There Is Something About the Outside of a Horse
The smell hits you first.
Dust hangs in the summer air. Sun-baked leather. Hay was tucked into the corners of the barn. The musky smell of sweat from a horse that spent the morning working. If you’ve spent enough time around horses, you know that smell instantly. Years later, a single breath can transport you right back to a place you thought you’d forgotten.
Back to simpler days.
Back to hard lessons.
Back to yourself.
On hot afternoons, if the weight of the world climbs on my back, heavier than it should, I often find myself drifting out to the tack room. In there, Pop placed a rusty old sign up on the wall near the saddle racks that’s been there as long as I can remember:
“There is something about the outside of a horse that is good for the inside of a man.”
The older I get, the more I realize that sign wasn’t just talking about horses.
It was talking about life.
Life wounds all of us. The question isn’t whether we experience trauma. The question is what we choose to become because of it.
Today, conversations about PTSD are everywhere. Most people immediately think of combat veterans, law enforcement officers, firefighters, paramedics, and first responders. Those professions certainly experience trauma at a level most people will never fully understand.
But the truth is larger than that.
PTSD is a human experience.
Every one of us carries moments that changed us forever. The death of a parent. The loss of a spouse. A divorce we never saw coming. A cancer diagnosis. Financial collapse. Betrayal by someone we trusted. A child struggling. Dreams that never became reality.
Trauma doesn’t ask for your occupation before it arrives. It simply shows up. Sometimes quietly. Sometimes violently. Sometimes all at once.
And while the circumstances may differ, the emotional effect is remarkably similar. We replay events. We question decisions. We carry guilt, anger, sadness, or regret. We find ourselves trapped in stories about yesterday while life continues moving forward around us.
The pain may be personal, but the experience is universal.
Trauma may explain where you are. It does not determine where you go next.
In the mid-1990s, psychologists Richard Tedeschi and Lawrence Calhoun introduced a concept called Post-Traumatic Growth. Their research discovered something unexpected. While trauma can leave scars, many people emerge from adversity stronger, wiser, more compassionate, and more resilient than they were before.
Not despite what happened.
Because of how they responded to what happened.
That’s an important distinction.
Post-Traumatic Growth doesn’t celebrate suffering. It doesn’t suggest pain is necessary or fair. Instead, it reminds us that adversity can become a forge rather than a prison.
What didn’t kill you didn’t simply make you survive.
It gave you an opportunity to become stronger.
Not overnight.
Not without effort.
But stronger nonetheless.
Some of the strongest men and women I’ve ever met carry scars that nobody sees. They aren’t strong because life was easy. They’re strong because they kept moving forward when it wasn’t.
The goal isn’t to avoid hardship. The goal is to grow through it.
Out here around the barn, horses have a way of teaching that lesson better than most people ever could.
In the corporate world, you can hide behind titles. You can hide behind a big budget, a corner office, a polished résumé, or a slick presentation. People can spend years building an image of success while quietly falling apart on the inside.
But out here, in the dirt, none of that means a damn thing.
A horse doesn’t care about your stock price, about your rank, your social media following, or your credentials hanging on a wall. A horse only cares about one thing.
Authenticity.
Horses are masters at reading what words cannot hide. They notice your breathing. They notice your heart rate. They notice tension in your shoulders and hesitation in your movements. Long before humans built cities and boardrooms, horses survived by reading energy.
You cannot fool them.
If you’re anxious, they become anxious.
If you’re aggressive, they become defensive.
If you’re uncertain, they notice.
But when you’re calm, clear, and grounded, something remarkable happens.
That 1,200-pound animal begins to trust you. Not because of what you’ve accomplished. Not because of what you’ve survived. Not because of your title. Because of who you are.
A horse doesn’t respond to your reputation. It responds to your character.
That’s one reason Equine Therapy has become so powerful for veterans, first responders, and people working through emotional trauma. Horses pull us out of yesterday and bring us back to today.
Trauma often keeps us trapped in the past. We replay old memories. We revisit old wounds. We rehearse conversations that can never be changed.
A horse doesn’t do that. A horse lives in the present. And when you’re standing beside one, it quietly invites you to do the same. For a few moments, the noise settles. The anxiety slows. The mental clutter fades. They reminded us that healing isn’t always found in thinking harder.
It’s found in being present.
Sometimes it’s found in the warmth of the afternoon sun, the smell of fresh-cut hay, and the steady breath of a horse standing quietly beside you.
Healing often begins when we stop reliving yesterday and start experiencing today.
But here’s my favorite part about equine therapy. It goes both ways. We help them, too. Many horses carry wounds of their own. Some have been neglected. Some have been mistreated. Some have lost trust in people. Some have forgotten their own strength.
Sound familiar?
As we help a horse rebuild trust, we often find ourselves rebuilding trust. As we help a horse regain confidence, we rediscover confidence. As we help them stand tall, we remember how to stand tall ourselves.
Healing becomes a partnership.
Growth becomes mutual.
Connection becomes the medicine.
And maybe that’s what my Pop’s sign was trying to teach all along. There really is something about the outside of a horse that is good for the inside of a man. Not because horses magically remove our pain. But because they remind us of who we are beneath it.
So when life feels heavy, take a walk outside. Go to the barn. Sit in the tack room. Feel the heat of the sun on your shoulders and the dirt beneath your boots. Listen to the wind moving through the trees and the quiet sound of a horse chewing hay nearby.
And remember this:
PTSD may be part of your story, but it is not the end of your story.
Post-Traumatic Growth is real.
The strongest chapters of your life are waiting to be written.
And if a horse chooses to trust the person you are today, maybe it’s time you did too; look into Equine Therapy.
Scott is a Certified NLP and Mindset Coach, Speaker, Author, and Optimist. Scott was named Best Educator in 2025 by Best Holistic Life Magazine. He focuses his coaching on ex-military personnel, first responders, and their families. His passion for helping men become the men they want to be is inspiring. At home, he’s always building something, helping his community, sharing his knowledge with the next generation, and spending time with family.
“What a horse sees isn’t your rank, your mistakes, or your pain. It sees your heart—and invites you to become the person you were meant to be.”
– Scott Gates
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