 Training versus life experiences or I think of experiential learning. Training sometimes can be on the side of a bit more mechanics, repetition. People start getting into conditioned responses and all that stuff and that's all. That's all, you know, maybe that works and that's useful and I can't avoid training. We mean of course we're training but there's more to it than that. If I want to get my horse to where I could trust him in any situation, like the unknown, well training is a small piece but our life experiences together that accumulate over time they add up to be the big picture, our relationship. So if he can always be calm with me, when I'm in a situation where we're not sure he's not sure he'll look to me. So rather than looking to training, it's more like look to me. We've been through a lot together so I like to really get our life experiences together in such a way that they're calm if I can help it. It's looking really good. When people mount up, there's a couple points that I really want you to take away. And one is both reins are short enough to where if you were to walk forward and shift his weight forward you could just pick up on the reins and stop him. But I also like the inside rein a little shorter so I can see his inside eye. So I could tip him to me and his rump would swing away to the outside. So it's very important that as I mount up his feet are square, so he's relatively square so you can gently just push on the feet a little bit or you can have him step up a little bit and you'll find that a horse will get their feet more square. So that's important. Inside rein a little shorter than the outside rein. And then as I step up I want to sit down really soft tip his nose towards me. Now he walked off a little right there but I was able to pick up on that rein and ask him to halt. I still have his head bent around to my left and I'm still sort of looking at him in that left eye. Now as I reach for my irons he tends to think that that means go forward. And so that's just some old racehorse nervousness. But the point to that is that I'm able to balance him in such a way that I can get on. To go forward, don't squeeze your legs. And it seems like we all learned or many of us learned when we want to go squeeze your legs and go forward. Well think of this, what if we save squeezing our legs for later with the horse? What if we squeeze our legs to get suspension and elevation? To get the horse soft or rounded? What if then we were able to slowly close our legs up? But to go forward, let's not necessarily squeeze our legs. Now you've heard inside leg to drive. So what if we did this? What if I sat tall, tucked my tailbone, tucked my seat under and wiggle my inside leg? Let's try this. So I might sit tall, tuck my seat and I might swing my inside leg. Now I saw him, we could feel him increase tempo. That was nice. Show you one more time. I'll sit tall, wiggle my inside leg and see what he come forward. He does come forward and then when he does I settle right back down again. And I just sort of bring him back. Easy does it. I could squeeze release the reins and my abdomen. I'm exaggerating so you can see. But I could squeeze release my abdomen, my reins and just see if he could slowly find a halt. At the same time he's feeling a little squeeze in the saddle but just a little squeeze. Squeeze release. To go forward I'll stand tall, tuck my seat, swing the leg. My leg will open a little. Ready? Sit tall, tuck seat, open leg. Now did you see that leg swing? So if I swing the leg it could be the inside leg. It could be both legs on a young horse. But if I stand tall when I go to swing the leg he understands movement. And that makes a lot of sense for horses because when I move my leg they move their legs. Let's work out this technical difficulty here. He's looking at me on both sides. It's good that he's looking at me out of his left side and his right side. And if I look over to my right and I bring, just bring my headlight over a little bit would he look over there? Good. Very nice. To slow down I might squeeze release the reins like water out of a sponge and my abdomen I might set. Very slightly set my elbows in. To walk I'll sit up, tuck the seat, open leg. That worked out really good. If your horses don't understand that you might have to kick. It's easy to bump a little because your leg is already off and swinging. So if I sit up open leg and swing it if he doesn't go I could bump him. But it makes sense to the horse because once again my legs are moving so his legs are moving. Now to walk I might think of exhaling breathing and sort of melting down into the saddle. Remember he's young and green or green and to halt I'll squeeze release the reins. Now the mounting block that's a handy place to have him stop every once in a while but let's stop over here. So you can watch the aid there, the squeezing. I'm using my abdomen and my, all at the same time. Squeezing, releasing. Squeezing the rein, setting my elbow. Here we go. Squeeze, release. Squeeze, release. And there it is. To go forward, sit up, open the leg. I could swing the leg and the leg could bump him. Saying that I heard a lot at clinics and that was prepare to position for the transition and the transition takes care of itself. What? We'll explain that a little bit. While a horse is making a transition, a transition could be a change of length of stride within the gate. It could be changing tempo, speed within the gate. A transition could be changing gates, trot to walk, walk to trot. A transition could be changing direction. So that's interesting. Now preparing our horse to make the transition, that's where it's all, that's what it's about. If I walk him really fast, if I sit up and I think about sliding my saddle up towards his ears and you can see my seat swing, if that didn't work, I could certainly swing my leg. But if I increase that walk and get him walking along, sort of to his edge, he comes up with the idea. In his mind he goes, this is a lot of work, my engine is revving, I'd like to trot. And he looks at me, his ears come back and his ears come back to me and he looks at me and he sort of asks the question, can I trot? So when I want to trot, I'll then just sit up and think it. But I'll get him ready for it first. So I'll sit up, I'll really engage the walk, right here he's getting close, he thinks trot, I sit up and we trot. Now we can do the same thing, bringing him back to walk. I could slow my body, I could slow his gait, it becomes a little harder for him to trot. And so then he thinks walk and when he does, I change the position of my seat to forward swing again. Trotting is up down, good, very nice. Walking would be swinging back to front, back to front, you can see this. If I were to walk a horse really slow, you know what he's going to do, he's going to think halt. So if I walk really slow, remember he's kind of a race horse, so he's a little tense with the bit. Walk really slow, I'm squeezing, releasing, pretty soon from here it's really easy to just settle in and halt. Give him a second. Now he's calm right now or relatively calm, I mean he's alert, but there he is. There's a little place, a little change, mental shift. Now to go forward, I think it and it works. But to go forward I might think about sitting up a little bit, maybe I wiggle a leg, I bring his life up, it becomes hard for him to stay there and he goes can I walk? And I say yes, walk. Fast walk would prepare a horse like this to trot, here comes trot, so fast walk. When I want him to go I'll just sit up, think it. When I want him to walk I'll relax, I'll settle in, change the position of my body to swinging and following instead of up and down. So we're now walking and then slow walk and then he's ready and halt. So on a younger horse like this it's really important that we prepare them for the transition and you'll find that the horse is much more willing, the correct feel at the correct time makes the horse think it was their idea. Go ahead, try these things at home, let us know what you think.