One of the last times I roundpenned my horse it was pretty disastrous.... we had bad chemistry, he reared, and I got scared and cried, bugged my trainer, scared my horse, just really screwed up.... so I quit.... wow, she's a quitter..... no.... I quit to take like the 20 steps back I needed to take to get myself under control so there was ZERO emotion when I worked with Oliver the next time... to figure out why he was pawing and rearing and what was wrong with our communication. .... Steve, my awesome trainer, steveboyleshorsemanship.com, an advocate of every good trainer, told me I didn't trust the horse and I was lying to him.. and he left for the day..... we talked about it later and then we broke up.... it's been great.... since I intend to be in lessons with him forever, in one way or another, I separated myself from him for now.... I asked him to ride my horse for me and I have been working with Oliver alone by myself.... in the roundpen.... first I watched Chris Irwin's tapes about how to get started.... he was not one of those horses that runs round scared around the outside, he is one of the horses that is already in your pocket. He generally gets pretty close and we were having face to face conversations.... so I had to turn his away from me to even get any forward motion...... I had to also really watch my adrenaline and that I was calm or my energy would cause him to jump on me. ... so I even had to slow down more sometimes... go back to grooming, or just being with Oliver, intently realizing his size, his energy, his willfullness.... then after I was no longer afraid of him, I had to find the right energy tool... some people swing a rope... some people use a whip... I use a whip with a bag on the end of it to create some drama for him or he will just stand and stare and is not fazed at all..... I don't use this tool to scare him, but to ask him to move forward..... as soon as he takes a few steps I leave him be..... slowly but surely we have gotten into a good coversation about going around the roundpen instead of facing me and trying to rear up..... when a horse turns and looks at you all the time, there is a tendency maybe to look back at him.... when I was looking at Oliver and pushing him forward he was rearing.... as soon as I learned to look at his hip and not his head, which Chris Irwin explained to me, I had a horse that no longer reared up..... getting out of the roundpen and watching videos, practicing my energy, grooming my horse to learn about his energy, and learning about his dominance level, spending time with him to get to know him got me back into the roundpen.... mostly, again, it was all about working on me.... :) It is really hot here in southern california and dusty.... so I'm glad we have sprinklers in our area so we can play in the water.... Oliver try and turn things into games.... so our roundpenning is for communication more than anything.... and to learn more about how to move around each other... so we'll be out in the sprinklers guys.... Have a good day with your horses!! Jen
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