Horse Skills and Improving the Equine Partnership

 Nothing is too “basic.”

To demonstrate how repetitive interactions or behaviors can lead to mindlessness, I’ll sometimes ask students if they’ve ever been showering and suddenly stopped, and thought to themselves, “Did I already wash my hair?” People will chuckle at the “guilt” of realizing they might have had a similar experience...

Learning New Horse Skills- the Uncomfortable Learning Curve

 Letting Go: Why Learning a New Approach Can Feel So Inconsistent

Human Skills- Tips for Releasing Tension (Mounted or Unmounted)

When learning horse skills, many people focus on the mechanics to get the horse’s obedience or compliance, with little to no self-awareness of how their mindset and behaviors will influence the equine's responses. Anticipative, hopeful, or distracted thoughts decrease the ability to reset breathing and release tension in real-time, limiting one's adaptability to help the horse. 

Horse Learning without Guarantees

 The only consistent thing I have found to be true is humans ARE seeking connection.

Repeatedly, social media videos that “do best” show the horse that is willing to interact with people, offering an emotional connection. The promise gives viewers hope, triggering interaction… A great motivator for change, or to “activate” people- whether to react, sign up, or buy into a belief system- is to engage the human emotion of hope.