Mindwise Equestrian

05/12/2025

I am taking a break from social media promotions and business development, however don't take my disinterest in these things as a sign I'm not still seeing clients - I am so please hit me up if you want to work together.

For a deeper understanding I what I am saying and what lead me to this choice please feel free to have a read: https://www.sandratrott.com/post/r-d-promotions-are-going-on-leave-but-it-s-still-business-as-usual

05/12/2025

Such a valuable message and resource!

💕

02/12/2025

Sad to hear about the passing of two very iconic horses, their presence really shifted the lens of dressage for me.

They seem to have ended up representing all that is both good and bad with the sport and wider community.

26/11/2025

Looking forward to listening to this! 🐴💃🏻

Andrew McLean recently sat down with Samantha on The Elevated Equestrian podcast for an insightful conversation about the science behind how horses learn.

They discussed negative and positive reinforcement, classical conditioning, seat-only stops, the “two-beat rule” for perfect halts, retraining OTTBs, and the true definition of the half halt.

Other topics touched on were horse arousal and downregulation, the physiological power of scratching at the wither, and how allowing horses touch, forage time, and agency can change their mental state.

Listen now: https://open.spotify.com/episode/40prA7flNbX4dNxUkF2ijY?si=ozLdzXseSUuGJUgKBM-lDg

25/11/2025

This is brilliant… on many many levels 🙌🏻😂💪🏻🐴

We Are All Making S**t Up (MSU)

Does this guy look like an expert to you? Probably not. But that is the trouble with horse ideas. The dodgy ones rarely look dodgy. Most of the time they look perfectly sensible, even evolved and enlightened, until you try them and end up emotionally bruised, financially lighter, and with a horse who now considers you a walking safety hazard.

Humans are natural MSU machines. Making s**t up is practically our native language. And in the horse world it really should be a new Olympic equestrian sport. Scroll your social media feed and you will find a buffet of theories, spiritual downloads, opinions, and neuroscience flavoured fairy dust. Some of it is thoughtful. Much of it is an express ticket to Crazy Town. And while I can spot the nonsense quickly, it is much harder for people without my practical experience and background in science and research.

So here are a few red flags that your latest horse guru, speaking with great authority, might be serving you MSU of the unhelpful variety.

1️⃣ Complicated jargon delivered with smug authority.
If someone explains horses using words you would expect to find in an incomprehensible academic word salad, they are not enlightened. They are compensating. The more you understand horses, the simpler everything becomes, not the harder.

2️⃣Anyone who claims everyone else is cruel.
People with real experience become less judgemental over time, not more. If someone positions themselves as the sole kind, ethical being in a world of violent egotists, that says far more about them than about everyone else.

3️⃣Advice so vague it feels mystical yet contradictory enough to make you doubt your sanity.
If you cannot learn it, apply it, or repeat it, it is not a method. It is just MSU. And MSU does not load floats, stop rushing, or fix spooking.

4️⃣An expert who cannot handle questions.
If someone crumbles or claims persecution the moment you ask for clarity, it is not because you are closed minded. It is because their idea collapses under the slightest tap.

5️⃣Anything that humanises horses.
Horses are not humans. They are also not bats, penguins, or therapists. They do not have impostor syndrome or people pleasing tendencies. Viewing horses through a human lens makes your interpretations worse, not wiser.

A huge part of my job is extracting bad MSU from people’s minds so they stop feeling guilty, stop feeling confused, and stop unintentionally frying their horses in chronic stress.

We are all making s**t up to some degree. The art is learning to tell the evidence based helpful s**t from the harmful s**t. And yes, that is now an official category in my teaching, thanks to my client Simone who introduced me to the acronym and gave me a new way to call out nonsense.

This is Collectable Advice Entry 85 of 365 in my challenge. Share this with your friends so you can look each other dead in the eye and say “MSU” before calmly walking away from dodgy advice😆. Hit share or save and gift your circle a handy little acronym for those moments when someone starts believing their own BS😎.

21/11/2025

Very accurate!

14/11/2025

Such a great unpacking of the universality of foundational science based practice and how that intertwines with individual differences.

Thanks Lisa for writing this & I am very grateful we are colleagues 💕🙏🏻🐴

13/11/2025

Another example of twisted horse/human psychology.

This reads like parental counselling - a field I specialise in.

The start and the finish - accurate.

The middle - inaccurate.

It should read “The horse who tests you isn’t being difficult, he is telling you the demands you are placing on him outstrip his skills. Respond with presence not punishment”

Horses like children aren’t ‘asking’. Asking requires the mental capacity to project thought, reason, and clarify. Horses don’t have this.

Plus behaviour generally is never a question, it’s a statement 🤷🏻‍♀️

In the case of misbehaviour it’s a statement of ‘I’m not prepared for this’ or ‘I don’t understand’.

The end.

12/11/2025

Turns out this is a long post.

Frankly as it should be because this is not a small topic.

I get that human psychology is exciting.

I get the tendency to use it as a horse trainer to explain and describe horse behaviour.

As someone who is BOTH I also can say with certainty you should do it with real care and CAUTION.

It takes a lot of time and practice to really understand these human psychological concepts. I consider myself still a real apprentice in the field and I have been formally studying it now for over 6 years (full time).

So please be respectful and careful. Take your time. If you have an epiphany as a horse trainer when you read some human psych stuff, maybe go talk to a therapist and unpack your understanding of the concept before you start applying and teaching it.

With that though there is even risk, many therapists are doing the opposite, therapist first horse trainer second, and they miss the mark also, cause they don’t understand how different horses are.

It’s a big curly concept. I support moving forward, but move forward with education, curiosity and some uncertainty please.

For the love of horses and human, may this be helpful! 🙏🏻

12/11/2025

Abusive behaviour is learned, no one is born ‘abusive’ or ‘bad’.

We all grow up in different environments and those environments shape us - some grew up in person centred families who modelled secure attachment behaviours daily… some of us grew up in varies degrees of something other than this.

Same same in our ‘horsy’ family.

Good news but: how we relate to all things is learned and therefore can be unlearned.

Unlearning is hard, often painful and tends to lead to a lot of social discomfort and potentially ostracism which we (as social animals) are highly sensitive too.

There’s many reasons why large groups of equestrians are struggling with adopting change towards ethical practice, this is one of them…

FWIW I say this having lived it and having witnessed it for my students who chose to change. The shift can be horrible at times, very isolating and very hard, but for me and my students who choose to endure it, we all agree it is 100% worth it.

Thanks to Milestone Equestrian for a great post. 🙏🏻

The average person who has caused harm and engaged in abusive practices, would not identify themselves as an abuser.

There is a belief within the horse world, as well as outside of it, that abusive humans are the ones who act maliciously and abuse others on purpose. With the deliberate goal of causing emotional and/or physical harm.

The truth is often far from this.

People who are harming others, whether they be animals or humans, often times will make excuses and justification to try to absolve themselves of any accountability.

They may view what they are doing as necessary. They may deny the fact that it’s harmful altogether. They may seek confirmation bias to validate their current belief system.

But the average person who has displayed abusive behaviours will not self identify as an abuser.

They also are highly likely to have a lot of people who like them and see the good in them. People who also wouldn’t call them an abuser.

This idea that abusive people have to be a villain in every aspect leads people to missing signs of abuse.

Abusive people are just human beings. They may not be abusive in every facet of their life, but that does not absolve the impact their actions have when they are causing harm.

The sad truth is that a lot of people in the Horse world deeply love their horses, but also cause them harm with their actions.

The love that they have for their horses doesn’t cancel out the impact of harmful training and care practices.

The amount that the person remains in denial doesn’t give the Horse reprieve from the reality of this situation.

This is why we see so much cognitive dissonance.

People feel that to admit that you’ve caused harm and change is admitting to being a villain. Admitting to being a bad and irredeemable person.

But the reality is that a lot of people within the Horse industry have been taught harmful practises from the time they first started riding.

They have had signs of Horse stress normalized to them as regular horse behavior.

They have been repeatedly conditioned to not see what they are doing for what it is.

So, acknowledging that all of those years, they have been justifying practises that might be harmful feels like the ultimate betrayal.

But, nonetheless, if we want to see change in the industry, people need to start doing the hard work that is reflecting on practises and whether or not they are fair to the Horse.

Information being uncomfortable to hear does not mean it is inaccurate.

So, here is to being uncomfortable in the name of letting go of traditional practises that no longer serve, and that we know cause harm.

Here is to demystifying the abusive person, and recognizing that any person, no matter how well intention, can cause harm.

10/11/2025

Refine your horsemanship from the inside out.

Join Sandra, one of Australia’s only equestrian coaches with dual tertiary qualifications in human and equine psychology, this Sunday the 16th in North Arm, Sunshine Coast, for a day of insight, connection, and practical tools to strengthen your communication and partnership with your horse.

Open to all levels — groundwork or under saddle, depending on your preference.
✨ Only 2 places remain!
To book your spot: https://www.sandratrott.com/events

🐎 Understand your horse. Understand yourself. Ride with connection.

09/11/2025