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Can Tammy be a Rock Star?  con't

Today was the fourth ride since the First Resonance Repatterning session.  

It started out pretty good!  We did wavy lines at the walk, weaving in and out of a line of trees along the driveway, navigating under a mimosa and through a gauntlet of tires, a jeep, a trailer, and a crepe mrytle.  Also a chicken on the road (like, seriously?  it's not even near us.)  and a garbage can. also not anywhere near us.

So you may be wondering, how did these get included?  

Well, I think this is part of the problem with the DEAF horse.  They are on such high alert that what gets included in *their* universe often exceeds (greatly) what we, as riders, or even what other horses, would consider reasonable.

With these horses, I think the mistake comes when they 'spook' at something (on the horizon or in another universe) and we apply leg, or tap them with the whip, or the saddle squeaks or you bat your eye or something, and they then interpret this as the spooky thing magically attacking them.  Somehow the spooky thing that used to be over there has now magically teleported onto *them* and is attacking them.

So there's two problems - two flaws in the logic.  One, the spooky thing is *not* on their back and two, they are not being attacked.  And because this happened the first time in their life, and it was horrible, horrible, horrible, they encoded it in their brains in capital letters and have made it their life mantra.  And now, you just never know what horrible, horrible, horrible thing on the horizon or in the alternate universe or where ever it was might just land on your back and attack.  So you've got to be very aware of this.  On high alert.  The whole time.

Which then morphs into the next problem - they aren't listening to any suggestions!  Which is, truthfully, a dominance issue.

This got me to thinking of Dan Korem's profiling schema.  One of his scales has to do with 'Asking vs. Telling.'   Mr. Rogers vs. Margaret Thatcher.  

Tell people don't listen.  They tell.  Tell people don't learn so fast.  They're busy telling.  Tell people take charge.  They have answers.  They have strong opinions.  They dominate.

The only way to get a talk person to listen is to shout them down.

Which is hard for the gentler Ask folks.  (If you ever wonder if you're dealing with a 'tell' person, get louder and see what happens!)  If you want to shout down a strong tell person, you need to dig in your heels and get ready, 'cuz it's going to get loud.

And then the weirdest things will happen.  Sometimes.

Usually they'll smile and say something like, 'all right, tell me about it.'

OR - they might just punch you in the nose.  So, get ready to duck.

So today, on the wavy line, I took the approach of telling Tammy a LOT.  and the more I told her, the quieter she got.

Oi.

Is Your Horse a Rock Star? Understanding Your Horse's Personality

Is Your Horse a Rock Star? Understanding Your Horse's Personality
by Dessa Hockley

 

Horse Profiling: The Secret to Motivating Equine Athletes: Using Emotional Conformation, Behavioral Genetics, and Herd Dynamics to Choose Training Methods, ... Performance, and Hone Competitive Strategy

Horse Profiling: The Secret to Motivating Equine Athletes
by Calvin L. Carter

 

  The Art of Profiling - Reading People Right the First Time - Expanded and Revised 2nd edition

The Art of Profiling - Reading People Right...
by Dan Korem

She is a stronger 'tell' person than me.  This takes me out of my comfort zone.  (btw, I have a theory that most riding instructors are tell people.  Just watch us in action!  Is anyone listening?  to anything?!)

But I was happy with our wavy line, happy with our progress, happy with her calming down.

Then, I guess because I was happy, I moved into the arena and asked her to do the same thing there.  (Have you ever heard about quitting while you're ahead?)  First at the walk and then at the trot.  So far so good.  Pat on the back - we're moving normally around the entire arena -- and apparently no killer bunnies today.

BUT there is a killer SQUIRREL!   (at the other end of the long wall.) OMG!  It then ran a quarter of the way towards is. OMG! again.  And then jumped into a tree and made the branch whoosh all over the place.  Just kill me now, right?

On the positive side, although I lost my kidneys somewhere in the whiplash from stopping, in the corner, 200m from the squirrel, because you know, these things magically teleport and attack horses, (as evidenced by it running towards us) she moved forward when asked.  And then nearly ran over the squirrel!  (The first half of the long wall was at a walk, then we picked up the trot at E, then the squirrel decided to run onto and along the track in front of us!)  (maybe I need to be appeasing some god of the horse or something?) 

So, the crescendo wasn't so loud .... the decrescendo a little faster.  

But enough time for me to be thinking about other things.  When someone gets triggered into fight/flight, it takes about twenty minutes for the adrenaline to subside and any upset before then is magnified - which means they're like super heated water (which means I've got a ways to go before I can get off the horse!); some horses are not so good at processing information while in motion.  

And I'm thinking, today's Resonance Repatterning session, the 2nd, will include some other topics, too. 

 

And it all ended very well.  Pats all around.  We lived.  She moved forward when asked, conquered the killer squirrel, even got to the loose rein part.

I'm sure someone watching us would think it was all pretty normal except for that stop-snort thing, and if it was a different horse, I'd be laughing the whole time.

full article by Lindsey Kahn: (In)Famous Spooking Styles 

 

8/28/14

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Copyright © 08/28/14 Lynn S. Larson
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