw, hold our stomach in, and/ or brace our knees. Holding and bracing ourselves only makes our movement more difficult and can lead to pain and stiffness.

To change a habit you must first notice the habit. You must make it a priority to be aware of what you are doing and how you are doing it.

So, what are the habits that are preventing you from embracing change? Can you identify them? What if you were to ask yourself to stop and let go of the tension or intention around that habit? What happens next? Do you want to do something else? Do you want to choose something new?  

I’d love to hear your thoughts.

How You Move Matters! You can learn how to move better with my Amazon bestselling book  Agility at Any Age: Discover the Secret to Balance, Mobility, and Confidence.  My book is illustrated with 40 videos that you access with your iPad or smartphone!


You can purchase it here. 

Teaching people how to move well is my passion. Sign up for posts that teach you how to be more comfortable in your body! Click here to sign up or use the form to the right of this post!

My name is Mary Derbyshire. I am a fitness and movement coach. My methodology is the Alexander Technique, a mindfulness practice that teaches you how to move better. When you move better you feel better and when you feel better your whole life improves! Let me know what you think or ask a question! I love to hear from my readers! Feel free to post in the comments section below and feel free to share this with your friends!