In the last post (Complicated), I posed the root question:
And so, the whole thing depends on the question: can I help change Wyoming's experiences and thus her mind, that working together with me is something she can feel good about? And in changing this, could she feel better about her life all around?
Over time I have been given advice about Wyoming suggesting a few basic horsemanship concepts. I was told You've got to make the "wrong" thing difficult and the "right" thing easy. Also This is a horse where you have to get it to be her idea if you want to succeed.
This is all well enough… but somehow I wasn't able to get a next step from the well meaning clinicians and horse-folk who suggested these better ways, to actually sort out exactly how was one to do this? The devil, they say, is in the details.
As for the first premise, I have been astounded at how easy the "right" thing can be (walk quietly in a circle) to find this mare will choose ear pinning, rearing, and even trotting or cantering in order to NOT comply with my "easy" request. Have you ever heard that it takes more effort to frown than to smile? I'm certain that ear pinning and rearing take way more effort than quietly walking relaxed a turn or two around me.
Khaleesi had this figured out pretty quickly. She did the math and came to the conclusion complying with my general requests were going to be the path of least resistance. I think she also knew my heart (is that a stretch to write about?) for however a horse knows these unseen things, I think Khaleesi has always known that for better or worse, overall I am trying to do right by her. This horse seems to reward the least try by her human, and she seems to have a lot more grace in my failings. Khaleesi is the kind of horse of which it is said: they will fill in for you… a lot.
Wyoming is not such a horse. She may or may not know my heart is to do right by her, but she tells me every single time I am not quiet enough in a request, every single time I get impatient and don't allow her the time to consider and choose. She responds to my energy and where I am looking and if my body is not exactly angled in the ideal way to ask that thing. She responds in a huge way if I am at all confusing to her in any signal. Wyoming has a very low tolerance for mixed signals or confusion.
As for the second piece of advice, the making it her idea. I never got someone to show me effectively what that would that look like with her. In the past I figured it's obviously one of those things you have to struggle through on your own (what are you an idiot to have to ask that follow up question of HOW to do it? Or maybe it was like the force… you have to find it on your own grasshopper). That was another assumption. I should have probably asked better follow up questions. Maybe someone might have been able to show me.
Observing Harry Whitney and Tom Moates, it seems altogether less magical and more practical. The horse gets to choose and whatever she does IS her idea now. And as I've heard Harry say: when it's her idea, then she will own it, then it'll stick.
Harry Whitney in TN patiently allows for the horse to come to the idea on her own
Oh, I thought. So I must not trick, force, or otherwise manipulate and threaten her into doing what I want. And yet somehow I have to help her make better decisions? Which then follows that if I'm dealing with her honestly and not manipulating or otherwise controlling or punishing her… then it actually has to work out better FOR HER when she chooses the thing I am presenting. Which might incentives her to truly seek to join with me because… it works out for her when she does.
The devil is in the details.
I hear a lot of talk in horse circles about putting the horse first, then watch the presentation of folks' interpretation of that in action and am skeptical. Let me clarify a finer point, often I observe my own presentation of my own interpretation of putting the horse first, and I am highly skeptical even of my own stewardship of this concept.
And yet, as I perch outside the round pen as Harry helps a horse, I think there is actually a simple truth in… well… put the horse first? Harry Whitney, in the scant week or so I've spent around him in California and Tennessee, puts an emphasis on how the horse feels above everything else.
Harry in Vista, CA February 2023 helping a horse center and find peace in the midst of distraction
I am pretty good by now about sorting out what a horse does. I can see the way a horse steps over a hind foot, or if the horse's body moves backward, or if the horse is walking, trotting or cantering. I am even good at seeing a weight shift and feeling which foot is lifting underneath me. It is not that hard to sort out: I asked you to walk, and you are not walking. This I need to "fix" somehow. Harry wants to know how the horse feels.
As I circle back to the question, can I help Wyoming FEEL better about her life, it seems now to rise above all the other questions I have asked: Can I get Wyoming comfortable on the trailer? Can I get Wyoming to respond to a simple request unoffended? Can I put on a halter without her nipping at it as I put it on? Can I convince her to carry me as a rider without being so pinched up inside?
And so I went to work last week, and the devil is in the details.
Day one and day two were spent with Tom sorting out the fact that Wyoming is not only complicated, but that she does not feel good most of the time. Even in the herd she is never fully relaxed, she is the one who appears to take on the role of defender of any possible harm. This is a heavy load to carry. Any new environmental stimuli, even a chainsaw a mile away in the woods across the street is cause for concern and alert.
Khaleesi has a more balanced sense of what is concerning, and what can be noticed and let go of. Same herd, same stimuli, still aware of her environment and sometimes on alert, but quicker to let something go and relax again.
If I were to consider Wyoming's "worry cup" (as in the amount of anxiety a horse is building up until it runneth over - usually in a negative expression of some sort), Wyoming is not a cup half full kind of mare… she is like 5/8th most of the time and now has learned to carry that kind of worry in everything she does. This would mean when I want to do something together I have precious little room to press her before her cup runs over. I think this constant anxiety is a big part of this not feeling good all the time.
If she lives at 5/8 full, I think me showing up puts her at 6/8 (or 3/4 for those who prefer to simplify their fractions) then whatever we begin to sort through together leaves only 7/8 and then bam… self-protection at all costs shows up in fight/flight with the fight being unusually high on her list of options.
I am considering the possibility that her 5/8 full worry cup at all times being a way of life could account for why she is so quick to flip over to fight/flight and the fact that we've had to get decent at dumping out the part we just filled if we both want to survive together. If this is an accurate hypothesis, then it follows that I have not been effective at getting down into the bottom 5/8 of the cup she carries constantly in order to empty some of that and give us some emotional space to work in.
If I had to find an analogy to compare it to, it's like working with a machine that is not running quite properly and you have to learn how to manage it without it overheating and blowing up if you want to get anything done. We exist too close to the red zone as an every day functioning.
I think until I find a way to dig into some of the chronic discontent/anxiety she carries as her normal and help her to let go some of that somehow… then I'm constantly in the zone where every move I make could be the thing that takes her over the edge. It's an eggshell kind of life. My guess is she would rather not live that way either. If she knew there was another way.
As Tom says: this is the horse she would rather be.
This winter and at other times I've put her into the benign neglect zone, first because I didn't have any promising answers to bring a change. Second, in the winters I'm busy with my teaching work and have far less time for the herd.
I used the think caring for her basic needs, allowing her to settle into a herd in a life of basic freedom could not only do no harm, but would help her reset again and feel better in order for us to possibly try again after that refreshing time off. Maybe the horse can drain the cup on her own? Since meeting Harry I am convinced that they actually DO need intervention in a different experience in order to make a change. Leaving them alone to "be a horse" if they are troubled will not fix the trouble.
The biggest take-away I had from Harry in Tennessee this spring was:
Our understanding runs our emotions, our emotions dictate our actions. If you want a change in the horse, you must change their understanding.
Harry Whitney
After Tom's visit it had come into focus for me, somehow Wyoming needs new experiences to get that cup drained enough that she could withstand a little pressure in order to grow and expand her world. Leaving her alone to a world that gets smaller and smaller due to fears is not kindness. Creating a shake up in order to help her was going to be necessary.
No Wyoming... tell me how you really feel?
And the devil is in the details.
This is where the hoof hits the dirt. The first question from the last post was: can I help Wyoming feel better with new experiences that will change her mind. Once everyone was gone and it's just me and the mare I now to have to ask: How on earth am I going to do this?
I have a feeling this is going to demand more from me that I currently possess in knowledge, skill, creativity, grace and most of all patience. As I got started, I realized this horse is probably going to be the kind that makes me or breaks me - meaning I will either grown and learn, or she'll be too much for me and I will truly fail her. I can not at the moment accept the latter as a possibility, so I'm prepared to be changed from this process.
And so we begin… again… again.
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