Ask the Expert: Training Spooky Horses and Obstacles
Hi, I’m Caroline Beste of the Tao of Horsemanship. This month’s Holistic Horse “Ask the Expert” Q&A is about training the spooky and unconfident horses through obstacles. This month’s viewer wrote in: “Dear Caroline, my horse becomes spooky around obstacles and either won’t approach them or panics and flies through them. How do I get him to quiet down, relax, wait and trust me?”

First thing I want to recommend is “don’t make the obstacle course your training area.” When I first begin working with a horse, whether I’m starting or restarting, I always begin working on the ground and with specific exercises and techniques that engage the thinking side of the horse’s brain. Ground work is so beneficial to your spooky horse’s progression and ultimate change. The purpose of the ground work is to instill a foundation between the two of you that is based on trust, clear communication and subtle connection to your aids, relationship, confidence and partnership. Ground work should also be at least 75% of any horse’s education and beginning. Whether you have a naturally spooky and flighty horse or one that has become unconfident through negative training methods, my ground work method will assist in changing your horse’s mindset and reaction to stimuli as well as new and scary objects or environments.

How does this happen? It happens by developing the strength of bond in the relationship and your horse’s left brain – his thinking brain. Your relationship aids in creating trust and willingness and your horse’s left brain assists in problem solving and responding rationally. Horses are hard wired to use, and live in, their right brains. The right brain controls adrenaline and is controlled by sensory processing – processing environmental stimuli through the senses. The advantages of learning a natural horsemanship style of ground work are many with emphasis placed on exercising the left brain of the horse through various thoughtengaging exercises.

In addition to demonstrating the many benefits ground work has on developing a horse into a trusting and confident partner, I also talk about how to handle your unconfident horse. In this video you will learn the following:
How to help your scared horse through compassionate and consistently clear leadership
How to change a scary situation into a positive experience for you and your horse
How to see the world through your horse’s lens and perspective
How to read, analyze, your horse’s expression and reaction to stimuli and scary objects
Learn what strategy, exercise and approach, will work best for your horse – each horse is an individual, therefore each situation is unique and must be treated with sensitivity
Learn how to assess your horse’s nature as well as learned behavior
Learn how to become the “safe” place for your horse – safe enough for your horse to trust and try
Caroline’s 3 “R’s” Method to shaping and developing a horse’s mindset: creating responsiveness, relaxation and rhythm
How the obstacle should be used only a test (feedback), not a training tool or exercise

For more information, please visit: www.taoofhorsemanship.com

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