This Indonesian island retreat lets travellers discover whether horses can breed happiness

“Let’s just call it Rod,” I sigh, as the ground thunders around me. “Rod Stewart.”

Behind me, two Sumba horses and a large brown stallion are fighting — rearing up, stamping, biting and kicking each other. My companions and I are inside an enclosure with them, but we’re paying them little attention — we’re too busy trying to decide on a moniker for a length of bamboo suspended between stacked car tyres.

From where we stand, we can see glimpses of golden sand sliding beneath topaz seas, and surfers riding waves foaming with white manes. Elsewhere within Nihi — one of the world’s most luxurious resorts, on the remote Indonesian island of Sumba — guests are enjoying open-air clifftop massages, wraps and body scrubs. They’re floating in private plunge pools or sampling the produce of the on-site artisanal chocolate factory. They’re snorkelling and sunbathing.

In contrast, we’re at the resort’s stables, in the shade of a covered, round horse pen, and we’ve spent the past 10 minutes constructing an ersatz corridor across the enclosure, made from swimming pool noodles, bald tyres and a few lengths of bamboo. Now Professor Andreas Liefooghe has tasked us with creating and naming an obstacle to place in the path we’ve created. Debate has been heated.

While the rest of the task was completed quickly, with relatively little conflict, many members of my psychotherapy group are passionate about the stick’s baptism. Some want it to be called Obstacle, others Hurdle or Roadblock, but – with the literal and metaphorical qualities of each title under intense scrutiny — unanimity eludes us. One member of our group has already walked away. Similarly, the stallion is now also being released from the enclosure for safety reasons.

As the remaining seven members of our group become more irritable, so too do the two piebald horses, a fact that has not gone unnoticed by Liefooghe and his therapist colleague, Raul Aparici. As experts in equine-assisted psychotherapy and coaching, Liefooghe and Aparici say the horses are mirroring the tension within our group. I’m doing my best to dissipate it.

“It’s a stick, so we should name it Rod,” I wearily quip again, as I instinctively place myself between my new companions and the cantankerous horses. Some chuckle in agreement while others roll their eyes at my failure to take our task seriously. “Because we’re very much making a rod for our own backs.”

After five days of group therapy sessions in paradise, both with and without horses, Liefooghe would point out that I have a habit of deflecting with humour; of using a joke as an escape hatch when trapped in a box packed-to-bursting with emotions. We all have different mechanisms for coping with trauma.

Some members of my equine therapy group are eager to learn how horses can help us handle loss, addiction, grief and guilt. Others think horse therapy is a load of hippy nonsense, but they are, nevertheless, overcome with curiosity. Some have imbued the horses with mystical abilities — animals gifted with a spiritual understanding of the human condition. A couple of us believe we cannot be saved by means of head, heart, hand nor hoof.

Horses as tools of the trade

But none of that matters for equine therapy to achieve its goals, because Liefooghe sees horses simply as the tools of his trade. Horses and humans have a shared history dating back about 6,000 years, and Liefooghe uses them in psychotherapy for the same reasons we always have — to get us places faster.

A lifelong horseman, Liefooghe is a psychotherapist and a professor of psychology with more than two decades’ experience. In 2005, he founded Operation Centaur in the UK, bringing horses into unusual settings – from London’s Royal Parks to school playgrounds and prison yards — using equine-assisted therapy to help with corporate team building, anti-bullying interventions, addiction issues and the rehabilitation of criminal offenders.

“The connections that humans find with horses can become a catalyst for deeper self-knowledge,” he says. “Many people fail to engage with talking therapy. Some people won’t talk; some people can’t talk; some struggle to communicate their emotions.

“In contrast, the language of psychology is now bandied around so much that even schoolchildren are fluent in its terms, but they aren’t really connecting with the feelings behind those words.”

Liefooghe explains that introducing horses into therapy allows his clients to experience a non-threatening emotional connection without the need for language. By observing how we interact with the horses, he believes he can learn about us as people.

“As prey animals, horses rely on their instincts to stay safe. They make accurate decisions because their survival depends on reading predators correctly. Watching how horses respond to the signals we give them offers us a profound insight into our selves.”

It’s not important whether you believe horses can pick up on human emotions, as Liefooghe does, or if you think they can no more decipher human motivations than we can understand the working of their minds. The way in which we each engage with them — and inevitably anthropomorphise them — teaches our therapists about the ways we think and feel, much more quickly than they would be able to by simply talking to us.

You can lead a horse to water

By launching Retreat & Conquer, Liefooghe is inviting the public to embark on both literal and psychological journeys of self-discovery with a range of equine-assisted therapy escapes to glamorous destinations around the globe.

From Sumba to Limpopo, Mustique to Abu Dhabi, each destination has a strong link to the genesis of the human-horse relationship. Sumba’s diminutive sandalwood ponies — named after the trees that once forested the island — are integral to the island’s identity. Introduced from Java in the 14th century, they’re raced each year during the island’s Pasola festival by spear-wielding riders in traditional garb — a spectacle often recreated for guests at Nihi.

The resort has its own herd of 22 horses, offering guests the chance to ride on the sand and in the surf, or simply to watch as they gallop down the beach when they’re released from Sandalwood Stables twice daily. That’s a therapeutic experience in itself.

While everyone is welcome at Nihi, not just anyone can book a Retreat & Conquer break — there is an application process. When asked what kind of people respond best to this unique type of therapy, Liefooghe replies: “The people who are willing to put in the work. You can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make it drink.”

Of course, once my group and I have built and named our obstacle, we’re tasked with trying to lead our horses — without the aid of reins, nor any tack — through the path and over the hurdle.

Seeking the path of least resistance, I’d suggested we keep our corridor wide and straight, and build an obstacle as low to the ground as possible. The trail our committee has made is narrow and winding, however, and the bamboo hurdle placed high on stacked tyres. Wrangling the horses proves difficult, but I set about the task without complaint.

One of the many things I’ve realised about myself during this five-day retreat is that, along with my deflective use of humour, coming from a background of childhood conflict has made me defensive. This week has taught me to pick my battles; that I don’t need to play the saviour, nor the jester, nor lead the charge.

We have, as predicted, built a rod for our own backs, but I gladly capitulate when someone suggests we name the bamboo after another pop star. Desperately seeking neutrality, they named it Madonna (a name with no divisive connotations, I’m sure), but I accepted it with equanimity.

I don’t have a horse in this race.

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