The Parelli complex has been set up with the assumption that you have far more money than you want, and that you are just dying to get rid of a pile of it, which the Parelli company will kindly remove from your bank account or the old sock under the bed. Going under that assumption, they have outlined a great way to progress, but most of the explanations and "what to do next" and "how to do it" are contained in DVD's that you must purchase.
Now, I'm sure that those expensive DVD's are VERY nicely done, and clear, and just what the doctor ordered. However, by the time you pay for your monthly Parelli Connection (on the Internet), and get yourself a carrot stick with a rope, and a rope halter, and a 22 foot longe line and a 12 foot lead rope, without which it's darned near impossible to progress, many folks will find themselves out of money, and possibly short on food as well until the next few paychecks can repair the hemmorhage to their bank account.
I fall into that category, and didn't purchase my stuff from Parelli (well, other than the Parelli Connect membership). I'm using a homemade longe line which is 7 feet too short, and a quarter of an inch too small in diameter, making it difficult to latch on properly during those times when Daisy gets a gleeful gleam in her eye, and turns tail and hauls bootie for the opposite end of the small arena, jerking the thin longe line right out of my hands. Of course, she always turns around and trots back to me with the glow of success in her eyes. I just sigh and pick up where I left off. Punishing a LBE for a playful move would rain on their parade, pop their balloon, and nurture a sulky animal. It would be about as mean as stepping on a puppy. However (!), I WILL eventually acquire a longe line rope that I can hang onto and when I can, I will quickly take a grip and a stance at the beginning of her game, and she will come to a screeching halt.
There's a lot to be said for a rope halter. Originally, I didn't want to use one, as my predominantly Right Brain Introvert horses wanted to feel safe, secure and all wrapped up in a soft coccoon. LBE's (Left Brain Extroverts) have no such insecurities! They must be able to FEEL the pressure of a halter to understand what you want, at least in the beginning. I have no doubt that Daisy will come eventually to respond to a feather's touch, but that will be down the road a bit. At the moment she needs the "cues" as surely as a dancer needs phyiscal cues from their partner. And lacking those cues and the cause-and-effect thing of the rope halter, she simply becomes hedonistic and does her own thing.
This, however, does not mean that she doesn't care about me. And I hope if others are reading this, who have a Left Brain Extrovert on their hands, that they will take heart. Daisy is a loving, caring horse and I believe that once a human becomes non-scary to the horse (who is a claustrophobic fear-a-holic by nature), and once patterns are established that the horse can depend upon to happen today, tomorrow and forever after that, and if the horse is treated in a caring and loving manner, they tend to respond by bonding with their human.
Bit I digress...What I started out to say was that Parelli gives you quite a bit of instruction (written and video) on the Level 1 Seven Games (Friendly, Porcupine, Driving, Yo-Yo, Circling, Sideways and Squeeze). But unless you purchase a comprehensive DVD, it is not stressed adequately that a horse can become pretty sour if you concentrate on just those seven games, and don't incorporate Level 2 at the same time. Level 2 has you using elements of those games to get your horse to, for instance, go around two road cones, in a figure 8 pattern, Or using the Squeeze Game to help a horse release claustrophobic fears of a trailer.
Why should horses be all that different than humans, in that no one wants to have their nose stuck to the grindstone all the time. Give us a something to hang a concept on, and we "get it" a lot faster and more happily. I read about a nun in a parochial school who taught math by teaching the kids how bets are wagered at the track! This was in a different age and time than the one we now live in, but the kids ate it up and became marvels at figuring. It gave them something to "hang their hat on," instead of leaving the concepts dangling.
While watching a free video of Pat working with a horse to get it to do the figure 8's around road cones, walk over a tarp with a lack of concern and so on, it became clear that many of us (me included) tended to take a closer, tighter micro-managing grip on the leadrope when the horse was cutting capers and behaving in an unreliable fashion. As long as you have a longish rope and a rope halter, it works far better to give the horse a bit of rope when possible, letting it caper around you and move it's nervous feet, while guiding and directing with the carrot stick, forcing the horse to start focusing on you as you incorporate some of the seven games.
A horse which is thinking, "Uh oh! Watch out for the road cone" or "Oh my, look at that enormous, scary ball" and which is worked closer and closer, allowed to evade but is brought back time and again, gets into a rhythm, relatxation, retreat cycle which allows you to bring the horse nearer and near until they find that what scared them is no longer an issue.
And all you need to blow it is getting into a "forcing" mode. Traditional thinking says that the faster and sooner you can force the horse to submit, the better horseman you are. The truth is that it takes as long as it takes. Take the time to do it right the first time. A true horseman (I refer to myself as a horseman, but I'm a woman...just as I tend to call all post office mail deliverers postmen even when they are women) understands where his horse is coming from and understands the process it will take to bring the horse out of its natural fears. Dominion and submission is about "look how fast I brought that about." Natural horsemanship is more about thorough. It's about helping the horse work through the issue so that the issue no longer exists. This isn't always done in one session. Indeed, shorter sessions work better. Everyone has a certain window of best learning time. It's more effective in the end to use that window, and not push on the days when the horse has drawn a curtain over the window!
So what can I do, with only a puny round pen, to take Daisy into Level 2 exercises? Well, the pen is large enough for a small tarp. She is annoyed/bothered by things she has to walk over, but it will hold her attention which otherwise wanders because going around and around in a round pen is BORING! And repeatedly asking her to reverse direction is aggravating. She wants to know what the point is. Can you blame her?
I plan to take out an umbrella (we should get a lot of mileage out of opening and closing that, then leaving it open on the ground and playing the Squeeze Game past it. Ditto for a plastic bag on a Carrot Stick. But I don't want to focus primarily on "scary objects" only, because horses need games where they can move their feet and think. So some poles may be utilized as well. Parallel to her line of travel and she can go between a pole and the arena fence (Squeeze Game). Crossways and we have cavelleti's.
Anything which allows me to work with her on about 10 feet or a bit more of lead rope will allow her to start managing her actions and learning more about communication signals from me.
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