The lovely Danke

I thought I would follow up with my own observations of the experience with Danke and the massage therapist.

As you may recall (and if you missed it you can read about it here) Danke was not OK with having Heather standing on the hay bale while she worked on her croup area. This was the first time she had attempted to work with her like this. In the past if Danke needed to move Heather would just stay with her till she settled. But, since Danke is so tall (17+hands) it was necessary for Heather to stand on the hay bale to get a better look and feel of this particular area. As such it was necessary that Danke stand still. HA!

Initially I simply blocked Danke’s efforts to leave. However, when Heather invited me to join her on the hay bale to look at/feel a particular knotty area the problem escalated when there was no one up front to keep Danke still! So the first problem we solved with clicker training was just getting Danke to stand still long enough so that I could see what Heather wanted me to see. Then it was time for Heather to get to work. It was quickly becoming clear that just telling Danke not to leave was not helping her feel good about the process.

That’s when I said, “Well, you know, we could click her for standing here while you work. Do you think that would be too distracting?” As you know Heather believed it would be. But, I felt that it was worth a try because we weren’t going to get anything done at the rate we were going! So, we proceeded.

The part that I wanted to add to Heather’s story was how initially one might have questioned the sensibility of the plan. At first Danke tossed her head and stomped her feet. An inexperienced person might have said, “this isn’t working,” and quit.
But I kept the click/treats coming at a fairly high rate. Click for positiong her rump near Heather, click while Heather had her hand on her rump, click for stillness, click for relaxing the neck and so on. It really only took 5 extra minutes to start to see that Danke was ‘getting’ the idea that the clicks were coming when she let Heather ‘in’ and worked with her to release the area.

Heather’s surprise that the food would end up not being a distraction comes from one of the most common myths about clicker training. It is hard to wrap your head around it if you haven’t seen it time and again.

When the horse is really clicker savvy it isn’t about the food. It is about the process and the understanding.

Related posts:

1. Getting a Horse to Work WITH her Massage Therapist
2. Finding what motivates a change
3. Teaching a horse to stand for mounting

The author with the lovely Miss Tulsa.

How many times have we heard that there is so much to learn about dressage it would take a life time (or several!) to learn it all? Lots and it’s true! There is so much to learn that it is almost overwhelming at times. We keep going-or I do anyway!-because it is such a rush to finally “get” some small piece of the puzzle.

It is tempting to think that since there is so much to learn that going “outside the box” of traditional dressage training is a waste of precious time. However, in my personal experience the opposite has been true. Some of my most valued “ah-ha!” moments came as the result of connections I made from non-dressage experiences.

A Frustrating Start

When I got my mare, Tulsa who is now nine, as a four year old I thought I could ride. Well, I could ride, but count on a youngster to show you just how much you don’t know about training! I knew I would need help in bringing her along, and I was getting help, but a year or so into it I hit a wall and had a “major meltdown.” What ever happened to riding being fun?

Things just weren’t going well and I didn’t understand why. I was frustrated and so was Tulsa-who made her feelings known with a lot of resistance maneuvers including refusing to go to the right, head tossing, stiffness, rearing, spinning, and so on. Yikes! I nearly quit, but I couldn’t because I adored Tulsa’s (normally!!) sweet nature and, besides, I refused to quit a loser.

Around that time a good friend of mine and I decided to teach our horses the Spanish Walk. Yes, I know a lot of people might object to this exercise. However, for me, it was a very enlightening experience. I learned, for example, just how long it took Tulsa to process and learn one new thing and it made me a little more sympathetic to the learning process. I mention this now because it will become relevant a little later.

Dogs, dolphins and horses?

About the same time my friend and I discovered clicker training-a training approach that is taking the dog world by storm. As soon as I heard about it, I recognized that this was Something Really Important. We both had dogs we were training, we didn’t hesitate to jump in and neither of us has looked back since.

So what does dog training have to do with horse training, especially dressage, you ask? More than you might think. Bear with me on this! First, let me tell you a little bit about clicker training.

The first piece I read on clicker training was a short booklet written by Karen Pryor called “A Dog and a Dolphin.” That name hints at the fact that clicker training has its origins in dolphin training. Ever wonder how they get dolphins to do what they do? It is especially fascinating when you consider they can’t touch them or correct them. They do it using the same principles as clicker training: only they use a whistle and a fish-okay lots of fish!

Here is how it works. Lets say you want the dolphin to jump through a hoop. You start with the hoop in the water. The dolphin has no idea what you want but happens to swim by the hoop. You reward the dolphin with fish for swimming near the hoop which encourages the dolphin-he being no fool-to swim near the hoop a lot! During one of those passes the dolphin happens to swim through the hoop. This is rewarded with extra fish.

Now if you have been paying attention you might be wondering how it is the dolphin knows what he did to get the fish. This is where the whistle comes in. The dolphin trainer first conditioned the dolphin to connect the sound of the whistle with the appearance of the fish. The dolphin hears the whistle and knows that a fish is coming. Establishing “Whistle Equals Fish” is step one.

The next step is to teach the dolphin The Training Game. This is where the dolphin learns that he can make the trainer give him fish by doing things. Whenever the dolphin hears the whistle he takes note of what he was doing when he heard it. He soon discovers (and it really only takes minutes) that he can repeat whatever he was doing when he heard the whistle to get more fish.

So, in the hoop example, when the dolphin swam through the hoop the trainer whistled “marking” the behavior of going through the hoop as one that will earn fish. Since that behavior is the one rewarded the dolphin concentrates on going through the hoop. Little by little the hoop is raised out of the water until the dolphin is jumping through it many feet in the air. This is called shaping behavior.

Training dogs is basically the same only we use a clicker to mark behavior instead of a whistle (though any easily recognizable signal will do) and liver treats or a ball instead of fish. Using this approach my friend and I taught our dogs all kinds of things in a way that made learning fun for both human and dog.

To fully understand clicker training I had to delve pretty deep into the science and laws of reinforcement, behavior modification and learning. What might appear hokey and strange upon first examination becomes clear once you understand the principles being worked. I also discovered the successful clicker trainer has excellent timing (to click at just the right moment), is sensitive to how the animal is responding and has an eye for catching the behavior for which she is looking even if it is in a very rudimentary form. The clicker trainers creed is “Reward the Behavior You Want.”

I’m getting to horses–really!

An interesting thing happens in this form of training which is encouraged-as opposed to discouraged in other forms-and that is the dog learns to try different behaviors to see which one you want. Over time this subsides as various behaviors come under strong stimulus control, i.e. they are on cue and never offered without being asked. However, in the beginning you want the dog to offer behavior because if you can get the behavior you can reinforce it and if you can reinforce it you can get it again. And so it goes.

Okay, now we get back to horses.

One day about a year into the clicker training with the dogs, I was riding Tulsa and “out of the blue” she offered the Spanish Walk I had taught her months before. It really wasn’t right out of the blue because I’d been asking her to do something similar to the preparation to Spanish Walk. But, right at that moment it all hit me. The reason that Tulsa offered the Spanish Walk was because she was guessing. In other words, she had no idea what I wanted and offered her best guess-from things that had been rewarded before.

Suddenly all the clicker training I’d done with the dogs made me understand why I was having so much trouble with Tulsa. When I trained the dogs I was clear, precise and consistent. Tulsa deserved the same but I realized that day she wasn’t getting it. I felt really bad!! But, once I accepted that fact a couple things happened. One is a huge weight lifted off my shoulders. I didn’t need to be tense and frustrated, I just needed to go step by step, be clear and reward the behavior I wanted. DUH. Just like I did with the dogs. The second thing that happened was, voila and duh again, Tulsa immediately started getting better.

When I changed my attitude from seeing my horse as “evading” or “resisting” or “being stubborn” or “difficult” to seeing her as “struggling with a concept” I couldn’t be mad or even frustrated. It would be like being angry with a child because learning fractions is difficult. They make mistakes, they try the wrong thing, they get upset because they are confused and frustrated. I finally saw Tulsa for what she was, my student. As a teacher, there is no place for lack of emotional control!

Ah, but there is more!

Right about the same time as this I stumbled upon the work of such extraordinary horsemen as Tom Dorrance, Ray Hunt, Harry Whitney and others. Nope, these are not dressage folk. However, most of what I now know about horsemanship, feel, timing, balance and how to train a horse came from these guys. Plus, everything I had learned in clicker training was coming true again: break the problem down into small steps and reward the behavior you want. For some reason, these fundamental skills were skipped over in the strictly dressage training that I’d experienced.

A lot of dressage people look down on these “western guys” with the assumption that they couldn’t possibly understand our dressage requirements and therefore there is no value in studying what they have to say. This is, in my very humble opinion, an extremely narrow minded viewpoint. I’ve observed many dressage riders who are flailing and frustrated because they clearly don’t know what these cowboys know: how to make it clear to the horse what the heck you want!

The reaction to clicker training is usually the same, i.e. clicker training has nothing to do with classical dressage. My response is anything that helps someone understand the value of timing, clarity, consistency and reinforcement has everything to do with classical dressage principles. The principles of training are the principles of training and you can learn them from many sources. In fact, learning them outside the context of dressage is actually beneficial because you can focus on them without being distracted by what you think you are “supposed” to be accomplishing.

Once I understood basic training principles I was able to look at the classical methods with a fresh eye and really understand why certain things continue to be passed on and work so well. They work because they follow the laws of behavior and learning. Although we have only come to really understand those laws over the last 50 years or so, they have been in effect forever. Who knows this guy?

“This rule can be stated in few words, but is applies to the whole art of horsemanship. He will receive the bit, for example, more willingly if something good happens to him as soon as he takes it. He will also leap over and jump out of anything, and perform all his actions duly if he can expect a rest as soon as he has done what is required of him.” –Xenophon.

See, it all comes around to the same thing!!

Final Thoughts

In my experience, in order to be able to make the right changes in a horse I needed to understand how to elicit any change. Clicker training taught me about how to influence behavior and the principles of learning that apply to all animals including horses. It taught me about the critical importance of clarity and consistency, also about setting realistic expectations. The horsemanship studies taught me about pressure and release, position, timing, and feel as they relate specifically to horses. Through these pursuits I feel I’ve gained a much clearer understanding of classical training principles.

Dressage is still way hard! Developing the feel for throughness and straightness is a lifetime endeavor. But, now I feel like I have a handle of some of the pieces that make it possible for me to progress further. Tulsa kind of made it necessary for me to explore these side roads. Now that I have, I can only say, take the scenic route! It definitely makes the trip interesting, more enjoyable, and ultimately may turn out to be the shorter route.

Related posts:

1. Clicker Training: Myth vs. Reality
2. The Paradigm Shift: How a Different Way of Thinking Can Change Everything
3. Ah, expectations

Once the horse understands the clicker you can use it for liberty work in the round pen. Photo by Cynthia Mallard.

Unfortunately, at the moment clicker training still conjures up visions of silly pet tricks or dolphin training in the minds of many people. As such many serious riders take exception to the idea that clicker training could have any legitimate place in horse training. In fact, here are some actual objections that I have encountered in my discussions with horse people about clicker training. I’ll respond to each one in turn. Since I’m a dressage rider myself these objections usually come up in the context of dressage but really it could be any discipline.

Myth 1: People who employ clicker training in conjunction with dressage training are looking for a quick fix to problems that should be resolved by learning to ride better.

Reality: If only it were that easy! There are no quick fixes, no short cuts. We all need to ride better and that is simply a given. In order to use clicker training effectively you will need to add study of it to your existing education efforts. Some may think that this is a “side road” or a distraction that only wastes valuable time. But I have to disagree strongly with this sentiment. Here is why.

It is just not enough to be able to ride well. There is a big difference between the ‘good rider’ and the ‘great horseman’. The road from rider to horseman involves a lot more knowledge than can be gained just by taking riding lessons with your favorite big name clinician. Lessons and dressage instruction is important but if you are really serious about dressage you will make it your business to learn everything you can about horses and training. Doing some clicker training is one very powerful way to learn about how to train. You simply can’t have too many training skills!

Myth 2: Horses-unlike dolphins-do not normally communicate via clicking sounds and therefore clicker training can not be used successfully with horses.

Reality: Although it is true that horses do not communicate with clicks this fact is not a relevant factor when it comes to clicker training. After all dolphins are actually trained with a whistle! The fact is, any signal that can be reproduced reliably and consistently can be used as the “click”. For example, a buzz, a bell, a whistle, a touch, a flash of light or even a word can work.

What is important about the click is not the signal itself but the job it is intended to do. Its purpose is to “mark” (meaning highlight or point to) desired behavior for reward. The laws of learning tell us that ‘behavior that is rewarded will tend to increase in frequency’. So anything that gets marked and rewarded will start to occur more frequently. If you choose to mark, say, energetic forward movement you will get more energetic forward movement. Once you are getting the forward movement you can connect it to your leg aids. You can use the same concept for any of a number of ideas you want to make clear to the horse.

Clicker training can enhance ground work and longeing.

Myth 3: The click of a clicker can not possibly replace the full symphony of aids which is dressage riding.

Reality: Of course not and it is not supposed to. See above. The click is intended to mark performance you want to reward. You are not going to, say, click once for shoulder in and twice for half pass. Nor will you touch the horse’s right ear for right shoulder in. Or any other such silliness. The aids for shoulder in are still the aids for shoulder in. But, really, this is jumping way ahead. By the time you have reached the “symphony of aids” stage you are already deep into the horse’s training and long past the those days of clicking for the thought of looking at a cone.

If you had been using clicker training it would have been started well before this point and used to help lay the foundation that leads to that harmonious symphony. People who are using clicker training as part of their dressage training use it to help support the early learning process so that there can be a more harmonious experience down the road.

Many people seem to think that dressage training is limited to the part that occurs while riding. And therefore all one needs in order to train a horse is to ‘ride better’. While we all do need to ride better we all also need to extend our education to all aspects of training-both on the ground and under saddle. An important part of all training endeavors is understanding how the horse’s actions are influenced by reinforcement and punishment. There is no better way to develop oneself in this area than by clicker training your horse.

Myth 4: Well if clicker training is a reward, like saying “good boy”, and since I already praise my horse then clicker training is redundant and unnecessary.

Reality: It is true that the phrase “good boy” (and other praise words and phrases) are considered Conditioned Reinforcers just as the click of the clicker is a conditioned reinforcer. By conditioned we mean that the horse had to learn it stood for “something good”. It is not something good all by itself, like food is something good, or a nice rubdown is something good. These are considered primary reinforcers-the ‘real’ reward. The click is just a ‘stand in’ to buy time till you get to the real reward. Now if you were to connect “good boy” often enough with tidbits of food or rubdowns you could condition the horse to feel warm and fuzzy when you say “good boy”. Which is basically how praise works.

Many people do praise their horses. This is a nice thing to do but most people don’t use praise as part of a their larger reinforcement strategy. In fact, many people don’t seem to have a larger reinforcement strategy at all. There may be praising occurring but it doesn’t seem to correlate with specific advancements in learning or performance. For these horses this praise business is just so much background noise. I call it the “halo” effect. It might conjure up good feelings but in a generic sense.

What if the positive reinforcement (praise/rewards) were strategically applied to the training? More like a “laser” rather than a halo? Well that would be clicker training. Clicker training is based on these simple premises:

o Behavior that is rewarded will tend to increase in frequency.

o Primary reinforcers (pleasurable things like food or rubbing) can be linked to a marker signal (the click).

o Desired behaviors can be captured with the marker signal. Desired behaviors may include moving forward, stopping, turning or anything else you want to get the horse to do. Once basics are under way the savvy trainer may then click qualities of performance like stretching, or bending, or lifting the base of the neck.

o Behavior that is so marked or captured will tend to increase in frequency.

o Behavior that is occurring on a regular basis can be associated with a signal from the trainer (such as certain pressures from the leg, changes in body weight distribution, changes in body position, changes in rein contact) so that the behavior can be requested at will. These would be the basic aids.

Once the basic aids are understood they can be combined in the traditional ways in order to construct any movement desired.

In order to make this whole process work it needs to be started before you climb into the saddle! Once you are in the saddle your rate of reinforcement with the clicker, which had been very high during the initial training period will tend to taper off after the first few lessons. Until finally you may only click for exceptional moments a handful of times during a lesson.

Myth 5: Clicker training is only good for tricks and trick training is an insult to the horse’s dignity.

Reality: Insult is in the eye of the beholder. I won’t try to convince you that tricks are not an insult to any one’s dignity. But I’ll say this. Tricks should be fun. And, my own experience with horses is that they enjoy a “good laugh” now and again like the rest of us. So, train a ‘trick’ or two if for no other reason than to learn how to set a goal, break it down and figure out a way to train it.

However all that left aside hopefully by now you can see that there is a very serious side to clicker training and it most definitely can be used as part of your horse’s “serious” dressage training. Don’t be surprised though when, as a result of clicker training, your dressage horse starts to discover that even dressage can be more fun.

For work in hand the click can highlight those moments you would like the horse to seek out again. Photo by Cynthia Mallard.

Myth 6: You would not be allowed to carry a clicker or make noises during a dressage test so clicker training can not work for dressage.

Reality: It is true that you wouldn’t be allowed to carrying a clicker in a dressage test. But then there certain championship tests in which you are not allowed to carry a whip either. However this doesn’t keep people from training with a whip before and after the test.

So if you had been using clicker training as part of your training approach, the assumption would be that by the time you get to the testing stage you would be showing the finished results of your training. At least for the level you are testing at. In other words, the time for clicking little steps would be past. Once the horse understands what is expected of him he will continue to do it with only minimal reinforcement which can be done when you leave the testing arena.

Most of these myths are just a matter of misunderstanding about what clicker training is and how it fits in. What more dressage riders are discovering is that not only is there no conflict (between clicker training and dressage) but learning about clicker training has made it possible for them to tap into that elusive relaxed and playful approach to training that the old masters spoke about but they were unable to figure out how they did it.

I will sum up with a quote from The Complete Training of Horse and Rider by Alois Podhajsky (emphasis is mine):

“After a successful exercise, it is effective to walk for a while on a loose rein. The horse will soon accept this gesture from the rider-a break from the work-as a reward, and try to merit a repetition. It is interesting to note that Xenophon specified as a reward that the rider should, there and then, dismount and lead his horse to the stable, not ride him back. Food or sugar after as successful exercise is another way of showing appreciation, provided it is given immediately. From the manner in which rewards and punishments are administered, interesting conclusions can be drawn as to the character and mind of the rider.”

Related posts:

1. Developing a Soft Feel with Clicker Training
2. Why Clicker Training?
3. It is Not About the Food

What if there was a way to make a big impression on a horse without having to ‘get big’ in order to do it?

This is the first best reason to consider clicker training. Remember, clicker training isn’t a replacement for horsemanship skills. It justs gives us another tool toward achieving our primary goal: engaging the horse’s mind in the training process.

Lady was a big, stout 5 year old mare that I took into training. She’d already had some poor experiences at the hand of a so-called ‘trainer’. She’d actually been knocked unconscious as a result of being longed in side reins and flipped over. So, when she came to me she had already decided that the best defense was a good offense. I watched her interact with my other horses in the field. The gelding who pushed everyone else around couldn’t get her to back down. She kept fighting back. When I brought her into the round pen and moved her around a little bit I saw the same mentality. If the horses in the field couldn’t get a change in her by getting ‘big’ I had no chance. So, I started clicker training her.

It was like a light bulb went off in her head. Once I turned her on to the idea that the click meant ‘come get the food’ I started rewarding her for looking at me, following me, following a feel, moving forward, backing, moving laterally and so on. One or two times she tried to bowl me over and I needed to hold pretty firm. But when she got rewarded for backing off, she relaxed and let those thoughts go. You know that mare turned out to be a really sweet and reliable girl. And, this is the really interesting and heartwarming part, she stopped feeling like she needed to fight with the other horses too. It was like she just let all that worry go on every front. She was at peace.

Another way that many people have experienced the benefit of clicker training is when needing to deal with a horse who is recovering from an injury. The vet will prescribe x-amount of stall rest and then–HA!–hand walking for x-months. Riiiiight. And we do this how without the silly horse re-injuring himself?

A friend of mine had a 4 yr old Dutch WB who’s horse tore a suspensory ligament in a pasture incident. She wondered how on earth she was going to keep this athletic youngster calm enough to Just Walk when he wanted to be a kite at the end of the lead rope. So, she started clicker training him.

Once turned on to the game (which she started in a stall) she had a way to keep him sufficiently mentally stimulated that he didn’t need to bounce around like a fool and re-injure himself. He recovered from his injury and eventually she trained him to I1. Her experience with clicker training served her well throughout his continued training.

I know of numerous other similar examples of using clicker training as a means to engage the brain during a layup.

My philosophy is if it is this good for the infirm what’s to keep me from working with fit horses like this as well? Not a thing. And that is the reason that I incorporate clicker training into the program with all horses I work with. Do I have to ? Not at all. But why tie one hand behind my back just to prove I can?

Related posts:

1. Clicker Training: Myth vs. Reality
2. Developing a Soft Feel with Clicker Training
3. The Paradigm Shift: How a Different Way of Thinking Can Change Everything

The reason I write so much about clicker training, rather than about horsemanship or dressage, is because so much quality material is already available on those topics. (Check out my Other Resources page for suggestions.) My goal is to find the point at which all of these concepts can intersect. For me that point is what “Getting to Yes” is about.

The rule, that applies no matter what you are training, is behavior that is rewarded will tend to occur more often. All trainers depend on the horse finding doing what you want more desirable than not doing it. Some people may use the method of forcing the horse to “want” to cooperate by making not-cooperating more unpleasant. This puts the emphasis on the “wrong” thing. Clicker training turns the equation around and looks instead only at the goal, the right thing. By giving the right thing the most attention and reinforcement you simply get more of the right thing.

“Some fellas will say, make the right thing easy and the wrong thing difficult, and that may work for them. But, I say, why not just make the right thing obvious?” — Bill Dorrance

Clicker training is a training method that utilizes a marker signal (the click of a clicker) to highlight desired behaviors which are then rewarded, often with food but not necessarily so. The mark “tells” the horse exactly which behaviors are worth repeating. The behaviors that are marked, and therefore rewarded, are behaviors that the horse will seek to perform again. Okay you say, so what do I do? Click when the horse does a flying change?

Well not exactly. The first behaviors you start with are not finished products. For example you would not start by clicking a flying change. That would be much too big a chunk to work with. You would start with a very tiny bit of behavior which could occur long before-possibly years before-the flying change.

But we get ahead of ourselves here. So let’s roll back to the very beginning. How do you get started with the clicker? These beginning steps will seem far removed from dressage. But hang in there. To do anything right you must do it thoroughly and start from the beginning.

Almost everyone starts clicker training by starting with a super-ultra-simple can’t get it wrong behavior. One very common approach is to teach the horse to touch his nose to an object. Say one of those small orange training cones. This isn’t the only way to start and it isn’t even the only way that I would start. But, I’ll explain targeting as an example.

Here’s how you’d do it.

Put the horse in a stall with a stall guard up. You stand outside the stall door with the cone and clicker in one hand. You’ll use the other hand to dole out the treats. Have your pockets filled with lots of very small tidbits of food. Hay pellets are a good choice. But if the horse turns his nose up at this, then use something he will “do anything for.” Perhaps mints or bits of carrot. Whatever will make it worth his while to play the game. But keep the pieces very small… like the size of the tip of your pinkey finger. You are going to hand out a lot of them!

Hold out the cone one inch from the horse’s nose. Click the clicker one time when he sniffs the cone (and he will because horses are by nature very curious animals). Hide the cone behind your back as you simultaneously feed one hay pellet. Repeat this 3-5 times. Make it ridiculously easy for the horse to be successful so that the clicks occur within a few seconds of one another. During the early learning stages you want to keep the “rate of reinforcement” high.

Repeat the same scenario again another 3 to 5 times but now hold the cone a few inches away and wait there for the horse to move toward it with his nose. He will. When he does, again click the clicker, hide the cone, and feed one hay pellet. Repeat. Again, although you are making it “harder” (by moving the target) you don’t want to make it so hard that there is too much time taking place between clicks. Keep the “click rate” high.

The most common mistake beginners make is making it too hard for the horse to be successful and therefore they don’t click often enough.

Continue in this manner positioning the cone a little bit further away and/or either higher or lower than you have been. You are looking to see the horse seeking out the cone where ever you place it. Always click and treat every time he touches the cone.

After about 10 or 15 minutes of playing the Training Game give the horse a break. You can start again in a few minutes or forget about it until the next day.

Soon, either in the first session or certainly in the second the horse will be clearly seeking out the cone to touch it where ever you put it. Why? Because you have consistently rewarded him each and every time he did. So of course he’d go looking for it. Right about now, as you realize how incredibly quickly your horse learned to do this and how willing he was to do it, you may start to wonder why some other things-the things that are so important to you-are such a struggle. It is a most Excellent Question and one that may change your entire perspective on training.

What I am talking about is what I call the “Paradigm Shift.” The Paradigm Shift is that shift in your thinking that causes you to believe with absolute certainty that if the horse knew what you wanted and was able to do it he would be doing it. Not just sometimes with some horses, but all the time with all horses. After the Paradigm Shift you see all horses, even the most difficult, in a different light. One that gives them the benefit of the doubt rather than assuming that they are just ‘trying to get out of working’ or are ‘pulling one over on you’ or whatever you might think when things are not going as you had hoped. It also comes with a great responsibility. Often times the reason the horse isn’t “able” is because the rider is in the way.

Now I can talk about all that till I’m blue but it won’t mean a thing until you start asking yourself that “Excellent Question”. Why are things so difficult with my horse?

But for now, let’s just get back to the practical day to days.

What did the horse learn in the cone touching lessons? The horse learned that when he hears the click of the clicker that #1, food is coming and #2 whatever he was doing when he heard the click is the reason he’s getting the food. When the horse is clear on these two key points, especially #2, we can say that the light bulb of understanding has turned on. You know that the light is on when the horse perks up and begins to seek out the treat when he hears the click. Soon the horse appears to be seeking the click more than the food by his efforts to find behaviors that make you click. When this is happening we say that the horse is clicker ‘savvy’. He really ‘gets’ the game and the point has become less about the food and more about the game itself. He’s learned how to learn and he’s learned it can be fun.

I have to say that I never get tired of watching a horse’s light bulb start to glow and then suddenly-Snap!-the light is burning brightly. You know the light is ON when as soon as the horse hears the click no matter what he’s doing he screeches to a halt and looks you square in the eye. I think if more people had the chance to see this process take place more would understand why so many people are crazy for clicker training.

Once the proverbial light bulb is ‘on’ you now have a very powerful tool in your training tool kit. A way to reward the horse with laser accuracy. It is up to you to figure out how to use this tool toward accomplishing your riding goals. If you need help figuring all that out, well, that’s what I do. Let me know how I can help. You might also enjoy reading my book which answers the question, “I’ve taught my horse to touch a target. Now what?”

Related posts:

1. Finding what motivates a change
2. Why Clicker Training?
3. Clicker Training: Myth vs. Reality

This mare is 10 years old, and pretty set in her ways of bracing and leaving when she is uncertain.

The first session I spent just getting to know her in the stall and turning her on to c/t. She got it pretty quick.

Next session in the round pen she was so far gone (mentally back at the paddock with her herd mates) that food wasn’t even on the radar. I spent the whole time just patting the ground with the longe whip to get her attention. Starting with an ear. She’s flighty, so you blow on her and she was cantering around. Not what I wanted but it was where she was at. I waited. I wanted her to stop and check in with me when I tapped the ground with the whip. Owner asked, won’t this be expecting too much if the whip has always meant go? I just shrugged and smiled…Oh ye of little faith. (to tell the truth, I wasn’t even all that sure if it would be possible that day) I persisted. Eventually the mare did stop and looked at me, a little cock to her head. What??? I said, to the mare, nothing, just that. Thanks! The owner was surprised! So, slowly, she started to let thoughts of the other horses who she was fretting about not being able to see go. When she finally walked over she was calm and a little more ready to let me in. We quit for the day. The owner, being a quick study, followed up with the mare a couple times and told me that things went quite smoothly.

I wanted to see how the mare felt on the lead rope so the next time I worked with her (a couple weeks later) we did some rope work. I introduced following a feel left, right and down because she harbors a lot of tension in her neck. The idea is to show her that my feel through the lead rope to the halter (eventually reins to the bit) can be a Comfort and she can relax. I c/t this a lot. I take note that she loses her ability to stay with me if she gets going too fast. So, I take trotting off the table. I concentrate just on c/t for following that feel down and little inside flexions. When I lose her mentally I notice she refuses the food. When she is starting to offer some stretching down and is a little more relaxed, I quit.

The next visit was a week or so later. Back in the round pen on the lead rope. To start she is a lot more OK which was pretty cool right there. I continue with following a feel down (nose to the ground) and lateral flexions. It needs to be softly offered. I am clicking a lot but I’m also very conscious of how it feels in my hand. If it is pushy or hard I wait, keep asking for soft, click for soft–staying with me. I don’t feed if she looks off into the distance after the click. I click for behavior and feed for position. In this context that means that after I click I ask her to turn her face to me, really look at me (typically I’m standing at her shoulder), in order to get the food. Everything between the click and the actual delivery counts.

People often ask if they should perfect one behavior before moving on. I don’t. To me it isn’t the individual specific behaviors like turning or head down or whatever that a the most crucial thing. How it feels is what is crucial. So, in performing these various moves I have numerous opportunities to clarify my intent vis a vis the FEEL of it. So, with the mare I move between the ‘head down’ work (follow a feel down) and little turns on the rope. Some times, I see if she can follow a feel through an inside turn, click for walking, click for tipping her head in the right direction, click for stepping the shoulder through, this gets pretty good. Sometimes, I see if she can follow a feel through an outside turn, that one she has to follow the feel away from me and ‘unwind’. She finds this really difficult to the left, the side she really protects. I stay there a little bit and work on just the softening aspects and then continue. I go back and forth, checking on the little pieces, integrating, seeing how things have softened up how much more willing she is.

We were at this quite a while. The owner notes that after 1.5hrs the mare is still very present and significantly more relaxed. In the past, the mare would have long since lost her patience and her willingness. In fact, she might have become more braced, rather than less. We both view this as a very good sign indeed.

My newly acquired massage experience is factoring in too, which is so cool. In previous posts I’ve mentioned how Jim Masterson’s method depends on getting feedback from the horse. A lot of ‘eye blinking’ and ‘lip twitching’ tells us that the horse is aware of our presence on a spot they are concerned about. Time spent on this area with gentle touching/massage eventually leads to lip licking/releasing, sometimes yawning. SO interesting to see this mare processing like this when I’m in ‘waiting for a change” through a feel on the rope, I gently stay with it (sending the tiniest of gentle massages through the line) and just like with the massage, she softens and releases with lips licking. I notice that this is pretty much the same thing Phillipe Karl does with his flexions with the bridle.

I will continue in this manner each time I work with the horse testing to see if I can go a little further or deeper until I can have that same soft feel in all gaits on the ground and under saddle.

The mare’s owner and I were talking later about how HARD this process is to articulate. Which is why step by step written instructions are so inadequate. It is NOT a linear process! It is all about how it feels. You present a thought, you wait for a reply, and then you respond. You go back and forth like this until there is clarity between you. What I’ve described here is about a given horse on a set of given days at the beginning of our journey together. Your horse’s situation might have me doing much the same or I might need to adapt my approach to accommodate some unique challenge the horse presents for whatever reason. Hopefully, even with that in mind this story might be useful to read!

Related posts:

1. Why Clicker Training?
2. Clicker Training: Myth vs. Reality
3. It is Not About the Food

This is where, for me, Horsemanship is crucial and where modern dressage misses the boat. I specifically say ‘modern’ dressage because I don’t think that it supposed to be this way. But it seems to me that in the hustle to achieve competitive goals the matter of how the horse feels seems to be lost. Too frequently riders just start taking dressage riding lessons without lessons in horsemanship. Why is that? Frankly, no dressage trainer that I worked with over the years ever said the problem you’re having is more fundamental and that is where we need to begin. Now certainly there must be some dressage trainers who do address these issues but it just isn’t part of most people’s regular experience. How do we learn how to help the horse to be ready for dressage (or any other performance) training?

For me, it was necessary to go in search of horsemanship skills and I found what I was looking for in the work of such great horsemen as Bill Dorrance. Bill wrote, IMO, the greatest book on horsemanship–ever! It is called “True Horsemanship Through Feel” and it is a Must Read for all serious horsemen/women. Also worthy of note is his co-author’s (Leslie Desmond) website. Leslie has carried the torch of Bill’s work since his passing not long after his book was published.

I also found the exploration into clicker training to be essential to my journey as well. It really brought home to me what the old masters meant when they said, “Ask often. Expect little. Reward generously.” All of this together — the dressage, the horsemanship, and the clicker training is what really opened my eyes. Perhaps it can for you, too.

Related posts:

1. A Better Way to Deal with Bad Behavior
2. Changing Habits One Step at a Time
3. The Paradigm Shift: How a Different Way of Thinking Can Change Everything

A most excellent ‘for instance’ occurs frequently when doing groundwork in a halter. I have observed how some folks struggle to get the horse to walk a circle around them. Seems like a simple thing. It is, but it isn’t always so easy because of those little things that count to the horse. Here are some examples of little things that can ruin your ground work session.

Clenched fists

I find that horses are much happier when we allow the rope to drape over our open hand rather than clenching the rope with a hard fist. Horses are so sensitive that they can feel the difference between an open hand and a closed hand. As soon as you close your hand the horse will perceive this you as pulling him in toward you. If you have a horse who you have a hard time getting to go out on the circle check that your leading hand is open.

Walking backward

Another common reason why the horse is falling in on us is because we are walking backward and thusly pulling the horse toward us. Marry that with the clenched fists and now the horse is being given two signals to come in rather than stay out. It is crucial that your feet walk in a circle going forward. The circle may be small, about the size of a trash can lid or even smaller, but you must walk forward on that little circle.

Chasing with the popper

One of the hardest things to wrap our head around is the idea that we must cease acting when the horse is acting. If we don’t the horse has no idea what is supposed to be meaningful and what is just ‘white noise’. So, if the horse is moving his feet, then be still –I mean, stop twirling the rope!! You do need to keep walking though. Walking forward. Then, when you stop your feet and close your hand the horse will do what he is supposed to do and that is stop!

I know from working with folks on resolving these very issues that these can be very hard habits to break without someone on the side reminding you again and again to Open your Hand, Walk Forward, and Be Quiet. But, once you do the improvement in the horse will be nearly instant so you will get a big reward for it.

Related posts:

1. Asking permission
2. Watch the feet
3. How to get a horse OK with clippers

Here’s the thing. If a person is unable to change this situation in a few sessions then what it tells me is one or both of the following: a serious lack of ideas when it comes to actually TRAINING (not just hoping they figure it out) and/or a serious lack of willingness to pay attention to how the HORSE is feeling.

Here’s what I would do instead. First, turn the horse on to clicker training. This is especially valuable when you are dealing with a horse who comes to the table with a whole lotta ‘ideas’ that aren’t the best. Second I would spend time with that horse on the ground showing him how I’m gonna make the ‘right thing obvious’. I get his attention and he starts to let go of the worry he’s carrying inside and the need to flee that comes with that. Through rope work I show him how to follow a feel. I do this rope work in a variety of locations not the least of which is while standing ON the mounting block.

With me standing on the mounting block, I have the horse do circles around me and most important changes of direction (a figure eight). This allows me to lead the horse up to the block without getting off. I don’t make him stand. But I do click him every time the saddle is right in front of me. Pretty soon, because click means treat, the horse is putting the saddle in front of me pretty regular. They aren’t stoopid. Then I put a foot in the stirrup, click/treat. Repeat that a few times. Move the saddle around, click/treat. Put a little weight on the stirrup, click/treat. Start to swing my leg over, click/treat. And so on till I’m sitting in the saddle, click/treat.

Now you go through that process every time you mount (it will get shorter every time), which is not that big of a deal, and soon enough (in a few days) the worst that is happening is that the horse expects a treat as soon as you get on. Now IMO that is a LOT more pleasant that being off to the races as soon as the leg swings over.

How the horse feels after you get on is a whole ‘nuther story but I’d handle that pretty much the same as the above.

Check out this video for an example. This is an actual training session with a horse who is in the habit of taking off as soon as the rider gets in the saddle. It is all connected to her general worry about being ridden. A step by step, positive reinforcement based approach has made a world of difference for this mare.

Related posts:

1. How to get a horse OK with clippers
2. Getting a horse feeling OK inside about having his feet handled
3. Getting a Horse to Work WITH her Massage Therapist

It is now 3 months later. Progress is slow but I generally only work with Pamela once a week although recently while her owners were away they asked me to spend extra time with her which allowed me to move the process along a bit.

According to the previous owner, an ‘old-timey’ Tennessee horseman, Pamela was bred to be a show horse and thusly was just ‘high strung’. This was to explain why she would just take off running when Michele got on.

This was also the reason given as to why we would never be able to ride her in a snaffle. She had to be ridden in a long shanked curb bit.

Oh Ye of Little Faith.

Of course, Michele just ignored the man’s ravings confident in my certainty that Pamela really didn’t want to run off like that it was just that she didn’t know any other way to be.

And so here we are. Baby steps baby steps. The real problem, that the old owner just can’t see, is the deep worry in Pamela. As soon as you get on her first thought is to get back to the barn ASAP! So, our rides are all about making 1) being away from the barn a good thing, and 2) any and all efforts to relax and bring her attention to me is a Really Good Thing. She is trying SO hard! She really wants to let it all go but as yet still doesn’t fully trust that those old days are really dead and gone. But she is getting there. Last ride ended with a good half a minute of totally relaxed, neck out and down, regular horse walk. I’m so proud of her!

Related posts:

1. It’s like a miracle!
2. Hard to Catch
3. Developing a Soft Feel with Clicker Training