day 7

Well I barely got it in but I did it. It was a beautifully sunny day and I wanted badly to get some time in with Raven today, but I had other more important tasks to accomplish. However, at the end of the day I still was able to squeeze in an hour of work with her.
She is getting so soft to my feel in the lead or rein, even my seat and legs. I am picking up more and more on being able to push her with my seat, especially if she is collected up nice. We wnet through all the tasks rather quickly. I wanted to get to working circles with her to get her more laterally soft and then worked on trasitions with my seat and legs. She is working out well and I am refining my own horsemanship in terms of the details of riding. To give you a for instance, I was asking her to do a leg yield and to do that I have to get her prepped, by getting her head and neck shaped to the right or left (soft laterally and vertically) then if I keep my legs drapped around her like spaghetti, and my hands soft so she is collected then shift my seat just a bit to the inside off center of the saddle, then by rolling my butt under me makeing a C shape with the small of my back and pushing with my seat and adding my inside leg at the time that she is picking up her inside hind foot I can drive her hind foot across in front of her outside hind, the front doing the same thing and simply push her into the leg yield. Sounds like a lot of details and it is alot to keep in mind but that is why repetitions are needed so that I get good at it and it becomes natural.
We often think that spiritual growth as believers should just happen, but it happens the same way, with lots of repetitions of doing the right thing. Paul tells us in 1 Timothy 4 that we are to exercise ourselves in godliness. This is what he is talking about, doing the right thing so many times that it becomes the natural thing for us to do. For example, take a person who gets angry and swears everytime something goes wrong. If he has the Holy Spirit in him, for without it he cannot do this (1 Cor. 2:14), then he can consciously choose to not swear when things go wrong. He can put that off and put on controlling his mouth by choosing to think on something good at that time, like thanking God that he got a flat tire or the computer crashed.  As he does this enough, though he will have lots of failures in the process, he will find himself starting to hold his tongue and not only that but also think right and do right in the situation. There is no replacement for going through the conscious steps in the process and doing it lots of times. Horsemanship and Spiritual growth are connected.
Enough for today, hopefully more tomorrow, unless the storm actually does come.
Have a good one.

Day 6

After my two trip to speak in Jackson I am back. Raven and I had a great time this afternoon. The sun was shining bright and so was our workout. She is getting so light, there is a lot of float (slack for you none horseman) in the line. I had her doing backups, disengaging etc. with the lead dragging on the ground. Of course it helps if you can get these manuevers without a lead at all, which I can with her. I had her working on leg yields, and turn on hindquarters, that might be called a balanced turn on center, where I walk beside her come to a stop, as her to back up and when her outside front foot lands she is ready to pick up her inside front foot at which time I step out of the way and ask her to move her inside foot toward me and back which forces her to bring her shoulder inside and turn on the inside hind foot and go in the opposite direction. Quite an interesting move from the ground. It works in the saddle to, but you gotta know the foot falls of the horse to do this. She is getting good at this. We did round pen tranisitions trying to get more refined at downward transitions. Once I got in the saddle I got her buttery soft with the rein by using my leg on her side. Then we walked lots of circles working on lateral softness constantly using my inside leg and rein to soften her. Then it was back to transitions using my seat and legs and minimal or no rein. She stops good and turns good with leg and seat. Footing is still too slippery to do any loping or even much trotting, but we did some. Worked on leg yields trying not to use much rein except to position her poll. I had a great time with her today. You might wonder why I keep doing the same things over and over again. Well, because it takes lots of repetitions to get a horse to learn a cue. Sam Burrell said that it takes 300-400 reps to teach a cue and another 3,000-4,000 for the horse to learn it well. That takes alot of time in the saddle doing it every day or at least 4-5 times a week. It obviously takes alot longer if you only ride or work with your horse on the weekends. I am so blessed to be able to ride as much as I do. It also takes a willingness to get really cold. Well, until next time. By the way if anyone has any questions or would likes something clarified just send a comment.

day 5

Well I went over all the tasks for the Awareness course in all four levels and the only things I cannot do are the large ball exercise, a scarey object that helps horse overcome his fears, and the gauntlet which also helps in this area. But everything else, desensitizing, sending, transitions, leg yielding etc. These Raven already knows. There is one other thing and that is an exercise where I sit on a fence and get Raven to rest right next to me. It is not as easy as it might appear. The horse doesn't want to rest right there because you are above him and so with a process of moving their feet you teach the horse to rest next to you while you are on the fence. I haven't tried this yet. I will begin to work on this next time. Progress is going good. I rode bareback at first. It is neat how you can really feel where their feet are at as they move under you while bareback. It is a closer step to true unity with my horse.

day 4

today Raven and I went over the basics refining more of the round pen task of transitions and we did it not in the round pen, but in the other pen were the boundaries are farther. Just wanted to refine my body language and position more and to do it at the right time, like when she is looking at me for direction. We are connecting. Then we did the mounted tasks and those went real good, but again we upped the anty by doing it in the bigger pen so that I wouldn't have the round pen fence to keep her corraled. It forced me to use the rein a few more times, but she is getting used to it more and the footing is a little better. Even though it was warmer out, the footing was slippery so I really couldn't get her into an all out canter, though we did a few times working on transitions with my seat and legs. Did lots of leg yields and stops and back ups. However I find that I need to move on to the next course, cause we know these movements, they just need refined more. Gotta go get ready for a meeting.

day 3 of big idea

I am back peddling a little bit on the course tasks. I decided I wanted to refine what my horse is doing a little more. So I am working on the tasks esp. sending around the round pen, task 4 in cround school, where I have to transtion from stop to walk to trot to canter and back down in both directions without a lead line. I worked on that today till I got alot of improvement from Raven. The pen is slipper and choppy for her footing but she went up into a canter, but she slipped a few times so I didn't push it. I also wanted to work on refining my mounted tasks and more, esp. forward motion with transitions as above without using a rein. In fact, I did it with the rein on the saddle horn and even accomplished a collected stop and back up and turn on the hindquarters and disengagement then moving in other direction all without a rein. I think we have upped our game a notch. I am going to keep at it, hopefully daily, and improve even more. Some may think I am crazy since it is snowing and and maybe 25 degrees outside. I gotta admit my toes get cold. My goal is to work on this tues and wednesday then I will be gone til Friday evening and pick back up on Saturday. Then I will move up to the next course tasks.
Lots of fun in the snow.

cont'd

Thought I would continue from yesterdays blog. This was all done yesterday as I stated but thought it might be interesting to outline the tasks in the freedom course for you. We will begin with the 12 ground school tasks.
1. back up sending energy down the line. That is the lead rope line. It is telling the horse to back up by jiggling the lead rope with the least amount of energy needed to get the horse to step back and keep stepping back until the line is played out. A+ for both horses
2. back up sending energy with my body. That is without the lead line telling the horse to back up just by my body language using the least amount possible to get the horse to move. A+ for both horses
3. Back your horse out the gate. This they both do no problem just directional changes to get them lined up and going out the gate. I give them an A
4. send- no problem at all with this getting them lined up parallel with me and then sending them around me.
All of these exercises teach the horse to respect my space. The rule of thumb is whose feet move first is the follower. So I want to move their feet not mine when I am doing these exercises. Then they learn to respect me and follow my lead, that will be tendered down to the minimal amount of feel to get the job done. What I am after and pretty much have with these horses is a real light feel, ounces of pressure and they move.
5. saddle, the way Reis shows. I do it this way anyway and the horses stand still.
6. Lead- a horse isn't broke to lead unless you can move all the body parts in whatever direction you want when you want. And they move with the slightest pressure, they follow on the side I put them on and move as one with me. I can move their shoulders, the hindquarters, back up stop, just by my body language. Thus, they are not tugging on me nor running over me. I give these guys an A+
7. Send horse between you and fence- I call this the squeeze play and it measures the trust the horse has for me given that they are naturally claustrophobic. One might not think this is that big of a deal, but it is really huge. You never know the tight places you find yourself horseback and you want to have that control in tight places. This reminds me of the times that we as people are put in tight places, where we cannot wiggle free of the financial pressures or the relationship issues and we just have to learn to trust the Lord. Prov. 3:5,6 says alot about this. The horse learns by this exercise that tight places are not all that bad, and we do to. My horses do well at this. On the other hand I still have a lot to learn in my walk with Him.
8. Send around the arena- this is on a lead and free, I think. Again it is an issue of foot control. Changing directions is a great way to get a horse to respect you and follow your lead, this one my horses do well. They turn to the inside or outside according to my body language. You can judge resistance/rebellion in a horse by how well they are willing to change directions and with what attitude. What I am after is a fluid movement with no throwing of the head, just a relaxed change of direction without slowing the gait or stopping or speeding up.
9. Desensitization- this is tossing the lead rope all around them and even using other things to desensitize them. This teaches them to stand relaxed no matter what is going on around them. Dennis just uses the lead line for this task. my horses get an A+
10. Leg yield- this is from the ground on a lead. THey cross over one foot in front of the other while moving forward. A+ for mine
11. Lateral flexion- this is bending the horse side to side, getting them to free up the head at the poll. Lateral flexion is necessary to achieve the next task,
12. Vertical flexion- this is oftne called collection. It makes it possible for the horse to round his back and carry out the manuevers from horseback. Think of a weight lifter lifting a heavy weight. He has to get in the right position to lift the weight. He doesn't bend over and try to lift with his back alone. He uses all his body to lift. Teh same is with the horse, if he is collected then He can feel you on his back better and be in athletic position to carry out the movements you ask for.
As for my horses, they do both of these with no problem. So the ground school tasks are passed with what I would say are 9's and 10's.
Later I will talk about the mounted and mounted refined tasks. But this is enough for now.

Big idea

Had a great idea. Last fall I borrowed a friends copy of Dennis Reis Universal Horsemanship training course. I was supposed to watch the dvds and apply them to my horses. However, being the burgeoning  procrastinator that I am, I have only watched one of the four dvd courses. Now, guess what? She wants them back so she can go back through them herself. Therefore, I am on a mission aka my great idea. Over the course of the next 30 or so days I will watch the dvds and go through the course tasks to see not only what is taught, but where I am at in the course had I actually attempted to be certified by Dennis himself. Now then, my good friend Jaime Belcher who got me started and carried me along on my trek to become a better horseman taught me alot of the things Dennis covers in his course. And thanks to Jaime I think I am somewhere in the fourth and highest level in the course. But that remains to be seen. The four levels are Freedom, Awareness, Movement and Horseman. And each course has four classes Round pen, ground school, mounted and mounted refined. Each class has a series of tasks to accomplish before you can pass the class and move on. So my bright idea is to keep track of where I am at and test myself on the tasks. Now, since Dennis won't be testing me and Jaime, who got all but one of Dennis' certifications, will not be testing me either, you will have to trust me. Remember, I am a Christian and a Pastor so if my integrity is not intact, who can you trust? I will rate myself on a scale of 1-10, ten being the best no mistakes. passing is at least a five or six with room for improvement.
I started today with Raven and Jake on the freedom course. Round pen tasks are sending, haltering and changing sides. Sending is being able to point and send your horse around the pen in both directions. Haltering is haveing the horse stand calmly with head down low enough so that your elbow doesn't rise above my shoulder when I am putting the halter on and his head is bent toward me softly. Changing sides is accomplished without using the lead, but putting your hand under their chin to the opposite side and with slight pressure bringing their head around so that they change sides without me moving. Both horses do these three tasks with ease, a ten no problem. There are twelve ground school tasks. I will address those in the next posting.
Now you might ask, why are these tasks important to accomplish with your horse? Well the simple answer is the more I can move my horses feet with soft feel the safer I am. That is the main reason, safety. However, a few others are it gives me a task to accomplish, something to do with my horse so that I and the horse are not bored. It also promotes a unity, oneness or harmony with the horse that is almost as if the horse is reading my mind. That is just plain old cool. Have you ever driven a car without power steering? Its hard. But go to power steering and the ease of movement is nice. That is what it is like with a horse who has these things in its tool box. Another more important reason from my perspective is that God gave man the responsibility to rule over or have dominon over His creation, Gen. 1:28. Horses are part of creation. Also because we see it demonstrated by the Horseman of all Horseman, Jesus Christ when He entered Jerusalem the week of His crucifixion. He rode an untamed colt of an ass through a gauntlet of people cheering, throwing branches and clothing in front of Him, reaching out to touch Him and the colt remained calm as He rode. Most of us in a similar situation would have been for a wild rodeo ride. Not Jesus. That is why I want to be able to have this kind of relationship with my horse these tasks measure. In short, it must be in my blood. Why would I on a freezing cold day want to get outside and mess with a smelly horse? All of the above. So til next time, stay between the ears or on your knees.