Maureen Moons, founder of Courses With Horses at Three Moons Farm in Oakland, knows firsthand about the calming influence of equines. When previously working in a high-pressure, high-tech sales job, she also was a part-time Oakland County mounted sheriff’s deputy when the spark for her current vocation was ignited.
“I was working with a horse early in the morning, and I found myself so present and centered,” she says. “They are so intuitive. So, it set me up [to be in] a really good mental space.” That experience planted the seed for Courses With Horses, which offers custom-designed team-building sessions structured around the horses Moons keeps on her 8-acre on-site farm. “The foundation of Courses With Horses is the team building and leadership development,” she explains. “But in the last two years, I have developed a whole team mindfulness program.”
Participants don’t ride the animals. Instead, they participate in programs customized based on preliminary feedback about the group’s needs and goals. For example, attendees might start by observing the herd of horses. Moons might ask them a question such as, “Which one of the horses would you want on your team and why?”
“You can’t believe what comes out of the simplest of exercises,” she says. Moons also offers a “Leadership in a Box” activity, during which participants lead a horse across the arena into a box made from plastic pipes by earning the horse’s trust and enticing it to cooperate. Or, groups might choose to draw a mystery exercise out of a hat. “Sometimes, we have groups come out here and maybe they just want a fun day at the farm,” she says. “But I always try to sneak the broccoli in with the spaghetti sauce so they get something good for the bottom line.”
