In relationship counseling, there is a concept about the five love languages (website inspired by the book by Gary Chapmans) where we see that if a couple has different love languages they can be telling each other just how much they love each other, and yet not receiving the love and going through life with an ever more depleted love tank.
In human terms the love languages Chapman delineates are:
Physical touch
Quality time
Gifts
Acts of service
Words of Affirmation
And so if you’re a physical touch and quality time kind of guy married to an acts of service and words of affirmation woman you’re going to feel super uncared for when your wife is too busy trying to “do things” to help you and leaving you cute little notes to find in your car, lunch and briefcase and doesn’t stop to hug or touch you while she’s running out the door with the kids and doesn’t really have the time to sit down and hear all about your day while you do something fun together.
The problem isn’t that they don’t LOVE each other. The problem is they don’t know how to see the world from the other perspective and the communicate in the language the other can hear.
I’ve been thinking for a while about how this relates to my horse herd.
Do you know your horse’s love language?
Sure- just about everyone can answer: Of course… grain, carrots maybe or apples… peppermints… But is that all you’ve got? Is there more? How would you know? Something I’ve noticed is the tendency to assume that if you’re an acts of service girl that everyone would appreciate getting helped out… right? And gifts, that’s so materialistic! Why would someone want to get stuff to be shown love… I don’t need THINGS I just need you to come to the barn and move the hay with me, that’s real love right there…
However the gifts person is often trying to get the point across- it’s not the THING, it’s the fact that you thought of me, and you KNOW me and you choose that for me because it’s perfect for me. The gift person isn’t materialistic- they just want to feel known.
In the end it’s about trying to see the world from a different viewpoint. It can be a challenge to see it from your friend or spouse or teenager, but I think it’s ever more challenging and takes more time to see it from your equine’s eyes.
I have three horses in my current herd. Without question they have different love languages. I recently heard a challenge to see how many things you can list that your horse loves, and then I’d add- see if you can give them some kind of weight or rank.
Wyoming loves to be surrounded by touch
Wyoming is wild. She is so easy. She has never really been shut down by humans so her voice is always close to the surface. Some of Wyoming’s favorite things are:
Scratches….
Head scratches
Inside leg scratches
Outside leg scratches
Neck scratches
Side scratches
Back scratches
Chest scratches
Butt scratches (you get the idea)
Grooming (brushing specifically- this is kind of like being scratched)
Learning something new
Being very very close to you
Resting her head on your shoulder
Touching you
Killing flies for her she can’t reach
Underbelly Rubs (related to scratching)
A good roll
Being allowed to come on an adventure
Khaleesi quietly greets a new friend
Khaleesi was “feral” and she is pretty clear on her communication but she is domestic by breeding and she will tone it down a little more than Wyoming. She is also more “compliant” by nature so you have to listen more closely and be more observant to know her loves:
Hay pellets
Carrots
Apple juice (in a syringe… this is jackpot)
Killing flies for her
Wild blackberries on the mountain (in season)
Bonus if you pick the good wild blackberries so she doesn’t get thorns in her lips
Grazing time
Grazing time on the clover in the yard
Space (love me at a distance)
Reliable patterns
Clear communication
Underbelly scratches (not rub)
Butt Scratches
Being trusted with choices and responsibility
Being told she has done a good job
Being thanked
Super gentle with Hope
Hope is the most difficult for me. She spent many years in situations that appear to have been hard on her. Since she was returned to rescue twice and then failed out of being a lesson horse (also twice) she came pretty shut down and dull. It seems likely she was in situations where no one really cared what her thoughts and feelings were- they expected her to perform a job without much communication that would slow down the process. So it takes significantly more effort to coax her out of her shell to trust a human with any communication. Here are a few things I’ve figured out that Hope likes:
Hay Pellets
Apples
Carrots
Gentle rubs
Being told she’s a good girl (gentle soft tones, not high energy)
Grazing
Grazing on the clover in the yard
Being near the herd
Those cornflower blue weeds that come up in August
You may notice I did not add grazing to Wyoming’s list. Wyoming does graze of course, but she will 80-90% choose human interaction over grazing. Khaleesi will only choose the human over grazing if they human is interesting her with something she likes better than grazing (a sweeter food or a fascinating activity where she is learning something new). Hope will almost never choose anything above grazing except if you offer her a food and then when she’s finished eating she will go back to grazing- the exception for her is the herd, she would stop grazing to follow the herd. She doesn’t yet believe that human interaction could be as good as eating grass. And in an opposite nature both Wyoming and Khaleesi are clearly appreciative of killing especially the biting flies. Hope is still on the side of dullness that she is basically tolerant of the flies and if you take care of one for you, she may be grateful but she does not show any evidence of even acknowledging (the other two clearly do).
Additionally, Hope is the newest horse which means I’ve had the least amount of time to get to know her. She is also the most subtle about showing her likes. Here is what I look for- spend time with your horse in her environment without any halter or lead rope or tool for control, ask questions:
what do they do if I’m not controlling them?
what distance do they prefer me at?
do they have a side they prefer me on?
do they ask me to scratch or help with flies?
if I offer something (to brush, or scratch, or help with flies etc) how do they respond?
If you aren’t sure what you’re looking for, here are some things to notice (when you try something different):
Does my horse move (even slightly, like a weight shift) away from me or more toward me?
Does my horse pin her ears?
Does my horse tense any part of her body?
How is my horse breathing (regular? Deep/shallow? Watch for holding breath!)
How are the lips? Tight? pinched? Relaxed?
How are the eyes? Soft? Worried? Wide? Alert?
Is the horse blinking normally (not breathing or blinking is a sign of being frozen!)
What about the tail? Swishing? Relaxed? Held to one side or other?
How observant are you? What are their “favorite” things? Then check and make sure! Or you could end up being the guy who comes home to your “acts of service” wife with chocolates for valentines day and is confused in counseling the next month when she says: I don’t even like chocolates— but if you’d pick up your underwear I’d be over the moon!
Knowing what your horse’s love languages are could be a great start in improving your relationship in small but foundational ways!
I’d love to hear your comments on what you found or what you thought and found wasn’t really true!
I ran into a friend recently who asked: are you riding a lot lately? I had to answer honestly: no. Oddly I felt like I had to clarify the answer to explain, I’ve been spending a fair amount of time with the horses, but no… I’m not riding.
I have pressed into a season where Khaleesi is getting some rest (MENTAL), Wyoming as I mentioned recently is in “restart” mode once again (EMOTIONAL), and Hope has had a bacterial infection that seems to be resurging leaving Iva and I sensing she needs to have some down time to heal (PHYSICAL).
Wyoming in the penHope in the field
Horses have three major systems and it seems like I have all of them operating slightly out of balance in some form in the HH herd. What a neat opportunity, and a perfect time (early winter) to step back and ask: what can I learn from all this?
In years past I would have been bemoaning having 3 horses and none of them in a riding state at the moment, but today I see opportunity.
In my last blog I recounted Wyoming’s highlight reel and I continue to press in creating relationship with her. I have always believed that the challenges I have with Wyoming would make me a better horsewoman, and what I learned with her would bring me improvement in my already solid relationship with K. Today I wonder if in fact, maybe I have that backward.
Khaleesi is the favored one. The chosen. She is the mare I cut my teeth on what it’s like to start a horse from almost untouched. She and I have grown together from not being able to lay a hand on her to competing in 50 mile distances. On our best days I can think things and she does them while riding. She is a stunning creature of strength and balance with a good mind. I appreciate her input and try to at least take her suggestions as a factor as we work together- often she has very good ones. We’ve been in some pretty tight situations over our years together, and I trust her with my life. Yet the more I examine our connection- which is pretty solid- I realize it’s much more like a business partnership than that deep thing I long for.
In this season of giving her some down time to (you can read about this in my last greento100 blog “Rest Reset”) I only bring her in for more necessary things- which occasionally includes going in a pen to graze and hang out while I work with Wyoming. I can always “catch” my horses at least right now, but Khaleesi knows the difference when I communicate we have business and I’m haltering you versus I have something I’d like to do and am willing to have a conversation about it. When I offer more conversation, she has let me know recently that if I’m asking, then no, I’d prefer not to do whatever it is on your mind today thank you very much.
She isn’t rude about it. And I can insist and get it done. But it brings me back to the age-old question: doesn’t a horse always prefer to graze and be with the herd if given the choice?
Well, I have a little time this season. Maybe I can dig into this a little deeper. Maybe I can answer it at least for this horse.
And so I began a new experiment… without a tool of control (halter/lead) or a lure (hay pellets/treats) can I bring her into the pen and convince her to carry me around in there of her own choosing?
Can I go from a solid partnership – the illusion of choice – to a new layer of real choice where at any time she can disengage and leave without any adverse consequence?
I went out with the halter and no real plan… well that’s not true. The first day I had big plans. I cycled through plan A, plan B and plan C before I began to see the depth of the truth.
I had spent about an hour with the herd in the field, my curiosity at first would she choose for me to put on the halter? I was certain I could tell her that’s what we were doing and she would comply… but tolerating and choosing are not the same. She took the opportunity to kick up her heels and push the herd around the large field letting me know that her choice was not to work with me. So now I needed to begin trying to change her mind. I continued my human attempt at conversation with her where she would disengage with me but I would try again. Like unsuccessful courting… however her range of how far she would push the herd began to diminish until at least we were working in a smaller area.
I had danced my way clumsily into her space and began to get a real honest moment with her where she would go still and relax and accept me there – when she would turn toward me slightly and even take a step in and finally there was a moment where she would stand calmly and accept that it’s likely I’ve earned some right to her time after an hour of waiting her out I saw her give up and accept that this WAS going to happen…
And I stood next to her quietly and still, and then… walked away.
I did not even put the halter on her. This was not part of my plan at all.
I recently had a conversation with Katy Pistole who has a transformational approach to horses and humans where she reminded me: keep in mind that you must get away from seeing success or failure in an interaction with your horse based on their performance or what you “got done” in the session. I already believe this with my entire mind. My mental system concurs, but the truth is deep down I didn’t know HOW to live this out. What a strange thing it is to find out you are believing one thing in your mind but you can see the reality is that you don’t believe it in your depth of being.
I was ok with changing the goal post either direction as I sort out how things are going, but this was removing the goal post and the ball. What then are we doing out here?
And I knew: it would have looked to an outside eye like I walked around my field unable to catch my horse for an hour, apparently “gave up a failure” and yet something vitally important had occurred in that time.
Instead of answers I had even more questions.
How do I keep conversation with this horse going…I don’t have a lead rope, a halter, a stick, even a limited space pen where she doesn’t have 6 acres to leave into? Will she always walk away from me or ignore me without some way to connect us physically? How can I keep her interested in a connection with me with NO tool and NO lure (food)? Is this a stupid idea? What conversation should I even try to have? What are we even communicating about? Where can I get better equine language skills? I am not very non-verbal naturally – is there any hope for me?
And yet, I was willing to try. And on the next day a few changes had already occurred. First she never ran off at a trot from me, and though she has a huge field she stayed in a relatively small area. Her retreat zone was already smaller in perimeter than the previous day.
Also, she allowed me the space next to her much sooner and was relaxed about it, but I still felt more tolerated than welcomed. She gave me access to her “on” side where I normally would prefer to put on the halter sooner as well.
There came a point I considered quitting for the day. I had seen improvement, but I was coming up short in the conversation department. I didn’t know what else to do, so I found myself standing quietly near her, on the off side, mind wandering a bit as she grazed… what next? I got nothing. And just then, she took a step toward me and began to nibble on the halter almost as if to have me open it up. Which I did.
Then things got interesting.
She began exploring the halter, and when I’d offer it open to see if she wanted to put her nose in it she would turn slightly away.
Ok. So you want to talk about it, but aren’t looking to put your head in there quite yet.
Then I started to go off the map for me, and began change the conversation completely.
Let’s talk about the illusion of choice for a moment.
I have learned a fair amount of horsemanship that using concepts of training the horse. I have worked with shaping a desired behavior with pressure release horsemanship and also with positive reinforcement (clicker/treat) training.
In either branch of “training”, as K began to show interest in the halter I “should” reward her. Either by removing pressure/punishmentrelease (remove the halter when she shows interest and keep it steady there when she turns away from it) or by click/treatreward to encourage learning and conversation about the halter.
I have trained my horses to be pretty good at being haltered in both branches. I worked on asking her to lower her head into the halter with pressure-release as our foundation of horsemanship, and this summer I experimented with Positive Reinforcement (clicker/treat training or R+) and could take the halter out, stand a few feet away from the horse and if they knew it was “game time” the horse would walk over to me and put their head into the halter. Fun.
Today as I was having a truly honest and open conversation with my lead mare, I considered an option I have not tried before: when she turns toward me and the halter, offer it more; and when she turns away, let it go and release.
My brain began spinning as we experimented. This is essentially rewarding the horse for evading the halter. IF we are training or shaping behavior. What if there was another option? What if I really wanted to switch to trust, conversation, and freedom? If that were the case could I be rewarding her for an honest response? Now I’m in the weeds and I’m not quite sure the terrain. Yet deep down I know I want this relationship to be built on choice, but a really good illusion of choice seems to me the best we have in the other systems.
Pressure-release says to me You get to choose as long as you choose what I want you to choose!! Great job getting the answer right! I will release you, and when you do something super amazing I will reward you the highest reward I have: I will walk away and leave you in peace. And even though R+ puts the foundation of the work in choice… we don’t reward a horse for leaving us, walking away, or making a “wrong” choice. I like this game of learning approach for some things, but it becomes a bit of a problem when I run out of hay pellets. This system is better at choice because we find out when our own request/behavior is so undesirable to the horse they walk away even in the face of getting cookies. Also I do believe this system in the long run can make a horse feel pretty good about being with the human if done well, but there’s a gap after the cookies before the honesty really comes to the surface… and in the end neither are truly freedom and choice.
** Let me clarify I don’t think shaping and training are bad things. Probably they are even necessary — but are they limited to anyone who has the deep dream of more? Who wants to dance instead of train? Who wants the horse to operate as one with them together? Yes we can train horses to do those things but what we really want is partnership and in shaping and training only are we kidding ourselves by creating an illusion of what looks like total connection?**
This has bothered me at the core for a long time. Training by pressure-release and R+ are better than some old school methods of violence and force toward horses- yet there is something richer I keep feeling is missing.
I want deeper.
So the other day I took a plunge and decided to STOP shaping and training Khaleesi, and begin to build a different kind of relationship with her that could very well backfire on me completely at best, and depending on the horse, possible even become dangerous (not likely with K).
Back to the field experiment…
Khaleesi explored the halter with me on the off-side at first and if she turned her nose away I removed the halter and when she turned her nose back toward me I presented it again. I opened the noseband and she even began to put her nose slightly into it and then wiggle around.
Like someone trying to communicate in a totally foreign sign language I thought: she wants me to put this halter and lets go do something? Maybe she’s wondering where my leadership is and why I’m standing around like I have no plan? and so I began to bring the poll piece up over her head… and then she would remove herself and I always removed the halter and let her choose when to re engage.
We did this a couple times and then she zoned out, looked straight ahead and yawned and chewed and twisted her tongue practically in a loop as she considered the unexpected thing I was doing.
Next she offered to reposition me on the on-side. This whole conversation continued until I was offering the halter to her with my arm already raised and she could dip her nose through my arms into the halter with my arm over her neck ready to close the poll section over her head. She would lift her head up gently and I would release the poll section and let the halter drop down. She must have done this ten times to check and make sure I meant it. It was like she didn’t really believe that I would let her release herself even from when I had the poll section through the loop- at ANY MOMENT girl, you can say: no thank you.
This seemed to blow her mind. If I stepped back a moment she stepped closer to me. She wasn’t grazing, she was engaged in this conversation. Finally she stepped away and began to graze a moment. This was ok, it had been over an hour of field work and the last part of the conversation seemed really deep to me. It touched things in my own heart that I would need to process too. So I slowly stepped away and began to walk back to the barn.
As I looked back I saw she had taken a few more steps toward me and was still looking intently at me. I paused, I squatted down where I was and waited. After a few moments she crossed more than half the distance between us and then stopped again- intently watching me.
I waited a moment, and then walked over to her. She greeted me with her muzzle to my hand, and then she returned to grazing, and I walked off to the barn.
I have struggled with the idea of solid leadership versus listening to the horse and getting with the horse so that they can get with you. I’ve heard more times than I can count that if you don’t “be the boss” — or at least in a way I prefer to think of it “be a good leader” then you are both just going to be confused.
I think there is important truth in this. I do need to lead the conversation, however as I consider the greatest leader ever… the God who created the universe and the horse and me, I see that He tells us that great leadership is always in service. And we must serve in love. Love is patient, kind, does not demand it’s own way, is not arrogant, it is not frustrated, irritated or resentful… love rejoices in truth. Love bears all things. Love believes and hopes and endures.
Is it possible to lead a horse this way? Some parts are obvious. Leave your ego at the door and choose humility. We know patience is vital with horses. We know being mean, mad, annoyed or frustrated will kill our ability to work together with them. Everyone I know believes kindness is important… but, does not demand it’s own way?
If God is love… does HE NOT demand his way? Wait. Have I ever considered this as a truth? Doesn’t God actually demand we do things his way if we want to have relationship with him? Certainly he has a higher plan available if I will trust him. Just like I have a higher plan available to K if she would trust me. Horses love to graze and be with the herd, but I also believe giving them purpose is good for them, and I’ve felt her come alive in race day and sink into deep consideration when we find new balance together in the arena. Things she can’t do on her own with the herd.
Now as I’m leaving the field my analytical mind begins clicking new gears. God doesn’t just love the world, God IS love. And then God gives us the definition of love in the famous love chapter (1 Corinthians 13). If these things are true about love… then they HAVE to be true about the character of God himself!
Khaleesi will do just about anything and pretty willingly, but there is a part of her that she holds back. I do not have her heart, her complete trust, her spirit (or soul.. whichever is the inner being of an animal which is different from a human). We are a strong business partnership, but we lack the intimacy of a deeper connection.
She is my mirror. The hang up as I gaze into that mirror in the field this week is that I also lack trust in intimacy. To be clear- we are not called to deep intimacy in all our relationships, but there is a calling from the heart of the creator of the universe to us to let him in- all the way in- to the deepest part of ourselves… and yet it takes time and trust to get there and intimacy cannot be forced, it must be given. Similarly Khaleesi will have to choose if I am worthy of that deeper layer of her freedom, and I will have to prove my own heart of love for her.
Maybe this creature, this gift from the creator will help me understand and change that in a way that is healing in my own heart. Maybe HE is trying to tell me something, about how I hold back layers from his own heart of love. Probably there are changes in me that must happen before Khaleesi will sense the security and worthiness in me.
The story is not finished yet. I don’t know if I’m on a ridiculous useless tangent or on the road to something magical. I’m going to take a chance and see where the path leads.
So far my greatest teacher has been my mustang mare Wyoming. I’m a “goal oriented” type and tend to be good at moving forward toward progress. Of course our greatest strengths can also be our greatest weaknesses; with Khaleesi, this goal setting personality and refusal to quit the relentless march toward progress paid off. I started her with the very limited tools I had, and though it was a bit messy with holes here and there, today she is a fine partner and my go-anywhere trail companion and endurance horse.
However with Wyoming….
I have gone forward, sideways, backward and in circles with her and this has created much confusion for me. I can’t understand why it seems impossible to build on any kind of foundation with her. Each time I make a kind of breakthrough, at some point it goes sideways, and then often backward and I find myself in some negative momentum place farther back than I was before.
Of course along with this goal orienteering mindset comes stubbornness and refusal to give up so I tend to take complete failure as a minor set back. I lick my wounds and try again, willing to learn what it was in me or my approach that caused the crash. Each time I find opportunity to grow.
And with her… lots and lots… and lots of opportunities to grow.
I have had this mare riding miles on trails successfully (or so it seemed) only to have her eventually begin a habit of laying down on me that got so quick and subtle she’d outsmart me even when I was ready for it… she carried me along at a great walk and trot only to eventually start a bucking fit whenever I asked for the trot- of course I did all I could to rule out pain or physical issues – I found the way I was asking (which was mostly with my energy!) was apparently offensive to her sensitive mare system. I began to have great success loading her on the trailer until she broke two welds on my butt bar and chest bar- once she went underneath the chest bar to exit the front human door in order to escape the pressure she felt.
Well meaning friends when they hear some of the stories helpful suggest things that… Yes. I’ve tried that… is probably the answer.
Is she aggressive and dangerous someone asked of her recently?
No- actually she’s about the friendliest horse I have and she loves to interact. She wants a job, just apparently not a job that I’d like to see her engage in! She’s like the brilliant kid who wants to play and design video games when I’d like to see her just engage in some kind of standard boring gainful employment. Regardless, the truth is I adore her. She’s beautiful, bright and friendly, and surprisingly willing.
Yes. Willing- despite all I’ve said I think it’s her willingness to try that might be the downfall. I can see her want to try, but something in her eventually just can’t. And then we get into trouble. Once the pressure builds… the expression of it can be… wild.
I began to wonder if the murmuring peanut gallery might be right. What if I’ve refused in my natural relationship non-violent horse training attempts to simply get it done. I mean she is a horse right? There comes a point when the spoiled child has to comply, for everyone’s sake. Maybe I just refuse to close the deal with her. Like an irresponsible indulgent parent?
I decided that trailer loading and taking a ride up to a friends nearby farm to do a little fun work then come home would be the test. I was able to get this mare on the trailer (blood sweat and tears included) to move her, maybe it was time to build on this with a purpose- turn the trailer into the adventure box! Not just an exercise.
If I look back on how well riding out the bucking to go on a trail ride worked for me (I’m not afraid of her, she isn’t trying to kill me… yet the bucking did end up escalating to rearing and trying to bite at my foot when I ignored her, stayed calm and simply asked her to get over her concerns and go on the trail…Just riding her through it was not the best answer to that question.) ….. so if I were to l look back on how that closing the deal worked out for me with her in other situations I might have thought differently. But I am stubborn and somehow we both are going to have to learn.
The short of the story is we did not load the mare and go work at my friend’s property. I ended up with the second broken weld, terrible rope burns (yes gloves would have helped, I hate gloves) and thankfully though it seems she made it clear she would chose to the death rather than comply, the horse did not die, and if she hurt herself it seems nothing long term.
That day was a low point for me, but in a moment of slight danger to herself, me, and my trailer, I was certain of a few things now that I might have suspected before, but I knew them in that fleeting moment:
This horse was not ever going on this trailer by any kind of force. She’d only get on when she decided to on her own.
I hate the term “breaking” a horse… but if ever I was tempted to consider that breaking was necessary this might be the moment.
I wasn’t sure I could cross that line, but felt fairly certain if I wanted to I could not do it with this horse- I did not have the tools, and regardless if given the option she would die first.
Nothing that had worked for me with other horses was going to be the solution to working with this horse.
So. I released her from her precarious situation she’d gotten into. I calmly decided to accept failure for the moment and walked her back to the field and left her tied to a tree for a while giving me a chance to think and do some barn chores. She waited there mostly patiently and eventually when I had finished the things I needed to do, I set her loose.
What would I do with her I wasn’t sure, but even in this there must be some good. I was at ground zero. I had nothing to offer except surrender. Everything was on the table… shoot her? leave her as a pet? enjoy her antics as a pasture ornament? Get into liberty work? Learn the classic lesson of failure? There are just some things no amount of tenacity will solve?
Though I don’t need her to be a solid riding horse, I have seen she is not really a pasture pet. She isn’t looking for a life of early retirement. She’s too engaged. I just was missing it. Missing what?
Exactly.
As I thought, prayed, and talked this out with a friend I heard that still small voice reminding me of the well timed interview I’d just heard the day before. The interview I almost turned off because I found it to be a little too fringy. It was with a young woman who loves mustangs and had found success working with the ones hardest to gentle and train. She eventually went from wild horses to working with zebras and found them to be even more difficult to work with in traditional pressure release horsemanship. She explained that at least wild horses come from a domestic equine genetic line, zebras do not. She had to find a different way to get to both the zebras and the particularly challenging wild horses.
Maybe there was a reason that interview came at exactly this timing. Maybe the lady who can work with the mustangs other saw as ‘untrainable’ and undomesticated zebras had some things I might be open to hearing now.
So I began a dig into the world of positive reinforcement and it’s been quite a mind shift. I’ve only started dabbling and learning and I’m so far from being an expert I’m hesitant to even talk much about it yet. It feels like entering an alternate universe for me and one I’m not certain how to navigate, not certain how the world works, not certain how long to spend there, and not certain how to exist in both somehow. I don’t see myself leaving the pressure-release horsemanship system (negative reinforcement) completely– especially because horses use pressure release in their own language, and horses living alongside humans need to understand giving to pressure so we can work together for the horse and human’s best interest.
Yet there are things I’m beginning to seeing this alternate universe that are sucking me into a vortex that is all at once exciting, fun, and a little frightening. For today I can say the horses respond to it quickly, they have a lot of buy in, and I can see how giving them more choice is both scary to a control freak human like me, but empowering for them in a really beautiful way.
I woke up one morning recently with the whisper asking me: What makes you think if you allow them more choice they will choose not to partner with you? They are horses, they are looking to connect and partner…
And true enough, I’m already seeing them choose to do things I want them to do – better than my pressure release techniques ever worked. Wyoming is coming around a little slowly but she is definitely responding. Considering what we went through and the breech of trust I caused it’s a testament to her generous equine heart that she is still willing. And Khaleesi is eating it up literally — I can hardly work with any other horses without her trying to cut in and join the game for herself.
In fact when I go to the classroom my greatest struggle at the moment is not wanting to close any horse into the area so they get the total choice of leaving when they want to, but I have to close OUT the other horses because I can’t work them all at once and it’s like kids trying to break into the school room for their turn in class. It’s a little overwhelming actually.
I am seeing more and more opportunity and possibility each day with this and it’s engaging and invigorating work… it’s downright more FUN than any way I’ve worked horses before. I can see how it becomes a way of life, and the proponents of this “method” explain that it
Gets horses to learn how to learn and enjoy the process more.
Is a cleaner learning process for the horse to know when an answer is correct so they can learn more quickly with less frustration.
Associates the human/handler/rider with positive activities as opposed to just work.
Empowers the horse to have more control and choice which tends toward them offering more to the process and the rider, not less.
Creates better relationship for the long term (yes, at first the horse is excited for the treats or the food, but I’ve read that over time that association becomes greater than just reward but the time spend together is enjoyable for both and that deepens more than simply the food/reward which is a starting point)
It is way too soon for me to share advice or direction for someone else in this realm. I am certain I will find some pitfalls and I am trying to learn what I can so I fall into less of them. I don’t know if this is a helpful process for every human and every horse or if there are specific situations that will benefit more, but for the moment, just a few weeks of dabbling, my horses are changing. The changes are good, but also I find myself a little freaked out… by this alternate universe. The unknown.
Ironically I began this process for Wyoming, but it’s been K that has had the loudest response. I’ve come to the barn to find her standing in the classroom as if waiting for me. I’ve finished with her and given her an extra treat to end the session and 10 minutes later still found her waiting in the classroom for me. And she’s so quick to learn that I have struggled to keep up with her challenging her with new parameters and ideas.
Wyoming is smart, but she has needed (not surprisingly) to exercise the right to engage or disengage. I think this is the most important thing to her for now so she will work with me then decide to walk off and eat some grass. I don’t chase after her, I just watch her a while and wait. She always wanders back over and re-engages. This cycle will continue until I disengage and walk off putting my “tools” away. And ironically sometimes at this point Khaleesi is still waiting in the classroom!
Hope gets the least time though I still work with her. She is the most withdrawn and she will engage a minute or less and then stand deep in though processing. She will come out and re-engage, but I have to make the puzzle super easy to solve for now, she has little threshold for wrong answers or me changing parameters. She is more like the shy kid who needs a lot of confidence building with easy questions. If I shut her into the classroom and the other two walk off too far she can’t “stay” with me. She is incredibly herd bound for safety being the lowest and least confident horse. Finding a place she is comfortable, feels safe, and keeping the other horses nearby if they aren’t engaged can be tricky. I can see she won’t let down her guard and trust easily. Yet when I can find a way to work with her a few minutes at a time she responds and engages.
Each of them is unique. The more I work with horses, the more I see that though there may be answers that work more often than others, the real answer on how to connect is varied as the horses and humans creating the equation. The real answer truly is: it depends. Working in this universe gives me so much more feedback because they can walk away, so I have to find ways to help them be successful, not too challenged but not bored, and see if they have gone toward fear or stress (which shuts down learning) or can stay in curiosity mode.
With Khaleesi at the moment I am finding ways to apply the positive reinforcement to almost everything from haltering to standing while I tack up, while I mount at the block and even when I choose a trail she doesn’t want to go up… I can help sweeten the deal turning almost anything into a puzzle she begins to look at it differently.
I’ll keep you posted here as I play around with these concepts and let you know what I find. If you’ve used positive reinforcement training let me know how it’s going (or gone) and how it’s worked for you!
Hope Horsemanship 