Conversations with Amanda Held

Today we’d like to introduce you to Amanda Held. 

Hi Amanda, thanks for joining us today. We’d love for you to start by introducing yourself.
My name is Amanda Held, and I am the founder of H.O.O.V.E.S and the CEO of The Equine Wisdom Institute. Getting to where I am today has not been an easy path, I joined the Air Force straight out of high school and served on active duty for four years. When my enlistment was up in 2003 

I made the choice to stay at home with my children. However, being at home and sitting with my kids having not a lot to do brought up a lot of things from my past I had not dealt with. I began to have anxiety, depression, and thoughts of not wanting to be alive anymore. I struggled to find the connection and purpose I felt while serving. This was very scary for me because I had so much to live for, and I didn’t understand why I was feeling the way I felt. Thankfully I was invited by the manager of the Air Force academy stables to adopt and train a wild baby mustang. I named her Shelby and working with her changed the trajectory of my life. Through the process, my shortcomings, failures, and concerns were all exposed during each training session I had. When working with horses you have to learn to speak their language which means I had to learn to communicate non-verbally. This also meant I needed to gain control of my emotions when I was in the presence of Shelby. If I was an emotional train wreck she wouldn’t want to look at me, trust me, or even be around me. Therefore, through this process of gaining her trust, I was able to start trusting myself, and in turn, everyone else around me began to trust me more. Everything around me started to shift because I was in control of my emotions. I learned about Equine Assisted Psychotherapy, which is not for people who are necessarily handicapped but who have emotional problems and mental health problems. 

Once I learned that I fully understood how Shelby had helped me overcome my emotional issues and I decided that was my purpose. I now have made it my mission to help other people receive all the benefits I have gotten from my mustangs. In 2009 we launched HOOVES. Healing of Our Veteran Equine Services is a healing program for veterans and families of veterans. It has now become a 4-day healing retreat but has not always been that way HOOVES has remarkably grown, we started as a small program with just me working with them one on one. And it has slowly grown into what it is now. In these retreats, I teach our veterans everything that I learned from Shelby and use our horses to help them experience the same personal growth I have. I am enamored by the profound healing I have witnessed, and I realized my research and work were not only required by the veterans I was working with but the community and beyond. 

After 10 years of running my nonprofit organization, I have finally put my powerful facilitation process into a certification program and I am now training individuals who want to provide equine-partnered coaching and healing services themselves. The Equine Wisdom Institute is a resource that links people to the powerful wisdom of the horse so they can realize their own potential and through the ripple effect raise the consciousness of humanity. The Equine Wisdom Institute provides life-changing workshops and retreats for leaders which will allow them to actualize their true, authentic leadership potential. Horses reflect the life inside of humans; they serve as a gauge of our sincerity and interpersonal skills. You can lie to the people around you, but you can’t lie to a horse. Through equine-guided activity the herd reflects the leader’s blind spot, this will raise awareness to the leader as to how they can improve and grow. Through the guided process solutions are integrated and incorporated and instant long-lasting transformation takes place. 

We all face challenges, but looking back, would you describe it as a relatively smooth road?
A big struggle that we overcame with HOOVES was finding space we could call home that would hold all of our horses while also supplying enough space for our retreats. When I was doing individual work, it was at a barn I owned with my father. He passed away unexpectedly in 2011 and I wasn’t going to be able to keep the farm on my own. I had to start liquidating, and I put it on the market, and it sold 3 days after. I was not expecting to have to be out that quickly and with no place to go I started adopting out many of my horses. Thankfully one of my mentors called me three days before I had to be out and let me bring the rest of my horses and equipment to his farm. There I started doing small group workshops which turned out to be the biggest blessing because I saw the biggest growth within these small group activities. The struggle then began of finding space to hold these workshops. We were constantly moving spaces and holding these workshops at different spaces. Finally, in January 2018, we were offered the opportunity to have our own space. 

We moved into a small five-acre farm in Whitehouse, Ohio. It had the space for our horses, but it did not have the space for our retreatants to be able to stay. We were able to work with camp courageous, which was a local camp down the road, for housing but they had their own programming running from May through August, so we had to create housing for our summer retreats. We created our own four rustic cabins, but not soon after that, we began to outgrow that small place. We needed a new and bigger place to hold our quickly growing organization. Then I got a call from the owner of a farm of 30 acres on oak openings with a natural water source running through it. It was God answering my prayers, but we didn’t have the budget for it. I wrote and sent a business proposal anyway and left it in God’s hands. 2 days later they said yes and we were the owners of the beautiful property we call home today. 

Thanks for sharing that. So, maybe next you can tell us a bit more about your work?
This year we have implemented a new program. In January, my husband and I drive across the country to California to rescue 4 wild mustangs. We brought them back to our farm and are going to take 4 veterans through the gentling and training process so that these horses can be adopted into great homes. If the pilot is successful, we will continue to rescue and adopt out more wild horses. We are filming the process and posting on our YouTube Channel YouTube.com/hoovesforvets8032 

I love the small-town family feel. We are a community that cares about our neighbors. Here at HOOVES, we have felt so much love and support for the community around us, and we could not be more grateful for the support we get. 

I would love to see more activities available that promote a healthy lifestyle. My husband and I love to find outdoor activities and activities that will help our bodies feel good while being fun and enjoyable! Having more activities available for all ages that are fun while also promoting a healthy lifestyle and making your body feel good would be great! 

What do you like and dislike about the city?
I love the small-town family feel. We are a community who cares about our neighbors. 

I would love to see more activities available that promote a healthy lifestyle. 

Contact Info:

• Website: www.hooves.us
• Instagram: @hoovesforvets
• Facebook: Facebook.com/hoovesforvets
• Youtube: @hoovesforvets8032

Image Credits
Sean McConnel