It's All About The Philosphy

A few hours ago I published a post about how I had lost track of my purpose. I got so focused on riding and training that I lost the relationship and the trust. So today I determined not to worry about getting on his back, but not to put it off either. I just wanted to develop our relationship, because that would naturally lead to riding. I had high hopes for the evening but I had no idea just how awesome it would be.

I walked out and tried to catch Gambler, who was way out in the South pasture. He looked up at me, nickered, and started trotting. I thought "awwww, how sweet." And then he trotted right past me and chased Kezi all the way back to the barn, leaving me to eat dust behind them. Thanks Gamby. Much appreciated. At least they had the decency to run around me instead of over the top of me.

I look so cheerful wandering through the pasture. :P

After we fed the horses, I took Gambler out into the arena. I've never really played the Parelli games in order with him. He did surprisingly well! I didn't need to use very much pressure at all to get him to lower his head, back up, yield his forequarters and hindquarters from either side, or come forward to me. I introduced him to the game of circling as the Parelli's do it, which is slightly different from how I've done it so far. I normally face him as he circles me, but they stand facing one direction and expect the horse to keep going around them. At first Gambler was really confused, but now he will go two to three full circles at the walk without checking in with me.

The barn owner brought Kezi into the arena for a while to see how she would react to a tarp I had set up under some trot poles. It was the first time we've ever tried working with Kezi and Gambler at the same time. Gambley was a little anxious when Kezi was walking through the barn and he couldn't see her, but as soon as she was in the arena he was fine.

Kezi photobombing ;)

Since my goal for the day was to play with Gambler and rekindle the bond between us, I set up a few fun obstacles to play with. Gambler's favorite! My goal was to do some liberty work with him because I haven't in such a long time, but I started by leading him on the 12' line. He didn't have any problem whatsoever. 

Then came the moment of truth: I took the lead rope off. Since we haven't done anything like this in so long, I really didn't know what to expect. Gambley surprised me! Here is a video of him going over the tarp/trot poles. 

There were definitely times that Gambler just walked (or trotted) away from me, but he always came back. 

A couple of times he dodged around the tarp, but he loved the jump. He even trotted over it a couple times. 

licking and chewing

Somebody had an itchy chin.

Signs of relaxation: lowered head and licking and chewing motions.

I asked him to walk onto the tarp, stop . . .

back up a few steps . . .

and walk on.

 I was tempted to only show pictures of Gambler being good and edit all the "oops moments" out of my videos, but I decided against it. I want to show anyone who would ever want to try liberty that it isn't going to be perfect in the beginning and that is okay. Your horse is going to walk away from you. He's going to walk around the obstacles or awkwardly stand looking at you. There were a few times Gambler stood looking at me and I knew if I walked after him he would walk away. So I waited. It took patience, but every time I waited, he walked over to me.

He's thinking about coming to me.

Still waiting. 

And he comes over to see what I'm up (or down) to. 

Snuggles 

Gambler trotting over the jump at liberty.

I let him check out the mounting block too. 

But wait . . .there's more! The best part is that I got all the way on my horse today! I didn't "ride" him because he was holding still and I was just laying over his back. But I jumped over him sideways many times on both sides and stayed on there quite a while. There was a point when he saw my boot out of the corner of his eye and spooked, but he never bucked or anything like that. I fell off a ton (landing on my feet) while he was standing still. It is way harder to balance while laying sideways over a horse than you would think! I think it's ironic and amazing that the one day I didn't put all my effort into getting on his back was the day I finally mounted my horse.