Bending to the inside *help*

Make sure you give with the inside rein (even if the horse doesn't repond at first). Also do several small pulls, instead of one big one. Don't forget about your outside rein and leg as well! Good luck

Can I hijack this thread for a moment to ask a relatively similar question!??

I am working on circles and bending with my gelding. However his right lead is a nightmare and he tends to fall in when I am asking him to bend. Is this just something that will take time? Should I start with larger circles and work up to the smaller circles? Is it better to trot when trying to get a horse to bend or is it better to canter?
My horse seems to fall in ONLY when circling clockwise on the right lead... both at the trot and at the canter. But his left lead is, of course, his favorite so he bends and circles SUUUUUPER nice going counter clockwise on that left lead!
I'm not entirely sure how to fix it.

Stronger inside leg would be my advice. He probably is stiffer on that side and since you let him fall in (by not using enough leg) he just takes advantage of you and does it. I'd ask him to move out with the inside leg, if he ignores - I'd tap with the whip right behind the leg to reinforce the cue. Spiralling in/out (from 20 m circle slowly to 10 m and back) is another good exercise to work on bend/yield.

Please correct me if I'm wrong, but also bringing both of your hands more to the outside will help to support the shoulders, and compliment more inside leg.. causing the horse not to "motorcycle" or lean or "fall in" around bends.. right?

All horses are stiffer to bend one way over the other. That's a fact.

Mine's hard to bend to the right (she's tight on her left side).

Rather than bending the horse around the inside leg by pulling the neck around with the reins (a crude aid used by those who don't know any better), do the horse a favor by helping him supple the side he's stiff on before getting on with more strenuous work.

I spend the first 15 minutes of my ride solely on warmup, and most of it on lateral exercises particularly small circles and serpentines at the walk. I always try to keep the stretching and warm up fairly even from side to side, but I always do bends/circles to the right a little more since that's where she needs more help.

Any time Calypso starts to show me difficulty in flexion to the right I stop what we are doing and go back into circles and serpentines to loosen her up further.

OP, make sure you are also helping your horse by making sure your outside shoulder leads through the turn.

I'm not positive, Sky. When I started working on bend my instructor made me "open" the inside hand more (kinda perpendicular to horse, not towards me) in addition to the strong inside leg to help her understand what I'm asking. But we did it just one lesson. After that I keep them in normal position close to the withers, not moving either of them outside. It's all about strong outside aids/strong inside leg for my horses that makes the difference.

Yeah the importance of that inside leg..

I'm still learning so I welcome any information!

Thank you all for the advice, next lesson I will definitely talk with my instructor a little more on the subject. I guess it takes practice :)