​First of all apologies for the delay in sending out the Four Oaks Horsemanship Newsletter. I’ve had such a busy work/life schedule, it was difficult to find the time and I didn’t want to rush it for the sake of it. It’s important to me that the words I write may help people to improve and in turn improve the lives of all the horses out there.
On a positive note, during this period, I had a horse visit Four Oaks in the need of some help. I learned way more from this mare than I could ever teach her. I put this down to the different levels of awareness and consciousness when interacting with horses and the difference between being too linear in my approach rather than really listening to what’s going on for the horse I am interacting with. I have learned a lot from some of the best horsemen and woman in the world and I am still very aware that I am only scratching the surface of Horsemanship, although I am happy knowing that once I continue listening with awareness, I will continue to improve after every session.
I always work in the order of Energy – Intention – Focus – followed by the physical feel that I am offering. From the horse’s perspective, this obviously varies from person to person, so it’s not always easy for them to deal with it, never mind getting into the frame of mind to actually learn. It’s very important that we can stay focused to help our horses, but at the same time not get too intense that it’s almost a predatory behaviour. This is what hit home to me most when this particular mare came to us for help. I felt like I approached her with the correct energy, intention and focus, but the physical technique, including my body language, caused her to get emotional and she started to defend herself. This behaviour was pretty extreme to the point of aggression. Even though I was constantly aware of not putting her under ‘pressure’, she obviously felt under pressure from my approach. I have helped a lot of horses up to this point and I have never had a horse react in such a defensive way as this little mare did.
The fact it got this far, led me to take a step back and look at it from her perspective, and to search through the skill base that I have gathered up to this point, I also contacted my good friend Leslie Desmond for help. Leslie has always thought me to be very aware of my body language to a much higher degree than I ever picked up on in the past. Leslie also gave me a quick reminder, just like my friend James Roberts did in the past, that if you learn to listen and change your approach to what the horse may need, things will always work out for the better. Instead of staying too linear and pushing ahead in the hope that the horse will learn to handle what is being put before them, an adjustment sooner rather than later will help them immensely. In this case, it meant listening to her to find out what she enjoyed and to work from that point. The result was a very small amount of groundwork and more riding. She is a lot more comfortable with that and is learning to trust humans a lot more. This has allowed her owner to slowly add in more groundwork and enjoy bringing her out on more riding adventures, which she really enjoys. She finds it easier to learn this way.
In reflection, I have learned to check my ego by self-reflection and working hard on eliminating the linear approaches I can get drawn into. Drawing on all the different approaches I have learned from all my mentors and to always seek out advice from high level mentors. This goes a long way to rein in the ego. I am blessed to have direct contact to some of the best in the world and I will continue to respect every horse I come in contact with by learning to listen with more awareness. This will help me become a better teacher for humans and horses and generally a better human being.

I will start off this blog by quoting one of the greatest horsemen to live ‘Ray Hunt’ – “Go as slow as you can and then go slower”
These words can inspire humans to try and slow down enough to give a horse the best chance possible to learn from us, but in order to follow through on them consistently over time we need to become a lot more aware of ourselves to actually slow ourselves down.
When you take all the different personality types with the innate behaviours attached to each one, then add in a whole load of conditioning, the result is a very different mix of human beings. What may seem slow enough to one individual, will seem painfully slow to another, and on the other hand, may seem too fast to somebody else. When you add a horse into the mix, again depending on that horses innateness and conditioning, the combination can be quite complex. It still amazes me that horses will fill in so much for us humans when our feel, timing and balance are out of synchronisation with our horses. And if we are being honest with ourselves, this is more times than not.
I have been practising slowing down as much as I can for a while now. The philosophy I practice and teach goes in this order. Energy, Intention, Focus = Feel. There is a small gap in between each of these ingredients to allow the horse to try and synch to each phase. Once Energy intention and focus has been established, I then add the physical feel required to achieve whatever it is I have set up to help the horse find. It’s important that I am in the correct position and that I can adjust my position accordingly as the horse consistently changes the picture in front of me. If I am too late to adjust accordingly to set something positive up for the horse, I just reset and start again.
By breaking the ingredients down a little further, it might give a bit more clarity.
Energy – Awareness of breath. The life and energy running  through your body. (Separate from your mind.)
Intention – The mental picture of what you would like to achieve
Focus – A strong will to follow through on the above 2 ingredients without getting distracted (Out-focused)
Feel- I can obviously not describe this in great detail as it is different for each individual and has a lot of variables, but in this context, it’s a combination of the above ingredients that will help you become more aware and synchronise with your horse. Practised consistently,  it will  help you smooth out the physical or ‘direct’  feel that may be required if you have a physical attachment to the horse. (halter, bridle, saddle, human). The same principle applies for an’ indirect’ feel. (Liberty).
In summary, no matter what personality type you are, or what innate characteristics your horse has, practising with the above awareness will help you. Finding the perfect’ match’ is not that common, so working hard to slow down will be of great benefit to you and your horse. 

​A filter that always helps me in my approach to horsemanship is the question of the horse having confidence in what he is being asked, or is just tolerating what is happening to him.
In my opinion, there is a big difference between the two. If we put a bit of extra time into studying how to read horses better, we can develop a better understanding of how they think and feel. It also helps us understand how to help them move correctly with softness and with flexion through their body. This allows us to change our approach to each individual horse and over time develop confidence in each individual thing they are asked to do. Because of the horse’s natural instincts of flight or fight and their high sense of self preservation, learning to understand them better is a very important part of the process of teaching them.
Horses show a great amount of faith by putting their trust in people. Over time, if you approach things in the correct way, you can earn this trust and develop confidence. The trouble is that a lot of people dominate their horses and end up with what might look to them like the same result as gaining confidence but in actual fact horses have just learned to tolerate what has been asked of them. It can be sad to see a horse’s dignity being diminished like this and the life that they once had, being dulled down to ‘behave’ the way the human expects them to. The same can be said for humans who have been guided through life in the same manner.
In my experience, a lot of people don’t pay enough attention to this until the horse has ‘enough’ and starts to express himself by showing behaviours that are less appealing to the person. The other occasions that this is most prominent is with young horses and green riders or very sensitive horses that will not give in to dominance. Examples of this are horses that refuse to do anything and Nap, Rear and/or Buck etc and the horse that Bolts away and Shy/Spook at every ‘little’ thing. There are lots of variables in between, but these are examples of the most common behaviours. A lot of the time in these cases, horses are sent off to be ‘Trained’ and hopefully come back ‘Fixed’ by various trainers. Usually this does not work out too well, or it works in the short term.  It’s not long before the undesirable behaviour returns and the pattern continues or the horse is sold on to continue this pattern. This is very difficult and stressful for horses. ‘There is NO QUICK FIX’ to these problems. The only way to help horses is to improve yourself and your knowledge by seeking information from Mentors that you can trust and can help guide you towards being a better human for your horse.
It is my belief that 99% of horse owners have good intentions. The key is to take responsibility and back up these good intentions with good behaviours. Again, this is often not the case. It’s easy to excuse undesirable behaviours when your ‘intentions’ are good. The hard part is becoming focused and aware enough to change your behaviour to match up with your intentions. Horses can really pick up on this change in Energy and they also improve a lot by gaining confidence from you. It’s a win/win situation that helps in all other areas of life as well.
It is one of my life goals to help horses and people as much as I possibly can. It does not matter what level rider or horse. From happy hacker to Professional Equestrian, I feel I have a lot to offer. I want to play my part in expelling the picture that in some cases has been created that horsemanship is a fad or does not fit in the Equestrian world. As with all professions, there are the desirable and less desirable instructors and professionals. My advice is to try out a few different approaches and see if one of them fits in with your own system or beliefs. I only seek out high level Mentors who have vast knowledge and experience of horses and also understand the high levels of riding required to help horse’s to develop in all different disciplines. I look forward to being of service once again in 2019.

​I have been reflecting on the journey I have been on since I first discovered a different way to develop horses.
I think the main shift happened when I started working more on myself and taking more responsibility for my actions and behaviours. This has been a big learning curve in life and a big difference in my approach to horses and nature in general.
In the earlier stages of horsemanship, I got alot done mechanically through learning a series of techniques that were more helpful to the horse than I was previously doing.
This was backed up by learning more about the psychology of horses so I could understand their needs and to back it all up by caring enough about them during the process.
As time has gone on and I have continued to work hard on myself, I have transcended the process by increasing my awareness of all that is going on around me. To put it more deeply, it's the connection to nature and the awareness of being present and in the moment that has helped improve me.
Anyone who has experienced the message I am trying to share, will know I always say it's your energy, intention and focus that leads to the feel required to help horses or alternatively communicate to any individual on a deeper level. This comes before any actual physical feel. In the past, these were just words to me, but they are starting to become more of a part of me.
When you put this awareness first, the thinking process has its part next. 
The more you can improve your knowledge through study and putting it to practice and learning from the mistakes you are inevitably going to make, the better everything will be over time. 
It could take a lifetime to become 'average' at what I'm talking about, if you compare it to being fully aware at all times, but average is way beyond where most people will ever get to from a more linear perspective.
It's a cliche to say it's not the destination, it's the journey to get there, but there is alot of truth in that in my experience.
If you just want to get along a little better with people or horses, and no matter what your discipline is, from happy hacker to Grand Prix, these steps will help you become more aware, more disciplined and a much better leader. 
Once we drop our ego, stop blaming others or our horses and take responsibility for ourselves everything will improve. 
I look forward to continuing my own journey, and helping as many of you as possible to achieve in yours.
Cheers, Brian