Bareback!

Today, I received many tips on getting Siaga to stand still by the chair so I could mount. Our lesson today was primarily that. I asked R what to do, and she showed me with one of the horses at the stable. Basically, the idea was to lead him up to the chair, and step up, and if he didn't stand still, to hop down and make him work. My theory has always been that if a horse doesn't want to stand still, then don't let him stand still until he's standing still by/for whatever you're working on. So when Siaga swung his butt out away from the chair, I hopped down and sent him out, and he cantered and cantered and cantered and threw in some mighty bucks and shaking his head.

I kept him moving till I saw him drop his head and lick and chew. I then brought him in by the chair and stepped up, and started rubbing his back and giving him an extra "treat" with a back rub for standing by the chair. Whenever he moved, I'd hop down and send him out, watch for him to drop his and lick the dust off his brain, and then bring him back to the chair and the back rub.

Eventually he was standing still, and a couple times, even stepped closer and leaned into my hands for his rub! (See, not even horses can resist a back rub!)

Then we worked on flexing, and where last time I had him flexing his nose only halfway around, today he touched his sides of his own conviction, meaning I only pulled his head part way around, it was up to him to find the slack in the rope. Next we worked on more standing still and not grazing. Not much progress on that front.

AND THEN I brought him back to the chair, positioned him, climbed up, gave him a back rub, swung a leg over, and he stood still!

I couldn't pull his head up with the rope halter on, so I just worked on my balance at first. I realized that part of why I have such a hard time staying balanced on him compared to on other horses is because I tense my butt/upper thigh muscles, I brace myself all the time. So I made the effort to stay relaxed, and felt much more secure when I was sitting relaxed.

Another friend of mine suggested, for changing direction, instead of pulling the reins, to open the left and maintain normal pressure on the right, and push with the right leg. In a previous conversation, she had also said to drop the outside hip while pushing with the outside leg but to keep the shoulders level. I had laughed and said "Like belly dancing on horseback, an isolation of the hip!"

I applied all of this. Open left rein, keep right closed, open left leg, push with right, drop right hip... and he moved right around! I tested it on both sides. He's a little slow at it, and I was still pretty unbalanced and probably my nerves blocking his movement, but he did it all the same. :)

And he has a VERY good woah with the rope halter, but absolutely NO back up, and plenty of turn. Gah.