🌿 Touch & Feel – Helping the Horse Return to Feeling Good

How noticing changes in feel leads to better understanding, better posture, and better self-carriage.

One of the most overlooked skills in horse training is the ability to notice the moment when the horse begins to feel worse—and to gently help him find his way back to feeling good again.

Not through pressure.Not through correcting the body into a shape. But through awareness, space, and subtle guidance.

A horse’s body never lies. Long before an exercise falls apart, the feel changes.

And this is where true training happens.

1. Feeling Good as the Compass for Progress

Horses speak through how movement feels.

When the horse feels good, you can see it immediately:

• a breathing, swinging spine

• more ease, softness, and flow

• a clearer rhythm

• a steadier, self-regulated balance

• mental relaxation combined with willingness

These are the signs of a body that is working with itself.

When the horse begins to feel not good, you notice:

• tension creeping into the topline

• twisting or tilting through the trunk

• blocking in the back or chest

• pushing instead of carrying

• a shortened topline or loss of connection

None of this is a failure. It is information — the horse quietly telling us:

“Something about this moment feels harder than I can currently manage with my balance or understanding.”

If we ignore this information, we lose the dialogue.If we listen to it, the horse’s body becomes the compass guiding our next steps.

2. Your Role as a Signpost — Not a Sculptor

This distinction sits at the heart of good training.

The moment we try to make the horse do the movement or create the posture ourselves:

• the horse loses responsibility

• self-carriage collapses

• posture becomes artificial instead of organic

• the nervous system tightens rather than regulates

  
  

Good posture cannot be engineered from the outside. It must arise from the horse’s own internal organization.

You don’t shape the horse’s body from the outside.

Your job is to be a signpost:

• You guide direction, but don’t mold the shape.

• You offer clarity, not pressure.

• You create conditions in which good movement becomes possible.

• You help reduce noise so the horse can hear his own balance again.

  
  

This is an advanced training philosophy. It is what transforms a horse from obedient to gymnastic, expressive, confident, and proud.

You don’t create the movement.

You help the horse find the feeling where the movement can emerge.

3. The Cycle of Feel — Notice → Suggest → Allow → Feel Better

This gentle sequence describes how training becomes a dialogue rather than a correction.

It helps the horse stay mentally connected, physically organized, and emotionally safe.

Let’s walk through it.

1. Notice

This is the earliest and most important moment.

You sense the slight change where the horse begins to lose ease, softness, or balance:

• a subtle brace

• a shift in rhythm

• a shortening of the topline

• a hesitation in the energy

• a tiny mental disconnect

Your awareness keeps communication subtle long before compensation takes over.

2. Suggest (Signpost)

Here you offer the lightest suggestion — not to fix anything, but to help the horse become aware of a better direction.

A signpost might be:

• a soft shift in your own posture

• a breath

• a small spatial boundary

• a tiny redirection of energy

• the lightest idea of where balance could be

This is simply:

“Maybe try this way — see how it feels.”

You are not shaping.

You are not creating.

You are helping the horse notice the pathway that leads to ease.

3. Allow

Once you’ve suggested orientation, you step back.

You give the horse:

• time

• space

• quiet

• a moment to search

• a moment to reorganize

This is where understanding grows.

This is where responsibility stays with the horse.

This is where the nervous system stays regulated.

Allowing prevents micromanagement and teaches the horse:

“You can find the answer.”

4. Feel Better

The horse finds even a small improvement:

• better balance

• more flow

• a clearer line of travel

• a softening in the topline

• a deeper breath

• a more connected rhythm

This moment is gold.

You acknowledge it — not because the movement was perfect, but because the feeling improved.

And this teaches the horse:

“Following subtle guidance leads me to feeling better.”

This is the heart of self-carriage, understanding, and joyful movement.

And so the cycle begins again — naturally, softly, and without force.

🌟 Why Touch & Feel Changes Everything

This approach reshapes training without adding pressure or complexity.

It creates:

✨ clearer communication

✨ earlier and softer corrections

✨ less tension and fewer compensations

✨ more responsibility in the horse

✨ more lightness in the dialogue

✨ posture that arises instead of being held

✨ a horse who feels good, moves well, and develops beautifully

Touch & Feel is not about doing less —it’s about doing the right things with awareness and kindness.

A horse that feels good can learn, balance, shape himself, and thrive.

Our task is simply to help him find that feeling again and again.

Through…

🌿 The Cycle of Feel:

Notice → Suggest → Allow → Feel Better

…and a partnership built on clarity, space, and quiet communication.