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NEWS & ARTICLES : Confidence Is Key

Feel, balance, and timing are all crucial to success with horses. But add the element of confidence, and take another huge leap forward in your progress with your horse. In the photo below, Rebekka helps a young horse, Sophie at right, gain confidence riding with others, while Raquel gains confidence in her own horse, Micco.
Photo is courtesy of Christine Minky.

Ever heard the phrase “Horses know if you are afraid”? I’ve heard that fear causes one to produce a certain scent, or pheromone, that’s easily recognized by a would-be attacker. There’s no doubt that horses read us better than we read ourselves. When you don’t know much, as far as they are concerned you aren’t a viable leader. This doesn’t lead to confidence building in the horse-human relationship. That’s why it’s wise to match a green horse with an advanced rider, and a green rider with an advanced horse.

Building confidence is a key component to a positive result. You can study, take lessons, go to clinics, and still lack confidence. The usual result is frustration because you have worked so hard, and still can’t seem to make progress with your horse. When you’re feeling this way, it often seems like no one else ever experiences that, so you feel worse yet and begin to wonder if this horse thing is really your cup of tea.

Now, I’m not talking, necessarily, about outright fear here. Lack of confidence may be as deep as a panic attack at the mere thought of mounting up, but it may also be as simple as being uncertain about how to ask a horse to take his right lead. Lack of confidence shows in someone’s uncertainty about how to accomplish things with their horse. The horse feels this lack of confidence, and additional problems always crop up.

A new student I had recently held a deep lack of confidence. Her horse was completely unhappy and had no confidence of her own, either. This young rider needed confidence, so she could impart some of that to her horse. As we worked on developing improvement on specific tasks, and the student realized that she was actually capable of controlling the horse differently than she was used to, her confidence grew. Consequently, the horse’s confidence grew. When the lesson was over, there were two distinctly happier individuals leaving the pen (three, including me).

Another individual simply couldn’t get her horse to back out of the trailer under any circumstances, no matter what she did. The mare would always just turn around and walk out. She had heard me say that if what you are doing isn’t working, change something – anything! So she finally allowed herself to get creative with her horse. She successfully taught her horse to back out of the stock trailer after loading barrels on one side, so the mare had to back out, unable to turn around. This one incident produced a series of additional positive events, because it increased the owner’s confidence in her own ability to successfully handle problems with her horses.

If confidence is a problem for you or your horse, start with your own confidence building so that you have the ability to develop it in your horse. Confidence is built through systematic development of skills, properly applied, achieving a positive and productive outcome. Sometimes in order to accomplish that, you have to be brave and try something new. Sometimes you need someone who can help you find this important key. Not everyone will find confidence in the same way, so keep searching until you find it. Confidence building in your daily life will support confidence building in your horse world, and vice versa.

Occasionally something shatters your confidence. Maybe you took a jump that was just too high, and you and your horse were not yet ready to tackle that height. Return to a level that regains both your confidence and that of your horse. Never let anyone else determine what you are ready for when you know you lack the skills or confidence to give the new level a fair, safe try. Confidence building does not include character bashing, or unsafe riding and handling practices. Anyone who pressures you too much, without commensurate safety and skill teaching, should be avoided. That would most likely end up destroying what confidence you had.

Confidence grows first in you, then it will grow in your horse. That is only one of the many things it takes for success, but it’s worth every moment of the effort. Once you experience the difference confidence makes in your horse-human relationship, you’ll wonder how you ever managed without it.