Intrinsic Motivation for Healthy Movement in Horses with Kathy Sierra

Horsemanship Breakthroughs Podcast⁠⁠

Intrinsic Motivation for Healthy Movement with Kathy Sierra

"Nature as an ally instead of adversary”

Kathy Sierra has ten years working in human sports medicine as a training director in Los Angeles.

She then went back to school for computer science, working after as a game developer and software architect. Kathy eventually worked in Hollywood and taught “interaction design for intrinsic motivation” at UCLA Entertainment Studies and Universal Studio, and went on to create an educational book series in technology that sold over 2 million copies.

Horses have been a lifelong passion, but not her profession. However, when her beloved horse Draumur was nearly euthanized, Kathy felt it was her fault, so she took everything in her background on motivation, learning psychology, neuroscience, and movement science, and synthesized a path forward to help him when conventional methods failed.

Eventually other people saw them and began to ask for help with their horses, so she created the philosophy and principles of Intrinzen. She lives on a small island near the border of US/Canada with her husband and 6 horses.

𝐈𝐧 𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐬 𝐞𝐩𝐢𝐬𝐨𝐝𝐞 𝐰𝐞 𝐝𝐢𝐬𝐜𝐮𝐬𝐬:⁠⁠

• Kathy’s start with horses and how her career in sports biomechanics influenced her horsemanship
• Psychology of intrinsic motivation for movement in horses
• The story of Draumur, a horse who once refused to move, and who Kathy considers the founder of everything she does now with horse & movement
• Using negative & positive reinforcement without diminishing intrinsic motivation
• The challenge of Vavi- of helping a horse find badass movement!
• The birth of Intrinzen! And Kathy’s tips on how to get started with this way of training
• What could be really happening when you think your horse is “testing you”
• Setting up your environment to create intrinsic motivation for movement
• Kathy’s views on healthy horses and what healthy movement is
• Creativity, experimentation, & autonomy in training horses
• PLUS so much more!

Kathy is extremely intelligent, knowledgeable, and polarizing with her views on horses, horse training, & biomechanics.

Find out more & connect with Kathy Sierra on Instagram @pantherflows or checkout her website www.pantherflow.com

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