Whoa Means Whoa!

Do you find your horse getting bossy and pushing through asking for a stop?

Do they dance around, not wanting to hold their feet still for more than 5 seconds?

Do they walk off when you try climbing up in the saddle?

If you've answered yes to any, or all of these questions, your horse doesn't have a sense of purpose.

Let me explain…

Horses, just like us, need a sense of purpose. In the wild if they are to stop - there's a reason.

That reason may be there's a hole in the ground, a funny sound or smell up ahead, no more food, unsafe terrain, etc.

So they turn when they stop.

Think about it this way. How frustrated do you get when driving through stop and go traffic, or It seems like you hit every red light in town. Just let me gooooo already!

This is how your horse feels when you're riding and you stop him, then continue forward.

It doesn't take long before he's like what is the point?! I'm the pray animal here, how about we stop wasting so much time and energy stopping & going, and I'll just do us both the favor of continuing on from point a to b.

Here are my 3 tips to fix it:

1) Lateral Flexion - always flex your horses head from side to side when you first mount and every time you stop. This reinforces softness, attention onto you, and that you're not in a hurry.

2) Back Up - every time you stop for a while, back up. It can be 2 steps or 10. Just make sure they're soft & straight, not reluctant and bracing, and change up the number of steps each time to keep your horse guess.

After a while you don't have to back the horse up every time. Our goal is to get him thinking backwards when we say whoa, BUT he does not move backwards unless asked.

3) Change Direction - every time you stop your horse, change directions before you walk off. I don't care if it's 5 degrees or 355 degrees, just go a different direction. This will instill purpose to your horse.

He doesn't need to know why you went a different way, but he knows that he had to stop his feet because change was coming.

If you start incorporating these 3 tips every time you work your horse on the ground or under saddle, you horse will start not only respecting the whoa, but he will physically and mentally start becoming so much more softer & respectful to you.

Let me know how this works for you!