Dreamtime Case Study: Alicia Keen (showjumper)
My name is Barry Cridland and I work predominately with riders to support them in improving their confidence when riding using hypnotherapy and psychological interventions.
Barry Cridland
To give you a flavour of what I can do for you I have presented a case study of a young rider who came to me for support to enable her to take her jumping to the next level. The majority of my clients use me when they have had a knock to their confidence after a fall or just needing that extra boost to remain in control during challenging situations. This could be anything to anybody, but typically it is when their head is saying one thing and their heart is wishing something else. It doesn’t matter how small the challenge if it is stopping you from enjoying your ride then it is stopping you from progressing with your hobby/sport. This case study has been reproduced with the full support of my client and her parents.
The Client
Alicia keen Is 14 years of age and lives in the Northamptonshire area, she started riding at the age of 10 at a local riding school where she worked at the weekends in order to secure any additional rides available. She has been competing on the British Show Jumping circuit for the last three years and currently travels nationally competing with her top ride, a 148cm Connemara gelding called Madges Lane Grey in Foxhunter and JC classes.
mind-set continued with her new ride, which lead to her becoming anxious when training and competing especially when it came to jumping.
under hypnosis to train her mind to “forget” this behaviour with her old horse and keep her attention on a successful jump instead of pre-empting a “stop”. Alicia worked on managing her anxiety and was able to remain calm and relaxed prior to training and competing. I worked with direct suggestion for improving her confidence
and gave her strategies to use on an on-going basis. I showed her how to use visualisation for her to project confidence onto future competitions and aligned this all around her goals. Alicia was very open to these new methods of learning and she soon realised the benefits of employing this change to her thinking, In fact, Alicia showed so
Overview of intervention
Through a mutual friend, Alicia’s parents contacted me to see if I could help. After various discussions she was booked in for her first appointment where I outlined what hypnosis was and just as importantly what it wasn’t. It was important to get a baseline of exactly where Alicia was with her cognition and how it was affecting her performance. From there I was able to work with Alicia to identify exactly what she wanted to achieve and what “success” looked like to her. Once armed with this information I was able to map out specific sessions with the outcome of each aligned to Alicia’s goals. One parent was present at each session and acted as chaperone with Alicia being in control driving the direction and speed of each session. We reframed past poor performances
Barry Cridland & Alicia Keen
Presenting Issue
Twelve months ago Alicia was competing her 138cm pony in Discovery classes which range from 90cm to a 100cm however she decided that she wanted to compete on the bigger tracks where the jumps range from 1.10cm - 120cm+. Alicia’s ride at the time had previously suffered a nasty fall and taken to stopping at 1m+ fences. Alicia had got into the habit of pre-empting this behaviour which affected her overall ride with him. This
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