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Podcasting from a little cabin on a hill. This is the Stacy Westfall podcast. Stacy's goal is simple to teach you to understand why horses do what they do, as well as the action steps for creating clear, confident communication with your horses.
Hi, I'm Stacy Westfall, and I'm here to teach you how to understand, enjoy and successfully train your own horses. Welcome to Season 3. In Season 1, I introduce you to my idea of the four-square model. The model has four sections and if you want to quickly imagine it in your mind. Just draw a plus sign in your mind and then imagine the riders. Mind the rider's body, the horses mind and the horses body in each of those four quadrants. I use this illustration to help people understand the issues that they're having with their horses and break them down into smaller pieces that they can take action on. I'll put an illustration of the four-square model into the show notes for this podcast, which you can find over a Stacy Westfall dot com. In this season of the podcast, I'm focusing on the horses mind. Today, I'm going to explain two things to you. First, I would like to explain that I think you might possibly be underestimating your horse. And secondly, I'm going to explain my idea of moving beyond the prey predator model. Here's the question. Do you think you underestimate your horses mental capabilities? I remember when I was a kid that people would use phrases around horses that definitely led to the idea that they were limited in their thinking, whether they discussed the size of their brain being very small, whether they discussed, you know, and just use phrases like stupid horse or dumb or any kind of limiting words like that. I distinctly remember as a kid being told that horses had a very limited level of intelligence.
And when I look back, sometimes I think that Disney movies and horse books might have been really my bigger influence on challenging me to think a little bit bigger, or at least consider that the horses might be capable of more. When I think back, I think sometimes we underestimate horses, basically because someone else told us that horses were limited and we never stopped to question whether or not that might have been a mistake on their part. Maybe the horses are capable of more than what we were originally told. I know that personally, the more I understand horses, the more I'm amazed at how much they can understand. I have so many examples, but I'm going to share with you my most recent memory of a horse revealing to me that it was smarter than I was, at least in that moment. So just last weekend, I had Willow at a traditional dressage show. I showed her for three days in a row. And on one of the comments, the judge had said use more seat and less hand during the hald. And I remember reading that comment. I remember thinking, I definitely can do that. And I went in to show the next test the next day. And I came around that all these other maneuvers, all these other movements, I'm freely mixing my terms. By the way, between maneuvers is what we would say in training movements, which is what it would be in dressage. And since I'm learning both of them, I'm mixing them as I go.
Well, I was remembering all these different movements and I came down the center line to do my final haul and I thought, I'm going to use my seat and not my hands. And I came down through there with the contact on the reins even. And I shifted my seat. And Willow from a trot left little slide marks because what she remembered is something I forgot. And that would be that when we're going down through, I could stop her off from hands only or I could stop her from seat only. It's dressage, so I really shouldn't use my voice only. But what I didn't remember that Willow did was that once we take my hands out of the picture, which I already did, what she remembered that I didn't was that if I had kept my lower leg closed and shifted my seat, I would have come to a regular halt. But because I did not close my lower leg and only shifted my seat. We came to a sliding stop. Now, keep in mind, I'm the only person that has trained Willo, so I am the one that taught her all of these rules. And yet when we went down the center line to this last thing, I didn't remember the rules that I wrote, but Willow did. I'm telling you, we underestimate these guys time and time again. Now, I think that one topic I want to make sure that I squeeze in here is don't confuse underestimating your horse with the idea of failing your horse.
You know, we talked about failing your horse back in podcast number eight. If you're underestimating your horse, it's going to sound like something's being limited because your horse. Oh, well, my horse can't handle that or. Oh, my horse. You know, he just he doesn't like that. It's going to sound like something is being limited by the horse vs. what we discussed in in podcast number eight, which is where it's almost the other extreme. You would actually kind of be beating yourself up. I should do more with my horse. So these are very similar or related, but completely different because of the aim. So I just want to make sure you understand that you could have one or both of these going on. I think that people underestimate number one, because maybe somebody else, when you were learning, told you that the horses were limited somehow. Sometimes I wonder if people almost like to believe that the horses are a little bit limited, because maybe that gives them more permission to take care of that horse almost like a small child, because instead of giving that horse more responsibility, they keep it in this underdeveloped stage. And I'm not saying they're fully aware of this. I'm just saying I've considered this as a possibility. And then I sometimes wonder if sometimes people underestimate, because if you want to step it up and learn more complex ideas, if you admitted your horse could, than it would actually require that you did. So there would be hand hand thing that would go on. So if you claim the horse as a limiting factor, it can almost seem like it would let you off the hook for learning some more complex ideas.
Those are just a few thoughts to let float around in your head before I move on to this last one, which is I think one spot where people have good intentions, but it might be getting people stuck. Is the idea of prey vs. predator. And the reason that I believe this could be a sticking point at some point for some people is not that it's not true. I believe that prey predator is true, but I believe horses can move beyond the prey predator model. And I'm not going to argue whether we're taking this neuroscientific realm or not, because clearly I'm talking about the horse's mind. And what I mean by this is that if you can find one video out there on YouTube where you personally think a horse clearly moved beyond paw a predator, then it's possible. And then one of the reasons I think that it's a limiting thought is that although I keep it in mind when I have horses that are in a very highly reactive early state, part of my training that you've heard me talk about is moving these horses up through this educational system that takes them away from kindergarten and elementary school and up to high school. And the further up you go, the goal of mine as a trainer is to move them away from that highly reactive state of mind, which we could easily label prey predator. Now, does that mean we totally move them completely away? No.
But I'm telling you as a human being, and I'm pretty sure that puts me in the predator of this part. If you take me into a haunted house, it is dangerous because if people jump out to scare me and I don't feel like I can get away, it's not pretty. I don't go there because I am going to have flight or fight and I'm not going to think about it because it's gonna be a reaction. So I don't think it's because horses are prey that they always go there because otherwise I'm not quite sure why I'm going there. I do know why I'm going there, because that is a natural thing that can happen under certain circumstances. But my job as a horse trainer is to take the horse beyond. But before I can take the horse beyond, I have to believe that the horse is capable of going beyond. So let me be clear. I'm not saying prey. Predator doesn't exist. I'm not saying it's not a great thing for people to learn. I am introduced the idea that we could go way beyond with these horses. And I think that's what you see when you see some of the. Really. Amazing things that you see done with horses. You're seeing that glimpses of how far beyond these horses can move, guys. I threw a lot at you this week and I'd love to hear your feedback if you want to give any feedback or insights that you have on this subject.
You can do that over in the comments section of the blog underneath this episode, or you can call it in on the voice mail hotline that you can also find. Stacy Westfall dot com. Thanks again for listening. And I'll talk to you again next week.
If you enjoy listening to Stacie's podcast, please visit Stacy Westfall dot com for articles, videos and tips to help you and your horse succeed.
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We can teach horse how to think and use there minds. I teach my horses how to identify colors, shapes, picture cards , read small words spell words as well. It’s intersting that it doesn’t take very long for them to learn this as you would think and it is interesting how if I put a new color in the group and ask them to pick that color. You can see them think about it and most of them will pick the new color . I have some very interesting story over the years. I also introduce them to many thing . What I also find interesting is that I have opened the minds of a few horses that were shut down to the human world by using what I call Equine learning .
Love your podcast … I especially enjoyed the prey/Predator ideas. I so agree we all have the fight or flight response, but …. horses through education can learn about their environment through their human and live less reactive and worried. We can introduce our horses to things/situations so they can learn to feel safer. I especially liked that you did not go to the ‘be a good leader’ preaching to accomplish this. Both the terms ‘prey/predator’ and ‘be a leader’ seems to have developed into a form I don’t think was intended. Yes we can teach our horse in the parasympathetic mind and there he can learn about our world and not be so fearful … and yes we do not need to dominate/make our horses to do this (oh have you ever tried to make a horse do something lol) …. There is a partnership, we happen to have the right tools to teach our horses. It’s a lovely concept.