DO YOU OWN A SPOOKY, REACTIVE, ANXIOUS, SENSITIVE HORSE?

DO YOU OWN A SPOOKY, REACTIVE, ANXIOUS, SENSITIVE HORSE?

I understand, there is nothing that steals the joy from riding more than a horse that is prone to spooking, shying or generally being reactive to stuff. It is hard to relax on a horse that is constantly worried about the world. They put you on edge and can really hit at your confidence especially if you come off. What is frustrating is that you know that your nerves are just making things worse!

I promote people to understand WHY Horses become like this because it leads to solutions. In a nutshell, how reactive a horse is depends on how stressed it is. When a horse’s stress escalates it shifts from a thinking into a reactive mindset so the smallest thing can flip the horse into flight. Stress can also compound, so a whole lot of things the horse is having to cope with can all add up which can result in the horse entering a reactive state. Therefore, how stressed a horse is depends on how comfortable and confident they are in what they are doing. That means you can do a lot to help transform reactive and spooky horses. You do this by improving their comfort and confidence in what they are doing.

But how do you do this?

Firstly, you ensure the horse UNDERSTANDS how to respond to the pressure you are applying when you communicate with them. How good are their responses to the bit - your leg - your seat? How good are YOU at applying this pressure? Are you consistent? Are you balancing on their mouths because you need to do some work on your balance in the saddle? Or are you an experienced rider that is trying to correct too much all at once and creating a wall of unrelenting pressure? The more pressure your horse is having to endure on its mouth, sides and back…the more DISCOMFORT it will experience and the more stressed it will be.

Secondly, you ensure the horse is not experiencing PHYSICAL PAIN. There are many things that can cause pain that are well known, these include ill-fitting tack, dental issues, gastric ulcers, sore feet, joint issues, body issues etc. Some other issues that I have found also to be significant include the surface you are riding on and how it can cause fatigue and discomfort; making the horse ride in a posture it is not ready for that causes it to fatigue and experience discomfort; unbalanced or overweight riders; unfit horses getting exhausted with lactic acid build up; biomechanical and bad postural issues that are not addressed that lead to pain and discomfort for the horse when ridden.

Finally, you ensure that the horse is allowed to get CONFIDENT in what you are asking it to do. This is a massive topic and involves such things as not rushing a horse's training, never over facing them or continually correcting them so they never feel like they are successful in navigating what you are asking them to do. Confidence and trust go hand in hand. I really like the analogy of the “trust jar” to help understand how to build confidence and trust in horses. Every time you ride a horse and overall it has been able to successfully navigate you and what you have been asking it to do and it hasn’t had to endure much stress or struggle.....you are adding a handful of marbles to the horse’s “trust jar”. Every time you rush the training and make the horse struggle, over face them with a bigger jump they are not ready for or spend the ride correcting-correcting-punishing-correcting-punishing etc. then you take a handful of marbles out. Therefore, be thoughtful in your riding and training by progressing your training with thought to how many marbles are in that trust jar!