Photo by Susan J. Stickle

Do you sometimes feel like you and your horse are speaking completely different languages? Clear communication is fundamental to the sport of dressage. If you and your equine partner don’t understand each other, your test scores will reflect it.

How can we develop this all-important aspect of the horse/rider partnership? How should we apply the aids so that our horses not only understand what we want them to do but are eager to do it? What role do trust and empathy play? What about correcting a schooled horse that has ignored an aid? Two top dressage riders answer these questionsand more.

1. A Strong Riding Position

When riding, we communicate with our horses by signaling with different parts of our bodies. The clarity and understandability of these aids rely heavily on our control over our bodies through a strong riding position and independent seat. If we’re leaning on the reins because we haven’t yet learned how to balance in the saddle, the horse is feeling a constant rein aid. How will he know when you aren’t just balancing yourself, but really want him to slow down?

Nancy Later of Townsend, Massachusetts says, “It’s impossible to give clear aids if you’re balancing on the reins or your legs for your own balance. If your seat is independent of your hands, your hands are free to give clear rein aids.” The same is true with the other natural aids. If a novice rider is struggling to sit the trot, she cannot hope to use her seat as an aid to influence her horse’s gait.

If you’re a beginner and haven’t yet achieved an independent seat, don’t worry! Every rider started out awkward and uncoordinated. Cesar Parra of Whitehouse Station, N.J., has advice for you: “I know we hate to hear it, but we’ve got to get the basics stronger than they are. If you can’t effectively do a soft half halt, how can you expect to do passage? We want quick, easy success, but success takes time and dedication.”

To achieve concise communication with our horses, he says, “You have to be able to give the softest aid with the minimum effort. Then you can move on to the more difficult movements.”

2. A Fair System of Reward and Correction

Training horses requires that we first show them what we want them to do. When they understand, we ask them to do it and refine the movement with carefully applied aids. Rewards speed learning by pinpointing the correct behavior while giving the horse a pleasant experience associated with that behavior. Corrections discourage inappropriate actions by creating discomfort when they occur.

Later explains, “The entire lesson is a process of asking the horse to do something, and rewarding if he did do it or asking a little more if it didn’t come through. The most important thing is that when the horse does what you want, you remove the pressure of the aid. That peace is a reward. If the horse doesn’t find peace and a release of the aid, they won’t understand that they did the right thing.

“Each horse is a little bit different and the rewards and corrections should be appropriate for that particular horse. To figure that out, we have to pay attention to our horses. Some have a very sensitive mouth and if you pat the horse as a reward, that loss of connection with the bit can actually be upsetting for them and so it isn’t a reward. A horse that’s more confident in the mouth will be very happy to get that pat.

“You can reward with your voice, telling them right in the moment that they did what you wanted. If you accomplish something that the horse worked hard to do, it works well to hop right off and cool the horse out in hand. This is good for stressful lessons like flying changes. The lesson can be so difficult that even when they do it right they don’t get the lesson because it was so stressful. But if you dismount immediately, they start to understand.”

3. Good Timing

This is another one of those skills acquired only from many hours in the saddle. But good timing takes more than that; it requires “feel” and an awareness of what each part of your horse is doing as well as what your horse is thinking.

If your timing is off, your horse won’t make a clear connection between your aids and the response you expect from him. If you apply your right leg to ask for a leg-yield when the horse’s right hind leg is on the ground, he won’t understand what you want. But if you apply that aid as the right hind hoof is lifting off the ground, it makes sense to him to yield to that aid by reaching sideways with his right hind leg.

Correct timing of rewards and corrections can also make training go far smoother. When pleasant or unpleasant consequences occur at just the right moment, the horse quickly learns which behaviors he should repeat and which ones are not correct. If the reward or correction happens several seconds or steps later, how can he know which action you’re referring to?

When the horse is given direction, reward, or correction using accurate timing, his rhythm, balance, and forward movement continue uninterrupted. And then you will have accomplished your goal with the minimum of effort, the maximum of simplicity, and without confusion or frustration on the horse’s part.

4. Mutual Trust

Successful communication requires a certain level of mutual trust. The stronger the trust, the deeper and more effective that communication can be. “‘Trust’ is a small word but it’s a huge concept that holds a tremendous amount of weight. Trust is everything,” Parra says.

But getting our horses to trust us takes more than a pat and a carrot at the end of the ride. As herd animals and prey animals, horses greatly value a leader who provides safety. Trust begins when the horse recognizes you as a fair and reasonable leader who keeps him safe from bad experiences. “If the horse is going to trust you, you have to be a leader,” emphasizes Parra.

For horses, safety comes partly from knowing what to expect. Later says, “You have to earn your horse’s trust with your consistency. If we change our minds and use different aids for the same request, the horse gets confused and that’s a bad experience that prevents him from trusting. But if we come to the horse with a system of communication that we follow consistently, a system that enables the horse to understand and get reliable results, the horse knows what to expect from you and so can trust.”

Another spoke in the wheel of trust is empathy: an awareness and compassion for the horse’s experience. That includes having respect for the horse as a living creature, maintaining our patience because he’s just as imperfect as we are, and always giving the benefit of the doubt.

Parra explains, “Communication goes both ways—in his own way, the horse is also trying to communicate to you. The horse is a partner and you have to understand him to make that partnership work. When we ask the horse for something he doesn’t understand, the horse becomes confused and frustrated,” and will communicate that to us in the only way he knows how. If we then correct the horse for his supposed lack of obedience, trust breaks down. The empathic rider realizes that communication failed because the horse didn’t understand the request. She’ll ask again with clearer aids or break the lesson down into less complex pieces. “It’s important to be aware of how your horse is reacting to your aids,” Later says.

We sometimes forget that, as an essential facet of concise communication, trust also goes both ways. Later elaborates, “If we don’t trust our horses, we will often react prematurely to things they do, like reinforce an aid or give a correction. Because of a lack of trust in the horse, we don’t give the benefit of the doubt.”

Instead of being quick to correct and needlessly flustering your horse’s confidence, do some investigation to be sure he comprehends your request and is physically able to carry it out. If you cannot find a reason for his “disobedience,” then you can confidently apply a well-timed correction, beginning with the lightest pressure.

5. Being “Present”

As half of the horse/human partnership, we shouldn’t ask our horses to do anything we aren’t willing to do ourselves. When we ride, we expect our horses to tune out distractions, pay attention to the work, and give their best effort. As a fair and reasonable leader, we should expect no less of ourselves. Our equine partners deserve that from us.

Being mentally and emotionally “present” throughout our time with our horses (not only during the ride, but every moment we spend with them) helps us to be better leaders. We become aware of the horse’s emotions and how their environment and daily management affect them. We get to know each horse’s individual ways and habits.

When we know our horses this well, we discover how to bring out the best in them. We can begin to differentiate between resistance and lack of comprehension of the question we’ve asked. Knowing what the horse is experiencing allows us to apply our aids, rewards, and corrections in just the right way at just the right time. Not only does this make the training move along more quickly and smoothly, it continually builds the horse’s confidence in himself and trust in his rider.

Speak the Same Language

These keys to concise communication are essential to developing a working understanding with your horse. But there is also another aspect of strong relationships that enhances the trust, empathy, and bond we share with our equine partners.

It comes in times of relaxation and repose. It grows in moments when we’re expecting nothing of our horses except to be horses. This connection happens when we scratch a hard-to-reach itch, offer an unexpected treat, or just wait while he enjoys a bite of green grass. That friendship shows in a solid partnership, resistance-free performance, and higher test scores.a

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