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Developing Forward

The Project:

One Mustang directly off the range, One trainer, No tools, Just body language

The Goal:

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

 

 

Developing Forward

First rides at the canter this week! I had no idea how long it would take to get this far. Our progress, if measured against more normal training, might be considered inordinately slow. However, if measured against all the possible difficulties Myrnah could throw at me, I think we actually are developing forward at lightning speed.

While I do believe people have trained horses without tools before, this is the first time in history anyone has recorded the process: writing, photographs, and video, week by week, noticing the landmarks and breakthroughs along the way, and charting the previously uncharted path.

I am not sure people realize how challenging it is to train a horse when they are free to leave you at any time. So many times it has been tempting to cut Myrnah off, step in front of her when she is trapped between me and a fence, make it clear to her I am in charge; or even step behind her and send her forward with energy because she knows she has nowhere to go but forward. I could show her I am smart enough with my positioning and fences to intimidate her. That is not this project though: time and again I take a deep breath and get between her and the fence, making sure that when I push her, she has a choice to stay with me or move away into wide-open space, leaving me behind.

When I ride Myrnah I need permission to climb up on top, and, if she wants me off, both of us know it wouldn’t take much of a run and a buck to convince me I didn’t want to be up there any more. In everything we do together, Myrnah knows she can say no; and what’s more to the point, she often does. So when I say she carried me at the canter this week, I am beyond thrilled she felt comfortable enough to offer that.

Training horses is always a balance between motivating them to move, while at the same time keeping them focused enough on the trainer or the job at hand to keep everything under control. The faster a horse moves, the more exciting everything gets, and the harder it becomes for the horse to stay focused in the moment. The leaping, bucking, and bolting in excitement that can occur when a young horse is learning to maintain forward motion is something that may require a bridle to help refocus horse and rider together. Myrnah and I have no such luxury.

The solution to the above potential problems is: Myrnah and I trained the stop first and we practice it constantly. However, riding a horse at a stand still is not really what riding is all about. We want to move with our horses, that is where it gets fun. For safety, Myrnah and I have to maintain stopping as the number one importance in our training routines. Number two in importance, however, needs to be all about moving.

This week Myrnah and I had some brilliant new fun with movement. Our jumping that I talked about last week grew into a love of running and playing together in our groundwork. For the first time ever, Myrnah had a day where I could sprint off across the pasture, and she would come galloping after me, bucking and leaping and squealing with glee. Sometimes I wasn’t fast enough, and she would have to make a loop around me to play the air with her exuberance before coming in gently to touch my hand and take a grazing break, both of us panting as we lounged in the lush grass.

The bold confidence Myrnah had to play with me like that, instead of running away, felt like the biggest gift. Though after awhile the game changed for her from fun to overwhelming, and, as soon as that happened, she chose to run back to her herd instead of to me. That is when I knew I had taken the game too far, or too long, and it was time to slow things down to baby steps again. I love that she had the freedom to choose, and she could tell me when she enjoyed the energy and when she felt it became too much for her.

Riding and developing forward movement is a constant challenge for us. Myrnah would really rather just meander around and graze while I am riding. I would like to travel places. So we stop and start, and stop and start, walk and trot, and stop, and back up over and over, until Myrnah takes a deep breath and commits to moving forward until told otherwise; then I take a deep breath and ask her to bend around to a stop, touching my toe to connect in with me before I tell her it is okay to take a grazing break.

Day by day our trots get longer and more relaxed in committed forward movement, and, each time we stop to graze, I choose a spot we haven’t stopped before so she becomes eager to travel new places with me.

The first time we cantered, it was by accident. I had forgotten to put the cavaletti down to its lowest setting when I was riding; so, when Myrnah carried me over at the trot, her big pregnant belly made her clumsy and her back legs got tangled, flipping the jump up in the air and scaring her forward into a couple of strides of canter. The wonderful part was that she didn’t take off bucking, or get scared into a bolt. Myrnah simply and quietly cantered two steps away, stopped, and reached around to touch me with her nose, checking in to see if we were all okay. I reassured her, and then we continued our ride as though nothing had happened. She is a little more cautious going over the jump now, but, other than that, we were all fine after our small adventure.

Thursday this week, our trotting was taking us both up and down gradual hills in the paddock. I am impressed with how balanced Myrnah is trotting down hill, and credit that partly to how many stops and backups she has spontaneously offered in the process of learning how to maintain her trot the last few weeks. All those transitions she needed to do for her confidence also developed her physical balance. While I knew that was the case, I also have to admit it was frustrating for me to have her stop and start so much while she was developing forward movement. In hindsight though, the pay off of an incredibly balanced, easy-to-ride trot, both up and down hills, was very much worth the time and effort it took to get there.

That balanced easy-to-ride trot is also what made it so effortless to add a little leg going up a hill on Thursday and rock gently into a canter. Four strides of lovely, easy, flowing canter and I vaulted off to lavish Myrnah with praise, finishing the ride then and there. Riding Myrnah at the canter on purpose and having it be that easy felt like a huge breakthrough to me. Ending the ride there hopefully helped Myrnah see how much I value her effort to do something new with me, just because I asked.

Developing forward movement without a bridle or a round pen to contain the results takes perhaps a little more patience and quiet perseverance. So far, the results seem to be completely worth the extra time. I really had no idea Myrnah would be willing to canter with me quietly and easily this early in the game. Interesting how our progress can seem so slow and so fast all at the same time.

Hmmmm, I wonder how close we are to developing forward into riding the gallop?

I will keep you posted, and yes, I promise I won’t hurry. Developing forward is too fun to be rushed.

Elsa Sinclair

EquineClarity.com

“The Great Affair is to Move”

The Project:

One Mustang directly off the range, One trainer, No tools, Just body language

The Goal:

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

 

“The Great Affair is to Move”

Robert Louis Stevenson said, “For my part, I travel not to go anywhere, but to go. I travel for travel’s sake. The great affair is to move”

This week for Myrnah and me has been about just that. The love affair between us is what makes it possible for us to work and grow and learn together without any bonds of force. The ever analytical part of me wants to know how and why that works. Everyone else I know needs a halter and a rope and a round pen to build that bond between horse and rider… why is it that Myrnah and I get to skip those forceful steps and jump right into the voluntary love affair?

I believe the answer lies in movement and how we choose to use it. Our movement through space is the greatest love affair there is. If you have ever watched a talented dancer entrance a crowd with the twitch of a finger, or a brilliant comedian cause the audience to burst into uproarious laughter with the well-timed raise of an eyebrow… you know what I mean.

Everything means something, nothing means nothing… learning to place value in every movement, and reverence in traveling through space is an art and the best part about art is you can’t do it wrong. The trick is to enjoy it completely as you figure out the cause and affect your movement creates and learn from the ripples of change around you.

Because I have no tools to hold Myrnah close to me, my job from day one was to make movements that would cause curiosity, interest, joy, peace, and connection between us. I courted her with movement and strove to build a love between us.

Movement is what bonds Myrnah and I together. The more we move together, the stronger our connection. And so the quote seems quite fitting. “The great affair is to move”

I read a quote from a Natural Horsemanship trainer today that made me sad for a moment. “Remember the rules of Horsemanship: Whoever moves first, loses.” Perhaps it is true, but I wish to challenge the customary understanding of this statement. Is this relationship with my horse one where I want her to lose? I don’t know about you, but my answer is a definite no. I want my horse to feel like she has won every moment of every day with me. I want my horse to feel like she is in the best love affair ever and has won the lottery to be my partner. To achieve this I will, in the beginning, voluntarily assume the so-called losing position. I will move through space using advance and retreat and timing a balance of action and inaction to woo my horse into becoming my partner. Once those beginning phases of the relationship are formed then the real fun begins. Moving together is when the whole of our partnership starts becoming so much more than the sum of it’s parts. There is an energy and a lightness of being that can’t be bought or sold, it can only be earned through the devotion of movement.

During the snow this last week, Myrnah and I climbed a hill together with my daughter who took pictures for all to see. The next day we walked out through the woods in a different direction for almost two hours with my brother who videoed the journey for us. I question… would I be able to walk through the woods for two hours with any of my other horses? I have good liberty skills with many of them, but two hours out in the woods is a long time to stay connected and focused. No carrots, or sticks, or ropes. I don’t actually know the answer to that question, yet with Myrnah there was very little doubt.  

I attribute that confidence and that bond between Myrnah and me to our practice of movement together. The hours we have spent traveling in silence side by side, matched step for step, is the glue that binds us together. It isn’t my ability to make her turn, or stop, or go, it isn’t the things I have taught her, or the things she has taught me, it is simply the in between times. It is the times when we move through space with no change or directing necessary. Our ability to communicate left, right, stop or go is vital to our comfort with each other, however it’s our ability to simply move, in quiet harmony without communication, that connects us together like nothing else can.

Placing value in movement together is what allows this experimental training process to succeed.

So what of the riding part of the equation? Myrnah and I are in the courting stage of our relationship when it comes to riding. I do the movement, and she still is deciding if she wants to partner with me. Advance and retreat, a timed balance of action and inaction- the game is marvelous fun for me; and, while Myrnah still seems a little puzzled and unsure about it, I have no doubt that one of these days she will fall in love with the idea of carrying me higher and faster than my own feet can carry me. Our traveling through space together continually evolves and is an endless love affair of movement.

So I put this out to all of you. Value your movements, and observe the ripples they create through time and space around you. If you are looking for a partner and you want that brilliant feeling of connection, find a way to move together, step for step, breath for breath- more time spent existing in movement, less time talking, debating, and communicating about exactly what or how or when. Take the time to just be- in movement together.

Communication brings comfort and trust to the relationship- that is a necessary piece; however the inexplicably beautiful bond and connection between you comes from the time spent when communication isn’t necessary, moving in harmony together. It’s that simple.

“The great affair is to move.” Life is your canvas and movement your paint brush. Paint a landscape your horse can’t resist and revel in the great affair.

Elsa Sinclair

EquineClarity.com

Myrnah’s snowy mountain hike

Myrnah thinks that looks like a very big hill to climb…

“Are we really walking up that?”

Almost half way up…

Pine branches are yummy!

Snow is yummy too!

We reached the top!

Cold and windy at the summit.

Headed back down.

Have to stop to make a snow angel, Myrnah’s not so sure about this game.

Stopping for a snow snack.

Elsa likes the snow, Myrnah likes some branches in her snow…

Down the hill through the dark woods…

Almost home.

Not so sure about the snow monster guarding the driveway… luckily monster turns out to be friendly.

Thank-you Cameron for building a fabulous snow monster, and for talking these amazing pictures!

Elsa Sinclair

EquineClarity.com

Five things I can count on

The Project:

One Mustang directly off the range, One trainer, No tools, Just body language The Goal:

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

Five things I can count on

It snowed this week, beautiful white mounds of fluffy snow adorning every surface around my house- the landscape brilliantly beautiful, and yet for me, not as much fun as one might think. Unfortunately emotions and logic don’t always dance in the sane and controllable fashion we would like them to. I can logically appreciate the beauty, yet at the same time find my emotions beating me to a pulp underneath all that beautiful sane logic. Snow and cold send me into panic attacks of vertigo and nausea, blinding anxiety, and difficulty breathing. I am however far too stubborn to let that stop me, so for the most part everything proceeds normally. I have found there are five things I can count on to help. No matter how good, or how bad I feel, these five things will always improve the situation.

Thank-you Sally Swift for creating the five basics of Centered Riding. Thank-you Stephanie Mosely for introducing me to the existence of Centered Riding; and thank-you to all the brilliant Centered Riding instructors who have helped me understand those five basics in deeper and more profound ways.

I have been exposed to, and devoted to many different models of horse training. Each model and idea has created a facet of who I am and how I train today. I would have to say though, Centered Riding remains at the core of everything I do. The principles reach far beyond riding a horse. They apply to every action in life, and within these five simple ideas lies a power to improve any moment.

  1. Grounding – The feeling of having your feet rooted down through the Earth. Sally Swift added this to her original four basics when she wrote her second book. No matter which training idea I am currently working with, taking a moment to wiggle my toes in my boots and feel my feet become grounded always lends a solid and reliable feel to whatever I am doing.
  2. Centering – The feeling of your weight down low in the core of your body, the idea of chi or qi that martial arts talks of, all action originating from the center of your body. This idea always gives me a sense of connection with my horse and that legendary “feel” between horse and rider that instructors are always saying is so essential and so hard to teach.
  3. Breathing – Deeply, using the diaphragm and letting the air fill every part of your body like a professional singer would. This is perhaps the most challenging for me, yet I know how important it is. Horses are herd creatures and are constantly assessing the well-being of those around them. My ability to breath allows me to work at my best and signals my horse that I am feeling ok- there is nothing to worry about in our herd. Constantly I remind myself and my students, when your horse does something you like, just take one deep breath before you do anything else. That deep breath and the resulting positive feeling it brings to you and your horse is the simplest and best reward you can give.
  4. Soft eyes – Using a soft balance of focus and peripheral vision. In an ideal scenario we are using our muscles in a state of release contracting muscles or extender muscles used to the degree we need them. When we use both the contractors and the extenders at the same time an unnecessary tension and stress is present. We tend to create a great deal of stress in the small muscles around our eyes… the relaxation of those muscles allows us to use our peripheral vision as well as our focus.
  5. Building Blocks – The feeling of each part of the skeleton stacked in balance on top of the piece below- using only the essential muscular effort needed to stand, sit or move, nothing extra.

All these five principles can be evolved and developed, pondered and meditated on, however they work best for me in their simplicity. They are just five words to remember, each with a profound impact on positivity in any given moment.

Grounding

Centering

Breathing

Soft Eyes

Building Blocks

So when Myrnah and I are walking through the woods in the snow, my mind tells me this should be a marvelous novelty of fun, while unfortunately, my emotions batter my skull, blur my vision, lay lead weight on my lungs and make me want to cry or throw up. I reach for those five words, because I know they are five things I can count on no matter what to make everything better.

Grounding, I can feel my toes wiggle in my socks, I can feel the snow crunch underfoot, I can feel my weight roll from heel to toe, step by step in harmony with Myrnah. I can imagine that she feels grounded too as we walk together. Centering- Every movement of mine originating from the core of my body, every movement of Myrnah’s felt and followed from my core. Breathing- It’s not easy for me out in the cold and the snow, but if I think about it I can feel Myrnah breath, and I can match her rhythm, let her breath through me, an underlying rhythm to every movement we make together. Soft eyes can feel impossible when for me the world is spinning and everything looks blurry from vertigo, so this is where having practiced on a good day is invaluable. I remember what it feels like to release the muscles around my eyes, I remember what it feels like inside my eyes when I soften them and allow all my peripheral vision to become part of what I see. As I do these things it helps the world become still and more clear. It helps the stress dissolve and the beauty of the day become apparent again. Building Blocks- a nod of the head up yes and then no, smaller and smaller until the center resting point is found, a shrug and circle of the shoulders around until they too find the central balance, the ribs, the hips the knees and the ankles, all have their central resting point, in fluid balance with all the other parts.

Each one of these five ideas has benefit without need for perfection. Simply walking through them with whatever awareness I have on any give day has a power I would not want to live without.

We all have our highs and our lows, as do our horses. We hope that when one of us is low, the other in the partnership can step in and support, building the bond of connection stronger and deeper.

It often feels perhaps I should not train when I am low or stressed. I become afraid of spreading the horror of what I feel like a menacing rain cloud darkening everyone’s day. If I can allow myself simply to be as imperfect as I am and just show up anyway, I find very often my horses seem to enjoy stepping up to the plate to take care of me for a change. We can walk through the simplest of our movements together, my job being to remember my five basics and attend to them with whatever skill I have that day. I can let my horse take care of the rest of the details.

The five things I can count on will always be there for me. High or low, rain, snow, sun or wind. Life isn’t always easy, but with a partner like Myrnah traveling alongside me, it is pretty wonderful regardless.

Elsa Sinclair

EquineClarity.com

Shut down or overwhelmed?

The Project:

One Mustang directly off the range

One trainer

No tools

Just body language

The Goal:

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

 

 

 

 

 

 

Shut down or overwhelmed? 

When any of us are shut down or overwhelmed, the space between can seem as narrow as a tightrope and balancing in that calm seems beyond any realm of possibility.

So I want to talk about this side and the other side of the space between.

It’s not wrong to shut down, and it’s not wrong to get overwhelmed and propelled into action; it just doesn’t feel as good as the space between.

The best way I know to find that space between is to have a friend. Yes one can be friends with one’s self, but it is awfully nice to have a friend next to you to help you find your center. On a good day we are friends to our horses, helping them find their center. On a less than good day…. a shove is as good a boost?

People love community, and horses love their herd. The friends around us keep us interested, and push us to grow and develop our emotional fitness as the natural chaos of community can often be overwhelming.

As anyone who has ever been married can tell you, the closer your friends, the more overwhelming they can be; and you wonder why they would choose to hurt you instead of help you? A shove is as good as a boost perhaps?

A brilliant riding instructor once told me abuse only comes when we don’t know what else to do. It is the same for both horses and people. Horses kick and bite when they don’t know what else to do, when they feel alone with no friends and know no way to feel better. When they can’t find the space between, the only choices they can see are to take action- to drive away or flee from anything overwhelming. Fight or flight. Or, if neither fight nor flight seem viable, shut down is all that is left.

So what do we do when the space between cannot be found? What do we do when our horse is angry, or scared, or shut down?

All we can do at that point is be their friend, showing them that we are indeed a friend over and over and again until they believe us.

How, you ask? Approach and retreat is the best way I know. There are many ways to use approach and retreat; however, the basis is always the same- get closer and pull away, only to get closer again, and then pull away again. Getting closer lets the horse know they are not alone and you are their friend; pulling away lets them know you understand they feel overwhelmed and you don’t intend to make it worse. ( This is another way to understand balancing the drive and the draw.)

Even if a horse is shut down or disinterested, the same principles apply. Sometimes just the simplicity of being near them, aware of breathing in and out, is an advance and retreat of intense subtlety. Each breath brings you ever so slightly closer and then farther from them. Closer letting them know they are important to you; farther letting them know you understand they feel overwhelmed.

So when do we use advance and retreat in a big way, and when do we use it in a small way? Usually the rule of thumb is: when the horse feels dominant (anger or bored disinterest) we need to be a playful and provocative friend with big movements in and out of their space. When the horse is feeling lack of confidence (fear or shut down), we need to get quieter, smaller, and gently understanding in our advance and retreat.

What next?

As soon as you see the horse get a glimpse of what feeling good is like, as soon as the horse knows what the space between feels like for a moment, the most important thing in the world is to be still together. Let the horse enjoy what felt so incomprehensible moments ago- the ears forward, the deep breaths, yawns and signs of comfort are the greatest gift you can give a horse. If your horse can associate you with helping him feel better when he doesn’t know how, that bonds you together like nothing else.

We get to be both the cause of overwhelmed or shut down, and the solution. The closer we stay to the space between, the more functional is our relationship with our horse. There is a sense of flow in relationship as there is in anything else. Csikszentmihalyi’s chart is applicable here as well.

Today, working in the pouring rain with Myrnah, I found myself wondering, Why do I ask her to do these silly things that make her uncomfortable? Why do I get on and off her back repeatedly even when I can see her lack of confidence in the shake of her head and the tension in her neck? Why do I ask her to step up on a box when she never has before and doesn’t really need to? Why is that conversation important?

The tasks themselves are not important; however the tasks create pressure. Pressure causes growth, and, when the pressure is too much for Myrnah, I get to play advance and retreat until she finds her center again. I get to show her I am her friend and I will help her feel good again, no matter how much pressure she feels.

Today, beneath the drenching clouds and standing in the puddles, I didn’t really think Myrnah would step up on that silly platform. No halter, no rope, no stick, no treats… Nonetheless, the conversation was fascinating. Sometimes we worked in the sweet spot of flow, and she was interested in me and the box; sometimes I pushed too hard, and she marched off angry and alone. I would follow, playing advance and retreat until she felt like I was a friend again. Then we would re-approach and converse about the silly platform. When finally she did step up, calm as could be, I couldn’t wipe the grin from my face. She wasn’t forced into that action, she had plenty of exits, yet she chose it because I asked, and the look on her face was neither shut down nor overwhelmed. She was firmly in the space between. Happy to be quiet and still with me, enjoying life completely.

Happy New Year,

May you always find the space between.

Elsa Sinclair

EquineClarity.com

The Space Between

The Project:

One Mustang directly off the range, One trainer, No tools, Just body language.

The Goal:

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

The Space Between

Some call it perspective. For some it is the zen state of mind, for some it is the oneness with everything, for some it is non-dualism. Some find it though yoga, some find it through meditation, some find it through art, some study with masters and some stumble upon it by accident. For me, horses bring me to the space between….

Somewhere between disinterest and overwhelming emotion there is a space where life is at its best. We may think we live for emotion, that it is what brings intensity and vibrancy to life… I would argue that perhaps we can only enjoy the intensity of emotions when we have the presence of mind to be confidently one with that feeling, once it becomes too much for us we would rather run away. The space between is this side of overwhelmed and the other side of disinterested.

With horses, far too often they can go from uninvolved to scared or angry in the blink of an eye. The space between feels narrow and unforgiving. Training can feel like walking a tight rope, rapids below, wind buffeting from the sides. If we get it right, the feeling of relationship is exhilarating; if we loose our balance, we feel cold and alone wondering where it went wrong.

My goal with horses is to build that tight rope into a bridge by broadening our focus, our attention, our fascination, and our enjoyment of life.

How we do that links back to one of my first blogs about Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi’s chart and the state of flow.

The sense of play that I was pondering last week also comes into account, as well as the balance between drive and draw.

What if the relationship we had with our horse was always this side of overwhelmed and the other side of disinterested? What if, no matter how quiet and repetitive the practice, we always felt fascinated and interested? What if, no matter how high the intensity of emotion and pressure, we felt we had the space and the perspective to enjoy it?

The emotion feeding us with energy, a sense of space allowing us confidence that no intensity was too high to handle.

Like anything, this usually needs to be built and developed one gradual step at a time.

Myrnah and I began with drive and draw. A direct gaze felt like drive to her; to look away and take in the environment felt like draw to her. My job was to play at this drive and draw over and over until she was fascinated by her part in the game, letting her figure out that focus and attention to me would cause me to take action that felt like draw to her. That draw would cause her to feel curiosity and connection with me.

When she was disinterested, it would cause me to take action that felt like drive. Here is where the tight rope analogy comes in. Drive too hard and what was once a game now feels overwhelming and frightening to her. Drive has to stay in balance with draw in order for that space between to grow in strength, breadth, and depth.

Should I draw away too much with no drive to balance it, disinterest sets in. I am of no interest or use to the horse if I am out of balance.

In the beginning it is a delicate balance- a constant back and forth game of drive and draw stimulating interest, keeping the emotions in check, and, step by step, building the tolerance for both intensity and quiet- developing the sense of self that allows intensity to be fulfilling without fear and quiet to be nurturing without boredom.

At times the horse can feel like a child with a bad case of Attention Deficit Disorder. All we can do is love them for who they are in that moment and let the play and the games build them into the focused individual we know they can be.

People often attribute to me more patience than I actually have. Patience would imply I am weathering boredom with good humor as we train. In fact I find, when the progress of building focus is slow with a horse, I can feel a sense of exhilaration as I play along the tight rope of keeping the horse in that narrow gap between boredom and the desire to escape. This is my art.

When you have had the pleasure of partnering with a horse who always seems fascinated by working with you, and never seems phased by the challenges the two of you face, you will never be able to get enough of a relationship like that. It is intoxicating and feeds your soul like nothing else can.

Emotions like anger and fear become entertaining, adding depth and richness to experience. Every emotion is one that adds to the beauty of life, and every challenge is one that builds your connection to the world, to yourself, and each other.

This project with Myrnah is enriching and developing my professional understanding with unprecedented speed and clarity. When I hit a stumbling block with one of my other horses, I ask myself: What would I do if this were Myrnah? What would I do if I had no tools to cause an action? Again and again it comes back to building the focus, and the attention, and the connection- building the space between.

May we all have the space to enjoy life to it’s fullest.

Merry Christmas to all,

Elsa Sinclair

EquineClarity.com

(An immense thank you to John Sinclair for the amazing photographs today, best Christmas present ever!)