ON OUR MINDS
Check out our latest blog posts about relationships and leadership. For updates straight to your inbox, subscribe to the newsletter.
DEAR SALLY
Find out how our wisest mare, Sally, responds to your human questions and conundrums. She’s a bay mare with a lot of heart, a wise mind and the courage to keep boundaries clear and her herd stable. She’s got great leadership and generously offers horse solutions to human problems.
ON OUR MINDS
Check out our latest blog posts about relationships and leadership. For updates straight to your inbox, subscribe to the newsletter.
OUR BLOG
Connection Hangover
Two weeks ago I helped facilitate a retreat for a group that I’ve been working with for almost a year. Over many years of experience facilitating, what I’ve learned is that I usually get just as much out of a [...]
Vole, C’est Moi: What I’ve Learned from Working Alone
The prairie vole has become invaluable to certain scientists because the prairie vole appears to fall in love. It’s the only rodent that does. It’s one of about 5% all known species (per Smithsonian) that does. The prairie vole. And [...]
Making Something out of Nothing: The Creative at Work and at Home
Our offices are pretty dull. Tasks are assigned and tasks are done. We clock in, we clock out. Most of the time, we are repeating actions that have been deemed productive in the past. Rarely are we contributing anything [...]
Chicken Run: Letting Go is Actually Less Work
Did you know that chickens return to roost every night as the sun goes down? It’s true. They really do. But I didn’t believe that it could be so systematically true. I couldn’t believe that I didn’t actually [...]
Nature Has No Due Dates: Lessons from the Frontline of Foaling Season
Walk through any populated urban area and look past the concrete, see beyond the electronics, listen through the automotive noise. There, you’ll find nature: dirt and trees, birds and rodents, plants and water. As mammals that think and talk [...]
Mindfulness Schmindfulness: Reality Is a Pain
Mindful eating. Mindful drinking. Mindful working. Mindful napping. Mindful this, and mindful that. Mindful purchasing of mindfulness-branded goods and services. If you’ve been to a grocery store, a mall, a school, the internet, anywhere, in the past year or [...]
On Sunbathing and Kindness: One Big Lesson in Presence
I snapped this photo last week and couldn’t help smile at the ease with which these horses chose to pass a lovely afternoon in the sun. There was no angst about what they should be doing instead. No contemplation [...]
The Animals are Honest
I grew up in the Detroit area and you have to look a few generations back to find any rural folks. My uncle Lenny and I are the only members of the extended family with an interest in farm/ranch life [...]
Mindfulness in the Minefield: Reclaiming Calm in the Office
You’re at your desk and the phone rings. The hairs stand up on back of your neck when the number flashes on the phone’s face: it’s your boss’ admin and you do not have anything scheduled with your boss. [...]
When Hope Hurts: Waiting for Truth in the Corporate Parking Lot
I remember lots of things about my first corporate job. But the thing that stands out the most, the memory I’ll never forget, is pulling into the parking lot in the morning and feeling physically unable to leave my [...]
Corporate Grief: When the Workplace Breaks Your Heart
When I transitioned from my private practice as a therapist to leadership consulting in the corporate sector, I figured the psychic heaviness of my role would lift some. I knew that people’s work lives were ridden with relationship conflicts, [...]
The Problem With Problems
Many of us (myself included) believe that we’re pretty good problem-solvers. I love tinkering with a problem. I love brainstorming about a problem. I really love giving people advice about a problem (and somehow manage to earn my living [...]
Corporate Corral: Conferencing in Captivity
I just got off a weekly conference call with members of the Circle Up team. The call often runs well over an hour but, today, we wrapped in 45 minutes. And I’m a little sad. I miss my team. [...]
Relational Inflammation: The Value of Rest and Space
Relationships are like high contact sports. We bump into each other and sometimes knock each other down. It’s nearly impossible to have a human relationship with any kind of authenticity and not hit points of conflict and upset. You’ll [...]
Mindful of the Shadow: Do You Fight or Invite Your Dark Side?
Eric Killough shares the down and dirty truth about meditation and how slowing down our thoughts allows us to come face to face with primitive parts of ourselves. Is it our inner sociopath wanting to run our lives or [...]
My Guru is a Bay Mare
I met Sally when she was a youngster, just a slight filly fresh off the trailer. I had recently purchased my lovely horse, Rosie, and was knee deep in our love affair when Sally arrived at the barn where I [...]
How a Retreat Changed My Life
Seven years ago I went on a retreat that changed my world. It was the first time I had ever spent that kind of money on myself. The retreat was all the way across the country in California. I [...]
We’re Just Shy
Our teachers come to us in all forms. Sometimes, the animals in our lives carry the most powerful lessons, insisting that we search for and find a common language of trust, honesty, and love. Tai Little, who helps Circle [...]
I Never Go Camping
A good friend of mine has extended to me an open invitation to go hiking and camping with him in Yosemite basically every weekend over the past month. I said no thanks every weekend. Every weekend, I wanted to [...]
These Next 6 Years
I’m on vacation this week. I’ve been having a lovely time in Maine, with my family. I’ve been working on relaxing a bit, just letting things slow down. It’s hard for me. I notice that my mind is never [...]
Are You a Thought Addict?
A week ago, I hitched my wagon to the Circle Up Wagon Train. Me, a dozen or so strangers, and a months’ long conversation about personal leadership. What could possibly go wrong? Our first assignment, as I understood it, was [...]
Our Relational Blind Spot: Getting to Know Each Other
They shake your hand and say they're so glad you've joined the team. You have an impressive title, a shiny new badge to enter the building, and the passwords you need to start your first tasks. Now what? Well, [...]
Read This Before You Explode Again…
The Exploding Doormat has to be one of my favorite topics. Somehow I feel like everyone in the world must have heard of this syndrome by now, and then I casually drop it into conversation and get a totally [...]
The Grandiosity Trap: Why We Choose the Impossible
We're inspired to choose the road less traveled and we think it's what will make us heroic and extraordinary. But have you ever noticed how much trouble we get into along the way? One of my favorite things to [...]
40 Things I Know For Sure About Leadership
I’m turning 40 in just a few short hours. In honor of the big day, I’d like to share 40 things I’ve learned about leadership over the last...40 years! Leadership is probably one of the most misunderstood capacities. It’s [...]
OUR BLOG
Connection Hangover
Two weeks ago I helped facilitate a retreat for a group that I’ve been working with for almost a year. Over many years of experience facilitating, what I’ve learned is that I usually get just as much out of a [...]
Vole, C’est Moi: What I’ve Learned from Working Alone
The prairie vole has become invaluable to certain scientists because the prairie vole appears to fall in love. It’s the only rodent that does. It’s one of about 5% all known species (per Smithsonian) that does. The prairie vole. And [...]
Making Something out of Nothing: The Creative at Work and at Home
Our offices are pretty dull. Tasks are assigned and tasks are done. We clock in, we clock out. Most of the time, we are repeating actions that have been deemed productive in the past. Rarely are we contributing anything [...]
Chicken Run: Letting Go is Actually Less Work
Did you know that chickens return to roost every night as the sun goes down? It’s true. They really do. But I didn’t believe that it could be so systematically true. I couldn’t believe that I didn’t actually [...]
Nature Has No Due Dates: Lessons from the Frontline of Foaling Season
Walk through any populated urban area and look past the concrete, see beyond the electronics, listen through the automotive noise. There, you’ll find nature: dirt and trees, birds and rodents, plants and water. As mammals that think and talk [...]
Mindfulness Schmindfulness: Reality Is a Pain
Mindful eating. Mindful drinking. Mindful working. Mindful napping. Mindful this, and mindful that. Mindful purchasing of mindfulness-branded goods and services. If you’ve been to a grocery store, a mall, a school, the internet, anywhere, in the past year or [...]
On Sunbathing and Kindness: One Big Lesson in Presence
I snapped this photo last week and couldn’t help smile at the ease with which these horses chose to pass a lovely afternoon in the sun. There was no angst about what they should be doing instead. No contemplation [...]
The Animals are Honest
I grew up in the Detroit area and you have to look a few generations back to find any rural folks. My uncle Lenny and I are the only members of the extended family with an interest in farm/ranch life [...]
Mindfulness in the Minefield: Reclaiming Calm in the Office
You’re at your desk and the phone rings. The hairs stand up on back of your neck when the number flashes on the phone’s face: it’s your boss’ admin and you do not have anything scheduled with your boss. [...]
When Hope Hurts: Waiting for Truth in the Corporate Parking Lot
I remember lots of things about my first corporate job. But the thing that stands out the most, the memory I’ll never forget, is pulling into the parking lot in the morning and feeling physically unable to leave my [...]
Corporate Grief: When the Workplace Breaks Your Heart
When I transitioned from my private practice as a therapist to leadership consulting in the corporate sector, I figured the psychic heaviness of my role would lift some. I knew that people’s work lives were ridden with relationship conflicts, [...]
The Problem With Problems
Many of us (myself included) believe that we’re pretty good problem-solvers. I love tinkering with a problem. I love brainstorming about a problem. I really love giving people advice about a problem (and somehow manage to earn my living [...]
Corporate Corral: Conferencing in Captivity
I just got off a weekly conference call with members of the Circle Up team. The call often runs well over an hour but, today, we wrapped in 45 minutes. And I’m a little sad. I miss my team. [...]
Relational Inflammation: The Value of Rest and Space
Relationships are like high contact sports. We bump into each other and sometimes knock each other down. It’s nearly impossible to have a human relationship with any kind of authenticity and not hit points of conflict and upset. You’ll [...]
Mindful of the Shadow: Do You Fight or Invite Your Dark Side?
Eric Killough shares the down and dirty truth about meditation and how slowing down our thoughts allows us to come face to face with primitive parts of ourselves. Is it our inner sociopath wanting to run our lives or [...]
My Guru is a Bay Mare
I met Sally when she was a youngster, just a slight filly fresh off the trailer. I had recently purchased my lovely horse, Rosie, and was knee deep in our love affair when Sally arrived at the barn where I [...]
How a Retreat Changed My Life
Seven years ago I went on a retreat that changed my world. It was the first time I had ever spent that kind of money on myself. The retreat was all the way across the country in California. I [...]
We’re Just Shy
Our teachers come to us in all forms. Sometimes, the animals in our lives carry the most powerful lessons, insisting that we search for and find a common language of trust, honesty, and love. Tai Little, who helps Circle [...]
I Never Go Camping
A good friend of mine has extended to me an open invitation to go hiking and camping with him in Yosemite basically every weekend over the past month. I said no thanks every weekend. Every weekend, I wanted to [...]
These Next 6 Years
I’m on vacation this week. I’ve been having a lovely time in Maine, with my family. I’ve been working on relaxing a bit, just letting things slow down. It’s hard for me. I notice that my mind is never [...]
Are You a Thought Addict?
A week ago, I hitched my wagon to the Circle Up Wagon Train. Me, a dozen or so strangers, and a months’ long conversation about personal leadership. What could possibly go wrong? Our first assignment, as I understood it, was [...]
Our Relational Blind Spot: Getting to Know Each Other
They shake your hand and say they're so glad you've joined the team. You have an impressive title, a shiny new badge to enter the building, and the passwords you need to start your first tasks. Now what? Well, [...]
Read This Before You Explode Again…
The Exploding Doormat has to be one of my favorite topics. Somehow I feel like everyone in the world must have heard of this syndrome by now, and then I casually drop it into conversation and get a totally [...]
The Grandiosity Trap: Why We Choose the Impossible
We're inspired to choose the road less traveled and we think it's what will make us heroic and extraordinary. But have you ever noticed how much trouble we get into along the way? One of my favorite things to [...]
40 Things I Know For Sure About Leadership
I’m turning 40 in just a few short hours. In honor of the big day, I’d like to share 40 things I’ve learned about leadership over the last...40 years! Leadership is probably one of the most misunderstood capacities. It’s [...]