In my experience, most training is all about teaching horses movement and posture. Riders reward for changes in a horse’s body and feet, not their thought. Even though I mention it, it is not what I want to talk about today. Instead, I want to talk about training for changes in a horse's thought.
Any resistance we experience from a horse is because of two factors. They are usually linked to some degree, but they can be separate issues as well.
The first component that causes resistance is our lack of clarity when asking a horse a question. If a horse is unsure or left confused about the answer to our question there will always be confusion, anxiety, and resistance. If we ask a question in a way that is easy for a horse to understand the result will be less resistance to the new idea. Clarity is paramount to making life easier for a horse to get along with us. A lack of clarity is the most common form of abuse we impose on a horse because of the emotional trouble it creates. We are all guilty of this at times.
The second element that determines the level of resistance of a horse comes from inside a horse.
Everything we ask of a horse should involve asking them to change a thought. A horse does what it does because it believes it will lead to the least amount of discomfort. Training and directing a horse is asking them to do something. This requires two things to happen inside the mind. A horse must first “let go” of the idea to do the thing it is already doing. Secondly, when that happens their mind is available to accept a new idea that we propose. But until they let go of the old idea a horse is not ready to accept our new idea and we will conflict with each other. Letting go of an old idea and accepting a new idea are the two things that must happen to minimize worry and resistance in our horse.
For example, if I want to ask my horse to change from turning left to turning right, I must first ask it to stop thinking that turning left is the preferred idea. When that happens, asking my horse to turn right results in a right turn with very little resistance.
However, if my horse’s idea to turn left is strong, changing that thought to an idea to turn right is going to be met with considerable resistance. Therefore, the second component that determines the resistance to a question is the strength of the idea we want to change.
Both the clarity of our question and the strength of an idea can go hand in hand when determining how resistant or how softly a horse can respond to our questions.
In case you are confused let me just state it simply. Resistance is determined by (1) how clearly we ask our question, and (2) how determined a horse is to keep doing the thing we want it to stop doing.
If we lack clarity, we may create anxiety in a horse. The horse does not understand what we are asking and will therefore embrace more tightly an old idea that has worked for it in the past. This will cause it to cling to an idea we are trying to change. Likewise, if a horse has a strong commitment to an idea (eg, jogging home on a trail ride or not walking over a bridge) and resists any change, there is a greater need for clarity in how we ask our questions.
To summarise, to direct a horse with minimum resistance means there are 2 stages. We need to reward when a horse lets go of their old idea and we need to reward again when they change to our new idea.
I find most training that emphasizes changing a horse’s thought conflates letting go of one idea and taking on a new idea as one event. Sometimes this can seem to be true because it happens so fast (like some people believe when a horse shies it is a reflex because it can happen so fast). But when we are training something very new or a horse has a strong idea that it doesn’t want to change, we need to consider rewarding the “letting go” part first. If we can make the “letting go” easy we are building focus and confidence in our relationship that makes taking on our new idea relatively trouble-free.
I am talking about a feel that is hard to achieve without a lot of practice. I have heard some trainers talk about riding a horse where the horse's feet feel like their feet as if they are centaurs. They have the same influence over the movement of the horse as they do over their movement. That sensation is what it feels like when your thoughts and your horse’s thoughts are the same. I sometimes describe a horse at a clinic as working from a thought. That is exactly what I am talking about in this essay. It is possible if you stay connected to their thoughts and help them connect to yours.
I have described the goal of teaching a horse to let go of an idea and then teaching it to accept a new idea as being fundamental to achieving “oneness”. It is a simple concept that appears in so many different ways during working with a horse. But while it is not magic, it can feel like magic.
Jana and George teaching each other to pick up their left foot 😂