Are you reacting or responding to your horse? Are you giving your horse the space they need to process their internal experience of you, their environment and their training? As we learn more about the brain and the nervous system we can start to understand that even though we are doing everything "right" in training, because we are working with a living, emotive being, how we are in relationship to each other plays a critical role to our success with our horse.

Some things are physical skills required to develop: balance, coordination, cuing of aids and application of the body in movement. And some of the things are who we are and who our horse is in relationship to us. We could do a physical skill perfectly and our horse can choose to say no. We can fudge and muddle our way through the application of an ask and our horse can say yes.

Timing is about knowing when to ask. When is the nervous system up and receptive to the ask. And when to back off. The nervous system has blocked us out or deemed us as a threat and the horse needs space to process and navigate this internal response to us.

Ready to learn how to establish a connection based training with your horse? Jump on our free masterclass: Say yes to a happy, willing horse