Help the horse help himself

Beautiful Mustang posted a video of Parelli teaching a kid how to help a horse find comfort under saddle. Although Parelli doesn't have Rashid's mastery of people skills, I think he did a great job with the kid.

Of course the kid was nervous and looked very foolish several times and Parelli got a little edge to his voice, but nowhere as snappy as Brannaman. The kid has a lovely Forrest Gump accent.

The video presents a possible turning point for this kid where he can go from being a rider to being a horseman, that is, if he really takes it to heart and doesn't fall back into his bad habits. He comes from a strong kick and pull culture.

See if you can get past the saddling part because I almost couldn't! The kid was both meticulous and sloppy simultaneously with his three (!) saddle blankets. Then he went to put the breastcollar on before the girth and I was yelling at the computer, "No, no, noooooo" and Parelli stopped him, whew. Then Parelli told him a possibly-fictional anecdote about how he killed his saddle by fastening the breastcollar before the girth.

The horse almost got broken in half when cinched up, but that's how the kid was taught. I loved that Parelli jumped off his horse, put a strap around the kid, and pulled. Got empathy?

I did not agree with his method of getting the horse to stop grazing in-hand because Parelli did not know the horse nor the kid, and he put the kid in danger of being kicked by telling him, "Hit him on the butt!" But it was nice to see the horse's expression, "Oh, you want my attention now?" The horses weren't forbidden to graze, they just had to quickly stop when asked.

Then the kid got on and was a fine rider, to my surprise. But I would have posted that trot.

The horse was a "problem horse" because or rearing but you could see right away that the horse was trained in speed sports and really thought his job was to go fast. The horse was actually a laid back type, falling asleep while saddling. When mounted, gotta go, bye!

The kid was confident enough to completely drop the reins and let him run as fast as he wanted, but those panels might not be tall enough for some horses in that situation.  I can only see myself doing that on a horse I knew very well and trusted. But the kid was still in his immortal years, and his dream is to be a cowboy, so he just let the horse run. Remember Rashid's story about the runaway horse, how he risked his life trying to "just let the horse run"? I believe later he said something about not trying this at home.

What makes this Natural Horsemanship, I wondered. Turning a horse to slow it down is something everyone learns, the horse does not have a choice (well, most horses follow their noses, but some brace and keep going full tilt). Is it NH because it's only one rein? I know that's relevant because 2 reins to stop either won't work, or will add entrapment. Oddly, later Parelli lets the kid use two reins to slow down (but in a non-forceful way).

The training was not that amazing, really, it was logical. The great part was seeing the kid learn feel and perhaps change a paradigm. And the fact that most of the time the horse was being given a choice in what to do.

I think Parelli cheated by blocking the horse with his own to get him to slow down, using his horse when the kid just couldn't slow down. But when he saw the horse start to become gate sour he immediately stopped that. I wonder if this was an unedited film.

Just like WSchiller teaching a troubled Warmblood to relax, Parelli taught the kid how to show his horse it's OK to relax.

And then the horse did, and the horse was amazed. As P said, "He can't believe it."

Parelli repeated "Let him go, let him choose" a hundred times, and "Relax, relax, gently, gently" many more times. (But later admitted, "You can't make nobody relax. RELAX, HURRY UP AND RELAX!")

The kid's timing wasn't great, but hopefully by the end of the hour he had a sense for when to release pressure.

Some fun quotes, "Let me fix his forelock here, my wife would be upset."

"When you let go of the reins, there's only one thing left - the truth."

"You taught me how to make my horse relax." P, "You mean ALLOW him to."

"See if he can find comfort - rub on him."

"Let him eat let him eat let him eat!"