The young horse

Honesty
Challenge
Emotion
Confronting

Working with young (and when I say young I just mean uneducated) horses is a journey of self discovery in itself.
Our young horses due to their lack of experience are unable to ‘bridge the gap’ for us and therefore cause us to take ownership of everything that happens - the good, the bad, and the ugly.

When our young horse gives us feedback like;
‘You’re not making it clear’
‘You’re too loud’
‘You’re scaring me’
‘I want to be somewhere else’

It can be confrontational to us, as it causes us to consider our conduct and our self.

Older horses learn to ‘figure out’ what it is that we are asking of them, and will show up to bridge the gap, even if we are loud, unclear or clumsy.

Young horses cause us to self reflect and adjust or change.

Young horses cause that moment of “it’s not you, it’s me”.

When we have this thought we generally react one of two ways;
Guilt--- ‘I knew it was my fault’ and subsequent negative thoughts ‘I’ll never be good enough’.

Or

Rejection ‘it’s not my fault this stupid horse just doesn’t get it’ and subsequent affirmation of skill ‘I know what I’m doing’.

Humans tend to have this blanket exclusivity in the moment -- an issue presents and all of a sudden we are useless (or the horse is), instead of changing the dialogue to ‘usually I do this in this situation, but it’s not working for this horse -- what can I adjust’

Opportunities like these are how great horsemen are made.

GingerCoops
Shine by @cen_horse