I do have to shout out loud here: 'a stubborn horse walks behind you, an impatient horse walks in front of you, but a noble horse walks right beside you' - sorry, but what nonsense is that
??? I have studied the horse's language for years, and this statement is sentimental, humanized, amateurish and has nothing to do with the horse's natural communication. Is this a comment from Pat Parelli? I am very surprised if it is, because I thought he at least knew about horse language
! In a horse herd the front horse is the lead mare - she shows the way. All horses in the group behind her are more or less equal, they walk beside each other and the lead stallion is in principle behind the group (The foals are walking very closely beside their mother or behind her, but that is another story because they are under her protection and have a special status in this way). So a trustful, confident and noble horse may be either in front of you or behind you - both can mean that you are in a dominant position, though of course also both positions can be forced through by using predatorlike behaviour as is so often done in Natural Horsemanship based training. But if a horse walks beside the person it is either saying - hey dude - we are equal so right now lets walk the same way as long as I like it, or it is simply mentally dead. In the case of Pat Parelli I will bet that it is mentally dead after having been sent round and round by the predator until giving up its spirit. Folks, I know it looks convincing but try to sense the horse - try to see the expression in the eyes - or the lack of expression
- they are simply not there! They even drag their feet after them because there is no life spirit left - even by riding they do it, and their norses are nearly in the dust. Are they proud horses? I would not let any of these prats near any horse at all - end of story!
And if you need some comparisment in order to see the difference, have a look at the way Klaus Hempfling works
- with him the horses are alive, they are powerful, they are feeling great and strong, but they respect him as the ultimate leader, and then also give him the complete responsibility of their life - which is exactly what we have and therefore we have to be so extremeley careful what we do to our horses. We need to treat them with respect!
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