When Rest Feels Wrong: Relearning Safety in Stillness for High Achieving Horseback Riders.

Why your nervous system resists the very thing your body needs most; and how to begin again.

For years, I believed healing meant working harder.

Back when my own back pain started at age 11 after a riding accident) my first instinct was to fix it. I stretched, I strengthened, I iced, I foam rolled.

Later, I went to massage school, got certified as a trainer, studied biomechanics, and added every CEU credential I could find.

And still, my body would flare up.

It wasn’t until I stopped fighting and started listening that the real healing began.

The Paradox: Why Rest Feels Unsafe

Most of my clients are high-performing horseback riders: women in midlife who are used to pushing through. They’ve built entire identities around being strong, capable, and in control.

They’ll book the session.

They’ll do the exercises.

They’ll power through pain like it’s just another training obstacle.

But ask them to rest?

To lie down, soften their breath, and feel what’s happening inside their body?

That’s where the resistance kicks in.

Because when the body doesn’t feel safe, rest feels like a threat.

Rest Isn’t Passive. It’s Foundational. Especially When You're a High-Achieving Horseback Rider.

One of the biggest turning points in my personal journey, and in how I work with riders, was realizing that you can’t force your way into healing. You have to create the conditions for healing to happen.

You wouldn't refuse to put an injured horse on stall rest, even if it derails your plans. You know that letting them rest and recover is key to their longevity. So why don't we extend ourselves the same care and compassion?

(I mean, besides the patriarchy, misogony, being eldest daughters, and as millennials being told to "do what you're told" and "finish what you started.") (#yikes)

Rest isn’t a reward. It’s not something you earn after doing enough. It’s the only environment in which the nervous system can downshift from survival into stability.

Jolene is an expert in resting so she can sniff and explore later and longer.

And that’s what most back pain relief programs miss.

They start from the outside-in: stretch this, strengthen that.

But when your Internal Pressure System (your body’s internal support network) is unregulated, it doesn’t matter how strong your core is: your body will still feel like it’s under threat.

And a threatened body doesn't heal.

It protects. It guards. It braces.

Even when you’re “off duty.”

My Turning Point

For me, the shift happened when I realized I was carrying my mother’s pain patterns, and her coping strategies. She used to throw her back out sneezing. She’d collapse in spasms after pushing too far with little support. She'd use heating pads and Advil and the chiropractor, but the pain always came back.

I was terrified of becoming her, but I was living the same story.

Until I stopped.

I stopped fighting for control.

I stopped “earning” rest through effort.

I stopped pretending back pain was a personal flaw.

And I started breathing again, literally.

I started lying on the floor each morning to feel my ribs move.

I started letting my body show me where it needed support, not command it into stillness.

That’s where I began using what I now call the Internal Pressure System: a way of restoring deep support through breath, biomechanics, and nervous system cues.

Not through more doing.

Through creating support for myself in stillness.

So What Does Rest Look Like Here?

Not a spa day (though go for it).

Not skipping everything hard (we train hard too, just differently).

It starts with recognizing that we are high- achieving horseback riders who will prolong injury without stall rest, and that we would never do that to our horses. So let's stop doing it to ourselves.

And, start with this:

Lay down on your back with knees bent.

Place your hands on your low ribs.

Let your breath be wide as your lower ribs expand, not high (keep your chest still and neck relaxed).

Stay for 60 seconds and breathe 3-5 times.

See what softens because you've given it support instead of a demand for more.

Your spine doesn’t need more hustle.

It needs to feel scaffolded from the inside out.

Reflection Prompt

Where does stillness feel safe in my body; and where does it feel like a threat?

What would it look like to let rest be a strategy instead of a last resort?

Final Thought

Rest isn’t a retreat.

It’s a return.

To rhythm. To trust. To you.

If your body’s been trying to get your attention through pain, maybe it’s time to listen instead of push.

Not to fix, but to feel.

And if you want support finding that soft place to land, I’ve got a few spaces open for a 90-minute Ouch to Ahhh Breakthrough Session.

It’s not a workout. It’s a wake-up.

And it might just be the reset you didn’t know you needed.

[Book your session].

You don’t have to earn rest here.

You just have to arrive.