01/29/2026
“Desensitize” is not a descriptive word that I like to use in my partnership with horses. Honestly, I don’t want anyone in my life “desensitized” to me. Sensitized maybe, but even that feels a bit funny.
Familiarized!
Ah, that sits just right 🙂
It’s very important that my horses are familiarized to me and especially to the equipment we use.
I do not do traditional “desensitization” training (ie flag flapping, “friendly game, etc) though I purposefully engaged in over-the-top flag flapping for this video, hoping to clearly demonstrate my point…Which is that it’s important to me that my horses are familiarized to the flag and even more so, fluent in our shared language. I work outside (where there are often gusts of wind) and I work other horses from horseback. In order to establish calm, confident and clear communication, my horses NEED to know when my flag is speaking to them vs when it’s moving in the wind or working another horse. While I’m not going to go into training practices in a post, there are a few ideologies I embody to go about achieving this-
* I work From a Feel first and then back up my offered feel with body language and then with aids. In this order. Always.
* I do not sneak around and try to hide or purposefully scare the horse with the flag.
* I never whip with the flag (I’m talking about the underhand grip flicking/whipping action, not necessarily making physical contact). The flag is an extension of my arm and hand and I use it just so, overhand with the same motions I would perform with an empty arm and hand.
In the video, I am demonstrating communicating with Éowyn when my flag is speaking to her (in this case as a driving aid to step her forward) and when it is not. Éowyn is familiarized to responding to my Leading Aid. So when my Leading Hand is in a more neutral position next to my body, with my Feel requesting that she stay put, she’s not inclined to move from the stimuli of the flag. When my leading hand extends offering a Leading Feel, this signals for her to step forward and the driving feel from my flag is the backup plan. I do not use the leading feel and driving feel at once, always one and then the other. The goal being that eventually, we won’t need driving pressure at all.
I have been told by several humans that a horse cannot learn the difference. My horses beg to differ. Or at least this may be true for those folks but it’s not an issue I’ve had.
Please note- at no point during this clip does Éowyn Freeze or show any adverse worry or reaction to the flag. In fact, I used it a few times- once to discourage her from messing with the platform, once to help her shift her weight to a more comfortable standing posture and once as a backup to my leading feel asking her to shift her weight to prepare for walking off. Each time she followed the feel of the flag, ie keeping her feet still as per my leading hand while responding to specific cues from the flag. If she had become worried (either outwardly reactive or inwardly freezing), I would have stopped this demo and gone to work helping her settle or come back to me mentally.
This is not about training my horse to stand still no matter what I’m doing around them, it’s about teaching my horse to follow my feel and how to be comfortable and confident with our gear.
As I work my way through coaching the Balance Through Movement Method Lungeing Intensive, little things like this are popping up and not only validating but assuring me that the Horsemanship matters. Because how we do small things is how we do all things
~ Chiara 💕
