Focus Before Feel

Dorrence's great work, "True Horsemanship Through Feel" has all of the answers. Unfortunately, I have a very difficult time understanding some of his concepts and much of his vocabulary. For the longest time I was baffled by his concept of "feel". I have come to believe that "feel" is exhibited when the horse does what the human wants because the human wants it and for no other motivation. Read Dorrence. Try hard to understand him.

In any event, I do not believe that "feel" can come before "focus." Focus is the intense state of concentration that leads to physical relaxation while allowing the mind to block out other distractions. Focus is what causes me to look at my watch after 15 minutes of training a horse one on one only to discover that I have actually been with him over 2 hours. Focus is what allows me to become surprised when I exit the round pen and notice, for the first time, that a small crowd of people had gathered around the pen to watch us training.

The picture above demonstrates focus. This is not a posed picture. Jacob was mounting Harley for the first time. The intensity of my concentration is matched by Jacob's. Focus is the hardest thing for a kid to learn. It helps for a kid to get tossed a few times because of not focusing. Everyone needs incentives and staying out of the hospital is a good incentive.