Completely Confident: Creating A Confident Horse in 5 Areas

Lilah Rose is confident in herself, naturally curious, and always in you face!

As an owner of a right brained horse who is naturally inclined to be insecure, I think and talk about building confidence a lot. However, what does it really mean to have a truly confident horse? How do we know that we are setting our horse up for success in every situation? These are questions that I didn't even know to ask until recently.

A few months ago, we moved the horses to a new barn that is much closer to where we live. Prior to the move, we had been dealing with some serious separation anxiety between our two horses. Whenever we would take one out of sight of the other, they would get very right brained and emotional, especially our curly horse, Lilah. Now, after enduring the tribulations of being uprooted, our horses are more bonded than ever. Just when I was starting to feel lost about how to approach dealing with the times we want to separate our horses, I happened to pick up and watch a DVD that was a game changer for the way I think about my horse's confidence and is the key to tackling the separation anxiety.

In the video, Linda Parelli matter-of-factly explained that as a good horse person, it is my responsibility to  build my horse's confidence in five areas:

1) In myself as a leader
2) In his or herself
3) In the herd
4) In the environment
5) In learning situations

Say it with me now - "Hmm, how interesting!" I had never thought about gaining my horse's confidence in each of these areas before. In fact, now I understand why it is possible for our very left brained curly horse, who is very confident in herself, to be unconfident in new environments, because we really haven't focused on building her confidence in this area specifically. Additionally, I want to point out that the areas of confidence are compounding. For example, in a familiar environment, with the herd around, and me as a leader, my horse might have total confidence. But in a new environment, without the security of the herd, my horse might lose confidence in me as a leader, and if he is not confident in his own ability to take leadership, then you might have a mess on your hands. This is not the greatest example, but hopefully you get the idea of how each area of confidence has the potential to impact the others. You cannot ignore the ones that pose challenges. Alternatively, you can utilize your strengths to aid you in the areas in which your horse has less confidence.

It is our job to build our horse's confidence in each area to help our horse become more mentally and emotionally centered.

Eventually, if I've done my job correctly, my horse will have confidence in me as a leader, and in himself which will allow him to have confidence in our herd of two in any environment or learning situation. It is my challenge to you to work on building confidence in each of the five areas, I know I will be!

An Apology Letter

This is something that I never wanted to have to write, and yet it has become necessary. Last night, as I was playing with my boyfriend's super silly, and super smart, left brain extrovert/introvert mare, I was blindsided by a lesson I probably never would have learned from my willing and obedient right brain introverted gentle flower.

I have noticed for a few months now how discouraged Evan was becoming during his playtimes with Lilah (the left brain curly horse in question above). At first I would observe, offer advise when needed, and point him in the direction of professionals when my limited amount of knowledge wasn't enough. I thought I was doing the right thing by letting him navigate his journey with his horse on his own terms and timeline. However, as the weeks went by, I noticed Evan and Lilah had reached a stalemate and no progress was being made. Last night, I decided to assess the situation for myself and after a particularly wonderful session with my own horse, I offered to trade horses with Evan so he could feel what it is like to play and have fun, and I could gain some understanding as to what is going on in the head of that little, feisty, curly-haired horse of his.

Taking the rope in hand, I was awestruck by the horse I found at the other end. A by-the-book long phase one and quick two, three, four demonstrated a few things. First, this horse knew our game and was playing it one step ahead of us. Not only has our horse learned to be begrudgingly obedient at phase four, but she has also learned that she does not need to do anything until phase four comes, and she knows eventually it will come. So what did this scene turn out to look like? It ended up with a horse obediently following a figure-eight pattern but with absolute disdain for the pattern, for me, and for this whole "game". I found myself looking like a total idiot throwing out meagerly effective long phase ones and quick phase fours at the regular to keep this horse moving on a pattern and all the while HATING it. This poor horse did not see a purpose to the pattern, did not see what was in it for her, and yet was being forced into it by a seemingly harmless strategy I had learned in the Parelli program that was working but not making it fun for either of us....How interesting.

Thus begins my wake up call: Parelli Natural Horsemanship is not cookie cutter. My apology is to our horse for being too much of a direct line thinker, for believing that because she is left brain, I MUST employ certain strategies and that these strategies WILL work. Last night, I was reminded of a certain cowboy Parelli instructor insisting that "there are no rules, just eight principles" and it is our responsibility to seek out the strategies that use these principles to find what is best for our individual horse. It is our responsibility to maintain their dignity and to always put them first. And I can assure you, as I have lived it first hand, that if the strategies you are using make you feel like you are wailing on your horse with a semi-flexible stick or that the sound of you slapping the ground with a string is reverberating around the arena every five minutes, or if you are even remotely embarrassed to have someone watching you during this whole process, you're doing it wrong. 

So this morning, I will eat a big slice of humble pie, and be the first to tell you that I was doing it wrong with a very forgiving, very intelligent horse, who has been trying to tell us this for a long time, and I was too dense to see it. This is my apology to her, and to my boyfriend for not seeing that with some horses, you might need to think outside the box, to work smarter and not harder, and I know I will get a lot of flack for this from other Parelli people, but I don't see any purpose in having to "go there", to phase four with a horse that GETS it. This is not to say I will never use this strategy again, but upping my phases to get what I want is not going to be my go to game with a horse this smart.

I promise to work smarter, to use strategies that show this horse what's in it for her and to get her excited again about being and playing with us. No, I don't have all the answers, but I certainly am planning to think outside the box for a while. My first plan is to use more rewards at the slightest try and work up from there. My hope is that constant reward at the slightest try will keep her offering more and allow me to not have to use higher phases to force her into it. She KNOWS what we want, the key is to get her to WANT to do it.

In closing, let me be absolutely clear, this is not an indictment of the Parelli program, nor is it an indictment of any of their strategies as I am absolutely loyal to their program and see a time and a place for all their strategies if used at the proper time and in the proper position. Instead, I hope you will take the lesson that I learned and apply it to your own journey with this understanding: the horse and his dignity comes first. Using the eight principles, it is our job to build a relationship and a language with our horse that allows him to maintain such dignity while he betrays all natural instincts as a prey animal and forms a harmonious partnership with the ultimate predator.