Young Horse Training: Building Confidence, Trust and Nervous System Regulation

Words of Wisdom from Ray Hunt
March 21, 2004 by Eclectic Horseman

“My father was a great teamster. His horses were winners; he never made them losers. He was a horseman and maybe a little of him rubbed off on me. His judgement was very good around a horse. He knew when and how to go about doing things. I did not realize this until I got older. As I got older, I did things exactly like Dad did, but it didn’t work exactly the same way for me. So I found out there is something more to it, when you feel it in here (your heart), when you feel for him, when you feel of him; the confidence can go down through that body, or you can take it out.”

A horse is sensitive
“A horse is a very sensitive animal. He can feel a fly land on him. You folks who have been around horses know that because you put flyspray on him in the summertime. And yet when you ride him, you ride him like he doesn’t have any feeling. You ride him with a chain curb strap, a tie-down, martingale, wires, pulleys and cables. Why?”

“You’re destroying what Mother Nature put in there.”

What gets in the human’s way
“There is no way that the horse will ever try to take advantage of you. He’s as honest and as truthful as anything you could ever work with. He has no ego that gets in his way. He has no pride that gets in his way. He doesn’t know what win or lose is. And those are the four things that get in the human’s way. It’s very sad. All the horse is trying to do is survive; he’s trying to make it. So I try to work with him like he was me, just like I hope he would work with me.”

A reason why
“It’s got to come from here (your heart). People are working on their horse; their horse is all right, (your heart) has got to get in order.”

“You ask me why I do things. You don’t have to do none of this. But there is a reason why I do what I do, and the horse is why. And then you show him and he says, ‘well I’ll be darned.’ But I ask people ‘Well, why did you do that?’ And they say ‘Well, that’s what they say to do.’ What? How is the horse going to learn if you don’t know why you do what you do.”

“And look what the horse has to go through. Please, I’m not condemning anyone. But know where you are at. Can you really teach this thing? Everyone should have the opportunity to teach one, But how would you hope he would help you to understand? I think you folks can do the job; I hope you learn to see what’s taking place.”

“It’s amazing what you can learn once you have already learned all there is to learn. Some people think they’ve got it all figured out; they are just scratching the surface. There is so much to be had here it’s unreal. And what I talk about, most people will never ever reach that goal. That doesn’t matter.”

“Try to stay on the edge of trouble. If your horse starts to get really troubled back off and do less. That is so hard for the human to do. Why? They are afraid they have lost. Especially the cowboy. He wears a high-crown hat and high-heeled boots and he’s a tough son-of-a-gun. So he’s not too apt to see what I’m talking about; he’s too tough. For the lady it’s a little easier for her because she’s going to wait until her husband gets back, so she’s going to back off a little bit. At that point if I could I would just pour a little bit of that woman into that man so he could back off a little bit. Then if I could just get her to be a little bit braver, that would be great but you can’t do that.”

Being honest
“You have to have guts and determination if you want to look for what I’m talking about. If you don’t, that don’t make you wrong. What do you want to do or accomplish? And what are you capable of accomplishing? It’s your concentration, your coordination and your reflexes in that order. But the concentration isn’t near deep enough.”

“The human has to have confidence in himself. And lots of people don’t have the confidence. And the reason they don’t have it is that they don’t have the experience.”

“The definition of confidence is knowing that you are prepared for the unthinkable.”

“You say ‘Oh he might spook, he might buck, he might fall down, he might rear.’ So look what he’s working with. He knows you can’t handle it, and that don’t make him wrong to know that you can’t handle it. And he might do any of those things because something might scare him or he might slip and fall at any time and yet the people can’t handle that, but they want to go on with their horse. If he turns around quick, they fall off.”

“So confidence again is knowing you are prepared for the unthinkable, and I don’t know how you are going to get that without experience, That still don’t make you wrong. You know where you’re at, you should know your capabilities. That’s no sin and no crime. You’re being honest with your fellow man. You’re being honest with him; you’re trying to keep him out of trouble.”