Sid Gustafson
Novelist and Veterinarian

The Language of Natural Horsemanship
Sid Gustafson DVM


Foreword

THE LANGUAGE OF NATURAL HORSEMANSHIP is a professional interpretation of the theory and practice of contemporary horsemanship. An exploration and appreciation of this theory will help horsemen/​women and horses alike. Domestic horses are flight animals, herd animals, and grazers of the plains. They are sensual learners willing to please men to secure comfort and safety.
Effective horsemanship appreciates both the wild and domestic natures of the horse. Contemporary horsemanship is a cultural manifestation of man’s desired relationship with the horse, and has evolved to facilitate our likenesses and address our differences.
Horse and man coming together to develop a mutually supportive relationship reigns as one of the most important cultural-changing experiences in the history of mankind. By 30,000 years ago horse had embedded itself in the psyche of many cultures in Eurasia, North America, the Middle East and North Africa continents. Linguists report that the words for mind and horse are similar in many of these ancient horse cultures. The same word for horse and mind implies a deep connection, deeper than the connection man fosters today. Horse bones from that time are found buried with the bones of men buried from that time. Horses as art, as cult, as culture, as power, as wealth, and as God appear in many ancient civilizations. Today man seeks a return to the depth of those past horse/​man relationships, an understanding of the time when man was more in tune with nature, and therefore with horse.
Today animal enlightenment flourishes in a renewed yet ancient fashion. Horsemanship today seeks the state of mind that man and horse must have beheld in pastoral times. Society attempts to depart from the physical, coercive force horsemanship became through the Industrial Revolution and World Wars. Today’s horsetraining respects understanding, compassion, and communication. It is through these avenues, rather than dominance or force, that contemporary horsepeople seek to teach and experience the horse.
Attempted understanding and facilitation in shaping horse behavior is not new, only revisited. In order to commune with the horse in a willing partnership, one best develop a deep sense of the horse’s nature. Today’s horseman seeks not utility, but beauty. Xenophon expressed the concept of natural horsemanship as well as anyone. “Horsemanship misapplied and forced can never be beautiful or reliable.”
Before Xenophon, Simon of Athens suggested that what a horse does under compulsion he does blindly and without the benefit and contribution of the horse’s good reason and athletic prowess. Indeed, today we acknowledge the good reason and benevolent nature of the horse. Contemporary horsemanship seeks to share the horse’s wisdom and athletic ability rather than commandeer it. Natural horsemen seek partnerships rather than subjugations. Little is new about the concept of natural horsemanship.
Beauty with horses requires time spent with horses; horse time which people in the past experienced throughout their lifetime, but with which today’s members of society have so little available. Horses were once the essence of civilized society, and with horses man lived, a constant exposure to and sharing of life. Few horsemen today have the good fortune to live with horses on such a constant basis. Fortunately, many competent kind horsemen remain, and all have something to teach, and from all we should learn.
Time submerged with horses is experienced by a diminishing population of horsemen these days. To compensate for restricted time study is required to make the most efficient use of the time we are able spent with horses. Horses have evolved from beasts of burden to companions for pleasure and competitive pursuit. Today’s training ideologies seek to make the world a better place for horse and horsemen alike. An equitarian philosophy has evolved. Today the horse is finding more consideration and respect than through the century that horses became unnecessary to carry on the industry of manind.
The goal of this book is to help horsemen and horsewomen develop an appreciation of horse’s basic natures so as to better facilitate their horsemanship, whatever type of horsemanship they affirm or discipline they pursue. Study is one of the approaches to knowledge that allows horsemen to develop the confidence and connection necessary to develop positive relationships with horses. Educated horse people create a better world for horses and horsemen. Education opens minds and allows one to study many aspects of horses and horsemanship, to learn how other cultures approach the challenges of horsemanship and husbandry. Knowledge enhances experience and facilitates the competence, respect, and appreciation to succeed with horses in an ethical and moral fashion, as today's society demands.
Inquiry into the horse’s nature allows time spent with horses to become both efficient and compassionate. The Mongol word for horse is takh, meaning spirit. Mongols, sophisticated horsemen who introduced the riding of horses to the Greeks, are perhaps the oldest continuous horsemen we can consider. They relate to horse in a state of grace, a blending of body and mind. In Mongolia there remains a sharing of man’s spirit with horse’s spirit, a blending of the physical and metaphysical. Throughout America and throughout the world, man’s blending with horse has entered a state of renewal, renewal based on what many term natural horsemanship. The premise of contemporary horsemanship, like that of Mongolian horsemanship, remains to control the horse’s feet. Horses are inclined to have their movement controlled if only the horseman knows horse.
Like the Mongolian horsemen of the Asian steppes, today’s natural horseman and horsewomen seek a relationship with their horse that leads to a state of grace. Horsemen must go though the horse’s mind in consideration of his nature to penetrate the horse’s psyche to get to his feet, to control his movement.
To become horse, one must come into an awareness of horse. This awareness must function constantly in the presence of horses. Awareness facilitates the horsemanship required to attain the consistent willingness in horses to which horsemen and horsewomen aspire. Awareness of horses takes time and study. Awareness of the horse is the horsemanship advocated here.
THE LANGUAGE OF NATURAL HORSEMANSHIP predicates horsemanship on an awareness of the horse. This includes both consideration for the horse, and understanding of the horse’s nature. Rather than considering man and horse as opposites as predator versus prey, this treatise considers the similarities between man and horse, in particular the similar language of communication and a shared social milieu. Horses willingly herd up with humans, as humans herd up with horses. The adaptability of the horse to understand the horseman is unlimited if the horseman speaks and teaches fluently. Horsemen today teach their horses to understand and respect the language of horsemanship, rather than forcing the horse to perform a task on command with compliance based on fear of punishment.
The horse evolved to learn better than any of the herbivorous domesticates. Today, Equus caballus arrives in man’s hands selected and willing to please. Likeness draws man to horse and horse to man. The horses that eventually came to be domesticated are the ancestors of horses in our hands today. These were the horses that felt comfortable alongside man. As the reader will see, the ancestors of today’s horse chose man as his partner as much as man chose horse. The relationship man has cultured over time with horse is more about our likenesses than our differences.
Rather than dwelling on differences between man and horse, THE LANGUAGE OF NATURAL HORSEMANSHIP builds trust based on the similarities and affinities between man and horse. Indeed the two species are made for another. Rather than the opposite, we are sister with the horse. Horse is our brother and our keeper, and we are the keeper of horses. The relationship must remain mutually supportive. Until a century or two ago, horse was perhaps more man’s keeper, essential for his existence. Man and horse have come a long way side by side. We are melded together. We are not different, we are alike, if only we nurture our likenesses. It is important to identify our differences, yes, but partnerships are developed through the application of our likenesses.
Horse and man’s communication skills coevolved with time and then converged through domestication. Today, man recognizes the language of horsemanship as instrumental in both teaching and husbandry. Man and horse are born with the ability to communicate and understand one another.
A celebration of man and horse’s affinities defines the natural horsemanship of the 21st century. We are one, and it is a man/​horse relationship of mutual support and affinity we shall explore here.