Is Your Horse Reacting or Responding to You? By Clay Wright There is a big difference in what we are accomplishing with the horse depending on whether he is reacting to our approach - or responding to our approach. When the horse is reacting, he is operating from a place of fear and anxiety. When he is responding, he is operating from a place of feel. It is in this place of feel (from you and the horse) where brilliance and wonder begin to occur.
I cannot begin to define the word feel. It has a meaning that is unlimited, and I believe there is no end to what is possible. However, I will say that it is the state or level of communication that all master horsemen and women strive to understand to a greater and greater degree. It is our safety; it is peak performance; it is a level of communication that replaces cues and conditioned responses because it rises above the physical limitations of horsemanship; it is imperceptible. Some have said, "We think it and the horse does it." It is very simple, yet so complex. It comes down to our own personal level of awareness to the small details in our relationships with the horse, and all people are capable of increasing their awareness. While all of us may not want to be master horsemen, we do want to be safer, and have a better communication with our horses. And this much is sure, we simply cannot have a communication based on feel with our horses unless they are responding to us. I looked up the definitions of react and response in the dictionary. There are similarities in the two words. However, the word react carries with it a negative connotation, where as the word respond clearly shows a positive feeling. For example, you don't hear doctors say, "The body is reacting to a transplanted heart." If the body is reacting, it is rejecting the heart. If the body is responding, it is accepting the organ. For me, there is a significant difference between the words. I define them as follows: React - is to show a reaction out of fear that is based on a past record or history that has proved to be harmful. Horses will react to what their past experiences with humans have proven to be true for them. They will react to a demanding-controlling approach-the boss mentality. They will react to a feeling of being trapped-not just physically-but mentally as well. Respond - is to show a response to a rhythm or feel. A sense of being in the present moment and responding to a situation without letting our own responses be controlled by emotions such as anger or frustration. If we allow our responses to be controlled by these emotions-we are reacting. Though a response may not always show calmness, it always shows some form of thought or wonder. So a horse could respond from his natural instincts, or he will respond to the feel we are presenting to him. Horses will learn how to respond to us rather than react when we let them do whatever they feel they need to do and then we respond accordingly. We simply redirect their response until our idea becomes their idea. We don't make them wrong, we set it up so that they always have a place to feel content. We hang in there with them and keep them searching; we keep directing and supporting until they can find it. The horse must be allowed to search and find it for himself. How much or how little pressure it takes to get a response in the direction we are trying to go, depends on the horse's past, his personality, and his feelings of self-preservation. But more importantly, it depends on what we are able to offer him. Just make sure the horse is digging his own hole or putting the pressure on himself, don't make it happen-don't force it. Whether or not they are able to come through depends upon our feel and approach, it is our attitude towards them and toward ourselves that will determine the outcome. When the horse is not cooperating, we let him run into his own pressure. For example, he is resisting turning right; let him make the error-don't make him wrong-let him run into a wall. The wall is your supporting rein and leg. (Your outside rein and leg) He ran into his own pressure because you were there to support him. The important thing here is to know where you are going-have a line to follow-eventually the horse will follow the feel of where you are going rather than run in the wall of your aids. When he responds in a positive way, there is no wall-no pressure. Through this approach, the horse will soon begin to respond instead of react. He has a place to begin to operate on a feel. He finds that he can trust you because you are constantly offering him a place to feel content and free. And when he does offer you a good feel, you are accepting it and rewarding him for it. We need to be there for him with a confident feel coming from within ourselves in his times of upsets as well as his times of contentment. These spots where the horse is responding may only come for brief moments. However, if you take these moments and begin to build upon them, the horse will begin to see that he can trust you, and these moments will grow and become a way of life for both you and the horse. As we work with the horse, it is important to be aware of our presentation-get a clear picture in mind of what you are asking the horse to do before you ask him. If we have a picture and our presentation is accepted and understood by him there will be times where he begins to feel back to us. This is very important, because if we miss these times, we have given the horse the justification to be scared or anxious. He let go of the fear and trusted us, and we failed him by not recognizing it. It will be harder for him to respond now because we did not acknowledge him for his effort. This causes him to think that responding to us was the wrong thing to do and unfortunately we just taught him that because we were not aware. It is really no different than a relationship between two people. For example, if someone comes into our life and we begin to develop feelings of love for this person, we open our hearts and let this person know us on a more intimate level. If every time we open our hearts, we are rejected it won't take us long to start withdrawing from that person and feel resentment towards them. If we don't become aware of what is happening and begin to address it, pretty quick that relationship is lost. However, if both parties could have been up front and honest with their feelings for one another and to themselves, perhaps that relationship may have lasted a lifetime. For me, it is no different with the horse. We are building a relationship, and I want a relationship that is honest and respectful. When a horse is responding, he will become relaxed and content. When he is content, he will use himself with natural balance (physically). The more balanced they feel the more content they become in their minds. The balance may appear to be a physical thing, and the contentment may appear to be a mental and emotional thing; yet they are really one in the same. If the mind and emotions are not content, the body is not balanced. If the body is not balanced, the mind and emotions are not at peace or content. You have to be aware of the whole: the whole horse, the whole environment, and the whole feel. These things work as one in the horse, so we must see them as a whole in order to truly understand the horse. The same holds true for us. If there is no peace and contentment within ourselves, we have no real feel to offer the horse. This lack of feel shows up in our approach to the horse, and he is more sensitive to how we feel about life and ourselves than we know or could ever imagine. The horse lives by the guidance of his instinct which most of us are not even aware of in ourselves. Yet we expect the horse to accept our leadership when we can rarely guide ourselves in the right direction. If the horse is not trusting of our leadership, it is because his nature is telling him not to, for one reason or another. If he is forced to tolerate our leadership, it will cause him a great conflict in his mind and spirit. He will feel imprisoned, and he is. If this continues without being acknowledged, it will cause a breakdown of his mind, which tends to show up in the horse exploding or his spirit being broken. (Something many people refer to as being gentle.) And why shouldn't this cause his mind to be jumbled? We are not allowing the horse to listen to his own true nature (his instincts). If he cannot listen and trust his own nature, what does he have left? I see people in this same situation. They are caught between feeling forced into accepting things the way society has created them to be and feeling like they should be listening to their nature to create something better in their lives. I wish I could say that people handle these feelings of confusion better than the horse, but I can't. It seems to me like people's reactions to these feelings are no different than that of the horse. Depression is our nations number one illness, and it is a direct result of our not listening to and following our hearts or our instincts. We numb out; we stop feeling; we become dull because our spirit is broken, and we are hopeless. We can change this if we are willing to change our thinking. Once our thinking changes, our lives change. If we stop and think about what is really taking place within the horse, we will realize that the horse does not react or respond so differently from ourselves. The only real difference is the horse has no ego to contend with that keeps him from seeing and feeling the truth. He can admit and will show you when he is afraid, angry, frustrated, or feeling good. He won't cover it up by trying to control the situation when he is fearful. He is free with his emotions. Once we get our ego out of the picture by admitting our honest emotions, what ever they may be, or by asking for help in situations we do not understand, we can begin to truly understand the horse. When we understand the horse, we can offer him what he needs. What the horse needs is the same thing we all need, the need to understand and feel content and peaceful inside. When he feels this, he will choose to respond rather than react. ______________________ Judy http://iceryder.net http://clickryder.com
