Horse Skills: The Check- In Learning to Acknowledge the Equine to stop Guessing

The Check-In

I often encounter people who are surprised or overwhelmed by their horse's responses. There tends to be a major gap in the human's perception of when/what/how things have occurred rather than an understanding of all the ongoing, continuous equine communication that was ignored, overlooked, or criticized and how the animal's feedback would "tell" the person what behaviors were coming next. 

Building the Horse's Confidence and Trust

Building the Horse's Confidence and Trust The video (beginning of week 2 with me) is of a 17 yo Quarter Horse gelding who was a stallion until 2 months ago. He'd never been outside a barn, had no horse skills, was very anticipative, and was physically pushy because of his defensiveness towards human interaction. (Follow his story from arrival to present on https://tiktok.com/@AlternativeHorsemanship or Instagram https://Instagram.com/alternative_horsemanship #alternativeHorsemanship)

Building the Horse's Confidence by Alternative Horsemanship the Remote Horse Coach

Confidence- just because a horse is going through the motions of "doing things" and is "learning" does not mean that he is gaining confidence and feeling secure from his experiences.

The horse may "quietly" tolerate a situation a few or even many times before he starts to show more obvious signs of stress, insecurity, or fear about what is being presented if he is being pushed to physically comply with the task given.

Eliminating the Hurry to Improve your Horsemanship

In western society, people tend to hurry, and unintentionally carry their chaos into their horsemanship.

Their self-imposed urgencies of task accomplishment often become the focal point, rather than prioritizing the Quality of Communication with the horse. The general unspoken standard of "if the horse's behavior doesn't scare me, we're still okay," leaves many horses in the gray area during a majority of human interaction. If the horse "mostly" complies, the tendency is to add more to what is being asked of him.

Dear Sam: Horse Help *Changing Human Intention Improving Equine Partnership

Dear Sam: Horse Help Horsemanship Series *Shifting the Human Intention to Change the Equine Partnership Alternative Horsemanship with Samantha Harvey the Remote Horse Coach shares the latest advice and storytelling of how shifting the human intention led to a total difference in the equine behavior offered, rebuilding the horse's trust, increasing their confidence, and reawakening their curiosity to try.

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Horseback Rider Help- Letting go to feel the Horse

"Letting Go" to Feel the Horse

Learning to ride and becoming clear in the mechanics of aids to communicate can be a challenge in itself. And that is what a majority of folks limit their riding goals to. The experience is solely about the human.

But for those seeking connection, balance, and fluidity, they have to "let go" of gripping, holding, bracing, making, leveraging, and constantly driving the horse with pressure.

The willingness and connected feel of the horse comes from "letting go" of containing him in order to feel his feedback, acknowledge it without criticism, and address it, without it becoming a fight.

The "with-you-ness" of the equine partner- where the rider feels they have options to ask anything at any time- and the horse offers to try- comes from the human mentally "letting go" of and replacing hopeful, passive, reactive communication with the mental presence and proactive interaction with the equine.

Finding the peaceful, calm, quiet, and softness in the horse experience comes from the human "letting go" of their emotional chaos and distraction before they are ever in proximity to the horse.

"Letting go" of self-imposed or society's have-tos, allows for unexpected Opportunities to arise that often become some of the most valued and trust-building times- for both the human and the horse.