Relaxed & Forward Blog

Wild or Tame: Trust Actions Above Words

This is my neighborhood. That's Pikes Peak peering over the horizon, exactly where it was when I bought the farm....
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Deconstructing Horse Aggression

When I got home after school, I walked in the front door, dropped my books, and walked out the back...
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Affirmative Anxiety

For as often as we've watched horses run and thought them the most beautiful of all creatures, we should know...
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How Long Does It Take To Train a Horse?

I have a herd of relatively normal retired horses. And then this gang of raconteurs, misanthropes, and dangerous characters, referred...
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Human Failings, Horses, And Judgment

A four-year-old video surfaced this week and a dressage rider deeply apologized for the overuse of a whip. She will...
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Calming Signals: Love vs Understanding

The mare would not pick up the canter. She just wouldn’t. In her defense, the rider was off balance. Every...
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Travelblog: Mister Has a Dark Night of the Soul.

Dogs. We rescue them, buy them, inherit them. They are irrepressible puppies, midlife couch-partners or milky-eyed elders with wonky ears....
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Calming Signals: Another Word for Dominant

There is a wild stallion on the ridge fighting all comers for his harem of mares. We think aggression and...
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Travelblog: Thinking About Aging in Ancient Surroundings

I was in Newcastle Upon Tyne. I had finished ripping around Scotland and arrived at my hotel, where a group...
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Stay in Your Own Lane

I don't mind getting stuck in traffic. It practically makes me un-American to say so. I don't love it but...
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Nube: Undiagnosable

I hope I'm not going to end up writing some kind of justification for harsh training. Usually, it's easier than...
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Allowing Horses the Time to be Curious

I saw a video this week that I can't get out of my head. It lacked the drama of the...
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Nube: What If This Isn’t Wrong?

My first ex-husband used to tease me about my frantic love of shortcuts. I was always up early, on the...
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The Joy of Imperfection

We are sick to death of the violence against horses. It isn't just the damage caused by rollkur in reining...
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Nube’s Ulcers: What We Can’t Control and What We Can.

When Nube (nu-bay) was two and first diagnosed with ulcers, it felt rare, almost exotic. People were just learning about...
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Culture Wars in the Barn

There is a recent article in the NYT about the culture wars going on in dog training that's worth reading....
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Horse Training Means Affirmative Waiting

Humans, aren't we swell? Compared to horses, we have dim, frail senses, we're seven times slower in our response time,...
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What It Means to Love a Horse

I'm talking to a new client who contacted me for help, asking them to tell me about their horse. They...
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