Connection: the foundation for you, your horse, and your nervous system

by Nicky | Apr 24, 2026 | Uncategorized

Building Your Capacity

This week I want to talk about connection, because it’s something I’ve been feeling a lot this week. I’ve had the bad cold that seems to be doing the rounds and I’ve been feeling pretty sorry for myself. I had more time on my own than usual and I started feeling low.

As I started to get better, I went back to my foundations and realised that there was a lack of connection in my life which was impacting on how I was showing up.

I’ve spent the last few days, now I’m feeling better, working on connection – connection with Jessie, my horse, and my friends, as well as being a proactive part of the coaching community I’m belong to, and it’s made life a whole lot better!

It’s also helped my nervous system come out of survival mode and back to being more rational, gaining some perspective and back to being adaptive.

Where Connection Lives

There’s a lot said about the nervous system and it’s relationship to calm, but it’s not about being calm all the time. It’s about having the capacity to return,

To relaxation after tension

To connection after disconnection

To feel safe enough to be present in the moment

This is where connection lives. Connection isn’t something that’s forced, it’s something that naturally emerges when our nervous system is no longer constantly on alert and scanning for threats.

When your body feels safe, you can notice the small moments and you can respond, rather than react. Your perspective broadens and you take in more of the world around you. Things feel easier, connection feels easier and that has a positive impact on you, the people around you and your horse.

This is what allows connection to deepen—quietly, and powerfully.

What's a bid for connection?

Your horse (or person) doesn’t need you to be perfectly calm. They’re looking for how available you are. Whether you notice all the little things and all the bids for connection and being available to each other comes from an adaptive nervous system.

Relationship researcher John Gottman talks about bids for connection — simply put, they’re requests to connect. Whether we see these bids or not, and how we respond to them, make a huge difference to both humans and horses.

A bid for connection could be a glance, a softening of the body or eyes, a brace, or a breath. The moments that ask “Are you there with me?”

When our nervous system becomes adaptive, it reflects in the people around us, and our horses if we have them.

Your horse is always in conversation with you, much like the people you come across every day. There’s a conversation in play all the time, through energy, and the state of your nervous system.

They are constantly asking, in their own way:

“Are you safe?”

“Can I trust this moment?”

“Are we together?”

These are their bids for connection and they’re looking to see whether you’re present and paying attention. We can only do this with an adaptive nervous system.

Connection is true for us, whether we’re a horse rider or not, and it’s why it’s one of the 7 foundations I focus on as part of the work I do as a coach and mentor.

The relationship you have with your horse, and with others, will always have an impact on your nervous system, and will always be reflected back at you.

When you feel safe in your body, connection becomes something you offer, and something which is reciprocated until eventually it becomes a natural part of who you are.

Where to begin

The next time you’re with your horse (or about to do something you’re worried or nervous about), before you do anything else, stop and ask yourself these three things,

Can I feel my breath?

Can I soften my body, even just a little bit?
Can I be here, without rushing what comes next?

And then, what can I notice my horse? Or my surroundings? And pick out 3 things you notice.

With your horse, it might be how they brace or relax as you move around them, their breath, or the flick of an ear, whether they’re looking towards you or away from you.

In your surroundings, it might be the view from a window, a person walking past, the nature around you or your feet on the floor.

Once you start noticing more, your nervous system recognises there’s no threat, and it can adapt to the situation you’re in rather than getting stuck in a survival pattern.

Once you start noticing more, and responding to it, your horse will notice, other people will notice and watch how your connection grows.

It’s when you start building the relationship, with yourself, your horse and the people in your life. and that’s when you begin to flourish and thrive.

With love Nicky x