Sharing territory
May 26th, 2009 by Carolyn Resnick Method
Hello. On Sunday and Monday I took part in the first of my new Waterhole Rituals Insider Circle Program and had a wonderful time! It was so valuable to me to hear all the questions and where people are having challenges and I do hope my answers helped the Insider Circle Members who took part.
I thought it would be useful for everyone if I fed back some of the answers I gave as you may be having some of the same challenges.
A question came in from Marsha, who posted the question below and you can read my answer beneath that.
Thank you Carolyn, for a wonderful start. I took my almost 2 year old filly into the arena, after the session with you. When I sent her away, she first looked, very surprised, usually I just walk away from them, when I want my space. She did walk away and I rewarded her with a carrot. We did this about 4 times. All the others horses were watching very carefully. My question is… are we always to send them away from our space and connect with them, where they go to? Thank you again.
You only to ask her to go away if you think she is being too pushy. Otherwise, you let her interact with you but do not interact with her. What this will cause her to do is to try to get your attention. This will make her be more forward. I want my horses to be forward because it brings about a great spirit in them. When we do though, we need them to develop manners so they are socialable and kind and see you as a leader that they respect and like.
When your horse is too forward, ask her to go. If she comes back and is more respectful, then you have taught her to be polite. You can pet her for a while if she is polite and then go back to reading your book. Just keep working around this relationship. What you are hoping to gain is that she enjoys you company, learns to respect your personal space and that you can spend time in each others company with out too much interaction. Remember though, what you are looking for is sharing space and time doing nothing together while you read. I hope this helps everyone.
Carolyn
No related posts.
Carol and Laurie,
I still want you to read the blog pages but in the future take your questions to the class question page. This section is for normal blogers.
When your horses gets nervis you have two choices, eather take them back home or you can wait it out and let them adjust unless it is too far of a reach for them to make. You do not want to be the one that gives your horse worry, unless you can fix the worry easily and the rainblw happens soon for your horse. Choose the approach that you thing will work or create your own solution.
I would try to find a place close to the horses that they want to be with that you could be seperated from the horses with a comon fence in between, this would help. I have written alot on how to handle speration anxiety in my blog. Look for many answeres there.
If you cannot seperate your horse with out the anxiety you will need to sit with all the horses if you feels safe to do that and let the next step come organically.
The bond is not going to happen untill the horse is were he or she wants to be. I have giving you some ideas to get you started. Use your goal and the program of the first Rituals to help you to be inventive and come up with a solution that would deepen the bond and trust.
Get into a child mind and a joyful state and the predicaments that a child would face wanting to connect, when you need to work on things as they are. That is what my book is all about. The child mind and being in the moment in real time and enjoying things as the are, as well as to enjoy the predicament. Ideas will pop into your head. Be a horse and hang out with your horse and the bond will grow.
You could journal on your perdicment read my book again.
I will address this in more detail for you both in the class in our next meeting.
Let your instincts be your guide. When I was a child I had to work with the elements in builds trust.
Some times the trust happens befor the bond this is what you are both facing. Keeping the harmony and the laws of the Waterhole Rituals clearly in tact, this way your horse will tust you more rather than being the cause of your horses discontent.
Write back to me in the questions section the Insider Circle Club on how things are going.
This is going to be fun, see you inside.
I will start to write a teaching story for you to put on the blog that migh help you to creat your solutions.
Hope this is of help.
And this is why one should be careful inserting text into a message, well I hope it’s still readable.
regards
Hi Carolyn, first of all, thank you for the lecture, My question is this: I found it very insightful. I’ve got the same problem as Carol (though to a lesser degree). When I sit with my warmblood mare in the paddock, she first seems to be comfortable, but then she’ll start looking and calling for her mates at the stable. And she looks at me as if she wants to say: ‘Are you gonna do something? Bring me back or work or what?!’ So I’m very curious to your answer to Carol too.
Thank you,
Brenda
Hi Carolyn,
My new mustang, Banner, seems to get bothered when I separate him from my other horses when we’re sharing territory. At first he’ll eat and come check me out every few minutes as you’d predicted, but soon he’ll begin pacing near the gate calling to his buddies. As far as I know, he’s always been out in a pasture with many horses. Just wondering how I should handle this.
Thanks, Carol
P.S. I just got your Insider’s Circle CD in the mail today and I’m looking forward to hearing it tomorrow!
Laurie,
Age is never the issue. I pick horses that have lots of energy and spirit and then I shape his spirit to be dependable with the Rituals. The dance is the byproduce of the bond and conntion and the dance comes from the relatiship you build on an every day bases. If you have a slow natured horse I would not be able to change that.
Hope this is of help.
The Dance may or may not be the out come.
It is a long journey or it can be a short. The relationship needs to be the focus not the dance. This is the secret and the other is to work your horse fast and teach him to run, once you have all the qualities of connection in place or even when you have not.
He needs to know how to run.
Hope this is of help.
Yes Carolyn I believe this will help, I have not shared territory with your method yet, just by myself, Instant will be happy for as long as the food will last, then usualy will begin to fuss to go out, but my attention was always on him, so I will read and just be with him as I do with him in the pasture, after a month I will let you know, again thank you so very much for you help.
Michelle
Laurie,
work on the method for at least a year and as you go along you will see the horse will pick up intrest not loose it. My 35 year old was a fire ball. People many times do not want fire in their horses so they work on making them calm and the horse learn to loose his spirit.
Ruella,
That is a good idea.
I am on face book.
But I am not active.
So how do we do this?
Are any of you on Facebook? If you are, this would be a good place to exchange photos, etc.
Hi Carolyn, Thanks for the phone conference! I learned so much, and found the questions and answers all very helpful. I’m going to do the Rituals with 2 horses with very different personalities. The first is a high-spirited Arabian mare, Kira, who was an abuse case; you’ve given me very effective advice with her. The second is a Paint gelding, Renn. Laurie’s question would apply to him, I think. Much of the time, he thinks if he takes 3-4 steps with me in companion walking, he’s done enough. Some might call this lazy, but he’s very energetic when he’s playing in the pasture.
Hi Carolyn,
In some of the videos that I have seen, you are usually working with a young horse or horse that naturally has alot of “spirit”, maybe because they are young &/or untrained so anything & everything is new & exciting to them and so they are very animated, which looks like alot of fun.
My question is: when you have an older horse or a been there/done that horse that doesn’t get very excited about anything, how do you get them to become ‘young at heart’ again? I would really like to see a video of such a transformation. How do you get the ‘spring’ in their step, rather than the ‘plod’? Can you put one on Youtube?
thanks in advance
Nicole,
There are two way to look at this. First-Keep practiceing with her no matter what she feels right know and she will turn it into a game very quickly.
When I ask a horse to leave my space I do not do it punitly. I ask for space when a horse is pushy because she can learn how to court me when I do this and she will lean to be polit. I am not punishing the horse. An example ;It is like me saying to a guest who drops by uninvited, “It is great that you stopped over tonight, when can you come back again? I was just getting ready to go to bed, how about we get together tomorrow.”
Do not be punitive about any request when ever you can avoid it because this way she will not thing that when she is to leave that she has done something wrong. This way when you are asking for space or to “go trot” she is not offended. Be big when you need to get your point across just never punitive. If I am not punitive and my horse is offended the way I look at it he will get over it soon and get back to the fun.
No matter what I ask I never punish.
Just make a change of view point and go for it.
Second approach you can take. “If you feel that “go trot” is not right do not ask for it because it would not be right in your mind or hers. Listen to your heart and it will help you to your truth and a deeper bond with your horse.
Hope this is of help
Carolyn, you say:
“You only to ask her to go away if you think she is being too pushy.”
I understand the application of this during ‘sharing territory’ but how is it different when we are doing ‘go trot’ and we ask the horse to leave us with some energy but without them feeling ‘scolded’ or ‘pushed’ out of our space. I have struggled with this balance in ‘go trot’ and don’t practice it at all because I don’t want to confuse my poor horse any further. Her reactions vary between a confused and irrititated response as she moves off, to a ‘tearing off’ with her tail high in the air only to turn around and stare and me cheekily. She’ll come back when I call her, but with hesitation… then once she’s moving towards me she’s fine.
I get the sense that she wants to be with me more than away from me, but she needs to understand its okay no matter where. Also, perhaps my own energy is telling her ‘get out of my space’ vs ‘go play over there’?? I try to be as kind and gentle with the ‘go trot’ request but still not quite right.
So? Where is the difference between pushing/ moving the horse out of our space for pushiness vs. asking them to leave our space during ‘go trot’.
Dear michelle,
First I must ask you how long have you been sitting with your horse doing my method? I would suggest you sit with him or at least 30 days and give me a report and I can then guide you to the next step. Keep a journal. You need to foget about your horse and read and enjoy your experiance. Your horse must get comfortable in this new space, put some grain down form him or hay and that should help him to settle down. This is very important he is happy in his enviroment. Untill you can make him comfortable he will not be bonding Neather of your are happy being there and that will prolong the need to sit. When you give up your attachment your horse will make a shift and we will find out what your horse is made of.
Then I can make a better call in what the next step would be.
Does this help?
Carolyn, thank you so much for all of the help you offer, my question is I am working with two Morgan gelding’s 8 & 3 year old , Instant is the older and is the leader of a herd of 40 at the barn where they reside,we have a great relationship which we have worked on since he was two, with Instant when were share territory in an enclosed area he is aloof , running and bucking , there is a piece of his heart (due to trama) that he just not willing to give yet, how long do I stay with him, must I wait for him to connect the first time or can I continue the next day, when he finally does come over will I then end the session. I am soory if this seems long, Rico, the young one is overly friendly although he knows to be polite he wants to be at your side all the time, so with him do I need to spend a lot of time sharing space.
Michelle