The best moment you can be in with any horse or person is the moment you are in…the present moment is the most honest moment you have. It’s the only moment you have control of, the only moment you can do something about. You can actually do something awesome, constructive and productive if you can learn to live in this moment with your horse. Lets explore this further.

I can’t change anything that happened in the past with my horse. That moment is over and done with, never to be lived again. I hear a lot of people telling stories about their horses past behavior. And if the story is positive, if it was a win, I would say yes, talk about it until it’s integrated into your body and brain. This kind of thinking will set you up for further winning situations.

But, if it is a negative, complaining, worried story about how badly your horse behaved or was, you are setting yourself up for failure.  This kind of story telling sets you up to be worried or angry or frustrated and sometimes even vengeful with your horse. It sets you up to think either you or your horse can’t do something. When you are expecting bad behavior from a horse you will eventually integrate either worried, fearful behavior or angry, mean behavior in yourself or your horse. And this behavior I’m talking about will affect your performance and ability to train your horse in a very negative way.

On the opposite end of that is living in the future, riding for something you and your horse aren’t even ready for. An example of this would be working on lead changes when you can’t even pick up a correct lead and don’t have body control on a horse. This is called end-gaining and its a result of not staying in the present moment. The present moment in this case is riding at the skill level you and your horse are today, in this moment. Stop comparing yourself and your horse to others, you will get where you want to be faster if you work from where you really are. If you don’t know where you really are find a professional trainer and get an evaluation of you and your horse.

Training in the present moment is the best moment because you will be calm, open, relaxed, thinking and without an agenda that may not be in the best interest of you or your horse. A goal is different from an agenda. A goal is a thoughtful plan about how to sequentially train a horse… without any preconceived story about how the horse is going to behave. It leaves you with an open space to just go with the flow and train, not come into the training with fear or a fight in mind.

Do you ride and train in the present moment? I hope so. Please leave any comments or questions in the comments box below. And if you enjoyed this blog hit the follow button and/or share it with someone.