Saturday 27 February 2010

The journey to nowhere

It all started off pretty simple. When I first sat on a horse I quickly decided that for my own safety, I needed to be in control of the situation. I worked out that my horse had a few ideas of his own, and in some situations he even insisted on putting his ideas in to practise. This was sometimes fun, but not always.

Then pretty soon, a whole load of theories about horsemanship came into view. First I came across join up, after which the horse would be only too happy to do whatever I asked - oh, but I might need a pressure halter. And then pretty quickly a whole load more stuff came trucking along. Before I knew it a huge industry was spawned, all centred around this special relationship between man and the horse. Now suddenly, there was lots for me to think about. Am I the alpha, or perhaps I'm not? Is my horse right brained or is he left brained? Is he introvert or is he extrovert? Or, god forbid, is he the 'used one? Heck, this was starting to get complicated.

And then came the books, the endless books, telling me about this deep and meaningful relationship, but mysteriously, somehow not quite telling me how I can get to it.

But for the last few years I've been looking at my horse and wondering. And I'm standing there thinking, 'Nah, he doesn't care a jot about any of this stuff. He just needs to feel safe and know I'm not going to do anything too dumb. That's pretty much the same as what I want from him really!'

5 comments:

Kathy Baker said...

During the winter months I have been watching some DVDs of Tom Dorrance and Ray Hunt. When I watch Tom, the real meaning of "feel, timing and balance" is so readily apparent. Amazing and humbling. There is simplicity to all of this, but no one ever said it was easy.

As always, I am a student of the horse, they tell me how I need to BE and what is important.

Kathy

Di said...

You would think that making things simple would be easy, but it can be surprisingly difficult!!
'Do as much as necessary, but as little as possible'
I like what you say -that the horse really couldn't care less about about all the razzmataz, he just wants to feel safe.

jill said...

The question really becomes does your horse find you fit enough to trust and worthy enough to hang out with doesn't it?

You're right, all the other stuff is, well just stuff, for us, not the horse so much.

Anonymous said...

Very good thoughts - I think we people often have a tendency to overcomplicate things.

Tom said...

Thank you all for your comments. The human being is blessed with the ability to complicate, and often the desire to as well. I love the way horses work better when we keep it simple - it's inspiring!