Kathryn The Confidence Coach

It's no secret that I'm intuitive with animals - I have a whole other page dedicated to it ( Kathryn Knock Animal Intuitive ) after all. Did you know that I didn't always know how to talk to animals, and that it took a lot of practie and training for me to get good at it? That's right, training - I was taught how to be intuitive with animals and I firmly believe that anybody can learn to do it too.

I'm currently offering 1:! training which can help start you on your way to tuning in to your animals.

Intuitive Horsemanship Starter: A single session with me which will show you how to start becoming more intuitive with your own horses (or any other species). This is currently the most inexpensive way to work with me at ONLY £30!

Intuitive Horsemanship Toolbox: 4 x 1:1 sessions leaning deeper into intuitive tools and plenty of chance to practice with them. This is also a very special price at only £90. I won't always be available 1:1 with these trainings, and this is an opportunity to get in quick before the programme is rolled out in (probably, mostly) self-directed learning format.

Both are available in gift voucher format - so send this post to somebody as a hint for what you want to find under your Christmas tree this year!

Don't you hate it when your glasses steam up with your hot drink 😂

Is 2023 going to be the year that you finally get your riding mojo back? I have some very special offers for you to be able to work one to one with me at a great price!

Confident in a jiffy: a 1:1 session to learn the most amazingly powerful tool which is going to help you to control those nerves and be able to make progress with your horsemanship. Yes you really can learn this from the comfort of your own home and then take it out onto the yard to put into practice straight away, and it's yours for just £30

Confidence Toolkit: We're going to cover other tools and have a chance to practice and refine them over 4 sessions. Super special price at £90!

Are these perfect for somebody you know? e-gift vouchers are available now!

I'm still on a high from an intensive weekend away at The British Improv Project, where I have been coaching and enjoying other people's workshops and the company of a bunch of geographically diverse friends I only get to hang out with at these events.

As performers as in life, looking after our own needs is often an afterthought, only addressed when things get bad. To counter this I led a 90 minute workshop on self-care for improvisers, and it was touching hearing people be able to name exactly what situations they were looking forward to going away and using the techniques for. One of my favourite things about embodiment workshops is that they're not the type of thing that sits on a piece of paper in a folder afterwards, they are tools that are ready and accessible to use from the moment you learn them.

I also was able to add morning check-in circles to the programme, which explored two questions that are fundamental for self-care: "How am I?," and "how do I want to be today?".

If your group or organisation would benefit from training in self-care and resilience I am opening my books for workshops and coaching in 2023.

Image: a group of us performing an improvised musical song on Saturday night at the British Improv Project. I'm second on the right.

Alt text: a group of 5 people are standing behind 5 tall chairs. They are standing or leaning on the backs of the chairs, and singing to the audience (who are off camera to the left). They have fierce expressions on their faces, as the song is an improvised version of the Cell Block Tango from the film Chicago, and they are defending the murders each committed with the claim that "you would have done the same!"

Image credit: William Buist

Another coaching one today.

I was asked to coach a 10 year old who was feeling nervous about riding her pony. We worked over video chat, because when it comes to issues of confidence it's not only possible to do good work away from the horse, it can be really beneficial to do so. You can concentrate on learning and experimenting with new concepts without the complications and potential risks of being atop your equine companion!

After a chat it sounded as if she was anticipating him spooking and tensing up, and he was reacting to the tension by.. looking for what spooky thing there might be to worry about. So I taught her basic body awareness and centring. Because I work through practical exercises age is no barrier to understanding some quite grown-up concepts.

Here are her notes (shared with both mum and daughter's permission).

Imagine if all 10 year olds were taught basic body awareness, emotional intelligence and the ability to manage their emotions.

I still work remotely with people who are having confidence wobbles, but I'm mainly posting over at Kathryn Knock Animal Intuitive these days. Thought I'd update this page with some feedback from a coaching client from earlier this year.

Happy National Pet Day!

Are you part of a group who meets online and has talks? Would you like a fun and interactive presentation about resilience, confidence or working with your intuition?

I now offer talks to interested groups on the following themes:

Embodied Resilience for the New Normal
Tools and techniques everybody can use to deal with what life throws our way in 2021 and beyond

How to be Confident Before you are Confident
An interactive workshop full of easy assertiveness and confidence tools from a Confidence Coach

Listening from the Heart
What working with animals has taught me about intuitive listening and how you can become a better listener, for people and for pets.

As hosted by The Listening Summit among others.

Forward this post to your group if you'd like them to book me!

Happy New Diary Week! 💖

I know, I've been quiet recently. The truth is I've been in a kind of hibernation. I needed to take some quiet time off to rest. As you can see in the picture, I'm not exactly scheduling much in for now. My life has been bonkers (whose hasn't?!) and I've had some big life resilience challenges going on, on top of all the bonkersness that was 2020. I needed to learn how to rest - and I'm still in that process. I'll let you know what the plan is when I'm ready to emerge. But for now, I will wish you a Happy and healthy New Year, and I hope you can find the quiet time to reflect on this year, the good, the bad, the hideously ugly and, perhaps, the beautiful. 💗

Planner insert by Sophie Jewry Ladies That Plan

War horse facts

Somber reflections on the use of horses and donkeys in WW1. Many animals were killed as well as people.

War horse facts Eight million horses, donkeys and mules died in World War I, three-quarters of them from the extreme conditions they worked in. Find out more about these brave war horses.

If a picture paints a thousand words then a handhold conveys a thousand nuanced meanings. I've got you, you've got this, I'm with you, I love you, I'm scared, you're strong, We're together.

I don't have any words that seem adequate today, but I hope you feel my intention with these handholds. 💜

Images courtesy of the following people on Unsplash; Ben White, Josue Ladoo Pelegrin, Justin Groep, Leonhard Schönstein, Nagesh Badu, Katy Anne & Nathan Dumlao

“Hope” is the thing with feathers -

That perches in the soul -

And sings the tune without the words -

And never stops - at all -

And sweetest - in the Gale - is heard -

And sore must be the storm -

That could abash the little Bird

That kept so many warm -

I’ve heard it in the chillest land -

And on the strangest Sea -

Yet - never - in Extremity,

It asked a crumb - of me.

-Emily Dickinson

Image by Jan Meus on Unsplash and 500px.com/meeusj

On Autumn and Rest

Sometimes people talk about Autumn as a time of grief for the summer gone and preparing for the winter ahead. That's looking to the past and to the future, and whilst I agree that autumn is a time of transition, to me that way of expression misses the essence of autumn in and of itself. Oh how I long to write the word on screen as I would by hand - not with an Apex Capital Letter nor with a small unimportant lowercase one but a large full round and plump shape to signify it's importance without grandiosity or effort.

I see autumn not so much about endings/beginnings but as an entity in it's own right. She (and I do experience autumn as a female) is the gentle shedding of that which no longer serves. The beauty and meaning of dying as a process, a concept more nuanced than the complete ending of life, an autumnal death is a soft with grace and effortless shedding of the thousand parts that no longer serve us. The restful middle ground (not too hot, not too cold), the gentle dimming of the light as one would turn a dimmer switch to invoke a state of more rest-fullness in the home. A turn neither from nor to but inwards. The idea of rest being experienced as a rich concept in and of itself to be luxuriously experienced like warm melted chocolate as opposed to a necessary functional computerised task to be got over with quickly between more arousing activities. The invitation to light fires, gather oneself under a blanket and re-member oneself, piece by peace-full piece. Going through the process of a thousand tiny deaths allows me the opportunity to pull on the threads of the forgotten parts of myself, and I often find myself most creative at this time.

I wish you all the most luxuriously velvety chocolate rich autumn.

Image by Johannes Plenio Unsplash

How are you doing, really?

It's mental health awareness day. We're 6 months into a pandemic and I don't know about you but to me it's all a bit of a drudge. Let's have a check-in - comment with how you are feeling.

Photo of my dog with a toadstool on a rainy day, just because.

I'm not here to change your life.

I'm really not. I can't make you make the mythical "right" decisions. I can't tell you the winning lottery numbers, I sure as hell can't make you slim, I can't make you successful in your career, I can't make you a better lover, I can't make the decisions for you that will make your life better, I can't do your tax return for you and I can't do the day to day living for you that's going to create the life you
want.

Here's what I can do.

I can help you to discover what you really want.

I can put you back in touch with your instincts.

I can help you to process your thoughts and feelings at difficult and overwhelming times.

Some coaches tell you what to do, but that's not the best for every situation. I can walk beside you through the change and help you do you.

If you need somebody to walk with you through the changes that are going on in your life right now, I will be there.

I currently have two spaces for new clients. Drop me a private message if you think this might be what you need to cope with the change that's going on in your life right now.

Image: Dylan Nolte at Unsplash

Sorting through old forms and found this lovely client testimonial for a Reiki treatment I gave to equine client, Lulu. She had just moved yards and was finding the much bigger, hectic paced yard difficult to adjust to. I do love it when they feel relaxed enough from a treatment to just lie down and snooze 🥰

Why I'm in no great rush to get back to normal.

I found myself making excuses to not meet up with my improv troupe after lockdown. Not feeling safe enough yet, too tired, too busy, not enough energy, etc. All of which are true, but I realised today that it's not the full story, there is something else unfurling within me.

My life before lockdown was full on hectic. I'd frequently work a full day, have one or two coaching clients then grab take away food on the way to an evening dance, riding client or improv session, arrive back late, check emails, scroll Facebook.... wake up unrested, skip breakfast, walk the dog, go to work (grabbing a sub optimal take away lunch) and repeat. Weekends I'd be working on my business, more coaching, and going out to dances, sometimes not getting home until 6am or so.

It was fun, full and juicy, but it wasn't sustainable.

It took glandular fever last year to force me to do less.

It took a worldwide pandemic to make me realise that I WANT to do even less. I ENJOY doing less. Less is where I can finally BREATHE.

I'm having a major sort out of all my worldly possessions, quite literally. I'm owning less things, and the more clutter I clear the more headspace I have, and the more headspace I have the more ideas I have.

Less. Less. Less. Make space for things that are good and interesting to grow. W**d out the things that are busywork.

I'm a coach and equine facilitator... well those are the titles I operate under. What strikes me recently is that what I'm actually doing is much more like a translation service.

➡️ Human comes to work with the horses for an adventure in self discovery

🔄 I translate intention to horses

⬅️ Horses respond to what the human is subconsciously telling them

🔄 I translate to the human.

A similar thing happens when I coach directly without the horses.

↔️ We both get clear on intention for our session

➡️ Client has an embodied reaction to our work

↔️ I help them to translate what it all means to them.

And when I'm coaching confident horse riding too -

🔄 what I'm actually doing is helping humans to translate their embodied feelings and cognitive thoughts between body and mind,

🔄 to learn to understand horses' embodied language, and

➡️ to learn to speak an embodied language that horses can understand.

So perhaps instead of "Kathryn The Confidence Coach" I should be "Kathryn the Translator" 🤔😁

The Listening Summit Kathryn Knock on Intuition

I was recently a guest speaker at The Listening Summit. Here's a 10 minute clip of me talking about accessing your intuition and how to start intuitively listening to animals.

The Listening Summit Kathryn Knock on Intuition Kathryn Knock, a confidence coach talks about listening to intuition and guides us through a simple exercise to connect with oneself.

I'm taking a break from running nature circles, which means I can drop in to other people's circles as a participant. I adored today's creativity and play circle, and I wanted to share the poem I created from a passage of Peter Pan. It touched me deeply as a coach and I thought it might resonate with some of you too.

I don't know whether you have ever seen other parts of you?
With astonishing splashes of colour here and there, and fast going to decay.
There is also another map showing through, and nothing will stand still.

Happy take your dog to work day! Smol dog is very very helpful today 😄

First, Listen. Then, Learn: Anti-Racism Resources For White People

I acknowledge the injustices that black people are feeling keenly right now. I recognise that white people here in the UK have a lot of work to do to dismantle the everyday racism that we have the privilege of being able to not notice.

Here's a link with a reading list of books that we can perhaps use as a starting point.

First, Listen. Then, Learn: Anti-Racism Resources For White People For white people who are interested in getting more intentional about deepening anti-racism work, the below are a list of resources to help aid in that effort.

The Embodiment Circle Online - free to all

I get it. Lockdown is hard, and you've been finding yourself staring out of the window at the sky or the nearest green thing, wanting to go sit on a beach, or marvel at the blossom on a tree. Starting Wednesday 27th May 7pm for 5 weeks I'll be leading a series of 1 hour long nature connection embodiment circles. Expect gentle brief meditation, movement and enquiry as to how we can live more in sync with the rhythms of nature.

It's drop-in, free (donations welcome) and suitable for everybody, no matter how much or little access you have to nature.

If you'd like to come but have any accessibility questions or requests, do drop me a PM.

The Embodiment Circle Online - free to all Support wellbeing, learning & connection. Be with others in a pleasant virtual environment, reduce your stress, and move a little to support your health try this!

I'm having a good think about improving my systems to make sure that confidence coaching is accessible to everybody who wants it. I'm learning sign language but it will be a while until I'm anywhere near fluent, but text-based video calls are available with me in the meantime. I'm autism aware and have worked with people with physical and learning disabilities too, so don't ever let a disability be a barrier to working with me.

I wonder what little contagious bubbles of positivity you could spread today?

The Embodiment Circle Online - free to all

I just can't keep away from the Embodiment Circle online at the moment - it's lovely to connect with other humans, share a meditation, a bit of gentle movement and enquiry about oneself.

Here are the next dates you can definitely catch me there;

9.30am this morning (I'll be leading a short movement session)
5pm today (I'll also be leading a short movement session!)
5pm tomorrow (I'll be there socially!)
5pm next Tuesday (I'll be facilitating the group)

You'll need to register here (just once) beforehand to receive the link via email (same link for all sessions). It's free, suitable for all levels of experience, and is not dependent on fitness or flexibility as you'll be asked to move in a way that is sympathetic to your own body and needs.

The Embodiment Circle Online - free to all Support wellbeing, learning & connection. Be with others in a pleasant virtual environment, reduce your stress, and move a little to support your health try this!