If you’ve been working with me or listening to me speak recently, you already know that I spend a lot of time talking about the nervous system and regulation. It matters. A lot.

And lately, as seems to happen with so many meaningful ideas, I’ve been increasingly disturbed by the way valuable information about one aspect of our physiology has been co-opted for marketing purposes, profoundly distorting and oversimplifying how it gets applied to life with horses.

Over and over, I see ads and posts promoting methods, courses, tools, and tricks that promise to solve almost any problem:
Nervous System Reset for Horses.
Holistic Equine Stress Management Certification.
Equine Polyvagal Pathway Course.
Calm Horse, Calm Rider Workshop.
The Rider’s Guide to Equine Vagus Nerve Techniques.

These are just a few of the offerings riding the current wave of nervous system enthusiasm. And don’t get me started on the promises. Serenity, tranquility, calm, zen, harmony, all apparently available for the investment of a few hours online and a couple hundred dollars.

To be fair, I haven’t taken any of the courses, classes, or certifications mentioned above, so I can’t speak to the quality of the material itself. Some of these offerings may provide solid information, useful techniques, and a well-organized learning process.

What I can say with a great deal of certainty is this. It’s more complicated than that.

The mammalian nervous system is still, in many ways, a mystery. What we know, though it grows every day, pales in comparison to what we don’t. And even that growing body of knowledge represents just one piece of an extraordinarily complex system we call a horse. The same, of course, is true for us.

We are more than a nervous system.

We live in a world primed to grab new ideas and spread them quickly, especially when they offer both understanding and simplicity. Every new insight carries the risk of becoming a trap when it turns into the “one true lens” through which we filter all experience.

So here’s my thought for today.
Be curious.
Learn from many perspectives.
Be wary of theoretical demagogues.
Embrace complexity.

And remember, we are all more than a nervous system.

~ Paul

PC – Erin Gilmore Photography

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