The Reward of Undemanding Time

Frequently since I began studying Parelli Natural Horsemanship™ I’ve heard Linda Parelli say that one of the best ways to build a better relationship with your horse is to spend “undemanding time”. But working at the horse rescue, I discovered that finding the time to have undemanding time with my horse Sonny was not always an easy thing to do and our relationship was suffering. So I was desperate to figure out a way to spend more time with Sonny while still doing my regular rescue chores.
One of my main jobs at the rescue is to do ground work with the horses in our round pen. Our round pen is situated behind our tack room inside a larger fenced area that originally lacked a gate. While the round pen has a mostly dirt surface the rest of the paddock has some nice green grass, and since Sonny’s favorite past time is eating, I figured that if I could keep him in the paddock whenever I was working with horses in the round pen, I would be able to spend more time with him. A lead line tied across the opening in the fence was more than adequate to contain my easy going horse, since he was much more interested in the grass than he was in pulling a Houdini and going for a stroll.
This turned out to be a pretty good strategy for both of us. Sonny was able to graze undisturbed on some tasty grass and also got to visit over the fence with the retirees whose field adjoined the paddock. I was able to do my work with the other horses and still slip Sonny a treat or a scratch with out asking him to do anything and to observe his behavior more closely than I’d had the opportunity to do in the past. An added benefit seemed to be that the presence of my good natured quarter horse so close to the round pen had a calming effect on many of the rescue horses when then were separated from their buddies and brought to the round pen for work.
I think the benefits of undemanding time became more clear to me one day last summer when I had finished with the rescue horses and was ready to begin playing with Sonny. Sonny has never been a difficult horse to catch, but that morning when I started over to him to put his halter on, he walked away from me. I followed and just when I had caught up, he trotted off again, not stopping until he had reached the opposite side of the round pen.
“Hmmmm” I though, “That’s interesting. I guess he’s not ready to go to work!” Out loud I said, “OK Bub, have it your way.” I decided to see how long it would take for him to come to me. I went and retrieved my half finished cup of coffee and then picked up the mounting block that was outside of the fence, carried it over to the wall of the tack building, sat it down and parked my self on the top step to see what would happen next.
The horse rescue is a beautiful place. With over 100 acres in pasture located along the Sassafras river, there is a great sense of tranquility. It was warm morning and there was light breeze stirring the leaves in the trees. A red tailed hawk was circling above and it was very pleasant sitting there smelling the freshly cut grass. Across the round pen, I could see that Sonny was watching me as he continued to graze and he was slowly moving around the perimeter of the pen in my direction. I ignored him and concentrated on enjoying the sunshine on my face and the taste of my lukewarm coffee.
Slowly, Sonny grazed his way to the edge of the building and then disappeared. When I saw him peeking around the corner, I rested my head against the building and closed my eyes. I could hear him approaching. I’m not sure how long it took, maybe a couple of minutes, but when finally I felt his breath on my neck, I took a deep breath myself and exhaled a long sign. That’s when he touched my arm with his nose. I opened my eyes and looked into Sonny’s soft brown eyes and smiled. Sonny never moved while I sipped the halter on his head. He just blew softly and finished chewing his last bite of grass. We went on to have a fabulous session with Sonny being more responsive than he had ever been to this time and I knew that by letting him tell me he was ready to play rather than me forcing the issue had been a significant event between us.
Sonny and I have come a long way in our relationship. I know there are times when I want to do too much too soon but I like to think that I am better able to read his moods than I used to be and that I am much more willing to give him the time and space he needs so that he is mentally ready to “play”. For his part, Sonny seems to want to spend more time with me than he did before and we are starting to work more at liberty.
A few months after I had started bringing Sonny to the round pen paddock, my friend Jane watched me play with him in the round pen.
“Who is this horse?” she jokingly asked me. “He can’t be your Sonny. He’s like a different horse from the last time I saw him!”
It was at that moment that I knew with certainty I had reaped the reward of spending undemanding time with my horse.