Meditations on Equestrian Art

The Project:

Horses from many walks of life, communication through body language, tools used only for safety, never to train.

(Photo taken at Lime Kiln Point, a few miles from my home)

The Goal:

To discover how far Equestrian Art can be developed solely using body language.

A Grand Experiment

The full moon is reflecting off of every surface outside and the night is bright and quiet as I write. Here in the San Juan Islands we have just passed through an incredible windstorm that brought many trees down including one on the paddock fence, rattled all the roofs and kept the horses on edge for days. No one is hurt, but I think everyone is grateful for the quiet after the storm.

I find myself reflecting on intensity in life and the ways we all experience comfort and discomfort. The ways we sometimes protect ourselves from discomfort and the ways we sometimes walk head on into the wind and drink up the chaos and beauty of it all.

At the beginning of the week Atlas and Ari had another big fight, and this one resulted in Atlas becoming injured. Nothing life threatening, just a chest wound from a bite in the heat of battle. I understand stallions fight sometimes and they have their own social structures to build that might be outside the realms of my comfort zone. For that reason, I did not separate them immediately afterward, I watched and tried to understand.

Unfortunately, Atlas’ injury and ensuing weakness intensified his tendency to freeze and tune out the world which seemed to anger Ari and the attacks from Ari became more frequent and more intense in an effort to wake Atlas up. When I noticed Atlas starting to look over the fences in a searching way he never had before, I realized my space was simply too small for these two and all their differences. It was time to close the gates and separate them again, at least until Atlas healed.

Ari seems lonely since I separated them, and Atlas seems relieved. They still touch noses through the fence and the intensity of difference between them seems less dramatic every day. Atlas is still the first to pull away seemingly wanting more space to be peaceful. Ari only allows him that because the fence stops him from following and pushing for more attention.

I have had these issues before when putting Mustangs and domestic horses together. For Mustangs, staying aware is a life or death matter and they have very little tolerance for herd mates who freeze up and miss things happening around them. There is nothing more irritating to a horse that is quick to fight than a friend who is quick to freeze. Given enough space the horses always work it out, but space is a key factor and not a luxury I have with Ari and Atlas.

I have a strong belief that life is about learning. If we don’t know something, we get to try it, and then assess the results.

Life is all a grand experiment and we learn a little more every day.

I continue with my personal experimental work of Freedom Based Training® and it is so slow with these two that I am continually grateful Myrnah was such a generous partner to learn with in my first project. I remind myself over and over that slow isn’t bad, I am simply learning different things than I learned in the first project.

With Atlas there seems to a be a strong correlation between the time I invest simply being with him in ways he appreciates (meaning we are together with the buffer of space between us) and how much I can ask him to stretch his comfort zone. The thing I ask for when I can afford to stretch the comfort zone, is that he be interested or curious when I reach out to him.

I find he can match me reaching out to some degree, but it is a real effort for him, and you can see him grow more fatigued with each repetition. Some days he can manage a touch, the softest finger against nose moment. Other days all he can do is reach toward me, stopping short of any contact. If I ask too many times, he shuts down completely and pretends I do not exist. When this happens, any further movement I make toward him results in flight and I have hours of reinvestment in the relationship, being with him at distances he can handle before he is ready to try being interested in me again.

I think this is the grand experiment of the project. If I invest in doing primarily things the horses choose, and then, with good feel and timing asking for the things I might choose, how much can we ultimately do together?

I think of this on a spectrum, as I think of most things. It isn’t black or white, it isn’t all or nothing.

On one end of the spectrum are the things the horse might choose that we can do together. On the other end of the spectrum are the things I might choose that we can do together. In the middle of that is a whole world of variations we can play with.

In Freedom Based Training® I start with things the horse would choose, and I figure out the places around them it is most comfortable for me to be while we experience life together.

Then I start venturing into the places around them that are less comfortable, in small enough doses that it is reasonable for them.

With patient practice and repetition the horse’s comfort zone grows and the places I choose to be that were once uncomfortable become comfortable.

After we have established touch as a comfortable way of being together then I can start adding moments of pressure.

At first the pressure is what I call desensitizing pressure, that means I only aim for the pressure to cause interest or thinking of some sort, no movement yet.

Once desensitizing pressure is established then I can start to play with sensitizing pressure which means I expect the horse to move a little when I ask.

If I ask too much too soon, I will get fight or flight instead of yield and then I must go back and figure out what is possible in this relationship. What are we capable of together?

Investing hundreds of hours doing things the horses might choose is the foundation for everything else! This is the grand experiment of Freedom Based Training®, if I invest enough in doing the things the horse finds enjoyable, how much will the horse then be willing to try new things with me?

Then, after we do new things successfully can I link them emotionally to other things that are deep in the comfort zone, such as simply being together in harmony.

When we as human beings do training with tools or food rewards, we can ask the horse to do things for us because of an extrinsic motivator, then over time the horse learns to enjoy the things they are being asked to do and the extrinsic motivators become less and less necessary.

I am simply turning things around. If we take away all the obvious extrinsic motivators what is the natural evolution of building a relationship and the variety of things you can enjoy together in that relationship?

There are many days I wonder if I will get to the end of this experimental year and the horses will still have very little increase in skill to show for my time investment. The stallions are so much more difficult than Myrnah was for so many reasons and at this point I simply have no idea what our result will be at the end of this year.

The one thing I know is I asked for a challenge and I got it. Ari and Atlas are going to push my understanding of Freedom Based Training® far beyond anything I have learned before.

At this point with Atlas, sometimes we can touch and sometimes we can’t. I am learning to read probabilities of success from moment to moment with him based on more subtle signs than I have ever before noticed. Thank you, Atlas.

At this point with Ari I can handle every part of his body (apart from his mouth and his ears) and as I run my hands over his body, I find many moments of focus change, interest, and curiosity stimulated. When the weather is good and the stress levels are naturally low, I have started venturing into asking Ari to pick up a hoof for a moment or take a step back when I ask. I am learning to calm my greedy self that wants two steps of back up the very moment one step feels ok to Ari. I am learning to put my greed aside and read Ari’s probability of success instead.

Push a little when Ari is bored, release to flow when he is interested. Repeat as possible. The goal is to build an association of feeling good, being interested and curious when pressure is applied.

Thank you, Ari for helping me find the rhythm and consistency of developing new skills on your timeline.

How much is possible from this foundation? I don’t know, it is all a grand experiment!

If you are curious to learn with me as it all unfolds, join us on Patreon where I post update videos of the process every week.

https://www.patreon.com/tamingwild

Hooves and Heartbeats,

Elsa

TamingWild.com

The Project:

Horses from many walks of life, communication through body language, tools used only for safety, never to train.

The Goal:

To discover how far Equestrian Art can be developed solely using body language.

Everybody Wants Something

Being alive means having needs and wants that may or may not get met and everyone has different strategies for trying to sort this out.

This past week my two stallions had some figuring out to do, and it was very interesting to watch.

I have found the Mustangs that come into my care have a higher need for awareness in the herd than the domestic horses. I think this comes from living out in the wild where there are real dangers and issues to solve with sometimes dire consequences if left unsolved. Horses die if they are not paying attention, or if their herd mates are not paying attention for them in time to warn them of danger.

Ari has proved to be no exception in this need for awareness that I often see in the Mustangs.

Unfortunately, Atlas, does not seem as aware and does not seem to share Ari’s desire for constant vigilance.

Atlas seems to want peace and quiet and regular predictable schedules with easy companionship while he recovers from the difficult life he lived before coming here.

Ari seems to want entertainment, awareness, variety, and interactive friends to go along with his eating and sleeping.

On the surface it would look like these two horses are completely incompatible, but I think they are in fact very good for each other.

From Ari, Atlas will learn to wake up and see the world more than he might naturally do.

From Atlas, Ari will learn to slow down, take a moment, consider the options and choose wisely before taking action.

I think the two of them are very good for each other, but that does not mean it is always easy.

The way I understand this is: If you don’t get what you want easily, there are different types of behavior you can use to try and get what you want in life. I categorize them in three ways: Freeze, Flight and Fight. Each one of these runs on a spectrum that includes both functional and dysfunctional behavior patterns.

Freeze on one side is the catatonic state of believing there is no hope, there is no effort worth making, you are never going to get what you want, and you should just give up and die now.

This spectrum of Freeze runs through variations such as:

Dysfunctional Freeze where the giving up is temporary and likely to explode into the chaos of Fight or Flight at any moment.

Functional Freeze where there is time for rest and recuperation, it is like giving up, but in a healthy way where there is time for the body to repair and recover and then wake up feeling better and ready to take positive action toward the things you want in life.

Then on the most positive side of that spectrum there is thinking, where you see ears, eyes, and noses moving as the senses gather all the information available to make the wisest decision possible to get what you want in life. Thinking before acting is on the freeze spectrum because there is no action being taken in the body yet.

Flight is the spectrum of moving away.

The extreme version is at high speed to leave behind all the things you do not want.

Then it runs through a spectrum of leaving quickly while checking behind you to see if leaving is necessary.

Or making small evasive maneuvers simply to lose the company of someone who is giving you things you do not want.

Then there is the good side of the spectrum where you have somewhere interesting to go (better than where you are now and no longer want to be), and if your friends are fast enough to keep up with you, they are welcome to come along.

Or when you really want your friends to come with you there is a yielding feeling to every movement where you step gently out of a partner’s way, making sure there is room for them next to you and that they can keep up every step of the way.

Fight is the spectrum of pressure – putting pressure on others.

At the extreme version, Fight is full attack and violence.

Less intense Fight is irritating or annoying and gets the attention of those around you.

The good side of Fight is playful, sparing, competing to see who is best.

Or even more gently, the curiosity and inquisitive nature of someone investigating to see what is possible if you nudge just a little bit.

What I have found is that everybody wants something in life and the higher their stress levels are the more likely they are to use extreme strategies to get what they want (or give up on what they want). Fight, Flight, or Freeze with intensity.

As stress comes down you will start to see the more functional sides of the spectrum in action. Everyone still wants what they want, but they start being more strategic and intelligent about getting it.

Last week we had a cold snap and the tension levels went up as they often do in a weather change. Ari’s wants, and Atlas’ wants started being expressed in ways that irritated the other and eventually there was a fight.

As Atlas became more and more frozen and unaware of everything, Ari became more and more attacking. Eventually Ari thought he could get the attention he wanted from Atlas by coming on fast with arched neck and striking front legs. Atlas snapped out of his Dysfunctional Freeze and attacked back, and since Atlas is much bigger and much stronger, it didn’t go well for Ari.

As often happens when Freeze and Fight meet up at the extreme side of the spectrum, it is a little bit heart stopping to watch, and I felt grateful that both Ari and Atlas pulled away with only minor scratches in spite of the intensity.

I managed to catch the end of the fight on camera and posted about it in the Taming Wild Patron group.

You can see the video here if you are interested in joining us behind the scenes of the movie filming process:

https://www.patreon.com/tamingwild

I enjoy posting here on the blog an outline of what I am learning as I do this project. Patreon gives me an opportunity to dig a little deeper and share more details with community who might be interested. I do hope you join us.

The interesting thing that came out of this week and the big fight, was the considerations about herd behavior and how we might choose to deal with that in our everyday interactions with our horses.

I was asked why I didn’t step in to break up the fight and my answer was:

I did not intervene in the fight because I think it is likely that intervening in this case would only cause them to brew stronger feelings that would come out later when I wasn’t there. So, I stood back and filmed and tried to learn from the experience as I watched.

Watching gives me necessary insight into the patterns and likely responses of my horses.

Both Ari and I learned that Atlas is faster and stronger and more violent than he has ever shown before, if you push him too hard too fast. Good to know.

Atlas and I learned that Ari would feel better if everyone was more interested and responsive around him. Good to know, we can work on that.

So, if I am not going to intervene in a fight what would I do instead?

As a leader I think my best choice is to make a timely decision to walk away from brewing trouble, because getting stuck in the middle of a fight is not a good idea for anyone. When I see that tension is coming up, I walk away and make it clear that this is not a conversation I am interested in being part of. If either one of my horses followed my example there would be no more fights. I set the example and then I watch what choices they make.

They want what they want, and I will be able to see the level of stress they are feeling by the type of choices they make with each other.

I think this action of walking away does a couple of things for the herd dynamic. First, it shows the horses that walking away from a fight is an option, and that there is a good way to walk away. When I walk away I do it early so I do not have to run, I keep my steps steady and rhythmic, and I turn to face the action as soon as possible so the horses know I am paying attention.

I believe most fights are simply one horse’s need for more attention. Essentially, loneliness or insecurity are the causes of fighting. If there is enough attention given there is no need to push for more, with fighting actions.

Sometimes it seems fights are about resources (food or friends), but more often than not I see horses use resources as a means to an end to get more attention.

Atlas wants to be very quiet, introverted, and focused on eating and sleeping. Ari wants to be interactive and playful. Is one of them more right than the other? They both want what they want, and this week they had to fight for their rights to get what they wanted. Atlas is bigger and stronger, and he won temporarily. Ari isn’t going to stop wanting what he wants, he is just going to have to get smarter about how he goes about getting it.

Now, what about if I see a fight brewing, and I choose to step in the middle and protect one horse from the other? This is the more dominant management of the situation, and if there is a safety issue, I will do this, or if I am in a hurry to impress one horse more than the other, I might take sides like this. However, I believe the more passive leadership style has a deeper impact on the herd dynamics and greater learning value for everyone involved if you have the time and space to allow it.

If I dominantly protect one horse from the other, I do win a sort of appreciation from both horses, but unless I have some plan to help them both with the underlying need for the fight in the first place, it is only a temporary solution.

When I step in dominantly and stop a fight, I am simply telling them that my wants and needs override theirs, but when I am no longer there, they still will work out which of them gets to decide what is happening.

When instead I step away and then pay attention, I show them an alternate option to sorting out differences.

If Atlas could step away from Ari, but then give him full attention, there would be no need for the fight because Ari’s needs would be filled. If Ari could work around Atlas, stepping in and out of his comfort zone, Atlas would learn to be more aware. But this sort of helping of the other one is only going to happen gradually as their habitual stress levels get lower and as they learn what the other wants and needs.

Lowering the stress levels for everyone involved, that is my job. My hope is that as I lead by example, it will be easier and easier for my horses to choose similar healthy actions for getting what they want in life.

Only time will tell, and for now I am fascinated to be experimenting with all the possibilities in front of me.

I really do hope you join us on Patreon.com to see the weekly videos of the process and the making of the entire movie!

https://www.patreon.com/tamingwild

Hooves and Heartbeats,

Elsa

TamingWild.com