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Four ''C''s for Building Trust

© Patricia Celley

Notice the word carrot is not included here. What your horse needs to develop a trusting relationship with you is good COMMUNICATION, commands that are clear to understand (CLARITY), applied CONSISTENTly, and the ability to work without disCOMFORT. Let's look at each of these "C"s separately.

Communication is a two way street. It is not just your horse's ability to understand what you are asking of him, it is also your ability to understand what your horse is telling you. If you go to saddle a horse and he pins his ears back and maybe tries to bite you what is he trying to tell you? That he is just plain mean and nasty? Not likely. More likely he is telling you that he is experiencing (or has experienced) some type of discomfort with the saddle. We humans are always attributing horse's behaviors to human characteristics such as mean, lazy, or "he's just trying to make me mad." Horses are wonderful animals, but they do not posses any logical thinking skills. They are creatures of habit and instinct only. By rewarding positive behavior we encourage that behavior to become a habit. The ability to "read" a horse's body language is an important skill. It is equally important that we then respect what they are telling us.

When we are on the ground working around our horses we communicate with our body language and voice. In the use of our voice, the tone quality and rhythm is much more important than the actual words. Word commands are best kept to one and two syllables such as whoa, walk, trot, etc. Gee and haw are used for commanding right and left turns in some driving horses. "Come over here," or "Now stop that," are not very effective. The word whoa said in a quick high pitch or a whiney, begging tone is not likely to be effective either.

Our body language can either drive the horse away from us or encourage him to come toward us. Remember that horses still carry the instincts of being a hunted animal. Direct eye contact, open hands, and facing directly at them will push them away. Closed hands dropped low, diverted eye contact and approaching sideways is more welcoming. Horses can even sense our muscle tightness and breathing patterns both when we are on the ground and when we are riding.

When we are on the horse we communicate through our aides. The voice is again a useful means of communicating and is the easiest aid to use. The other aids are our hands, seat and legs. I will discuss the proper and intricate use of each of these aids in subsequent articles.

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