Why horses make you a better person

My horse, Jarrah

1. Horses toughen you up. You learn to tolerate being stepped on, kneed, head-butted, bitten, kicked, drooled on, sneezed on, pooped on, peed on, thrown into the mud, scraped against trees, and treated with soul-destroying indifference. You learn you can cope. That there's a difference between feeling pain and actually being damaged. That you are strong enough to stay calm in the face of danger.


2. Horses teach you patience. The first, most important rule of horsemanship (and I forget where I heard this) is: Always have more time than your horse. If you're trying to catch your horse, or teach your horse something new, or persuade your horse to behave politely, it is going to take a long time. More time than you thought. And if you have a deadline, the horse will sense this, and will jerk you around until you are hopelessly late for your next thing and give up. The horse wants this, because it gets him or her out of doing what you were asking. The only way to avoid this is to not have a deadline. To have all the time in the world. The horse senses this, too, and realizes that resistance is futile.


3. Horses impose calmness on you. If you're freaking out, your horse will freak out. If you're fretful, irritable, or angry, your horse will be terrified. Yes, terrified. They hate it when the person they rely on is unreliable. And scared horses are dangerous horses. It's very rare to find a horse with genuine malice in them, but that doesn't mean they're safe to be around when they're scared. If you love your horse, you want them to be calm and happy. If you love your own safety, you want your horse to be calm and happy. So you learn to control yourself, find your center, put the bad stuff aside for the time you're with your horse. (Usually, by the time you're done for the day, the bad stuff has lost a lot of its power during its stint in quarantine.)


4. Horses connect you. With themselves, with other people, with yourself. I can't explain it, but I know it's pretty much impossible to be surly and isolated around a horse.


5. Horses teach you lots of stuff. History (what was it like to use a horse for your transportation, and to have to take care of one?). Geography (what kinds of terrain can or can't you ride on, and what ramifications does that have for non-motorized societies?). Phys. ed. (riding is a sport, and it develops coordination and core strength, not to mention how much exercise you get grooming, carrying saddles around, etc.). Biology (horses are very earthy about their bodily functions and their interactions with the environment). Physics (how much will it hurt when a 70kg person hits the ground from a height of 2m?). Economics (can I afford the feed, shoeing, board, vet fees, tack purchases?) Risk management and emergency planning (have I let anyone know I'm about to go out alone on trail and when I expect to be back?). And on and on.


6. Horses accept you. They don't care what you look like or sound like. They care what you are like. Whether you are kind. Patient. Loving. Curious. Confident. Encouraging. When you mess up, they always give you another chance to show you know better now.
   
   They always give you another chance.