Finding Mastery with Dr. Michael Gervais - What Can We Learn From Animals? | Dr. Laura Stokes-Greene:

Episode Date: April 6, 2022

This week’s conversation is with Dr. Laura Stokes-Greene, one of the best equine sports medicine doctors in the world.Laura is also an avid entrepreneur, focusing on the intersection of medicine, technology, and creativity. She’s utilizing cutting edge biotech to help competing jumper and dressage horses maximize their performance.  Creating innovative therapeutic programs to optimize strength and mobility, Laura emphasizes regenerative medicine with bio-logics such as PRP and stem cells.  An active lecturer and veterinary mentor, she enjoys educating about the human-animal connection and drawing parallels between horses and ourselves.  So that’s why I wanted to have Laura on the podcast - to better understand the human-animal connection and dive deeper into her innovative medical practices that are relevant for humans as well._________________Subscribe to our Youtube Channel for more powerful conversations at the intersection of high performance, leadership, and meaning: https://www.youtube.com/c/FindingMasteryGet exclusive discounts and support our amazing sponsors! Go to: https://findingmastery.com/sponsors/Subscribe to the Finding Mastery newsletter for weekly high performance insights: https://www.findingmastery.com/newsletter Download Dr. Mike's Morning Mindset Routine! https://www.findingmastery.com/morningmindsetFollow us on Instagram, LinkedIn, and X.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

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That's linkedin.com slash deal. For two full months for free. Terms and conditions apply. Finding Mastery is brought to you by David Protein. I'm pretty intentional about what I eat, and the majority of my nutrition comes from whole foods. And when I'm traveling or in between meals, on a demanding day certainly, I need something quick that will support the way that I feel and think and perform. And that's why I've been leaning on David Protein Bars. And so has the team here at Finding Mastery. In fact, our GM, Stuart, he loves them so much.

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with something seamless, I'd love for you to go check them out. Get a free variety pack, a $25 value and 10% off for life when you head to davidprotein.com slash finding mastery. That's David, D-A-V-I-D, protein, P-R-O-T-E-I-N.com slash finding mastery. Now, this week's conversation is with Dr. Laura Stokes-Green, one of the best equine sports medicine doctors in the world. She gets to work with horses. I love horses. Mustangs are like, as a spiritual animal, I love the Mustang.

It's phenomenal. But she gets to do it on a regular basis. So Laura is an avid entrepreneur focusing on the intersection of medicine, technology, and creativity. Right now, she's utilizing cutting-edge biotech to help competing jumper and dressage horses to maximize their performance. And through that, she's creating innovative therapeutic programs to optimize strength and mobility, of course, that's the sports medicine part. And then she also emphasizes regenerative medicine with biologics such as PRP and stem cells. So as an active lecturer and veterinary mentor, she enjoys educating about the human animal

connection and then drawing parallels between horses and ourselves. So that's why I wanted to have Laura on the podcast to better understand the human animal connection and her sport, the sport she helps the horses in. It's a unique sport in that the rider and the horse, that connection is so materially important. It's unlike any other sport because the horse has its own mind, but doesn't communicate in the way that we communicate necessarily. So it's a fascinating conversation about how to dial in to the nonverbal cues to communicate intimately, sometimes without language even, between animal and human, and then also how that translates

to human and human. And then we also take a deeper dive into her innovative medical practices that are relevant for all of us. And with that, let's get right into this week's conversation with Dr. Laura Stokes-Green. Laura, how are you? I'm doing great. How are you? I'm fantastic. I think that I've said this so many times, but I feel like I need an asterisk next to that because of the conditions of the world that we're in right now. And so at the time of our recording, it feels like we're on the hinges of World War III or something. So I say that with all due respect to the suffering that people experience. But notwithstanding, I'm excited to have this conversation with you. Yeah.

And I'm hoping that I can bring some levity and talk about something that, um, people really connect with. And so one of the things I want to do is I want to, I want to understand about the takeaways from your insights on animals to how we can better understand how to one relate to animals, but to relate to each other better. And so let's just let's pause that thought for a minute and maybe you can go way upstream and talk about what is a veterinarian and what does it take to work with horses in the competitive space, and then just take us wherever you want about your craft. Great. Um, so I think something that I always hear whenever I tell someone that I'm a veterinarian is, oh, I always wanted to be a veterinarian, you know, whether male, female, it doesn't matter. It's across the boards. People have such incredible connection with animals that it's this common thread between us. And that was certainly true for me. I loved animals always. And something that I

love so much about horses specifically is that there's this freedom, this spirit, this power. And at the same time, when you connect with them as a person, there's this gentleness and trust and relationship that often takes a lot of time to build. And you have to yourself be very calm and approach it very thoughtfully, very present. I think that's something that, you know, in terms of human animal behavior and connection is really, really important. So the process for me was initially when I was in vet school, I actually thought that I was going to work on rhinos. I wanted to be a wildlife veterinarian. And that came through mentorship with one of my first mentors who asked me to help him on a

reproduction study in South Africa. And so I went with him to work on these incredible animals. And the idea was rhinos are partially going extinct because they really don't reproduce fast enough. And there's a lot of, they're very solitary animals to begin with. And then getting them to have a fo a hole essentially is, is really challenging. So we were there doing a lot of work, finding these rhinos and evaluating them. And it was this absolute, talking again about being super present because the adrenaline that courses through your body

when you're in the brush brush in the presence of a wild rhino is just unbelievable. Um, and to give you like a little story about this. So one of the veterinarians would go up in the helicopter and he would find this specific, um, rhino that we were looking for and, and dart it with this very potent anesthetic that would, if you got a drop of it in your eye, it would cause real problems in a human. So we always had the reversal in our jackets. And my job was to drive this truck full of- So this is not ketamine, which has turned into a recreational drug, right? No, this is like many, many hundred times that. And I remember being so shocked that to drop syringes of this medication, the veterinarians

are wearing masks and gloves and rain jackets because, again, it's so potent. But you have to imagine if you can fit it in a little dart and be able to put a rhino under anesthesia, that it's a very potent medication. What's the skin like of a rhino under anesthesia, that it's a very potent medication. What's the skin like of a rhino? I think, I think maybe this year we are going to, and I say we meaning the Finding Mastery team, we're going to have an opportunity to be on safari and go to a safari in Africa. So I think that's where one of our trips is going to be. But so I don't, I have no idea the texture of a rhino other than just what I've seen, but what, what do they feel like? Very tough, wrinkly skin. It's, it's almost,

you can knock on it essentially because it's so thick. I mean, you have to think they're running through the brush and they run really fast. And so if they hit any briars or trees or anything like that in the process, they can't, they have to have impenetrable skin. It's, it's very prehistoric feeling. They're so massive. They're huge. Yeah. I mean, just, I get, this maybe tells you a bit about me, but like, as you're describing this prehistoric creature with all of its raw power and this texture that I wouldn't even really know what to map it to. I get really excited. Yeah. Well, that primal feeling that you get and being in the land, I'm so excited for you to go there and experience it firsthand because it's life-changing. And it absolutely was for me. It was a defining moment for me of being in that environment

and also in that unique set of sort of you're on your own, but you're with a team and you feel very vulnerable being in the plains and anything could kill you at that time, right? I mean, the rhino could kill you. Other animals could come out. You could really get hurt. So there's this feeling of excitement and you have to just take all of that in and turn a lot of the fear into excitement. You can't just gloss over that now. Like this is, you just hit on like ground zero for working from anxiety to excitement, you know? So, okay.

So do you mind if we pull that apart a little bit? Okay. So I don't expect you to be an expert here, but if you've had experience feeling fear and turning it to an excitement, a state of excitement. How do you do that? It's funny, I was gonna ask you something similar with your other athletes, because I do face this a lot in my job, right? There are here, I am, I'm trying to help the animal, I'm trying to help the horse. But a lot of the things that we're doing in sticking needles in them or taking blood or pulling on things that hurt, palpating areas that are really sore could be interpreted as a threat by the animal. So there are, I would say 99.9%

of the horses that I work on understand that the person that's there is there to help them. And it's a really beautiful thing. Yes, absolutely. Specifically in this industry, which I think is really important. And there's a difference, let's be very clear, between the equestrian and jumping and dressage and racing, right? We should probably clarify that you're not on the race side. No, no. And what's so incredible about race horses being two or three years old, they're very young. They're very hot blooded. They are born to run. And when they hear that gun go off, they are sprinting, right? But that also translates into their relationship with people I found just on my experience in the stalls. So there's a little bit

more of an element of danger. I think, um, the horses that I work on are show jumpers majority. These are horses that are 11, 12, 13 years old. They've been slowly groomed and trained to do these incredible Olympic courses or very high level courses. I mean, some of the horses that I'm working on are jumping high feet courses, which is really quite a athletic endeavor. And they're so used to people touching them everywhere and grooming them and palpating their legs that they don't mind when I approach them. And so it's like I was saying, 99.9% of them don't mind at all. I don't feel that adrenaline response, but every once in a while, there's one that's scared. And the whole thing is, you know, how do you approach the horse in a way that creates that bond where they don't feel like

they need to wonder if you're going to hurt them or in turn, turn around and try and hurt you. And a lot of that actually to me is in the, just in the initial approach. So I'm always telling people when they first approach an animal, regardless of whether it's a dog or a horse, you want to actually put your hands down like this. So many people, and especially kids, where I worry that kids are getting bitten by a dog, they're coming at the dog or at the horse like this. It's a very common, especially saying like over, over the top, like almost like an overhead right cross, right? Like don't do that. Don't give the horse or an animal or dog. And you're saying palms up. Yeah. Palms up underneath coming under exactly. And, and going really slowly and trying to read that body language. And I think it's

similar with people, right? And this is what's so beautiful about the conversation about animal behavior and human behavior. When you go in for a hug, for example, a lot of people don't like that or they're not expecting it. But if you go in with your hands or a handshake, it's a lot less of a intimate move. So I always approach the horse like this. They come to you if they're not afraid, or even if they are sometimes afraid, it's a very passive way to come to them and they'll sniff you. And there's something about the pheromones and the, and the whether or not you're in a stress state that they can recognize a hundred percent. And I always found that. So can we, you know, like humans can, we can sniff that out for other humans as well.

But, you know, it, it, I never knew how to approach an animal. Like, so thank you for the teaching. There's an intuitive nature to get down, like say a dog down to their level. I don't know if that's good or not good. Cause I feel like now I'm a bit compromised if the dog wanted to lunge, you know? So, but maybe I shouldn't be getting down if they're already in that agitated state. But what I love about what you're saying is like palms open. It's like, you're giving a gift. The gift is kindness or affection, but no different than if you're going to give a basket

or something like here, you know, like, okay. so that that's, that's a nice little framework for a simple framework. Yeah, I love that giving a gift and so much of their communication is through sense too. So getting to know you and getting to know who you are. Often, you know, the whole point of putting your hands out is so that they can smell your hands and really understand, you know, what you're about. So do you, are you familiar with the, the different sensory processing mechanisms, meaning olfactory as well as like visual versus auditory touch and tactile that the olfactory, the smell centers in our brain work at a faster clip than the others. Oh, no, I didn't know that. Yeah. So there's a's the thalamic gate.

It's under 400 milliseconds, 0.400 milliseconds to be able to process visual information. And from the smell sensations, we process faster. So there's an idea that we're constantly smelling our world around us well before we can take in the visual information. And it might sound like those milliseconds I was just describing, like that's a fast rate, but even faster, whether it's pheromones or other smells that we're detecting threat, opportunity,

challenge versus, you know, danger in our environment. so it's pretty cool yeah i would imagine horses are probably a little better because they've got these huge really kissable you know yeah yeah that's unbelievable yeah and then um but so then let's let's stay here with the senses for a minute before we go back to the rhinos let's stay with this for a minute their ears they can pin their ears back and they can like full, not 360, but why, why did they do that? Why are they able to move their ears all the way around that big dome of theirs? Well, it's, people are always saying to me, how do you interpret what's going on with a horse when they can't talk to you? How do veterinarians fix animals

that can't speak? And I always tell them, well, they do speak, right? They communicate very clearly through their body language. And that's part of it, right? The ears on the horse tell, obviously it's for listening, which is really important when you're, let's go back to evolution, you know, when you're on the planes trying to assess, okay, is there something that's going to eat me in the woods? I need to be able to listen to some very subtle sounds. So there's that reason for the movement, but also to communicate, stay away from me body language, their eyes, when they're stressed, get really big and the whites of their eyes show. I actually have a couple of, I've started to take some photos of these different facial expressions that horses have, because I find it really fascinating to be able to show people, this is a calm horse where their nostrils are not dilated. Their eyes are very calm and don't show the whites in their ears, maybe in a neutral

position or maybe pricked forward. This is a horse that's upset and pissed off and it's got the ears back and the nostrils and it's kind of looking like this and maybe it has teeth bared a little bit. And then there's also just the anxiety look that's very similar, but maybe doesn't have the ears back as much, but definitely the wide eyes. So this helps me to know what state I'm in and what kind of relationship I need and how I need to move with the horse the moment I walk in the stall, right? And so much about being a doctor or being a therapist of any kind is listening and observing. And so this is a really important part of my physical exam, even from the moment I see the horse, because I need to know what kind of state it's in. Is it dull and depressed and its head is down and its eyes are kind of droopy when I know that this is a sport horse

that should be up and going and bright and alert? I mean, obviously that's not good. Is it pacing around in the stall anxiously? And again, not something that it should be doing. And so there's a lot of reading body language where they're communicating to me. They're telling me, okay, something's wrong. And there's a list of differential diagnostics that go with each of these kinds of body languages, right? And same for people, right? If a person walks into a doctor's office really depressed and kind of flushed, you might think, okay, do they have a fever? If they have a different kind of body language, you might put a different list of things that are affecting them. Finding Mastery is brought to you by

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Just head to FelixGray.com and use the code FindingMastery20 at checkout. Again, that's Felix Gray. You spell it F-E-L-I-X-G-R-A-Y.com and use the code FindingMastery20 at FelixGray.com for 20% off. Are you better at reading body language of people because you're so good now as a skill of reading animal language? I think I have learned a lot of skills that help me. Yes. I don't know that I'm better at reading the body language, but I think there are a bunch of skills from having those relationships with horses that are very stressed that make me better at dealing with stressful

situations with people and give me a level of patience and understanding that I probably didn't have before. Because you're never going to make a 1500 pound animal do what you want it to do without having some level of trust, right? Or having a lot of trust. Are you familiar with equine therapies? Some of the, right. So you just walked over one of the gates, which is if a person is depressed or anxious or irritable, or they're working on some sort of mood challenge that they're having, that they can't, the horse will just not trust them. And that person walks up kind of arrogantly or disrespectfully or out of tune or out of

touch in any way. And the horse is like, yeah, I'm not going with you. Right? Like this 1500 pound thing, just sitting there like, no, not until you get your stuff together will I follow you. And it's an amazing breakthrough for folks. I don't know if you've been able to witness it or not, but you've probably seen it a lot with,

it's called dysregulated people where the horses are like, yeah, you're not going to lead me anywhere. This is a really fascinating topic because a lot of my clients will come to me and say, I'm asking what's the main problem, right? That's the first thing I approach when I'm talking to an owner or a rider or a trainer, what's your main complaint? And sometimes people will say to me, I can't get the horse to do what I want it to do. And it is acting up. There's a behavioral issue in the horse, right? And so my job then is to decipher, well, what is that? Is that physical? And I've seen it. I mean, there's no subtlety to it. When a horse is ticked off, the rider will get on and all of a sudden it's bucking and rearing. Well, is that pain related? Is it because

its back hurts? Is it because it's lame in its foot? Is it because it has arthritis in its neck? Could absolutely be a possibility. Is it because it has some sort of systemic illness, you know, that there are a list of them like Lyme disease is a perfect example. There's chronic Lyme in a lot of these horses, especially in the Northeast. So there are these physical and medical things that I have to uncover and turn over the stones and make sure that that's not an issue. And then there's also the more subtle thing of what is the relationship of the rider with the horse, right? And that's not a veterinary diagnosis. So my job as a veterinarian is to come in and almost give the person permission, in a sense,

to work on that relationship, to turn over every stone, make sure that there's nothing physical. No, you know, check the back. No, there's nothing in the back. Check the neck. sure that there's nothing physical. No, you know, check the back. No, there's nothing in the back. Check the neck. No, there's nothing in the neck. Check all the, make sure it doesn't have ulcers or maybe you find something, right? And maybe that gives a justification. And I certainly have found that the horse has terrible ulcers. And because of that, every time you ride it, when the, when the gastric juices are sloshing in the stomach, the horse gets ticked off. Well, of course, that makes a lot of sense if they have really bad ulcers. But let's say you find that there's

nothing there, then I'll go to the client and I'll say, look, I really haven't found anything. The other options that we can work on are how do you get that relationship, that behavior, how do you work on that? This is awesome because this is, this is like in some respects, the, Oh, um, essential challenge for the human experience is that we first blame the other. So I'm talking about the rider. Okay. I just can't get the person, the horse to behave the right way. It must be their fault. Well, okay, well, what do I do now? Well, it must be medical, right? And then there's a medical workup. And then at the end of that, if there's no diagnoses or no differential diagnoses, then it must be psychological. Well, hold on a minute. I'm laughing because what if we just actually did it in the order that... Hold on, let me pause. There are reasons that people are in pain from a medical perspective, clearly understood,

not confused there. But what if, what if, what would happen if people took inventory first and said, huh, what's my role in this? Do I have a role in this? Maybe it's not the other. Maybe I'm stressed out. Maybe I'm being prickly. Maybe I'm dysregulated. Maybe, maybe something like explore from a, like interrogate with a sense of kindness about your inner self. And interrogate is too strong of a word,

right? That's too strong of a word. The idea is like to really look within, to say, what is my part in this relationship with experience and this relationship with others? And if we could start there, how about it? Wouldn't that be great? So when you're called in, they've already gone through a sophisticated scan about like, okay, I think that I might be a little anxious and depressed or something. And I need to work on some of that. But I also think that there might be an ulcer or there's something with the back or the foot or their face when I am able to diagnose something, especially if it's subtle, right? I have a perfect example of one.

We had this horse that was so lame. I mean, just dragging its leg. And it had happened overnight. There was no reason for it that we could find. I go over the horse. I can't find any. There's no heat. There's no swelling.

When he stands there, he looks perfectly comfortable. And usually if they fractured something to be this lame as he was, they're in distress, right? Back to that behavioral reading their face. He's totally fine eating in the stall. He walks sound. You trot him. He is dragging his leg. And so I went through the normal protocol that a sports medicine veterinarian does in terms of trying to diagnose what was going on. You block them, which is essentially where you're using an anesthetic to make sure that there's not a lameness in a, in a disalim in a foot, nothing. I x-rayed him just to make sure nothing. We even sent him for bone scan, which is basically nuclear radiography, where you, it's very similar to a PET scan in humans, nothing. The chiropractor came out and he worked for one hour on this horse. And when the, and this is also what's

so beautiful, right? These clients are, and these horses are of a level of sophistication and sport where people recognize that there's a whole village of medical care and different kinds of working with their physiology to make them better. So the chiropractor works on this horse for one hour. He locates this one area of pain, which I had felt there was a little bit there, but it wasn't that dramatic. It was miraculous. I'm actually going to send you the video at some point. I need to see this because first of all, like a chiro for a horse, come on. Really? No, no. I can't even get my arms around like how how that would actually work but i understand i understand that

these are beautiful animals and most of the horse owners have great resources especially in the competitive sense or competitive arena so but how do they work? How do you adjust a horse? How do you adjust a horse? So it involves in this case, lifting up the hind leg. And again, this is all about trust, right? Your horse is allowing you and it's painful because you know, it's limping. So there's gotta be some level of pain there, lifting up the leg and pushing it with your whole body so that it hops. And this requires a lot of teamwork between you and your horse, right? The horse has to trust you that you're going to hold it in the right way. You have to believe that the horse isn't going to nail you, you know?

And so you make the horse hop and it adjusts the pelvis. And then you literally palpate and manipulate the back. And I always love to draw the parallels between, and you have perfect experience with this, with working with the Seahawks. It takes a village of people, medical professionals, to make each of these athletes the best that they can be. And that doesn't just mean, oh, eat well

and go to the doctor and get the arthritis x-rayed and injected. It also means stretching and physio and band work and maybe acupuncture and all of these sort of adjunctive things. It is exactly the same with this sport horse. And so this chiropractor adjusted the back and I watched this horse trot off perfectly sound. And it had been crippled an hour before it was absolutely a miracle to me, but it also, I think highlights, there's this relationship with the horse and the person that, that, you know, you're, you're trying to read all of that body language. You're trying to see what's

going on with it. Um, and, and hoping to get to this positive outcome. Yeah. Nobody does it alone, whether it's a extraordinary horse, animal slash human. It's life is too multifaceted, multidimensional, complicated to think that we can go it alone. So nobody does it alone. Individual athletes, individual contributors at work, um, single parents, like there are folks that are intimate to the becoming. And so, yeah, I'm glad you brought that up because if you, if you, I'm going to sound like I'm outside of the circle, if I and people inside of, you know, whatever community don't have a sense of seeing and belongingness and complementary skill sets, it's really hard.

And the research is quite clear that relationships are at the center of fulfillment. And so we not only need each other from a complementary skill set standpoint, but also from a being seen and seeing others standpoint. So that's why, like, that's one of the reasons I wanted to have this conversation is to learn from a expert perspective, how you see and how they see you, how to relate. The other thing that I wanted to better understand from you is this unique relationship between rider and horse. So we're talking about the relationship between the physician and the horse, and that's built on trust. That's built on a sense of they are part of a community and you're a familiar community member and you're there to help. And I would imagine that's because not every

time you walk up to them them you're sticking with a needle they would learn very quickly not to trust you like right this this person brings pain so you're probably tripling down on kindness on a regular basis prior to having to put the animal in a compromise situation but I'm just guessing absolutely so how do you do that what is do you have a I don't want to be a reductionist here but do you have a ratio of sort of negative associations, right? I'll walk you through a physical exam that will give you an idea of this, right? So I approach the horse. I'm looking at the way that it looks in the stall.

We bring it out of the stall, and I do a very specific, every horse exactly the same, evaluation of all of the muscles the neck the shoulder the feet the legs everything and in that I'm feeling is there any heat is there any soreness what's the range of motion of every joint I'm pulling the leg forward like you know you could pull the the leg and stretch the shoulder and the neck and they communicate to me and also I think it feels good because think about when you go to your trainer or when, you know, if anyone has ever had sort of a, an experience with a trainer or a masseuse that is stretching you while you're being evaluated, it feels really good. I kind of call it horse yoga because a lot of them lean into it. And so that evaluation, even though for me, it's medical, I do think it's most often pleasant for them and they'll start to chomp their

gums and like move that. And that's actually a sign in horses of relaxation and enjoyment and endorphin relief. So I can read that signal. And then the other flip side of that is if they get upset when I go and flex an ankle and they pull away from me, well, then I know that's an area that I need to investigate because they shouldn't do that. They should have a nice free range of motion and not be distressed when I'm flexing that. And same thing with pulling their legs behind them and stretching it. A lot of these horses will get lower back soreness or SI soreness because they're jumping such huge jumps. So I'm pulling their legs back behind them and that can be very enjoyable if they're not sore. And if they are sore, then they're resistant to me. And I can feel that. And the other thing is I know these horses so well,

because it's the same patients every time. So I follow these horses through the circuit. I'm, I'm down in Florida now because that's where they are. But then when they go up back up to the Connecticut area, I'll go with them. It's very much traveling. You know, it's like, it's traveling with a sports team. So each of these horses I know and I have notes. Okay, last time, yes, his left hind was a little bit restricted. But now that range of motion is better because we've been working on it. And that, I think, is vastly mostly enjoyable. So there are only a few horses that when I approach them, they're like, uh-uh, you're the veterinarian.

And I have had a couple. And it can be, again, it can be very scary for me too, because if that horse spins in the stall and turns the other way and is only putting its butt towards me, it's a very clear communication, do not come in here. And luckily that's the rarity. And I think that's because so much of the exam is just maintenance. It's evaluating on a regular basis as a sports medicine professional would in any other team to make sure that that player or that athlete is holding those different areas that are chronic issues and just always evaluating, evaluating until you get to a moment where you say, okay, this is different than it was last time and it's better or worse. And if it's worse, what's the maintenance plan

that we can come up with to make this horse jump as straight as possible and be as comfortable as possible. Because I keep going back to, if it's not comfortable and the horse does not want to do it, you're never going to make a horse that doesn't want to jump, jump. It's just, it's just not possible. So let's go back to an earlier question about turning nervousness to excitement or anxiety to excitement. How do you, when you get the signals, you're going to do your job. Like, how do you get, when you get the signals, how do you work within yourself to settle, to be in a state that you can actually be a partner to the horse? Yeah. Breathing. I mean, just a couple of deep breaths really helps. And I lean into them actually, because I'm actually safer being right up next to the horse if the horse jumps quickly,

because my body's right there. And so back to your earlier comment about how our sort of our primal nervous system can activate a lot faster than the thinking that, you know, the conscious thinking, if I'm right up next to them and they move quickly, then I will automatically be able to move faster. Um, and then also creating as much of an environment of safety and security as possible. So oftentimes that has to do with, there are specific people who care for each horse. In our show horse world, it's called the groom, and the groom is the one who feeds the horse and brushes the horse and tacks the horse. It has, that person has the most one-on-one time with the horse and really builds an incredible relationship. So I will call that person in and say, hey, please help me to make sure that the horse knows that it's safe and also to try and

keep me safe. And that is invaluable. Like if that, for that example, where I told you where the horse is spinning around and facing its rear end towards me, I will not go in that stall because it's telling me don't come in here. I will then ideally have the person who that horse trusts go in and put the halter on and bring it around. And then I can introduce myself and really say like, Hey, I'm not going to, I'm not going to hurt you. You know, are horses predators or prey? They're prey, right? Absolutely. Yeah. And they've been around for is this 40 million sound? I'd have to look it up. Yeah.

I'll look that up. Yeah. I mean, well, I don't have the math right on that, but they've been around a lot longer than us. Right. And so how have they figured out how to be primarily prey and to still be here? Like, how would you suggest that that's worked out for them? Herds. I mean, going back to community, right. There's strength in numbers.

And I think being in a group and following a leader that they trust helps to make good decisions. And the ones that didn't have that are not here. And then also I think the relationship with humans, right? Because like we talked about a little earlier, horses are the only athlete that have this kind of relationship with a person, right? Where the person is the athlete, but the horse is also the athlete. And I think that's spectacular because that relation. Yeah. I love those two responses that basically, you know, the herd and the relationships with not only other horses, but with humans. I love that. No. Okay. This is going to kind of bring us back over to rhinos eventually, but how come we don't ride zebras or like they look the same. And I,

I do want to ask you if they're black or white. Like I do, I do. I would love that debate settled, you know, from the expert, but like, how come, how come we didn't domesticate or work well with zebras? Personality. They're different. They are more feral and, and less domesticatable. It's just, why don't we have wolves in our house? Right. They're so similar to dogs, but they're not dogs. So it's, and, and you could say the same thing about lions, right? Why don't we have lions? Well, some people do, but they should not. You know, it just is, yes, they're so similar. They're of the same genetic background, but the personality is not the same. And it does bring me actually back to rhinos because the different species of rhinos have different levels of flight or fight response. And so the ones that we worked on in South Africa, the black rhinos and the white rhinos tend to be a lot more, not have a relationship with people. They don't want to be near people. They do not view people as, they do not cohabitate with people

in any way. Whereas the rhinos in Indonesia, the Sumatran rhinos, it's much easier to develop a relationship with the Sumatran rhino than it is with a black or white rhino. And I actually worked on rhinos in Sumatra. And so I got to see that firsthand and it made working on them from a veterinary perspective, a lot easier because in Indonesia, there were these huge, massive reserves, sanctuaries for the Sumatran rhinos that are, so the rhinos can be in their natural habitat, but then they will also back themselves into stocks essentially, and the keeper can feed them fruit and you can do the ultrasound exams that you need to do while the rhino is totally awake, not anesthetized, and will literally allow you to do it. And then goes off and it's completely wild,

right? The difference I think here is just to clarify that it's not a zoo. It is absolutely in the wild habitat and hundreds of acres of it. But there is a difference in the personality of that Sumatran rhino that allows it to have just an edge more of domestication or relate, maybe that's the wrong word, but relationship with humans, trust with humans than a black or white rhino does. Finding Mastery is brought to you by Cozy Earth. Over the years, I've learned that recovery doesn't just happen when we sleep. It starts with how we transition and wind down. And that's why I've built intentional routines into the way that I close my day. And Cozy Earth has become a new part of that. Their bedding, it's incredibly soft, like next level soft. And what surprised me the most is how much it actually

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Head to calderalab.com slash finding mastery and use the code finding mastery at checkout for 20% off your first order. That's calderalab, C-A-L-D-E-R-L-A-B.com slash finding mastery. And how many rhinos, I guess, are they called species or is it, what's the right language I'm looking for? Like denominations, that's not the right word. How many different types of rhinos are there? There's five different types of rhinos. Yeah. And they're all very endangered, unfortunately. Yeah. And is the number one predator human? Yeah. A hundred percent. Because people still believe that there's power in the horn. And there isn't. You're going to confirm that?

No, I mean, ultimately, I think this sadly comes down to a socioeconomic problem, right? Because easy for me, and I think for people in the US, especially, to have a judgment about poaching a rhino. But I have been there and I've seen it and I've seen the level of poverty that these people, a lot of people live in. And it gave me a sad understanding of why it happens, right? I think that's the point is not that it's, of course it's terrible. It breaks my heart that the rhinos are going extinct. But if we don't fix the socioeconomic problem first and the poverty problem, you can't save the animals. And I think that's really... Beautifully, sensitively explained.

So thank you. What happens if the rhinos go down? What is that two to three order magnitude that takes place? If we lose the rhinos, then what happens? I think it's an indication of the trend that we're going in, right? And the conflict between animal and human. And you see it also in the elephant populations where there are conflicts between the farmlands and the elephants that are eating the farmlands. And they don't know that it's farmland,

but they are indeed ruining the crops and going on the, you know, so then you have these whole programs of relocating entire herds of elephants to keep them safe and to put them back in a place like a huge park where they're safe and they're not going to be interacting as much with the humans. But it's not so much that there's one specific thing that I can say, oh, this is going to happen. The snowball is going to happen if the rhinos all go extinct. I think it's more of, we are not doing a good enough job of fixing the main problems. And it is not going to end only with rhinos. It's going to continue on with all of these conflicts between humans and animals. And going back to horses, right? We have such a beautiful relationship with so many animals. I would love to see us be

able to come up with strategies to continue to preserve a lot of these wild species. And then how many types of horses? I know we're toggling back and forth, but how many types of horses are there? If there's five types of rhinos, how many types of horses? I actually don't know the number. There's a lot. There's a lot. The breed that I mostly work on is called a warm blood. So you have hot-blooded horses, which are the Arabians and the racehorses. And it makes sense that they're hot-blooded, right? They're racing. You're thinking of long distance endurance races. That's an Arabian horse. You're thinking of thoroughbred racetrack, hot-blooded horse.

Then there's the warm blood, which is in the middle, which is bigger, stronger, more, stronger in a different way, less fast, less quick, not so much of a sprinter, but more power. And that's what makes them so good at doing dressage and doing jumping because they are, they have the elegance, but they also have power. And then you have the draft horse, which is considered the cold-blooded horse, which is going to be your Budweiser horses and your Clydesdales that are just, I mean, those are magnificent to stand next to because they are huge, but they really are good for pulling things. They were used, obviously, for agriculture.

I mean, now there's, I think, a little bit less of an agriculture or work use. But that's really what they were for in the beginning. And then in show jumping, are those horses, as a trend, are they getting bigger or smaller? It looked like there was very few big horses in the last Olympic Games. But the big ones stood out. Like, wow. So is there a trend that's big horses in the last Olympic Games, but the big ones stood out like, wow. So I don't, is there a trend that's taken place in the sport? I haven't noticed one, but one of the things that I find really incredible about the sports, especially, you know, you look at the Olympics of show jumping and dressage, and it doesn't matter

if the person, the rider is male or female, And it doesn't matter whether the rider is older or younger. And it doesn't matter if the rider is tall or short, because it's all about the relationship and the synergy of that rider with that horse. And I think that's spectacular. And who's in charge? Is it the horse? This 1500 pound?

It's all. So, but like. You can't have one without the other. You really can. I mean, obviously equal partners, you would say equal partners in a lot of ways. Absolutely. And because the rider is showing the horse where to go, but the horse has to carry the rider.

The horse has to make the decision. Yes. I'm going to jump this enormous thing that you put in front of me. Sometimes that, you know, I look at these jumps and I'm like, oh my God. I'm astounded at their athleticism and their excitement to do it. And this is the other thing that, you know, sometimes people ask me, oh, is it cruel to jump horses? I don't think so at all because they would not do it if they didn't want to, or if they couldn't do it. And I've also seen that where the horse gets to a point where physically it can't do it or mentally going back to mental, like it does happen. The horse just doesn't want to do it anymore. Fine. That's the exception to the rule,

but the vast majority of these horses that you see that are successful are looking for the next jump, just like the athlete is. I love that. And I And it brings me to the thought that I don't understand. And I really, I don't understand. It makes me angry when I hear that horses are put down. And I don't, I just, it's not out of compassion and naivete. Like, I don't understand what the horse is going through, but help me understand that. Put some perspective of why do we put a horse down if they, I get the leg because the pain is so great, I think,

and they can't walk around on three legs very easily. So, but listen, I'm really sloppy here, but it makes me crazy thinking about having to kill an athlete, you know, like we wouldn't do that, but we do that to these horses. So help me understand this. And I love that we're talking about this because I find that the veterinarian often has a really specific perspective on it, which is obviously I was born to help animals.

That's my passion. That's my purpose. So the idea of having to euthanize a horse because it's gotten hurt or broken a leg is horrifying, right? What that comes down to often, and let's take the example of a horse breaking its leg, which thankfully in this show jumping world is a rarity. Depending on where it has broken the leg, you cannot, because they're prey animals, you can't tell them, Hey, if you just stand quietly in this stall for three months and stay on bedrest, you'll heal and you'll be perfect.

Which is the case. If you could get them like a person, like, you know, your son or your daughter or your friend or whatever, and you can say, Hey, just do what the doctor says. Don't go out, run around, rear up, jump on things, just chill for three months. There's no way to communicate that. Right. And yes, we try. There are levels of sedation that we try to, to, to get them to stay calm, but horses are used to being out and they're used to being mobile and they're used to being mobile and they're used to being free. And so there's only so far that you can push their personality outside of

their base nature. And that's where a lot of this comes from is that we know if they fracture at a certain level, the higher, the worse it is, right? Because lower down, you can cast it, you can immobilize it. Like if they, if they break, for example, the smallest bone is, right? Because lower down, you can cast it, you can immobilize it. Like if they break, for example, the smallest bone in their foot, it's actually not, it's very fixable. Maybe they won't jump again to the degree that they did, but definitely they will live. If they break their femur, you can't cast the femur in the horse because it's just so huge.

And the weight of the animal, again, going back to, there's somewhere between 1,000 to 1,200 to, you know, the big, big ones are 1,500 pounds. The weight of the animal, it is too much for the casting material that we have, right? A cast will work on a person's thigh, but it doesn't work on a horse's thigh. And then also we even have slings where we can try and hold the horse up with a sling so that it can move around in a stall and have a little bit more mobility. And there, there are cases where this works. Um, but it's, it's a, it's a really hard challenge. And the worst thing is to watch a horse suffer in a stall, right. And, and be so distressed and anxious and have this level of, um, it's just not, not natural. And, and be so distressed and anxious and have this level of it's just not, not natural. And that's where it comes from. In the performance world, there has been

breakthroughs that humans have been using that veterinarians and others use with animals, horses in particular, because of kind of the access and let's just call it the access, I guess. What are some of the, and some of those breakthroughs are not healthy, you know, but they're performative and some have been actually meaningful. So what are some of the advances that you're seeing in animal care that could maybe one day trickle down into enhancing the wellness and or performance of humans? Well, the number one thing that we've seen that I love to utilize for our patients is biologics, right? And what does that mean? So that means something that is coming from preferably your own body. So something that's coming from preferably your own body.

So something that's coming from the horse's body. And that would be for me, mostly PRP, which is platelet-rich plasma and stem cells. And these are being used. If you ever had a friend or an athlete that had really bad arthritis, it's likely that they had their knee injected with PRP or stem cells. And so that is awesome to be able to use in the horse because there's no drug in it, right? There's no steroid in it. There's no created drug. It is literally from- Is the US good enough? And PRP is one thing, yes. But from a stem cell and the, the way that the stem cells

are not, not, I'm not talking about harvesting, but I'm talking about the way that they're spun and then reallocated back into the body. Are we at a pace or an FDA acceptance level yet that matches Europe and other countries? I know that like, yeah, Germany, like, Germany. So we are we're on par with Germany's advancements. I know South Korea was a leader for a long time as well. Yeah. On the human side, I don't know. On the animal side, I would say absolutely in the horse side, because the level of the sport is, is so high, the high performance. These athletes and these people and the teams around them are looking for exactly that, the bleeding edge of medicine. And in also a way, I think the thing that's so wonderful about these biologics is, to me, there's very little downside. There's very little risk other than, hey, maybe it doesn't work,

right? That stinks. And putting time and effort and money into it when it doesn't work is frustrating. But that is a lot better than putting a medication in a horse that potentially is going to cause some deleterious effect, right? And I use a lot of steroid injections as well, because that's kind of the bread and butter of when you think of how do you help arthritis, there's a place for it. And you see this in human athletes as well. Or let's say even your parents who busted their knee skiing, life. And I've had personal experience with this with my family and they come back and they say, wow, I feel amazing. I have a different range of motion. I can walk and exercise and do the things. And that's awesome to see. And that is the same in the horse, but you can only do it so many times, right? Yeah. That's the, that's the downside of it. PRP and stem cell therapies are very commonplace in elite sport. I don't hear about it much for humans outside of sport, but there are pretty incredible

advancements taking place there. Okay, cool. Nothing else? Nothing else that you're saying? I'm really excited about this, but I'm also nervous about it. Well, the other thing that is coming more and more on the forefront, right. Is I, for example, there's a, um, Red Bull athlete who I follow who's a skier and he broke his leg very severely last year. And on his Instagram, he posts his PT, you know, and so I've been following it because it's fascinating. And also this guy's an absolute rock star. And so here he is at the top of his game. He somehow

breaks himself and he now is chronicling from the moment he was in the hospital bed to now he's recovering. And it, it is really cool to see because he's posting in a way that I can actually see the development in the muscle and his leg. And maybe that's because I'm keyed into it and I'm paying attention and I can watch how the range of motion over the past couple of months has changed. This is starting to be something that is happening more and more in horses. Before, what people would do when you had a tendon or a ligament injury is they'd say, okay, turn the horse out for six months or a year. And just let time, and they would call it Dr. Green, which is grass. And they would say, let time and, and just turn out cure it. And oftentimes that will work or it will work to a

certain degree. But what you find is if you don't address a severe injury in a certain way, you're much more prone to have scar tissue develop as a, essentially like a callus or a bandaid on a tendon. And so you then have a much higher chance of re-injury because scar tissue, while it's very strong in certain ways, it also is brittle. And so it stretches and snaps a lot easier than normal tendon fire fibers. So our rehab protocols now, and our physio protocols are much more geared towards how do you increase that pliability, that range of motion? Um, and especially in an older athlete, right? Like horses that I'm working on are 12, 13, 14 years old. This is a, this is the equivalent of Tom Brady, right? Like horses that I'm working on are 12, 13, 14 years old. This is the equivalent of Tom

Brady, right? This is how did Tom Brady have such a successful career being one of the oldest football players that I know. And I think his physio regimen, and he talks a lot about pliability as well, but it's not just whole, I almost said it's the whole horse perspective because it is. And these horses, it's adding in everything from nutrition and antioxidants and making sure that you're feeding really high quality grains and not feeding it the horse, the equivalent of like cracker jacks. And then also the range of motion exercises, the slow buildup, the gradual stressing of different tendons and ligaments, and then the biologics. And then there are these adjunctive therapies like therapeutic ultrasound and laser,

chiropractic, acupuncture. It is just like the human athlete. And I love to see that. And we've been embracing more and more. And there's a gentleman named Tim Worden, who is incredible, and he's on the human side. And he has gotten really excited about the animal horse perspective on this. And so there's been some really good collaborations. But this is still new in a certain way, or at least the level of complexity is becoming more and more. It's becoming more and more useful, which is awesome to see.

Very cool. Okay. I've got a lot of questions I still want to ask, but I want to honor your time and say thank you. And then maybe we can actually make a little bridge here, which is from a humanity standpoint, what are the insights that you have, you know, from working intimately with these beautiful species of, of animals, um, port that over to humans? Like, what are we, what are your insights? And then maybe it's more clear to say, what are we getting wrong? Um, I think we're inside too much. People are inside too much. And something that I love about this job. And when I was thinking about how do I talk about

this with you and what are some of the defining reasons that I love what I do, it is super physical. You know, I am essentially working out with the horse and through all of the movements and the stretching and everything. It's a very physical job. I'm outside a lot, which I love. And I think is, is really, really helpful. Um, and people love animals, right? You, that feeling that you get when, and that endorphin kick that you get when you snuggle your dog or you, you know, your cat comes up to you and, and it's the same with the horse. Like I, every time I'll be working to give you an example, I'll be working on the foot of the horse and the horse will turn its head around and bend down and sniff me and kind of like rub its nose on my back. Right. And that fills me with the most joy. It's

like an explosion. I'm like this. I literally in, in the middle of a very stressful day, will say, this is why I do this. Because that feeling and that connection is so magical. And I think in terms of humanity, right, more outside, more animals, more compassion with animals, kind of taking those lessons of what it feels like when you're loved unconditionally by an animal and hopefully turning that towards your fellow man. I love it. Thank you. I mean, what a fun, I haven't been exposed to anyone in your profession. And so thank you for sharing the insights and the practices and the whole thing. And I guess we can't really leave until we figure out this debate. This was with my team about zebras. Are they black or white? Like, what are they? Are they black or white? I will tell you, this has never come up in a veterinary conversation.

You'd have a better insight than us. So in our prep for your call, we were arguing about it. And so we thought that you would for sure end that debate. I don't think there is do you have any practices that have been meaningful and important to you and becoming the person that you're becoming? Paying it forward, I would say is huge for me. I gained so much from mentorship and I am where I am because of my mentors, both in the conservation medicine and men in the horse world. And I love mentoring people, you know, mostly it's pre-veterinary or veterinary students. I have a lot of veterinarians that come that want to learn our techniques. And when you watch someone and

their eyes light up and they get it and they, they learn something new. Oh, that's fantastic. Awesome. Thank you. I'm wishing the best and looking forward to the next time we connect. Yeah.

Thank you. It was so wonderful to talk to you. Thank you so much for having me on the podcast. Oh, absolutely. And then where can we, where can we drive people? Is there a place on social that you would prefer?

Yeah. So I have a strong Instagram account that I love to post things that I love when people ask questions. So please feel free if you have any questions. It's at Dr. Laura SG and that's D-R-Laura-S-G. And Laura, L-A-U-R-A-S-G for your hyphenated last name. And do you go by Stokes Green? Yes. Yeah. Perfect. Okay. Listen, thank you again. And I'm looking forward to following you on social

more. So thank you. Awesome. Thanks. Talk to you later. All right. Thank you so much for diving into another episode of Finding Mastery with us. Our team loves creating this podcast and sharing these conversations with you. We really appreciate you being part of this community. And if you're enjoying the show, the easiest no-cost way to support is to hit the subscribe or follow button wherever you're listening. Also, if you haven't already, please consider dropping us a review on Apple or Spotify. We are incredibly grateful for the

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Until next episode, be well, think well, keep exploring.