New Options
Last night I was frustrated with myself. I feel like I am on the verge of figuring something out but it is just under the edge of my consciousness and I can't find it. When I am interacting with Gunny, I am trying to re-define our relationship to one where I am the Lead Horse (ala Carolyn Resnick's definition) rather than being the more dominant of two Dominant horses. There is a common thread running through Carolyn's materials that she doesn't meet opposition with opposition but goes with it and then re-directs it. So I am trying to figure out how to behave that way more and more in our interactions.
I figured out that I had missed a couple of important pieces to the First Ritual. So today I will start incorporating those in. The part that I missed relates the the horse getting pushy/rude and shooing the horse away until he gives you space. I also missed the reciprocal movement phase. I was thinking that that was a different Ritual. In the meantime, I still need to handle Gunny in our day-to-day routine. So I am trying to figure out how to do that and replace my old thinking with some new thinking.
This morning as I was moving Gunny from his night paddock to the pasture, I realized that he tends to try to pick up the pace when we do a turn that places me on the outside of the turn. If I do a turn that places him on the outside of the turn, he will regulate his speed and stay back where I was asking him to lead from. I wonder if this has anything to do with who is perceived as being in charge based on the angle of the arc? So I am going to use that to my advantage and just add a loop-de-loop to our route each day so I maintain my position on the inside of the turn the whole way to that pasture. At this point anyway, this removes the need for me to keep telling him to slow down. He could be perceiving that as a spot to subtly argue.
Then I decided to take his blanket off because the snow was tapering off, so I went out into the pasture. He was eating at a hay feeder when I approached. He looked at me initially with his ears forward but then put his ears slightly back and to the side so I stopped my approach. He then went back to eating and wouldn't maintain his attention on me to approach and say Hello. Rather than saying "no", I felt like he was just plain ignoring me. So I stepped away and re-approached but herded him away from the feeder. The first few times he just went to a new spot and continued ignoring me. But then he stopped away from the feeder and allowed me to approach and say Hello, so I could remove the blanket.
Is this obeying the Rules of Conduct for the Waterhole Rituals? On the one hand, he was not giving me his attention when I was in his presence. I was trying to honor his space, but if he isn't going to say "yes or no" and is just going to ignore me, then I felt that I needed to move him around a bit. I am trying to not engage in the conflict but still get what I want.
I figured out that I had missed a couple of important pieces to the First Ritual. So today I will start incorporating those in. The part that I missed relates the the horse getting pushy/rude and shooing the horse away until he gives you space. I also missed the reciprocal movement phase. I was thinking that that was a different Ritual. In the meantime, I still need to handle Gunny in our day-to-day routine. So I am trying to figure out how to do that and replace my old thinking with some new thinking.
This morning as I was moving Gunny from his night paddock to the pasture, I realized that he tends to try to pick up the pace when we do a turn that places me on the outside of the turn. If I do a turn that places him on the outside of the turn, he will regulate his speed and stay back where I was asking him to lead from. I wonder if this has anything to do with who is perceived as being in charge based on the angle of the arc? So I am going to use that to my advantage and just add a loop-de-loop to our route each day so I maintain my position on the inside of the turn the whole way to that pasture. At this point anyway, this removes the need for me to keep telling him to slow down. He could be perceiving that as a spot to subtly argue.
Then I decided to take his blanket off because the snow was tapering off, so I went out into the pasture. He was eating at a hay feeder when I approached. He looked at me initially with his ears forward but then put his ears slightly back and to the side so I stopped my approach. He then went back to eating and wouldn't maintain his attention on me to approach and say Hello. Rather than saying "no", I felt like he was just plain ignoring me. So I stepped away and re-approached but herded him away from the feeder. The first few times he just went to a new spot and continued ignoring me. But then he stopped away from the feeder and allowed me to approach and say Hello, so I could remove the blanket.
Is this obeying the Rules of Conduct for the Waterhole Rituals? On the one hand, he was not giving me his attention when I was in his presence. I was trying to honor his space, but if he isn't going to say "yes or no" and is just going to ignore me, then I felt that I needed to move him around a bit. I am trying to not engage in the conflict but still get what I want.
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