I bought my first horse at 14 years of age from money earned on a paper route in the suburbs of Colorado.
I bought a bridle from a Tandy leather kit, and the halter and lead came with the horse. I was beginning to save for a saddle but my first horse died of colic six weeks after I bought him. The saddle had to wait until I paid back my mom for loaning me money for my second horse. This situation taught me to ride bareback fairly well before I was able to buy a saddle. I did have experience riding rental horses with saddles from my mom and dad taking us kids to rental stables to ride. My mom continued to take us to these stables when she could even after my dad died when I was about twelve.
It is always good to start with easy-going horses such as I had in the beginning, to practice riding bareback. Remember God’s sixth commandment: Do not murder. Normal people and horses murder when they panic or get mad, so have the good teacher attitude of justice. Start with an easy-going horse, and work up a step at a time in maneuverability and speed in a smaller corral before going to bigger area. People talk about holding on with their knees when riding bareback, but the only time that would be true is when we are bracing for a stop. We bring our knees up to keep from being thrown forward when our horse is stopping. I actually brace for a stop with my knees as my signal for the horse to stop while I am bareback or in the saddle.
The whole key to staying on a horse bareback is to move the way it moves. We stay on because we are doing what it is doing, not because we are holding on. Holding on to the mane will help some, but the “Jesus Christ” part of it is the main thing. I call God’s eighth commandment – do not steal – the sensitivity one because this is the one in which we have learned to move just like a horse. I call it the Jesus Christ one because to me it is a great illustration of the amazing thing God did for us by becoming a human.
When we learn to move like a horse, we are essentially taking on the horses body so we can move more like them and therefore with them. When we are looking at a good rider, it truly looks like they are part of the horse – if not the same creature, much like a centaur. All of our joints are being flexed. I some times call it belly dancing because our back and waist muscles are especially utilized when there is true unity between horse and rider. By far the most awesome thing I admire about Jesus Christ is the example he gives being the biggest boss man ever of all time. The record in the Bible that showed him taking on a human body in order for us who believe to be saved by him for eternity.
If we are impressed by that, we have an obligation to our horse to do what we can to give our horse a smooth ride by keeping our bodies as fit and as flexible as possible.
Next time. I will talk about ways to use our horses effectively and efficiently in our increasingly high tech era of replacing warm bodies with machines so we all spend our time in some form of wheel chair for much of the day.
Mike Daniels is a horsemanship trainer and barefoot trimming specialist from Raymondville. Email: rlhorse58@yahoo.com.
