The InHand Project — Equine-Assisted Relationship Learning

You don't need horse experience. You need curiosity.

Horses are deeply present animals. They respond not to words, but to congruence, regulation, and clarity. When you work alongside them with your partner, they offer immediate, visible feedback about what's actually happening between you. We don't use horses as metaphors or therapeutic tools. We work alongside them, and they respond honestly to what they see.

This is skill-building, not psychotherapy. It's designed for couples who are generally functioning well but starting to notice strain, miscommunication, or recurring patterns they'd like to address.

This tends to land for people who

Keep having the same argument without knowing why it keeps happening
Communicate well on the surface but feel like something isn't getting through
Want a shared experience that goes deeper than a weekend away
Have done talk therapy and want to approach their relationship from a different angle

Two practitioners, one shared belief

James and Olivia walking with horses at the farm

We built The InHand Project together, as practitioners and as a couple. We kept seeing the same thing in our own relationship and in the people around us: caring deeply but not being able to see the dynamics actually playing out. Horses gave us a way to make that visible. We bring different training and different lenses, and that's the point.

James Wilson

Equine-Facilitated Leadership Coach

Over 20 years working with horses and leading teams. Former Executive Director at one of NYC's largest therapeutic riding centers, CHA certified, trained in natural horsemanship with Chris Irwin. In workshops, James runs the observational framework and skills-based debrief, helping participants name what they saw and connect it to concrete tools.

Olivia Weber

Licensed Creative Arts Therapist, LCAT, ATR-BC

Olivia's work is grounded in attachment theory, mindfulness, and relational awareness. She supports individuals and couples in understanding how their histories, nervous systems, and patterns shape the way they connect. In workshops, she guides the relational and nervous-system dimensions of processing, helping participants understand not just what patterns showed up but why they exist.

What two days look like

Each day runs 9 to 5. You'll work alongside horses through a series of groundwork exercises, each followed by guided processing where we unpack what happened and connect it to your relationship. No riding, no horse experience needed.

The exercises are designed to surface the stuff that's hard to see from inside a relationship: how you regulate under pressure, how you communicate when the stakes feel real, how you repair when something goes sideways, and whether you can coordinate as a team when neither of you is fully in control. Horses don't let you fake any of it.

A participant leading a horse through a groundwork exercise in the covered arena

Couples working with horses in the arena during a workshop session

What to expect: Two full days, 9am to 5pm. You'll be outdoors and in a covered arena. Groups are small so every couple gets real time with the horses and with us. Wear clothes you can move in and closed-toe shoes.

$1,200 per couple

Two full days of facilitated groundwork, processing, and skill-building with your partner. Small groups mean you're not watching from the sidelines — you're working. That's the whole point.

The workshop ends. The project doesn't.

Two days will give you a set of tools and a shared vocabulary. But relationships keep moving, and the patterns you surfaced will keep showing up. We're building ways to keep the work going.

Follow-up sessions

A check-in with us after the workshop to talk through what's stuck, what's shifted, and where you want to go next. These can be one-off or recurring.

Private work

Some couples want more time with the horses, at their own pace. Private sessions let us tailor the exercises to what's specifically showing up in your relationship.

What's next for us

We're still building this. We don't have all the answers — we're practitioners and a couple doing the same work. As The InHand Project grows, so will the ways to stay connected to it.

In their words

"Olivia and James facilitated a truly wonderful relational learning weekend out in nature. Since completing the Equine Relationship Lab, I've been able to utilize the skills we explored to deescalate and reframe conflict with my partners, and set better boundaries professionally and within other interpersonal relationships. Not often do I experience a learning environment with such immediate impact on my life, and the opportunity to work with them and horses made the work really special and meaningful."

— Veronica Chin Hing-Michaluk, LMHC

"James and Olivia brought together a solid foundation for the development of couples communication skills, utilizing the naturalistic demands of basic equine motivation. It was great to work with my partner to find ways of motivating the horse — a third party with motivations and anxieties of its own — without the benefit of practiced language or over-learned tools, and without the option to use inefficient yet well practiced behaviors as a motivational tool. We were taught to work together to sense the needs of the task, and communicate with each other to address this rather unusual challenge together."

— JN, PhD

"The Relationship Lab was a wonderful weekend spent with knowledgeable leaders who shared their expertise in horse mechanics and tools for improving communication. The experience was very open-ended, allowing participants to choose their own approach and utilize the tools provided in ways that best suited them. Rather than focusing on a fixed set of goals, the course emphasized each individual's and partnership's interpersonal growth and what they chose to take away from the experience."

— PCM

"Push, block, and draw have stuck with me in the weeks since the program."

— DM

Are you a clinician?

If you're a therapist or counselor and you're curious about how this work complements clinical practice, we wrote something for you.

Information for clinicians

What horses reveal about how you move through relationships