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Permalink Reply by Brenda Gordon on February 1, 2010 at 7:54am

Hi Cynthia,
I went to look at the Royal Academy and jumped in, I sent for the DVDs on sale. I have tried some of the no pressure/friendly style with my horses and had success with my very limited understanding and no real training just what I picked up from reading.
First I read the Monty Roberts life story, he learned about the language of horses and I used his method on my young-frisky-barley broke Morgan, it worked. It is about taking the leadership position.
I have Hempfling's book, it was basically the same, I am able to longe my horses without a line and it worked on my 21 yr old gelding. He never had previous training, guess he just got it. Or I finally got it, how to communicate with him.
I am getting the set of training videos at the sale price so I can't wait to see what more to do. I have a 5 month old to get started correctly,
Doesn't this seem to be the old way coming back around again? If you think of the ancients training, riding and developing their relationships with horses, because their lives depended on their horses, those people got it.

Permalink Reply by Cyndi on February 3, 2010 at 7:41pm

Wow Brenda, reading your post was like reading my own words!! LOL I read Monty's book when it first came out, and that's when I realized there was a way to train horses that didn't include scaring the wits out of it. I did Join-Up with my mare when I first got her, but like you, I am very limited in my understanding. It would be nice to have someone nearby who could show me how to do things, as I learn so much better from observing than reading.

I got "into" Hempfling's books in the past year (I have 'Dancing With Horses' and 'What Horses Reveal'). I am starting to get things in place to build a "portable" picadero on the property where my horse boards, as I have no enclosed area to work with her alone right now. I am looking forward to Hempfling's training videos coming out. They're already a year late, and he's got a new book coming out in April. Guess they wanted the book out before the videos.

Watching people like Hempfling and Cynthia Royal moving with their horses (dancing!) is breathtaking. I am learning to be a better leader to my horse (how does Hempfling word that? - be dominant without being mean?), and I look forward to the day when she follows me wherever I go, whether I'm on the ground or in the saddle.