If I ask my horse to walk and it becomes his idea, he walks. I don’t have to treat as if he is a dumb blonde and tell him, “left foot, right foot, left foot, right foot” for the entire trip. His thought to walk arranges everything in place to make it happen.
One Horse, Two Sides
Most of us appreciate that all horses are different. When training, what works for one horse may not be the best approach for another. The almost infinite variations of a horse’s nature combined with their varied experiences (nature plus nurture) mean the chance is almost zero in finding two horses responding identically to identical training.
Primary And Secondary Thoughts
So the reason we need to know what a horse’s primary and secondary thoughts are is that it lets us know how available a horse is to learning. We should always be trying to have the conversation we are having with our horse be the primary focus. It’s a non-stop battle because we are constantly competing with the rest of the world for our horse’s attention. This also means that while other things occupy a horse’s primary thoughts, we will never help our horse find softness and willingness.