The Reed and Body Talk
Sep 24th, 2009 by Carolyn Resnick Method
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I gave a lesson during the Self Realization through the Waterhole Rituals course on Body Talk that was very empowering. What I often find my students doing is communicating body language at the horse rather than dancing with the movement. So, I asked everyone to imagine that the horse was as big as a whale that was listening to them. They had to exaggerate their body talk while slowing down their movements so that the whale could clearly understand what they were asking. This worked out very well and helped the students to better understand how to use Body Talk.
Another image to use is to imagine that your horse is far away and so you need to exaggerate your movements so he can clearly understand what you are asking from a distance. One student got the Body Talk down but could not use the reed with the same softness. She could not make the reed an extension of her body because she felt that is was too aggressive to use it. She used the reed in little jerking apologetic gestures, which only agitated the horse and no one moved anywhere. You need to use the reed in the same manner that a conductor would wave a baton when conducting an orchestra, in slow flowing movements. When the student started imagining that she was signaling to someone far away on a hill or to the big whale, the dance between her and the horse clicked like magic.
It is important to take the time to practice Body Talk and using the reed. Working to music will help open your desire to make a big statement with your body language that is soft and inviting. When you begin with the Waterhole Rituals, the first Ritual is Sharing Territory. The first step is to introduce the reed so you can share territory safely and allow the bond to grow naturally. You do not want to sit down in a horses space until you know you can ask him to stay a safe distance away from you as he respects your boundaries.
The best way to introduce your horse to the reed is to walk around his paddock waving the reed in front of you from side to side just like you would a Geiger counter. After about 10 minutes, you can start approaching your horse swishing the reed in front of you. It is a horse’s natural instinct to leave anything that is approaching him so your horse should walk off. Make sure you approach your horse from the side or the front so that he can see you coming and you are not surprising him. If your horse does not move as you approach him you will need to swish the reed faster and put more energy and intention into the action.
Remember that horses are used to other horses pushing them around in the wild as they continually re-establish the pecking order within the herd, so your horse will not be offended if you move him. If your horse moves away very fast you have probably used too much energy in your movement and you should have been softer and less energetic in the request. A horse that does not move away from the reed has probably lost his natural instincts and become desensitized. If this is the case you may need to seek advice from a qualified clinician to help you re-educate your horse regarding boundaries and instilling his natural instincts.
Later on we will use the reed as a directional signal in Liberty Dancing as well as in all the training pursuits going forward at liberty. Don’t worry, we do not use the reed in a way that takes the bond away nor is the reed used in punishment of any kind. Using the type of reeds I do, you cannot hurt a horse even if you try to. I buy my reeds in home decor departments in stores like Pier One but you can also look for a natural stick that is very flexible like strong grass or a willow branch. It is important that the stick is flexible because a horse will respond to flexible movements from the reed more easily than those of a firmer stick.
That’s it for this week, I’m looking forward to the weekend as I am pretty tired after all the recent classes and clinics. What are you up to??
Carolyn
P.S. By the way, I hope to have more news on the next Waterhole Rituals Insider Circle class for you next week.
No related posts.
Dear Stina,
Cannot wait and enjoying the waiting and feel so connecting with in the pause and with in the dance you are experiencing with your horses.
We are all spirt chasing for some connection that is bigger than the maps that we lay out for ourselves.
This is when coaching becomes sweet when all I need to do is inspire and offer sage advice when it can create magic greatfulness, celebrating, kindness, knowingness, and awarness to our evolution in the moment and to the universal connection to all things in harmony and unity.
another very interesting blog thanks, this is a great classroom.
What are we up to?
We are up to the unbridled spirit. I am working on the new excersises you assigned to us, but i cannot get out of the unbridled spirit ..spirit.. and will make another by the end of next month.
ideas, rhythms, new spirit just keeps coming so i will produce now when the moment is here.
Lots of love from us!
Stina and the herd
http://www.arobridge-kaimanawas.blogspot.com/
Regards
Kathy
Mary could you just google arobridge kaimanawas. The blog should come up that way. Thanks- Kathy
Kathy – I tried your blog address, the recent one you gave us. Apparently Blogspot doesn’t think you exist! Mary
http://www.arobridge.kaimanawas.blogspot.com is the correct address on google – sorry I left the . out in the original message
Dear Kate,
Thank you for letting me know that you are enjoying the blog.
Kathy Marx: I went to look at your blog on the wild horses of NZ and the link is not working! Can you repost or send to me at info@foresthorse.com
Carolyn and all the commenters: This blog is such a refuge for me. I appreciate
it so much.
Kate and the wild horses of the USA
Thank you Carolyn. I look forward to it.
Kindest Regards
Sally
Dear Sally
You have raised a very interesting question, one which many people ask, and which I will answer in my blog next week.
Regards
Carolyn
hi there,
i am wondering if i can do the waterhole rituals with all 4 of my horses at once?
i have always shared territory with them and they all enjoy it.
so, is it best to focus on one at a time in the group paddock, or all together in the paddock? or best to separate them and work with them alone in an arena?
they are (in herd order): one calm lead mare Billy (quarter horse x hannovarian), one young up and coming leader Tom(pre gelding), a dominant pony Patch and a sensitive colt Cooper (english riding pony).
we’re riding Tom and Patch at the moment, so i have them in a small paddock near the house, but i’ve noticed patch dominates tom constantly when billy’s not around to mediate. when i’m in there with them i protect tom from prankster patch and shoo him off, and have been catching him off guard which is fun to have a focus.
another question is how to help my 9 yr old daughter feel more brave around patch. i’m thinking getting her to take territory from him, and make it a game for her to catch him off guard. he can be nippy so am very keen to start the waterhole process with him properly.
thankyou for your great blog, i’m sifting through the archives to catch up!
regards, robyn, wanaka, new zealand
Dear Caroline,
In most cases it is very impornt to be an experiance rider with alot of knowledge in how to ride many diffrent kinds of horses and then when you start to train for the first time you are wokring directly with someone that is very experianced with a horse that is naturally willing and naturally forward.
Today people thing that it is so simple to make a connection with a horse with out experiance but experiance makes live upfold naturally and experaince should with a safe willing horse that suits you well.
If a horse is bitting your boots he doesn’t want you on him in most cases or is not yet ready or you have some respct and leaders issues that need to be addresed. What ever the case the next step can be bucking.
I am glad you diecied to work with someone that can help you on to advancing your connection.
Thanks for sharing.
Hi there Carolyn
Would you consider coming to New Zealand for a clinic??
I would love to put you up and host a clinic.
I’m in Wanaka, a magnificent lake and mountain destination on the South Island, on 50 acres with 4 horses.
I see there are quite a few kiwis and aussies on this blog who I guess would be very happy to see you down here.
Although I have your book and videos, and am happily playing with the information I can glean from them, there’s clearly a lot more to be gained from personal interaction.
Thankyou for your inspiration and affirmation,
Robyn Bardas
Wanaka
New Zealand
Dear Carolyn
Today I made the decision to leave my horse at a friends who has a lot more horse knowledge/experience than I do. I was feeling that the stage that I’d got to with trying to ride my horse had hit a block, and I was unsure what to do, which wasn’t helping either of us. He tries to bite my feet, quite aggressively, when I ask him to go forwards whilst mounted. Today I was able to work through this with the assistance of my friend both being led, and from some forward impulsion from the ground. It also made me realise that I don’t know enough on my own to make things clear to my horse when being ridden. He is only five, and hasn’t really had any schooling, just been backed. I also noticed that the work I had done at liberty with the waterhole rituals helped us both when we were doing some groundwork online.
Dear Carolyn,
Today I had a really amazing morning with Tahnis. After working with the rituals in the arena I felt such a strong bond with her that I took her out for a spontaneous and completely unplanned walk without any worries, just being completely wrapped up in the moment. For a long time I’ve been thinking about how to get her out on the road safely and get her used to everything, worrying about it and planning it all out. Every time before today that I’ve tried to take her for a walk I’ve felt unsafe by her side because she would be afraid of everything and ignore me, trying to push me around and pulling on the lead, which has caused me to feel like we’d never have a nice and enjoyable walk together. Today our walk together just happened so naturally and unplanned that I’m nothing short of amazed. I felt so calm and empowered and she stayed calm and curious, even when meeting a car which is something I’m not sure if she has ever done before. Almost the whole walk the leadline was hanging loose between us. It was so wonderful and I truly realized the meaning and value of working with a horse when you are bonded in the moment…
Hi
I’m a newbie who has been reading Carolyn’s and everyone’s posts and surmising the waterhole principles from there. Concurrently I am also reading Klaus Hempfling’s work so that Carolyn and his ‘way’ of being with horses tend to meld in my mind as a single body of work. A question has popped up due to a recent experience which I have been unable to figure out;
Can my status as ‘lead mare’ be extended to my younger children, how do lead mares do it in the wild and if possible what are the limitations of this ‘leadership protection’?
Your thoughts, observations and experiences would be greatly appreciated. Of course if the answer is in you book, just say the word… been looking for the flimsiest of reasons to purchase them
Thanks
Leanne
Tasmania AUS
Hi CArolyn – I’m up to thinking that I’ll never figure out how to do leading from behind with Lady! Today she bucked and raced around! She will walk ahead of me with her ears back. It seems as though things are sort of okay and then she takes off. Also today when we started she whipped around and looked at me – excellent eye contact!- but I was able to get her to turn around and go. My reed isn’t very flexible and it’s short. I have used more flexible ones. Lady appears frightened of the reed flexible or not. I have to keep it at my side and barely show it to her except when she starts to turn toward me then I hold it up and click and she turns in the direction I want. She is not happy with any of it! I have also put food out as in reciprocal movement and led her with short stops to eat. She still will eventually take off.
Today after an especially wild display where she almost fell, I talked to her while she cooled down and then went to say hello. She was very focused on me and i did hello several times.Her ears were forward the whole time and and I talked to her with a cheery voice. This brings me to
the worry that sometimes Lady turns her head away when I go to say hello. This is recent. Her ears have always gone back so I decided to wait each time they do, until they come up and then continue moving toward her to say hello. I learned in a Way of the Horse workshop to be aware of horses’ boundaries and pay attention to their signals and “sense” the boundary as well. You step back and take a breath each time there is a signal, like ears back, or you sense the boundary and wait. When the ears come up or you sense the boundary is gone then move forward. Lady seems to have a lot of boundaries. And I really can see just how dominant she is. Her ears are back so often and always when I reach out for hello so I thought I’d try this. I’ll do it as many times as she puts her ears back. It works sometimes and sometimes she will turn away when I reach out.
It seems she has decided to do a little companion walking every other day! Again, part of the time with ears back. Marie, her owner, tells me that Lady keeps her ears back no matter what’s going on. Marie has just learned to ignore it. I’m not sure about this because when Lady does something with her ears forward it just feels like the way it’s meant to be. I may not be describing this well.
It just occurred to me that magic comes in all forms. This may be a time of magic that I haven’t recognized!
xoxo Mary
Hello Carolyn, I miss the course!
I have overcome some of the issues i discussed with you on the course with Del. I have theory on this, I believe that we reached a transition point in that I worked so hard at building his trust and treated him very gently and giving him choice he had never had before. His confidence grew so much in that time. In doing this he began to challenge my leadership and I re adressed this by utilising more core energy, on one particular day he was very spooky for some reason (very rare for him, I have had him a year now and only seen him like this three times!) he was on the lead rope and I thought he was going to jump on me so had to find that energy pretty quickly, which up until then hadn’t really used as much as I perhaps should have. Once I found this and became more assertive he stopped challenging me. I now need less and less in terms of signals, he rarely plants his feet at the gate now and if he does I now have a strategy based on using the reed in companion walking, I just go and stand by his neck, point with the lead rope with one hand and move the air with my other hand just by his neck and shoulder, at first I used the reed but now just stretching my hand out gets him moving forward straight away. Since then we are going from strength to strength. I am using body language far more and hardly use the reed anymore as he just follows my signals without it. I can also get him to go trot from the other side of the small field as well.
I experimented with body language playing stay and come here where I stood up tall and put my hand up to stop him moving forward, I then backed away and asked him to come to me by changing my body language, we had great fun and I could get further and further away each time until I was a good 25 yards away. It did feel a bit like I should teach him to sit next though! We had an awesome dance session too, I felt like another horse unfortunately age got the better of me and i had to quit way before he wanted to!
Hi there Carolyn,
Thankyou for this site..I am in New Zealand and have had 6 “wild” kaimanawa’s now from the musters. 2 from 2007 2 from 2008 and 2 from June this year. I have found these little horses to be so very calm and not at all wild-or as some people would presume them to be…they are just so willing and sensible around us- we do not pressure them in any way- we try not to put any human baggage onto these little guys…I have a website http://www.arobridgekaimanawas.blogspot.com if you are interested. The energetic or spiritual connection with these horses is absolutely amazing- they are just so in tune with their surroundings….Where they come from -in the Mountains -central North Island NZ- there is mainly just tussock grass and they are on army land with rifles- missiles etc all around them- they actually out manouever the army to an extent- their survival depends on being smarter than enything else up there.The terraine is very harsh and their immune systems are extraordinary- they carry a fairly high worm burden and apparently a lot of external lice etc -although the ones I have taken have not shown signs of lice at all. I have rehomed 2 (to the same home) and will never part with Sargeant the first kaimanawa I received…He taught me so much. The 2 I have now are “Louka” and “Noa” and Noa you would swear had been here before- he is just sooo easy- he was dancing with Hannah a neighbour’s daughter -keeping in perfect time with her steps-it was glorious to watch. Louka arrived here with a cut on his leg and was very protective of that originally BUT now he has shown that he just loves to be with me- and is now letting others into his world as well.
It is like a breath of fresh air that I found your website- thankyou- I was given a list of books to get -one being “Naked Liberty” and I am about to order that- when I saw your website and took a look- WOW- so much what I was looking for- the universe works in the most miraculous ways. The internet puts such a lot of positive proper and compatible views together if you really want to find it. THANKYOU AGAIN. Kathy
well, to answer your question…what are we up to?
I have been practicing my go trot and come up in a large pasture instead of the arena. It is going farely well. i find that i am to0 strong in my send and he takes off and does not look back – haha. but if i am softer, i can get a cock of the ear and i use that to “catch” his attention and bring him back around to me. but he does not come back to me in the same speed. it is always at the walk. so i am experimenting with different approaches.
my gelding makes me giggle when we “play and dance” b/c he does alot of tossing his head around – ears are forward of course, he is just sassy and fun. It is still very hot here in miami so we are looking forward to the cooler months that are ahead of us.
Hi Caroline
How does all this work relate to the ridden horse, preparing the horse for riding, the horse outside confines of a pen or arena?
Thank you
Sally