 Hi everyone. I'm Katrine Boer and I'm the founder of Contemporary Art of Riding, which engages with building a bridge between the past and the present for a very considerate way of training horses in the future. I have found and I've discovered every time I do this kind of work how much I love this very honest and open connection. I have also, through my teachings, discovered how important knowledge this is about the young horses as many people nowadays train their young horses themselves instead of through a professional. Academic principles make it possible to be fair and considerate to the horses' mind, body and motivation not only as an end result but throughout the process. If we want a happy and healthy and lasting riding horse we must first and foremost nurture the joy of moving together. This will be a common to demo about how to keep the enthusiasm and motivation in young horses while you're trying to strengthen their bodies. I will give some examples on how the two might collide and how to keep their spirit awake and alive while giving them calmness and security in your company. Although this video is about the young horse, the principles are very relevant for all horses. Remember that one must never ask anything physical from a young horse but you need to leave them in their own balance and learn from there. Making growth into comfort. This first clip shows my at-the-time two-year-old Philly displaying some completely normal young horse behavior bursting with energy and jumps because of the slippery icy field had put a limit on the free movement for some days. I prefer to handle my young horses only as much as needed when they're growing up. They learn from their herd and learn from seeing the relation the adult horses have to people and that's it. This I feel is how I best support their development to be friendly but to give space. In this clip you can see how I try to answer all explosions with calmness and clarity and the essential key the same slow consistent rhythm in steps and in breath. She is not calm enough for learning stuff here but how you handle these kind of extreme situations is important to whether or not you can give inner calmness and confidence to your youngster also in a learning situation. So this is mostly about trust. I must offer her a steady rhythm to fall into when she is ready. I don't want to teach her manners by showing her how strong a person is on the contrary. I want to speak to her with clarity about how fragile a person is compared to a horse and that she therefore must act with care. And the horse that is a bit excited is usually not so fond of a lot of touch and cuddles. So I do this only if I can do it without breaking any barrier of trust. If done with patience and a lot of feel touch however can be great for making this frail place of learning and growth into a not only comfortable but even comforting place. A horse who can speak with a person in a poetic and creative way. I have worked with her about 10 times here. I start by trying to create a calm atmosphere for learning. Then I teach her to walk calmly without too many explosions and then to follow my steps from different positions to lengthen when I do and to slow down when I do. Each horse has their own unique beauty and it's your job to find it and to display it for everyone to see especially the horse itself to feel the magic of this particular horse. Here I'm practicing for her to feel comfortable with having me in the third leading position at her hip that I can initiate movement from here but that she also feels comfortable to follow me into a stop. I change back to the leading position in front of her quite frequently so that I'm always aware if she gets scared or she hesitates. I don't want to do too much, that cannot be repaired. When I ask for forward motion I do it in kind of a slow motion so that she will have enough time to grasp, respond and coordinate movements and to move forward with power. I don't want her to just move mindlessly or frantically because she got overwhelmed by me moving too quickly. I want both her and I to be super focused and aware so that we learn from the experience. In this last stop if you look really closely you can see the very first steps of collection into a halt. This is important body awareness for the horse and leaning back will now be stored in the horse's physical memory as a great way of stopping. The same will what my body was doing at the same time. Like in this clip where you see the half halt here I hesitate and move forward again. This is where riding from the seat actually begins. Variation gives versatility. I emphasize the importance of bringing the young horse places. I find that it's an important part of the young horse's education to experience different environments. Not to encapsulate their reactions so that they don't show how they feel inside not to desensitize them but to advance their natural curiosity. With curiosity it's so much easier to learn the life skill of overcoming a challenge. Here I've brought Naranya to a riding arena so that she can investigate in a safe environment and I bring her for walks in nature to get to know her, to gain closeness and trust and when you do this it's very important not to overwhelm your youngster. So when in doubt always bring a body making confidence into creativity. In this clip you have a lot of spirit and you can see the personality of the horse shine through but not in nervous way like in the very first clip with Naranya because there are some of the focused calmness from the second clip with Naranya and some of the confidence that even started to show in her clip. This is what these things could look like in combination but remember that personalities express different. When I begin to see the self-confidence in motion during the training I immediately encourage the horse to use this skill creatively to explore his newfound balance. Here it is essential not to find too much security in perfectionism on behalf of the horse even though you see his mistakes. You simply allow the spirit to unfold and embody this grace in yourself. I don't claim to have all the answers of keeping the young horse spirit alive through the education while he's learning some skills but it seems to have something to do with learning how to do nothing while you're doing something together just leaving it be and start to have fun together. If the person stops allowing ambition and achievements to kind of block their horse horses usually start to open up as well and only then we can begin to enjoy to kind of be together at the same time as we're doing something together. Slowly we can then dissolve the illusion that there is actually a difference between the two to do and to be. Thank you so much for watching this video. I hope you got some ideas to use in your own training and I hope you'll enjoy to be moved by your own horse.