Nonverbal Communication With Horses

Running head: NONVERBAL COMMUNICATION WITH HORSES

Nonverbal Communication with Horses

Cassie Jenkins

Ashford University

COM 200: Interpersonal Communication

Alfred Wiltfong

21 January 2008

Nonverbal Communication with Horses

Like many of today's young girls, I was a completely horse-crazy kid. Unlike most adult women, however, I never lost my equine obsession. As a kid in school, my bedroom walls, doors, and ceilings were plastered with pictures of everything from unicorns to zebras to the latest Olympic riders and their legendary mounts. I had all the books, the magazines, the clothes, the tack and even a collection of over 250 model horses, including classic Breyers and Grand Champions, most of which were inevitably brought to school at one time or another. In the third grade, I took a summer's worth of lessons on a dependable old Appaloosa gelding and from then on, I thought I knew everything there was to know about horses and horseback riding. There was no horse I wouldn't dare to ride; I was virtually fearless! And yet, by the time fifth grade rolled around, I still had no horse of my own, and I was becoming desperate.

At the end of the year, my dad and I finally moved out of our little apartment in the big city and rented a house out in the country, complete with several acres of luscious pasture land, riding trails, and (to my utter delight) a horse barn. For weeks on end, my father and I worked to clean the place up; there was garbage everywhere, and the entire barn and house needed renovation desperately. However, after several weeks of hard work, building fences, and cleaning up, my dad gave me the best surprise a horse-crazed little girl could ever ask for: he had found me a horse, one that I could finally say was all mine!

Her name was Dutch. She was a hot-tempered, orange-gold, five-year-young mare with some professional training as an ex-rodeo mount under her belt. I was a ten-year-old little girl with plenty of confidence and next to no experience. With my similarly inexperienced father leading me around the pasture on her back, I was happier than I could ever remember being. But, as with all new and wonderful things, everything was not perfect. For some reason, I could not make my new and wonderful horse move more than a few steps without someone leading her on.

After the first week, I was becoming incredibly frustrated; this was a blow to my self-esteem! I was the horse-crazy daughter who thought she knew absolutely everything about horses, and I couldn't figure out how to make my own horse go. So, one day while my dad was in the house, I decided to show him that I could do it all on my own. I climbed up on Dutch and squeezed her sides. We moved a couple steps. Repeat. As we neared the closest fence, I decided it was time to turn her to the left; this was not a wise idea, because what followed would have made any professional rodeo bronc proud!

Dutch's head came up, her body stiffened, and she turned into an ocean wave with legs and hair. Her head disappeared and her hind end reached for the sky; up and down, up and down we pitched. I screamed at the top of my lungs, bringing my father running from the house, just in time for him to watch me go flying off behind the angry mare. The next buck landed a perfect black-and-blue hoof print on my thigh for weeks to come. I didn't know it at the time, but I was fortunate that a few bruises and some scrapes were all I ended up with. The crazed mare continued to back for several more minutes, until her creaking old western saddle finally slid to the ground, and then she galloped quickly away to the far end of the pasture, warily eying the screaming little girl and concerned father hobbling up to the house.

Had I understood then what I do now about the importance of nonverbal communication, I would never have attempted the feat. Hindsight is always 20/20, and I know now that I was going about the entire situation completely wrong. For starters, I was rather insecure about my own abilities, but wanted everyone, my dad especially, to think of me as a horse-expert, and through this silly experience, I had just obliterated that idea. I was attempting to make up for my lack of experience and practical knowledge with what I had learned in books (to make your horse move forward, squeeze with your legs); in other words, I wanted control, but was impatient, and not learned enough to realize that I needed to listen closely to the nonverbal messages my horse was trying o end me. I want to display my superiority, so I was deaf to Dutch's attempts to communicate with me, and completely unsupportive as a rider.

What my mare had been trying to tell me through her unwillingness to move, was that her saddle didn't fit her, and it was pinching her shoulder blades whenever she moved. Had I been responsible and longed her first (longing is essentially putting her through her paces in a circle with no rider on her back), I would have quickly seen that she was not being obstinate or disobedient, as I thought, but that she was severely uncomfortable and in a lot of pain. Because of my lack of empathy, the communication climate between my horse and I became hostile and defensive, causing both of us to lose trust in each other, and to fear each other.

After I came tumbling off of Dutch's pitching back, my dad took me inside and handed me some ice. Once he had checked to see that I was not seriously injured (apart from my pride), he went back outside to catch Dutch. I watched tearfully through the living room window as my dad calmly and carefully walked toward the nervous mare. He spoke softly to her, and her ears pricked forward to catch the sound of his gentle words. Her strained muscles and coiled limbs loosened and relaxed. She lowered her head as he approached. My dad reached out his hand and rubbed her face in a pacifying manner, catching hold of her trailing reins; then, he led her back to the barn.

At that, I was both jealous that my dad could achieve what I had been too afraid to do, and embarrassed that he could so easily show me up with my first horse. Through his kind, relaxing words, he not only won Dutch's trust, but also caused me to need to reevaluate my perception of him. Until that time, I had viewed my dad as a largely impatient, inexperienced, loud, and forceful. I had never seen my dad as someone who thought through things carefully, or who