The Art of Natural Dressage

Hi Everyone!

My name is Alla, and I am excited to be here and be able to learn from all of you. I am not new to the community or the philosophy, although today is my second time ever visiting these forums.

I, like many of you, come from NHE. I rode horses for 10 years before finding NHE, and quit shortly after that. This was in 2007. I partboarded a horse for a short period of time after I found NHE, and began working with him according to NHE principles, but was kicked out of the barn as soon as my horse began showing something resembling an opinion.

At that time I started university, and had nothing to do with horses until I completed it. I also slowly moved away from NHE - not so much in philosophy, but in involvement. Shortly after graduation I remembered about a former NHE forum member that I met with in my area, contacted her again, and began going to her place weekly just to be with horses again.

Fast forward six months, and I've gotten the opportunity to partboard again. This time it is a barn that is very open-minded, and very holistic and natural in their horse keeping practices. Horses are barefoot and on paddock paradise. I hope that this time goes better and i'm able to stay there for a while.

I see a large number of familiar names and horses here because I've been following a lot of you on youtube for 5 years. Lasuria, Romy, Esprit, and plenty of others. Its been a great load of fun watching all of you, now I want to try myself.

Hi Alla, welcome!

So cool that you are here! I remember you from the NHE forum, I think we arrived there at about the same time in 2007 - only that you stayed longer than I did, because I was kicked out after a little more than a week. Great that you can work with a horse under better circumstances now, I remember you had quite some trouble back then due to your goals being so different from those of the barn owners.

Looking forward to reading from you!

Best wishes,
Romy

Wow, it's crazy that you remember me! Haha yes, I had lots of trouble with the previous barn.. but I have matured (no longer the 17 year old kid... now the 22 year old kid!), have a little less fanaticism and a little more open-mindedness with regards to training and horses in general.

What I like about AND is first of all, clear instructions and ideas and second of all, the live and let live attitude. I'm tired of feeling like I need to jump down the throat of anyone who puts a bit in their horse's mouth - so I just know that I'll never put one on my horse and I'm more than happy to leave others alone if they will leave me alone. Now if they're curious about what I'm doing.... that's a whole different story.

I've been watching your progression with Titum and Pia (she is SO cute and picks up things so fast!) for a long time now on youtube. Your videos are always a lot of fun!

I just started my journey with Outlaw, my new partboarder, yesterday - and I'm going to see him again on friday, so I'll likely start a journal before then. I also plan on video-taping all of our sessions. Thank you for the warm welcome!

Hi Alla,

Welcome here! I live in Ontario, too (just south of London). What part of Ontario are you in?

I can totally relate to issues with barn owners; I was kicked out of a barn once, simply because I asked too many questions...and honestly, none were asked in a rude way. I was fairly new to horses and wanted to learn as much as I could. Apparently, the barn owner didn't like that. But it was a huge learning experience, and having to change barns has brought better and better things to my mare and me

Welcome Alla!

Interesting story you have... We also left a barn just before we got kicked out, so I know what that feels like .
Great that you like AND for its open-mindedness - that's also what I love it for

Looking forward to your stories about Outlaw - a very promising name!

_________________
Volker

The horse owes us nothing.