Liberating with Liberty, Positive Reinforcement and Marker Training, Postural Development Progression – Mudgee, NSW – May 10-12

CREATING CONNECTION by causing them to feel "GOOD". There are MANY ways to do this. Inadvertently much of the time people are making their horse feel "Bad". Our energy, feel, timing, mental & emotional state and the activities that we ask the horse to do all cause our horses to either feel GOOD or feel BAD. Are we over facing or overwhelming them or being repetitive and boring, asking them too much physically and causing them to be physically uncomfortable?  Are we causing our horse to feel stressed or uncomfortable or at peace, comfortable and stimulated ?

CREATING  CONNECTION because the horses know we know them and how they feel. And they know that WE CARE MORE about how they FEEL than achieving a task or outcome.

Make it a MENTAL GAME

Give your horse CHOICE

Create CURIOSITY, be STIMULATING

Use our ENERGY in a way in which we become like a MAGNET that draws them to us.

Use FOOD – Yes food is a great motivator and also a great social connector. In humans, we often meet together to have a meal, go out to lunch, have coffee, have a cup of tea, go out to dinner. I usually don't start liberty with food treats but as I advance things or use liberty to help train postural development, positive reinforcement with food is helpful in making it very clear to the horse what I am looking for and motivates them to practise repetitive things.

I often hear people say – “they are only doing it for the food”. Whilst that is not actually the truth when we use food well, even though it is very motivating, I would rather my horses do it because of food than because of the “stick” or negative consequences which is most commonly what we see. If people didn’t have sticks or other ways to pressure horses most horses wouldn’t do the things they ask. For my horses if they don’t like something for whatever reason, food is not going to get them to do it.  If things get too hard, too scary or too uncomfortable they just walk away. Food doesn’t keep them there.

There has to be something in it for them – either Intrinsic motivation (feeling good on the inside. eg. safe, relaxed, stimulating)  or Extrinsic motivation (coming from the outside, eg. in humans a pay cheque, for the horse food or something else they like) or a combination of both these motivations. Connection with us, stimulation – mental, emotional or physical stimulation, and play (also a form of stimulation) are all Intrinsic motivators. Food is an extrinsic motivator but it too also leads to intrinsic motivation by various means.

This course will teach about both intrinsic and extrinsic motivations.Giving horses CHOICE is a big motivator just in itself.CHOICE is a powerful motivator and reinforcer.

The more we employ the horse’s “seeking system”, that is, having them seeking (wanting to move towards) something positive as opposed to them moving away from something they don’t like - discomfort or any aversive, the more relaxed, calm, happy and willing a horse will be. The “seeking system” stimulates the parasympathetic nervous system, which brings the horse into relaxation, rest and digest mode and social engagement or “connecting” mode. Its opposite, using discomfort, pressure or aversives, stimulates the sympathetic nervous system which puts the horse in the flight, fight or freeze survival modes which does not lead them to building connection or social engagement and they definitely are not going to be feeling happy, playful or joyful.

So pressuring techniques (even with low grade pressure) don’t result in the most positive outcome or relationship with your horse whatever we are doing, so it is especially not going to inspire your horse to want to be with you at liberty.

• Catching - As already stated when we are catching our horses (before we get the halter on) we are working or interacting with them at liberty. We might have horses that are hard to catch for various reasons in which case we may need some options or more advanced skills for catching.
• Real Choice leads to a great Relationship - Liberty, done in way that truly gives choice is very relationship building.  It is very liberating and empowering for the horse to “truly” have choice because mostly horses feel like they have no choice. Much of the time when people think they do give the horse a choice there are negative consequences if the horse doesn’t choose the right answer. This is not real choice. If no is not an option, that is not real choice.Good horsemanship is about getting to the source of why we got a no and resolving that issue and or “Talking them into it, not forcing them into it”.Many horses, once caught, become resigned to the fact that once the halter is on they have to do whatever the human wants, whenever they want. The halter puts most horses into a state of learned helplessness. Their choice or freedom of speech and ability to have an opinion and communicate that opinion is gone or greatly diminished. For many horses this learned helplessness began the first time the little foal had a halter on. For me the real power of liberty is giving horses back freedom and choice. It is not just about being able to do “tricks” with your horse or having an obedient horse.
• Teaching new things - If you teach or introduce your horse to new things at liberty you will clearly know if you are over-facing them or going over their threshold because they will leave. When we go over threshold we induce stress, if they can leave in this moment the stress is reduced. When haltered and the horse feels they can’t get away, the stress is internalized and we have built an association with us and “that thing” to stress. This is relationship destroying. It is not always safe or possible to introduce new things at liberty but it is good when we can. When we can’t, we need to be extra vigilant about observing the horse to notice if we are going over threshold.
• Expression, Playfulness, Spectacular Movement - Horses will often be more expressive, playful and exuberant at Liberty because they feel free to express themselves both positively and negatively. Expressing themselves more positively leads into playful exuberance and better movement. When a horse’s true “play drive” comes up (meaning there is no tension, fear or stress mixed in there as well) they will move in the most engaged, collected way that they are physically capable of. In fact, quite often, because of the biochemistry related to excitement and joy, they will over-ride their physical limitations and move above and beyond what they are physically developed muscularly to do, so their body gets an experience of what a really powerfully engaged body moving with optimal biomechanics feels like.When horses truly play, remembering that true play means the absence of fear or stress, that is when in nature we see them the most correctly engaged. In pure play they use their body in the same way they need to when they carry a rider or do high level dressage movements. A lot of the time people don’t see horses in pure play. Much of the time when horses play they are also tense, because they got spooked first and that initiated the play or their default way of being is so strongly grounded in stress or tension. In these cases they are half playing and half worried and we don’t see optimal biomechanics for engagement and collection - their back is often hollow, the tail and the head are set high and the pelvis and hindlegs disengaged.The movements of high level dressage eg collected gaits and passage and piaffe, are  movements that horses naturally do when they play. So to my way of thinking, having the horses perform to their highest potential in these movements requires that they feel playful, not resigned, robotic or just going through the motions to avoid aversives. Liberty is one of the ways horses can first experience “true play” with a human. This makes it a very valuable training tool when it is done without pressure.
• Just for Fun – Liberty is often a good thing to do just because it is fun. We can really experience the feeling of the “Boy and the Black stallion” playing on the beach at liberty.
• Skill Development – Liberty is a great way to develop or check your connection and communication (body language and energy) skills. We need to be more precise and clear with the safety net of the lead rope gone.
• Variety – It is something different and another way to exercise your horse
• Tricks or exhibition or demonstration – You could use liberty for this and there is nothing wrong with that if it is done in a positive way for the horse, but hopefully you have realised that liberty is not just a trick or about teaching your horse tricks. The measure of a horseman or horsewoman is not about their ability to have an obedient horse that is too scared to leave and does a bunch of tricks, but rather the quality of connection, communication, communion, softness, joy and pleasure that the horse and human experience together in either just being or in doing something together.