Ibalansi Horse Center-pty ltd.

01/02/2025

Welcome beautiful Monty for your month of school here 💕he’s a stunning and young Ottb who needs to find his balance

30/01/2025

So many horses we meet don’t ‘see’ their human at all, and their human also doesn’t see their horse.
Once you see each other, then the breathing synchronises and the dance begins- just like befriended horses play together or a herd acts like one mind

29/01/2025

How to find a balance between just being, play, stretched and collected work?
Do it at liberty and your horse will teach you!

The stronger their bodies get, and the more their minds can collect, the longer they can physically collect.
If the mind is not 100 percent content, empowered and self confident, then they cannot physically ground themselves for collection.

It takes trust and motivation to collect for high school movements like Thula in this Piaffe.

22/01/2025

‘Your purpose is to awaken.
It is as simple as that.
You share that purpose with every other person on the planet- because it is the purpose of humanity.’

Stop putting pressure on yourself. Stop the rat race. Stop being caught up in your roles.

Remember the vastness of eternity, of energy and the connection between everyone.

Breathe . Close your eyes- what do you hear, smell and sense?

The beauty of the present moment. The beauty of planet earth and all its inhabitants.

This is why you are here! To experience emotions, create and to remember that we are all one.

Energy cannot be destroyed, only transformed- we were all stardust! We were transformed into different shapes and take on different shells in order to experience and learn!
This is the essence of evolution!

Don’t get trapped or go backwards by medicating yourself numb, or being so caught up in media or even in your own thoughts…

The horses are not horses, just as little as you are a human.
Those are just shells.

What is inside the shells?
Your indestructible energy- nurture it by filling your life jar of beautiful moments you can create…

21/01/2025

Another update on our beautiful clients mare Tulsi- not only was she rather scared and wild a few months ago, but also terrified and very unbalanced when getting her hooves done before. Through the Liberty work, the conscious stretching and the simple lateral exercises, she developed enough body awareness, balance and strength to be a super relaxed girl when we trimmed her 💕(even with Noah’s feet in her face 😅)

19/01/2025

Welcome little (or rather huge) baby sky dancer! Only a year and a bit old and he travelled all the way from Mosselbay like a pro

15/01/2025

Why do we see so many stressed out horses? So many horses living on flight mode? It’s not natural!

Nature is grazing mode. Flight comes in short bursts and only if there is a true threat. Otherwise: grazing mode, playtime, allogrooming.

There’s no constant worry, just a healthy alertness.

Wise leadmares teach younger herd members how to live like that- but there’s no more wise leadmares teaching herd members about this!
Horses grow up isolated or in dysfunctional youngster herds.

The same thing is happening to humanity- where’s the wise elders teaching us how to be grounded, breathe, and deal with stress? Nobody teaches us anymore on the real threats of life and how to release unnecessary stress!

Humans and horses are then living in constant tension. Their physical bodies store this tension. The body gets sore and inflamed. Eventually illness strikes..

12/01/2025

11/01/2025

It’s a tough life as clients horse here at Ibalansi 😅😂

Tulsi, our beautiful clients young Frisian/ Clydesdale/ Boerperd cross mare is a COMPLETELY different horse to just two months ago!

She grew up on a big farm and was loved from day one, but was terrified by the sheer sight of a halter as that usually meant- deworming/ vaccination time.

She is big and strong and was not self confident which made her very spooky.

We worked our way into her heart, first focusing on Liberty work in the paddock so we could boost her self confidence and build up trust.
We started to introduce the halter in a calm and positive way, slowly halter training her in the safety of her paddock.

Over time she relaxed so much that we are doing proper work in the arena, she has had different types of saddles on, she stretches beautifully and learned how to balance a calm canter.

Her mom came to visit and just sat on her for the very first time 💕 her backing process is getting there with love, patience and understanding.

05/01/2025

We currently have an open spot for a horse to come for training 🐎
May it be backing a youngster, working on trust with unhandled or traumatised horses or simply schooling - WhatsApp 0730700083 for our information sheet.

05/01/2025

I always say to my clients that we can’t be in the horse’s personal bubble until we both have the same ‘colour’.

I mean the same energetic colour, the same wave length: if you’re a blue (for example a little bit weary or scared) and your horse is pink (a little spooky, anxious), then you will both influence each other negatively if you’re too close to each other. The horse isn’t grounded, you’re not grounded and there’s no trust. The colours may clash.

In that case you will work at a safe distance with your horse first. The horse will be able to relax, you will be able to relax and trust can build through communication and getting to understand each other at a distance.

As you build this understanding for each other, you will become similar in energetic colours, your heart beats can entrain to each other and you can get closer now.

Just like you wouldn’t hug a stranger!

01/01/2025

Happy new year 🥳 we started the year beautifully calm with everyone being relaxed throughout tonight’s fireworks 💥 and after working with our clients horses 🐴 I had some time to play with our stunning four year old warmblood filly Lori a little bit 💕

31/12/2024

You cannot train trust- you have to truthfully earn it!
Our clients horse Beau had a rather big issue lifting his hind hooves. He would be truly panicked and kicked violently out of defence.

We see many young horses with farrier problems- I think these growing youngsters find it difficult to balance, especially if the farrier picks up the hooves really high and doesn’t give the horses a chance to stand broad first.
They often get very impatient with horses that don’t stand and think they need to discipline them… what follows is months and years of difficult trims.

On top of the balance issue we now have a proper trust problem.
Lifting the hooves off the ground and having them immobilised is anyhow a trust ask for a flight animal!

What did we do with beau?
We built trust through our work at eye level. Proving to him that we are trustworthy, acting predictable and fair, never holding or cornering him- therefore he could move away when he gets scared and didn’t need to defend himself anymore.

31/12/2024

Beautiful Jewlray is still looking for a full lease/ home lease 💕
she is the kindest 6 year old OTTB!
She’s best suited to an experienced older child/ teenager or lady rider. She has a heart of gold, not spooky, no runaway and ridden in these photos with a bitless bridle! She boxes herself into the trailer, stands perfectly still for the farrier and vet. No issues with injections or deworming- just a sweetheart.
She does phenomenal Liberty work and is always super motivated to come into the arena.
WhatsApp 0730700083 to arrange a meet and greet.

28/12/2024

My new years wish for all the horses is that they may live a pain free life- We see so many horses (basically all of them) with ‘behavioural’ issues on the ground or in the saddle, which are simply in pain!

It might be chronic dull pain, which the horse has learned to somewhat live with and only shows ‘laziness’, it might be acute intensive pain which leads to explosive and dangerous situations on the ground and in the saddle.

But it’s all pain- diagnosed or not - it’s there.
If your vet cannot find the source of the pain or you cannot afford to go through extensive testing, then please give a mild pain killer/ anti inflammatory for a while and see what changes.
Almost 99 percent of horses that are in pain also have developed stomach/ hind gut ulcers which lead to more pain. A vicious cycle.

Another very common issue we encounter are foot sore horses and poor farriery- they might not show the usual careful walking but they might be lazy, dull to the forward cues and struggle in canter transitions. If your environment and your horses feet don’t match up, then please just put shoes on (traditional or glue on shoes as fantastic alternative)!

We have seen horses go from slow, irritable horses to horses that MOVE beautifully, forward and motivated. They can finally put their feet down properly without the constant fear of pain! And remember the footsore horse is most likely sore in all his muscles too as he is moving in a ‘held’ manner throughout the body.

Don’t even get me started on saddle fits - please learn to FEEL the fit with your own hands too..
lastly please always get two opinions on teeth as some dentists feel that horses can deal with a lot more than they actually can.. have you ever had a sore tooth or mouth ulcers and not gone INSANE without pain killers?!

16/12/2024

A few days ago versus four years ago! Jewlray was gentle before her racing career and even more amazing after.