A letter.

When she was checking out my updated website, one of my clients came upon this photo I took while riding her mare up in the hills above the barn. It inspired her to write me this letter, which she so graciously offered to share with the world. It is one of the most meaningful letters I have received, and I think her experiences will resonate with others.

This picture means so much to me. To some it will just look like a beautiful photo looking over the barn from the rider’s view, but to me it is like seeing a picture of my mare standing on an Olympic pedestal about to get her medal. You and I remember our first weeks with her, and our very real worry that she would not be able to be trained. Her level of fear was on a level above a mustang who had lived wild , her first two weeks she stood wary and untrusting, shaking like a leaf in the corner of a paddock deathly afraid of a rope gripped and paralyzed with fear. The journey to arrive at this picture has been such a welcome distraction from the challenges in my life this last year and a half. I feel like for once it was not something in my control at all, I had to let go of my fears too, and trust to go on a journey without a map and with a copilot, you Alex. My mom’s terminal illness rocked me to the core, and made me realize that I needed to stop waiting for “the perfect time, the perfect horse” to have a relationship with horses again. I had a wonderful teen gelding with ringbone who was healing but he was not a trail horse, he was my reminder that having a horse in my life filled a missing piece that had been absent for 18 years since I had an accident where I nearly died, and then life was busy going to school, working in pediatrics, having babies………and did I mention, ignoring the fact that I had almost died in an accident. Denial is a very strong coping mechanism in my life, not healthy but survival ready. My accident and serious head injury while riding when I was 18 was a lurking memory of the real risks involved in this decision to get back in to riding seriously, and I knew that I wanted to be safe, and that I also wanted a horse who needed a home. In the end this horse picked me, somehow I found myself wandering through a herd of 60 head of 4-6 yr olds who had not been handled. Did I mention that denial was a strong presence in my life? But they needed jobs. I had driven by them on my way to bring my daughter McCall to lessons at Alex’s barn and thought they were beautiful and wondered what their story was. Then the herd reduction sale happened and I thought I would just go take a “look”, I of course was drawn to the beautiful chocolate geldings with flowing creamy manes and tails. Alex correctly advised me that she could help me find a better fit for my journey back into horsemanship than an horse who had not been handled. Did I mention that stubborn and denial are strong characteristics in my life? Oh yeah and a challenge? I ignored Alex’s, my good friends, my mother’s and my husband’s, advice and brought one of my very best friends who also happens to be a veterinarian and as horse crazy as I am to look. The horse that kept following me around (now I know she was looking for treats and the pushiest girl in the bunch , was a smoky black mare, I was adamant I wasn’t getting a mare. I went back four times, every time she found me every time until the last visit I thought about other horses. Her journey to Alex’s place was not far in distance but has been a solar system in her awareness of a world with human interaction and learning about letting go of fear, and over all developing trust and partnership and respect for other horses and humans. We are still on a journey, she is almost always light, and is growing in her willingness to be soft. It has been a true test of commitment and patience. She has a job now, and she still looks up at the hills above the pasture with a wild eye most days. In the end I know now why she picked me, I needed her to teach me, I would not have learned near as much with any other horse. That is why this picture of her with her ears pricked forward willing to go for a ride in the hills, calm, soft, brought a tear to my eye. Thank you Alex, for healing my horse and my heart.

Down to business! 2014 updates

Well, it's a week into 2014 so it's time to get down to business! If you are considering training this year, make sure you read the rest of this!

My updated website is live, and you will find tweaks all over the place, from photos to text to testimonials. Please pay special attention to the updated 2014 rates as they do reflect some changes. www.threerivershorsetraining.com
*thanks to my web guy, Miguel, for all his hard work on the site. If you need a web guy, he's your man and I'll put you in touch!*

A reminder about how booking a 2014 spot works because I do things a little different than a lot of trainers: I will begin working my way down the list of full training horses in the first week of March this year, weather dependent of course. As always, I ask for a $50 deposit to hold a spot. Deposits place you on the list, first come first serve. Because I like to spend as much time as each horse and owner pair needs, I don't guarantee when your horse will arrive to training, only what number on the list you are. I will usually give you an estimate for when your spot will come up (I'm generally pretty close) and then two weeks notice for the confirmed date of arrival. This keeps things fair, and prioritizes progress over schedule. As always, I work to customize every training program to the specific horse and owner.

I HIGHLY recommend getting a deposit in ASAP if you are hoping for a March or April spot, as history shows that these months are pretty close to full by the end of January. If you have a deposit in with me already that was a hold over from late fall due to cold temps, you will automatically be placed at the top of the list.

**Spots are only guaranteed with a deposit to hold them**

Please don't hesitate to contact me with questions about training, or to set up an evaluation this winter. That's a great idea if you are on the fence about training, or want to know exactly what you are getting with me. I posted about that a while back, and will make sure to re-post that again soon.

I'm so excited for a great 2014!!!!

www.threerivershorsetraining.com

Being soft together.

A question came in regarding lightness and softness that I think is a good one.  I’ve done my best to answer it below.  I welcome further conversation and follow up questions to keep the topic going!

Question: It seems to me that once you have lightness that seems to stay, but softness I am constantly having to work on.  Is that the way it goes? Or, if I become insistent enough will my horse get so with me that the softness will eventually always be there when the two of us are doing something whether it be on the ground or from the saddle?

First, I guess I should recap what I see as the difference between lightness and softness.  This is certainly not a concept original to me.  Harry Whitney, Ross Jacobs, and others talk and write about this all the time. But, this is my take on the whole discussion.  Lightness is a physical reaction, where as softness is a mental response and emotional feeling.  To me, lightness usually is a horse avoiding pressure somehow, maybe the pressure of the line, the whip, the leg, or the ask in general, by staying physically ahead of it, without really changing a thought or feeling.  As anyone who has been chased knows, you can stay ahead of pressure/contact without feeling good about it, or thinking about what you are doing!  In fact, if you are simply staying ahead of pressure, you are probably thinking only about the pressure in order to react!  Softness, however, is a response.  Softness means that the horse has let go of one thought and picked up the one presented, completely committed, and made whatever physical changes were necessary to make the mental and emotional shift.  You can have lightness without softness, but if you have softness you will necessarily have lightness.  This is because, a horse can feel bad, tight, worried, etc in order to stay ahead of the pressure and react (lightness without softness), but will never be heavy and and also completely committed, okay feeling and engaged with the activity (softness).

A lot of the time, a horse will learn lightness as a form of obedience.  They know that if they do X then Y will not happen (if they side pass, the leg will not push into their side.  If they go left on the line, the sound/whip/stick/flag will never engage).  But, when they practice this obedience, they do not necessarily feel okay about it (who would feel okay about simple avoidance, even if it was successful? Not me.) they simply learn that it works to avoid trouble.  Horses will do a lot to avoid trouble.

A really easy place to spot if a horse has changed their thought softly, or simply learned a light trick, is when asking a horse to go out on a circle on the line.  If you ask them to go left, and they go left immediately without any pressure on the line, follow up with a flag, etc, but also without looking and thinking left, that is lightness.  If they actually look to the left, organize themselves to get ready to go left, and go left with their body and mind, with complete intent and okay-ness about going left (and as a byproduct, with a really nice physical maneuver) that is softness.

So, back to the question.  My first thought when I read the question is that the reason it seems that lightness stays and softness doesn’t, is because lightness is a lot easier to get than softness.  It’s as simple as that.  Horses are amazing at staying out of trouble, and many will stay really light even when really worried. So, my guess is, the horses that are being referred to in the question have figured out the physical expectations of the exercises and to avoid  conflict, which to these particular horses is pressure, they are performing the action with a level of obedience that does not necessarily reflect their mental commitment to the task.

I think that it is natural that a horse that is used to obedience and lightness, not soft engagement, will come in and out of softness as they learn.  Being soft and focused and engaged is tiring and takes practice.  If that has never been a part of the program, it is natural to default to the easier task of lightness and obedience.  However, don’t read “easier” as “better.” It is only easier because that is what the horse is used to; it does not mean they feel good about things.  Quality horsemanship will try to show the horse that place of softness and engagement repeatedly, until the horse realizes how much better that feels than simply shutting down and becoming obedient.  Once a horse truly realizes this, they will search for this feeling, and the try will shift from being directed at avoiding trouble towards being with the person. 

I also think it takes practice from the person’s end.  I know very few riders who have thought to look for softness rather than lightness, and even fewer that have been taught to.  So, for the majority of us it is a very new and obscure thing to not simply look for obedience and lightness.  As with any new world view, it takes time to not only learn how to ask for softness, but even what that looks like in the first place!  My guess is the person asking the question is still experimenting with softness themselves, and so are inadvertently not particularly consistent about the level of expectation, and maybe miss moments when the horse isn’t fully engaged and soft.  This is completely okay, it’s part of the learning curve, and we as people are likely to regress to old habits the same way the horse is.  This doesn’t mean to stop aspiring to perfection, it just means that sometimes there might be setbacks between us and our horses, stemming from both ends of the relationship!

A horse that feels good will be soft and ready to try.  A horse that feels bad will be worried and simply trying to survive.  It’s as simple as that.  Those moments that feel wonderful for both the horse and the human probably mean the softness is going both ways, and that’s an amazing thing.  But it takes a while to recognize the difference between an obedient trick and a willing try.

This co-softness, of both the horse and human, mentioned above is the last part of the equation.  It’s hard to talk about directly because it feels very intangible, but I think it comes up in a lot of my writing on this blog, however inadvertently.  We must remember that our expectations of softness must not only be for the horse.  I know that those of us trained to ride seeking lightness (read: obedience), also learn a certain amount of dictatorship.  Because, only a dictator would seek obedience.  A leader with benevolence, compassion and clarity would seek engagement— a two way relationship—and this sort of leader is lives through softness themselves. 

Finding softness within ourselves is as difficult as finding it within the horse, particularly when we are working toward something specific from animal.  It’s easy to get fixated on goals and technique and forget the horse.  That is exactly the moment we (at least I) turn into a dictator, and the moment the horse stops trying and starts worrying about what the next moment might bring.  Instead, we must both look softly into the next thought, with clarity, intrigue and engagement, excited for what each conversation might bring.

Below, I’ve posted two photos.  One, of Eddie looking soft and interested in coming around the corner.  The other, of both Eddie and me looking into the future!

Good luck!
Also posted at www.threerivershorsetraining.blogspot.com

www.threerivershorsetraining.com

Who they are.

Here is something I posted on Facebook last year, and thought I would share again here.

A conversation that comes up a lot at the barn is what each person is looking for in a horse. To me, this is a very personal decision and it requires being very honest with yourself about what you want from your horsemanship, and your horse.
If horses are about riding for a particular purpose, whether in a show, on the job, or on the trail, you need to be realistic about what you can offer a horse and what your horse can offer you. There are plenty of horses that could do a specific job with a lot of work, support and the perfect rider combination, but otherwise will struggle to feel okay enough to perform. Other horses have physical limitations that determine what they can or cannot do. This doesn't make them bad horses, it just makes them who they are and in need of the right circumstance.
A lot of us might be able to offer these horses a great deal, if we are willing to live within what the horse needs and has to offer. This doesn't always match what we were hoping for, though. So then a decision has to be made by the person, as to whether it is the external goal that is important, or the journey with the horse. This is a personal decision, and has a lot to do with what the person is interested in.
I know fantastic riders who are primarily interested in going down the trail, doing a job, or showing. I don't have any problem with this. But I think it is important that they are matched with the right horse. A horse that can handle the pressure of the job, physically and emotionally, without a ton of support, and without worrying much. There are horses that can do this, with the right combination of personality and experience. There are other horses that may or may not still perform, but fall apart emotionally. And that's not fair to the horse.
For me, my interest for my personal horses is more in the journey, and I don't mind spending a long time working on emotional issues, physical challenges, or anything else that comes up. That's where my interest lies in horses at this point in my life, from the saddle or from the ground. Each horse that I own has it's own special strengths and limitations. My lesson horses have physical issues that limit how much riding they can do and determine their need for extra care, but they have unending patience and offer safety for their students. Among my personal horses, I have horses with physical and emotional issues that may or may not be resolvable, but hopefully are manageable in the long term. But they offer me a world of learning and they have no where else to go. I'm a last stop for them. And I'm happy with that, with who they are, and I think that I have enough to offer them to keep their quality of life.
So the question that I encourage everyone to ask when deciding on a horse to take home, or whether to keep one, is if your goals, and the effort you are willing to dedicate to the horse, match what that horse needs and who that horse is.

Taking things for granted

Here is a photo from yesterday as four dogs and I went to pick up Punalu from the hospital after over two weeks! We are happy to have her back.

The vet said Punalu had over 100lbs of sand in her stomach! Punalu is a big horse, but that is almost 10% of her bodyweight in sand! This is incredible, and had to take years to accumulate. What I find more incredible, though, is that she was at my place for a little under two months when this happened, with NO signs of trouble. Granted, she was just being boarded here, and not being ridden daily, but there were zero colic symptoms. She was seen by a vet within an hour of the first foot stomp that indicated she did not want to eat. Punalu was living with what I have to imagine was extreme discomfort for a very long time without any complaints...and at the very least, without missing a meal!

I think that this demonstrates something even bigger about horses that we talk about a lot, but sometimes is really hard, at least for me, to drive home in lessons. Horses are incredibly resilient and obedient. They will try to avoid trouble at all costs, even if this means working or interacting with humans at a huge emotional or physical cost. Punalu's is an obvious situation, in which she was willing to do her job despite 100+lbs of sand sitting in her stomach, possibly for years. Now, Punalu happens to be tough as nails when it comes to personality, but I think this applies to a much bigger range of issues, from soreness because of poor teeth, ill fitting equipment, bad riding, all the way to horses feeling huge amounts of anxiety just from being around a human, much less having a person on top of them, and still performing.

To many, this quality in horses that allows them to sacrifice their own well being to get the job done, in hopes of staying out of trouble, is the reason people choose horses to ride. They take for granted that with a minimal amount of training and understanding, horses can provide them the four legs they need to fulfill whatever the person wants to do. It is seen as permission to use horses however one wants, because, wouldn't the horse complain if it was really that bad?

But to me, this quality feels like the exact opposite. Knowing what I do about a horse's capacity to shut out discomfort, whether physically or emotionally, makes me feel even more responsible for their wellbeing, and drives me to want to be an even better horse person. I am the one who chooses to have horses in my life, not the other way around. I choose where they sleep, what they eat, and who they interact with. I am the rider, literally seeing the horse from above. So, to me it becomes a profound responsibility to do the best I can. At the very least, I want my horses to feel that there is someone listening if they need to complain. That comes with relationship, with trust, and with time. And most of all, it comes by showing a horse, over and over, that their feelings are important. This doesn't mean they do whatever they want. All of you know I have pretty high expectations for behavior! But it means that in showing them what is expected, their feelings are not squashed. It means always doing the best we can to understand what they are experiencing, and never becoming complacent because a horse is "broke." It doesn't mean that we stop doing what we like to do with horses, whether competing, trail riding or working, but it means doing it with as much compassion, clarity, understanding and education as we can, so that hopefully it, at the very least, doesn't make our horse's day worse. Even though we still want our horses to perform, it means prioritizing their best interests, even if that means changing the goals of our performance, whatever that may be.

It means not taking for granted that we are humans, and humans ride horses. I'm thankful every day that a horse would ever let me touch it, much less sit on it and direct its ideas and actions. I think the day we start forgetting that this is an amazing gift, one that we should aspire to deserve, is that day we should stop riding horses.

Go for it

Usually I use this blog as a place to discuss things that I am experiencing or experimenting with, and then I apply them to things that I commonly see as struggles among my students. Often they are one and the same so it isn't too much of a stretch!  With this blog, though, I am going to discuss something I talk to a lot of people about, and I believe is more about humans than it is horses. I want to talk about taking risks, trying new things, and being accountable for how we are with our horses. 

Almost on a daily basis someone tells me that they feel stuck because they don't want to make their horse worse or mess up the horse's existing training. Usually this is followed by them telling me that it is still falling apart!  

Usually I keep the advice I give out to individual encounters, because it's hard to give specific suggestions that will apply in any situation. But I think I can break that rule when it comes to this issue. I think it is important to go for it. To try. To take risks and to think outside your comfort zone. Be careful with your physical safety, but not with your strategy. Just because you haven't seen me or your trainer do it, or you aren't sure you can execute the idea perfectly, doesn't mean you shouldn't give it a go. I do new things everything I go to work. That is how you grow, stay inspired, and become better and produce better horses. 

It is important though that two things happen when you are trying something new or uncomfortable. Firstly, you must ensure that what you are trying to do is true to your philosophical ideas about horsemanship. For me, this means that it is true to what the horse needs in that moment. That it is clear to the horse and in their interest. What I'm doing may need to be firm, just as it may be quiet, but either way it must be asking for the horse to try, think and be responsible. I should not be carrying a horses weight, physically or mentally, and should not be forcing a physical change without also asking for a mental one. 

Secondly, in being true to your conceptual goals, you must be accountable for your decisions.  Every time I work a horse, I try to do it as though someone I respect is watching. It is so easy to cut corners when no one is watching, which is one of the reasons it is so common for people to tell me that what I'm seeing in a lesson isn't common at home. Because at home, no one is holding them accountable for what they are doing. That is the difference that I see between people who make rapid, consistent changes at home, and those people who continue to struggle making a big jump. It doesn't have anything to do with technical skill or riding ability. It has everything to do with the person's ability to make decisions that reflect the sort of horse person they want to be rather than getting frustrated or in a rush and regressing back to what is comfortable for them (and probably not comfortable for the horse!).  

This certainly doesn't mean things will be anywhere near perfect! It just means that you are moving forward and pushing yourself rather than staying still. And with this, you must be sure to be confident and sure in your decisions, rather than worrying if it will work. It definitely won't work if you aren't going for it with all of your ability!  Sometimes in clinics or when people are watching me work at home I try to remember to mention if I'm doing something that I've never done before or that I'm not sure if it will work.  The truth is, that's all the time!  If it weren't all the time, I would be the same horse person I was five years ago, and I certainly am not that.

That being said, if I try something new, at that moment I am sure that it will work.  If it doesn't, I usually feel that pretty quickly and am not afraid to move on to something else. Most of the time, though, it does work, and I don't think that's in any small part to the fact that I'm following all of this advice. I'm confident it will work, and that the horse can come through, and before even starting I've evaluated if I'm being true to myself and my horse, and working as if someone I respect is watching. 

As a teacher, I would absolutely rather see someone come for a lesson trying new things and trying hard, even if I have to change their direction some, than someone who is paralyzed because they are afraid to fail. So, give yourself permission to mess up!  Why not? It takes a long time to get good at anything, and you have to put yourself out there for big rewards. If things get worse before they get better, so what?  Treat your horsemanship like a journey and an exercise in self growth, not a competition, and you will find things inside yourself you didn't know where there, and your horses will thank you. 

Two at a time

A post from facebook that was well received, so I'm reposting it here.  

I've been trying some new stuff with a couple horses I have in for training I thought I would share. They live together, and the owners have a really difficult time catching them when they are out in the pasture together. I did a little experiment, and realized that if I put them in separate pens, but still with multiple other horses and just over the fence from each other, so they could still feed off each other, within a day or two I could have them catching quite easily. But put them back together, and they would regress quite a bit, even as the rest of their work with me improved, and after they had been very easy to catch in with other horses. So I decided to try working them together, first in the round pen, at liberty. I spent time setting up a search, in which I was in the pen with the flag, with both of them loose, asking them to be on opposite sides of the pen and focused on me. This was fun, because it didn't take long before the appy mare (who is the more confident of the two and has had more work with me than the grey gelding) figured out exactly what I wanted, and was helping the gelding figure it out. Once they were confident with this, I spent time working each of them at liberty as if the other wasn't there, asking the one not being worked to hang out, stay attentive, and ignore the other horse, and ignore all of my movement while guiding the other horse. Then, I spent some time doing all of this again out in the bigger arena. I've seen HUGE improvements in their catching! The first couple days after this, I went in to the paddock with the flag, and set up a search, which only took them minutes to figure out (and they separated, and looked to me). I worked them at liberty in the paddock before catching, just the same as I'd done elsewhere. At this point, they are just plain easy to catch, and at the most I have to ask for their attention with a little cluck. I'm still revisiting working them together in the round pen from time to time, as the grey gelding can still get a flustered and I have seen a lot of benefit to his confidence, both in himself and being comfortable while I work the other horse, that not everything is about him, and in his ability to prioritize me over his mare friend. The softness that is coming into both of them during this work and other work has been great! Plus...it's just way less of a pain to catch them, which was really the point of the whole experiment.