Feelings of Competence

Have you ever experienced something that was hard for your horse to overcome, emotionally or physically, even with R+ training, then once you've both accomplished it, the horse beams with pride? Most things come easily with R+, most horses are happy to do any behavior will earn reinforcement. But some are physically or emotionally more challenging and the horse has to really puzzle it out, work up their trust, and build their confidence in the skill. Then they get it and it's all they want to do from then on, they practice it on their own and offer it often when training. Even more joyful than the easy skills.

We've been talking about this a lot lately. While it's important to listen to our horse and value their feelings, there are times helping encourage them through an issue is appropriate. Because pushing through a road bump, working through a hard thing, leaves the horse with feelings of achievement and competence. They solved a hard puzzle and succeeded in something they didn't think they could. These are deep feelings of learning their body, empowering their mind, and building our relationship together. So it's very empowering when we do overcome these hard things. So when something is difficult, see it as a chance to grow, slow and at the horse's ability to stay trying and working toward the goal, don't push them over threshold, but let them problem solve. We don't need to over support them, providing answers for them or being a helicopter parent Let them solve their own puzzles, so they can feel their own achievement.

Dream is a great example of this, as a carriage horse his entire life he had never had to figure out how to climb up on uneven terrain. So his first encounter with a platform left him mind boggled. He couldn't figure out how to get his legs to do what he wanted, and I'm sure trust was a big part of it, that the object was safe and could hold him. We got front feet on quickly, with just targeting him on, but he'd always jump off sideways instead of putting his hinds on. When finally one day, he was up on his fronts and I walked over and cued him to pick up his hind leg, I didn't touch or guide him, just pointed at it. He picked up his hind and it hit the platform. Then I watched all the dots connect in his brain and let him solve the rest of the puzzle. It took him many more tries of picking up and stomping down his hind feet, looking for the platform with his feet, but then he got it. After that day, platforms are now his favorite obstacle. He will leave the front lawn (good grass) to go climb onto his favorite platform when given the chance, even when that's not what we're looking for This gave him feelings of competence and understandings of his own body that he hadn't had before.
”Feelings of Competence” - Mackenzie Whitsell