01/26/2024
Training Aids that make your BODY BIGGER.
Sticks. Whips. Crops. Flags. Targets. Spurs. Ropes. The list of physical tools available to us as horse people continues to grow each year. I remain conflicted about their use. My mind is not yet fully made up on all of them.
Some of them I have made my mind up on. Spurs, for instance, are a No from me. In the effort of being open minded and accommodating, I have welcomed spur wearing riders at clinics in the past, watching very carefully for their appropriate use and leg control. But recently, I have made a clear decision on them. They are a No from me. And I will be inviting all clients to leave them behind in trainings going forwards.
You see, all horsemanship requires our judgement. It just does. When we shame people for making a judgement call, we incapacitate them from having good judgement. And another persons judgement call is not their passive aggressive comment on what you do differently. We must allow people their basic freedoms to make choices for themselves. So, my decision as a trainer, coach and instructor to remove the presence of spurs from all of my work is not a judgement against those who use them. I can fully intellectualise and rationalise that it is possible for their use to be non-harmful and even very helpful with the right instruction. But my MO is to avoid things in training which reinforce strongly our desires. And I have specific reasons to do this. It took me 1.5 years, for example, to slowly make this choice about spurs.
Whips. Sticks. Wands, euphemistically labelled, is in a similar category.
I can rationally understand the concept of "The stick is an extension of my hand". I really get that. I also understand that sticks, and flags, can be important for safety. I have had such experiences too. One horse in my past, about 10 years ago. Was very dangerous to handle on the ground. I needed a stick to protect myself... unfortunately. I had to wave it in front of my body to stop from getting kicked. I was participating in this poor horses rehab at the time, and eventually the stick helped me do the following.
It helped my body feel bigger than it was.
It helped me feel more powerful than I felt.
It helped me see that I was more effective and skilled than I believed I was.
This is not everyone's journey or use of a stick in training. But I remember personally, this specific scenario, where this was the case for me.
But then a funny thing started to happen. Week after week, I realised that though the stick was on my person, I wasn't using it. But my body felt more powerful, more effective, more confident. That I knew that if push came to shove and I was in real danger I could defend my space without striking at a horse. That was a transformative experience in working with this very volatile and dangerous horse.
I remember the day that I dropped that stick. But the feeling the stick gave me, stayed with me. I have often wondered if I still have the somatic stick inside me, and ask myself that question before I interact with fearful horses. I don't want them to feel the stick they can't see, and give me responses tied to fear of retribution. Horses are sensitive you see. They feel the embodied stick in the (over) confident trainer. And can give you the illusion of trust, when what might be happening is their fear of non-compliance.
It is such a tricky subject. I have not made my mind up. And if you're reading this hoping to extract "Lockie's Defininitive Point Of View On Training Tools" I am sorry to disappoint you, this writing is a tool of thinking. Not an instrument of declarative endings. Shall we think through this one together? Can't hurt right?
In my experience, it is exceedingly rare to find horses for whom the stick has never, and truly never, hurt, stung, concerned, worried, frightened or harmed them... ever. Even if recent historical use was skilled, fair and appropriate extension of the arm, often those horses, way back in their lives, remember the stick being something else. What if they forgave but never forgot. And their ability to be more responsive, "respectful", forward or calm with the presence of the stick is due to a healthy mistrust of the stick's potential?
If the stick is truly never used as punishment, and truly only used as an instrument of aid and signal, why not add a soft, foam covering to it's sharp ending? Because it is accidentally easy to sting a horse with the end when tapping or touch them for a response. That sting is not enough to harm, but enough of a veiled low level threat of potential, or enough of an annoyance that their response can be more immediate. But is a more immediate response worth the trade off for a response motivated by low level manageable fear, or low level annoyance and anger? Do we want responsive movement embodied by the root of those emotional states? I certainly don't.
My horse Sani, was beaten horribly by sticks when he was a 4 year old stallion, sold, and loaded to a trailer without any preparation. One of my earliest trainings with him. I just picked the stick up from the ground, he blasted away, gave me rope burn (melted the palm of my hand) jumped a 1m fence, crossed a road and ran into the neighbouring mountain.
For years he forbid me to have any arm extention what so ever. Colleagues around me at the time, proponents of arm extensions, said (gaslightingly)
"It is your energy behind the stick"
I had no energy behind the stick except the question of
"Is this ok with you"
My horse said "No." End of story.
Except it wasn't the end.
Years later, I started using CAT-H and then Clicker training to positively condition the stick as a target. Initially a raw stick was forbidden but a flag or a target was ok. Pool noodles too. Sani seemed to understand that sticks can sting and hurt, and the other arm extenders did not. So enter my chaotic era, where every traditional horse person in my vicinity thought I was the madman riding my draft horse with a pool noodle, where my horse thought they were the man people holding weapons.
Recently, I have been able to hold a raw stick in his presence. But what it gives me, still, is the illusion of trust with him. It has the power to reinforce him into actions that he internally is not ready, or willing for.
And I think this is the root of it for me.
I am extremely invested, and interested in exploring unexplored places in Emotional Horsemanship. One of those places is the horses absolute, inviolate, non-interfered with internal state (emotional state). Their opinions. Their desires.
I understand that some tools, even positive and kind tools, are powerful enough to give a horse an external reason to do something. But not powerful enough to connect that external reason to a true internal desire to do that thing in the world... together WITH me. They do it because of the thing. Not because it symbolises our potential together as a team.
I know I will be gravely misunderstood in these above writings. I hope you know my intentions are pure, and these are musings alone of where I am right now in my horsemanship. Not bold forever declarations for what will always be.
But I remain interested in neurologically quiet techniques, that don't blindfold the horses emotionally while they explore new behaviours, and give them something their heart is not ready for.
