Now that the Paris Olympics is coming to an end, I expect some of the controversy over the conflict between horse events and animal welfare will subside for another four years. But it shouldn’t.
I am a huge fan of teaching a horse to follow the feel of the inside rein and offer a lateral bend through its whole body. One of my most regular Ross-isms at clinics is “The bend is your friend.”
People are always chasing symptoms because it is the symptom that most bothers us. We view the symptom as the thing that gets in the way of what we want to do.
Why do so many serious dressage riders I know dare not take their horse on a trail? Is it because those horses do not have the makeup to be safe on a trail?
I think it is widely accepted that when two horses ask, “Am I in charge of you or are you in charge of me?”, the one who moves the feet of the other is the more dominant horse.
Problems with a horse are not fixed because we want them fixed it. For things to change with our horse it must begin with things changing with how we work with our horse.
