Jean Luc Cornille

09/08/2024

Let the reductionists be. Believe in knowledge, your skill, and your horse.
We posted recently in Reel the video of my horse performing Tempi Changes. Years earlier, the horse was lame and diagnosed with a severe case of navicular syndrome. I attempted his rehabilitation, encouraged by L. Ostblom” research finding that navicular changes were remodeling instead of degenerative disease. “The findings introduce the thought that navicular disease is not primarily caused by ischemia and subsequent necrosis, but rather is the consequence of increased activation of bone remodeling caused by altered pressure from the deep digital flexor tendon on the bone and increased load on the caudal part of the foot. The disease is, therefore, considered to be reversible and may be alleviated by altering the load on navicular bone by special shoeing.’ (L. Ostblom, 1982) Having already, through the practical application of advanced scientific discoveries, observed that the most efficient way to reduce the load on the hoff was acting on the direction, intensity, and frequency of the forces loading the front legs from the thoracolumbar spine down to the hoof, I did not limit my horse’s rehabilitation to corrective shoeing. I focused on identifying and correcting the source of the forces loading the right front leg abnormally. It was an inverted thoracic spine rotation, shifting the dorsal spine toward the right and loading the right front leg. I observed then that the corrective shoeing hampered my ability to correct the right front leg’s aberrant kinematics, and I removed the corrective shoeing in favor of simply correct shoeing.
At first, the horse was so lame that he could not carry a rider, and I started the rehabilitation working in hand. The in-hand technique I use differs widely from all in-hand approaches. I discovered that a horse can feel subtle adjustments in my back and body tone even walking by the horse’s side. I developed a in hand technique exploiting this phenomenon. I asked my horse to slow down the horse not in response to a hand action but by adjusting his back muscles to the tone of my back and body muscles, basically, my tensegrity. My horse learned to slow down, converting the hind legs thrust forward through his thoracolumbar spine into greater upward forces, reducing the load on the forelegs. After two months of this daily practice, at first just a few minutes and then longer, my horse’s lameness was markedly reduced, and I applied the same technique when riding the horse.
Riding accelerated the progress as it was possible to refine his balance control. I mean authentic balance, not the erroneous pantomime pretending to shift the weight back over the haunches with half halts. I taught my horse to convert the hind legs thrust forward through his thoracolumbar spine into greater upward forces. Reductionists cannot understand the concept because their classical education limits their mind. My horse understood easily, and soon, I was able to refine his balance control, narrowing the corridor through which the hind legs’ thrust is managed forward through the thoracolumbar spine muscles. To understand the concept, you need to evolve from the usual linear thinking regarding balance as a front-to-back phenomenon. It is not. Balance is the horse’s capacity to center the forces above and around his center of mass, which is about behind the girth under the rider’s upper thighs.
The concept appears difficult because we are conditioned to think in mechanical thinking. Instead the concept is easy to apply once we evolve from biomechanics to biotensegrity. We have three courses teaching riders how to apply biotensegrity from a simple to an advanced level. Riders are amazed to discover how easily their mind evolves to actual knowledge and how easily their body communicates with the horse through subtle nuances in muscle tone.
The video is important. This is a paradigm shift. Many rather believe that the shoeing can correct navicular syndrome because they are not prepared to question their beliefs. Correct shoeing or trimming is necessary but not enough. Success demands a properly balanced hoof and a rider capable of upgrading her or his thinking to understand the horse’s body function.
I join the reference of a study that we have completed and published in the Veterinary Surgery Journal about the new discovery of the soft tissues involed and eventual damages in the navicular apparatus. It is an “The Equine Navicular Apparatus as a Premier Enthesis Organ: Functional Implications,” (Michelle L. Osborn MA, PhD; Jean Luc Cornille, SOM, Uriel Blas-Machado DVM, PhD, DACVP; Elizabeth W. Uhl DVM, PhD, DACVP
Here is the link. https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1111/vsu.13620:
The article is open-access so you can read it without being charged. .
Jean Luc

09/08/2024

We posted a video in the reel program about navicular treatment, and it was one good question.
"Did you take shoes off during the rehabilitation?"
Good question. If the horse arrives with shoes, I keep the shoes, but I remove the corrective shoeing in favor of the correct shoeing. The reason is that the corrective shoeings alter the capacity to recreate proper limb kinematics from refined thoracolumbar spine function. It is important that the hoof is properly balanced, but it is only one part of the rehabilitation. It is a mistake to believe that the shoeing alone can fix the problem. For centuries, the focus has been on the distal sesamoid bone. and the shoeing was the logical thinking. Now that we know that soft tissues are often the real problem, the direction, intensity, and frequency of the forces loading the forelegs have to be corrected. This must be done from the horse's thoracolumbar spine down to the legs and hoof. It is time to evolve from mechanical thinking and biomechanics to the understanding that the forces loading the navicular apparatus involve the coordination of the horse's whole physique. This is why we need to evolve from biomechanics to biotensegrity for the horse's soundness. This is what the Science of Motion has done.. Biotensegrity is a totally different picture, but interestingly, riders are afraid of the change at first, but they realize that all along, they were thinking in this new direction and are comfortable applying it. Horses naturally have a high sensitivity and refined perception. They are at home with the biotensegrity approach. Jean Luc

09/05/2024

“Can you remember who you were before the world told you who you should be?” (Charles Buchowski)
Can you remember the rider you were before the equestrian world told you who you should be? Who you were was the real rider. Who you are entering the show ring is marketing. Carl Jung says we devote the first half of our life to forming a healthy ego. The second half is going inward and letting go of it. Once you enter the second half, you discover the real nature and value of your horse and, through your horse, the real person you are. The earlier you enter the second half, the better rider you become. Showing can be just ego, and you exploit a talented but dysfunctional horse until pathology ends his career. Showing can also be a partnership where your value is your capacity to prepare efficiently the horse’s physique for the athletic demand of the performance.

Teaching the horse to coordinate his physique efficiently is delightful. It quickly became the primary purpose of our life with the horse. The showing can be part of our partnership, but the pleasure in the show ring is the capacity to prepare the horse’s physique for the movement in one stride or two. Our value as a rider is the capacity to adjust to the situation when the preparation is not optimum, which includes not forcing the horse when his body coordination is not optimum. Once we reach this level of knowledge and ethics, the judge’s score is an insignificant detail. You leave the ring with a sound horse and pass the vet without needing another corticoid injection.

How can we liberate ourselves from the pressure created by the system? Simply by learning how the horse’s physique effectively functions. The concept of obedience to the rider aids lets us believe that we can micromanage each instant of the horse’s athletic performance. This is not the cutting age; it is the dark age. Advanced knowledge demonstrates that, to the contrary, the horse coordinates for the performance, numerous systems that are out of our physical influence. Advanced understanding of the horse’s body function sends the concept of obedience to the horse museum as a heretical belief that has hampered the horse’s performances for centuries. The horse willingly coordinates his physique for the performance. What we interpret as resistance or disobedience are difficulties related to the horse’s morphology or athleticism and the horse’s nature, which protects against muscle imbalance or other issues instead of analyzing them. If knowledgeable, we are the ones who can identify the cause of the horse’s difficulty and correct it through appropriate gymnastics. If we are not knowledgeable, we can learn. The practical application of new knowledge is a fascinating journey.

Tradition is the pressure of dead people. They never pretended to know all; they offered their experience as a work in transition, a stopover along the way. They believed the hind legs propel the body upward from their advanced position under the horse’s belly. Of course, this is not true, but they believe it is because the naked eye cannot register fast movements. It took advanced technology to realize that at impact and during the first half of the stance, the alighting hind and front legs excerpt a braking phase. It took research to understand the concept of storage and reuse of elastic energy. Yes, it is useful to engage the hind legs, but not for the reason our ancestors explained. The elastic energy stored in the tendons, fascia aponeurosis, and muscles during the decelerating phase is used for the propulsive phase. Science deeply changes the meaning of the classical literature. It is not the engagement of the hind legs that allows balance control; it is how the back muscles manage the hind legs thrust forward through the thoracolumbar and cervical spine.

This is where a paradigm shift is necessary. The hind legs induce a force into the thoracolumbar spine in the direction of motion. The back muscles, supported by the core muscles, convert the hind legs thrust into forward motion, horizontal forces, balance control, upward forces, and other forces. Traditional equitation principles don’t permit educating the back muscle efficiently. It is doable through harmonic tensegrity, a subtle interaction of forces between the rider and the horse’s whole physique. It cannot be done efficiently through biomechanical thinking. Biomechanics helps understand how the horse’s body functions, but the advanced understanding of fascial connection, close kinematics chain, and kinetic energy places the interaction between the rider and the horse at a more dynamic and sophisticated level. The horse can feel touches that are too subtle for a human to feel. When we are told ”more legs,” we are told a piece of advice that guarantees our failure. It is the same when we are told that fitting the saddle to the horse’s back muscles imbalance corrects the back muscles imbalance. It’s the same when we are told that trimming the hoof properly balances the whole horse. One element of truth needs to remain one element of truth, not the whole picture.

What fascinates me with the tensegrity approach, and this is true for the riders, and for the horses, it is to see horses and riders discover aptitudes that were there all along but burrowed under rules and regulations. Knowledge of equine biomechanics and the practical application of knowledge through the biotensegrity approach allows us to be who we are before the equestrian world told us who we should be.
Jean Luc

09/04/2024

An Open and Attractive Journey.
The Devina D’Or series shows no need for authoritarianism or brutality. The backing and more advanced training can be done gently, respectfully, and intelligently. Devina is now interested in finding ease and effortlessness, and her mental processing and physical intelligence work for excellence through ease and effortlessness. Horses are willing, and the concept of obedience to the rider’s aids has kept them below their potential. A great part of a successful performance is the horse’s mental processing. As the horse’s mind processes for efficiency, the physical intelligence develops muscle synergies, fascial connections, and closed kinematics chains.
Guiding the horse’s mind toward efficiency and consequent ease and soundness is a rewarding and ethical journey. The horse learns to coordinate his physique efficiently, and the rider discovers his true potential. Being a skilled rider is one thing. Being a better human riding efficiently is a higher goal.
Teaching the horse how to think positively is more effective than teaching the horse how to do it. The horse executes the performance, not us. If we educate the mind, the horse orchestrates numerous systems for success that we don’t have the physical capacity to influence. Success for the rider is a blue ribbon or the capacity to execute a high-level movement. Success for the horse is ease, effortlessness, and soundness. Both can be achieved, but not through obedience.
Every school of thought claims to do what I describe, but it is ugly when a video shows what happens behind the curtain. In the Simple 24 and Master One courses, we show Devina’s daily work on video. The whole education is done in front of the camera and is so gentle and easy that people think it must be more behind the camera. There is no need for forceful education because Devina is trained to think positively. Devina is now starting her journey with me riding her. Watching the process, you will understand why I did what I did, preparing Devina for the backing experience.
Starting next month, we push the experiment further. Two three-year-old horses are scheduled to arrive, two and three years old, and, as I do with Devina, I will show the whole process in daily videos. I am 78 years old. I no longer have the speed and stamina I used to have, but I know more than when I was thirty and fifty. There is a way to do it where pertinent thinking compensates for superior physical skill. Join us on this highly educative journey.
Jean Luc https://www.scienceofmotion.com/documents/simple24.html

08/28/2024

A Natural Evolution.
The natural evolution from biomechanics is biotensegrity, which is the faculty to harmonize the complex functioning of the body parts. In the late nineteenth eighty. I wrote introductions to Biomechanics in the late Magazine Dressage and CT. Reductionists attacked me viciously, pretending to protect the classical approach. Forty years later, as I encourage thinking riders to explore Biotensegrity, the same type of reductionists attack me viciously, pretending to protect Biomechanics. Conclusion: reductionists reproduce but don’t evolve.
For long, I felt that the practical application of biomechanics demanded a new dimension. Many have tried integrating body awareness and therapies but have downgraded biomechanics’ evolution. When the therapy is the science of sophisticated motion, band-aids and thicker paddings defy the purpose, hampering the refinement of the motion. I knew that experience was helpful, but by experience, I mean experience riding and training high-level competition athletes. Not too many riders have this experience. Thinking deeper, I realized that experience erases many theories strongly supported at a lower level but ineffective at a higher level. Experience also replaces these elementary theories with a refinement of the whole physique and greater respect for the horse’s mental processing. Basically, extensive experience practiced Biotensegrity before Stephen Levin came up with the term Biotensegrity.
Evolution, for those intellectually capable of evolving, often commences with intuitive thoughts but supports and furthers the thoughts with extensive and constantly evolving knowledge. There is a constant battle between cult leaders who want to keep members of the cult within the theories they promote and intelligent minds who seek further knowledge. The aim of cult leaders is their ego. The aim of sensible riders is the horse, and the complexity of the horse’s body function demands an evolved form of riding and thinking. “In a mechanical system, the parts shape the whole, while in an organic system the whole shapes the parts.” Organic systems, are more flexible, adaptable, and evolving. The components of organic systems, such as the rider and the horse, interact with each other in complex and dynamic ways. Unlike mechanical systems, organic systems do not have a fixed set of rules dictating how they operate. Organic systems evolve and adapt based on the interactions of their components, and the system as a whole changes over time.
Mechanical thinking promotes relaxation as the cure for protective reflex contraction. There are no resting muscles in living anatomy and physiology. The non- linearity of collagen does not allow for zero tension in human contractile tissue. In other words, contractile tissues never rest. Biotensegrity understands that the efficiency of a tensegrity structure is the complex interaction of all the structure’s elements. Tightening or releasing one element alters the function of the whole structure. Mechanical thinking remains at the level of obedience to the rider’s aids. Biotensegrity thinking understands that the horse is the one who can efficiently orchestrate complex systems with the rider’s assistance.
All along, horses have done a lot more than academic equitation ever understood. Horses have achieved different levels of balance control despite theories believing that the hind legs propel the horse’s body upward from their advanced position under the belly. The theory is false, and science has explained that for decades. At impact and during almost the first half of the stance, the alighting hind and foreleg produce first a braking phase resisting impact forces and converting impact forces into elastic energy stored in the tendons, fascia muscles, ligaments aponeurosis, and used for the propulsive phase and the swing. Theologians believe that the hind legs propel the body upward, and scientific measurements have demonstrated that the hind legs’ thrust is primarily a force in the direction of motion.
Since Richard Tucker’s 1964 study of the biomechanics of the vertebra column, the evolution of knowledge constantly upgrades how the hind legs’ thrust is converted into balance control by the back muscles. We have evolved from the linear theory of balance control, which supported riders’ actions such as half halt, to the actual understanding of the Center of Mass, which explains that balance is the horse’s ability to center the forces above and around the Center of Mass. Now, we need to think at a different level. Balance control is our ability to channel the forces in the direction of the motion and around the Center of Mass. Reductionists will claim that the concept of narrowing is included in the classical theory of straightness. Now. I defy the reductionists to provide a sound and factual explanation of the rider’s aids capable of centering the forces above and around the Center of Mass.
We explain the process in our four different online courses. It is a complex process, and the rider’s ability to evolve from mechanical thinking is the greatest evolution. Many succeed and enjoy a new relationship with their horse. The evolution from Biomechanics to Biotensegrity is a natural evolution. It is not one or the other, as the biomechanical knowledge evolves constantly. So does the understanding of Biotensegrity, but without the evolution to Biotensegrity, riders try to apply new knowledge, tightening the bolt to secure the joint and the horse develops pathology.
Jean Luc

08/27/2024

08/25/2024

“Some people are not put here to evolve. They are here to remind you what it looks like if you don’t.”

When the French Cadee Noir was a military institutuion. It was mandatory to complete at first a military training. I volunteered for special training to jump in a parachute, and the training included a forced walk/run test where we needed to cover ten kilometers carrying a backpack with a fifteen-kilogram bag of sand. The backpack was rudimentary, a soft bag with harnesses for the shoulders. After a few kilometers, the bag of sand bouncing on our back was painful. To avoid the bouncing, I used my belt and tightened the backpack around my chess. After a few kilometers, a different problem developed. The pressure of the tightened belt distributed the sand unevenly, creating local pressure and sharp pain in my back. The memory of the pain makes me cringe when someone tells me that her saddle has been fitted to the horse’s back muscle imbalance. The saddle cannot correct back muscle imbalance; it is the rider with adequate gymnastics. To identify and correct the back dysfunction leading to muscle imbalance, the rider must have an undeformed perception of the forces interacting between the horse and the rider’s back.

Today backpacks are very well designed; there is no padding modeling the human back. They are firm yet supple enough to distribute the weight evenly; they use materials that absorbs forces. So they are good saddles.

The video is a model showing the diversity of movements in motion. Like all models, the illustration is not perfect, but it is useful enough to give a visual impression of the large diversity of forces and movement occurring during locomotion. The saddle needs to fit this dynamic diversity of forces and movements. The saddle is not a mold that fits exactly the skin and muscle variations of the horse’s back. The saddle needs to be steady, close contact, well balanced, and transmit as precisely as possible the forces and movements created by the horse’s body to the rider’s back, and the rider’s body to the horse’s back.

The horse and the rider are two tensegrity structures that have to work in synchrony, and the saddle needs to allow this exchange of forces without distorting movements and redirecting forces. The tree, for instance, needs to be wide enough to fit the shape of the horse’s wither and upper neck muscles. However, believing that a tree wider than necessary gives more room creates a detrimental instability problem. Considering that a great part of the interactions between the horse and the rider is channeling forward through the thoracic spine a large diversity of minute lateral and transversal shifts, the steadiness of the saddle is primordial. I use the Macel Samba S Chazot because, through my experience which includes hundreds of different saddles and horses ridden through the training program and clinics worldwide, The Samba S Chazot is the steadiest saddle I have ridden on.

I was told, as everybody else, that balance was created by shifting the weight backward over the haunches, but starting in 1965 with Richard Tucker’s first biomechanical study of the equine thoracolumbar spine, a large number of researchers explained that on the contrary, Balance control was a forward concept where the hind legs’ thrust was converted forward through the thoracolumbar spine into horizontal, upward and other forces. A recent concept talks about the human and equine capacity to maintain forces around and above the center of mass.

Of course, people who cannot evolve will scream blasphemy; they don’t use the advancement of science to upgrade the wisdom of our ancestors; they count on the horses’ talent to compensate for their incapacity to evolve. I have seen numerous riders claiming they love their saddle until they ride in a really good saddle. Their first words are always, “I never felt my horse’s back that well.”

08/23/2024

Awesome
When I saw her for the first time, the girl was thirteen, maybe fourteen years old. I was impressed by her feeling and determination. She stood against therapists and veterinarians telling her that her pony was sound. She felt that something was wrong. Effectively, the pony had an inverted thoracic spine rotation, causing mild kinematic abnormality in the right foreleg. I told the mother that appropriate gymnastics could likely correct the problem. There was no follow-up, and I assumed that as she was involved in the show circuit, they opted for the large diffusion of band-aid therapies based on an element of truth but extrapolated for marketing to the point of being ineffective.
Six months later, the mother called me back, asking for help. The pony was now showing aberrant kinematics of the right hind leg. I went to look at the pony, and he was effectively worse. During the time spent with ineffective therapies, the pony had aggravated the initial inverted rotation, inducing abnormal stress on the sacroiliac joint at the other end of the thoracolumbar spine. The pony was large but too small for me to ride him. I warned the mother that the compensations that the pony had developed complicated the problem, and it might be difficult to explain to such a young girl and challenging to do. The mother asked me to try, and we agreed to stop the session if her daughter had difficulties understanding.
I explained the pony’s problem to the young girl, and she listened with a poker face, no smile or a single word. We started to work, and she reacted and rode well. I asked her if she understood what I said several times during the session, but she never responded. However, she reacted well as a rider, and the pony progressed. We fully corrected the abnormal kinematics of the right hind leg, and the right front was almost normal. She halted with a big smile, and I asked her, you understand all that? She slowly turned her head toward me and said. “Awesome!”
Back home, the mother called me saying that during the drive, her daughter explained to her from A to Z what I told her, what she did, and how her pony responded. The mother added. I listened to the session but unconsciously interpreted your words based on what I had been told. I was stuck in mechanical thinking. Listening to my daughter, I realized that your explanations are clear and easy to understand. The next time she came for a lesson. I welcomed her, “Hi, Awesome,” and she smiled.
Jean Luc

08/21/2024

Healing yourself can be offensive to those who benefit from your brokenness. So is healing your horse or, even better, preventing injuries. There is a better word. It is in this world but demands a definitive evolution from mechanical thinking. In the Science of Motion courses, Simple 24 and Master One, I post daily the work of a talented young mare named Devina, who belongs to Karyn Meserve. Devina is a great athlete and has started to show superior gaits. I don't talk about the throwing of the legs with the thoracic spine in extension that horses rushed in panic around the ring exhibit to impress naïve buyers. I talk about beauty resulting from adequate coordination of the horse's physique.
We show the whole process through non-edited videos. Yesterday's work showed beautiful strides and prompted numerous comments from course members. Ebba Camitz made a special comment.
Jean Luc
JL, I heard a description of the word Authenticity just a few months ago.
As described, it basically ment that the mind's intention matches the language of the body. To me, this resonated so well with how horses perceive us, inside matching outside
There are so many methods and theories projected on us to; breathe in a certain way, act in an assertive manner, move a certain way, and make sure we stand our grounds for respect towards animals and in this case horses etc.
The confusion and misalignment of so many horses and humans become so blatantly apparent when you realize that inside and outside, the intention and purpose, and therefore the energy tone, do not cohere with the outside facing them, the horses.
Watching you and Devina’s progression, Authenticity came to mind. It is pure; there are no gestures, and there are no filters between you and her. It is just a dialog where you are stimulating and setting conditions for further research and processing, but she main act
Your sessions' peaceful and positive processing is such a pleasure to watch.
And it is as if I can feel the bubbling of proudness and joy when Devina succeeds and starts bouncing effortlessly dealing with her balance and spring.
The profoundness of the letting go of the ego, that we cannot take over the control of their minds, their bodies, we can merely be the instigator, and the co-actor making way for their success. By knowledge, empathy and Authenticity
Truly humbling to be able to glimpse into your daily work JL, thank you!
It makes for better humans
Ebba Camitz

08/20/2024

Epictetus

“You have been criticizing yourself for years, and it hasn’t worked. Try approving yourself and see what happens.” (Epictetus) Don’t try with humans; they are too deep in their fake world to respond honestly. Try with equines. You have been criticized for not applying the aids correctly. Try to communicate with the horse through your whole body, frequency, and energy. I don’t talk about the forces of the Universe; I talk about the energy that your whole physique creates, the frequency that matches the horse’s frequency. Don’t expect to find the magic formula in a book; it is not magic; it is real; it is who you truly are if you brush away the correct aids and other inventions of traditional equitation.

Don’t remove the bridle or the saddle; these hypocrisies are just another form of the same fake relationship with horses. If you want to develop and coordinate the horse’s physique for the athletic demand of the performance, use the tools you need. The true relation occurs through education. The horse will work with you if you are true to him and yourself. Intuitively, you have the essence of the solution, but you doubt yourself because your intuition does not match your education. Intuition is not infallible; you need knowledge, but, paraphrasing Bertrand Russell, “We are faced with the paradoxical fact that education has become one of the chief obstacles to intelligence and freedom of thought.”

Biomechanics is useful for understanding how each part of the horse’s physique works and the relation of each part with other parts. Biomechanics includes the understanding of fascia, but while the fascial system can be viewed as the fabric of continuity and communication, biotensegrity can be seen as the model for explaining the architecture underpinning continuity and communication. Through body parts, we cannot influence how the horse coordinates the many systems that compose an athletic performance. Our gestures and body shifts do not influence the systems. A relation occurs at a more subtle level, and we can meet the horse at his high perception level if we support our intuition with science instead of surrendering our value to pseudo-science.
Fitting the saddle to back muscle imbalance does not correct the back muscle imbalance. Muscles don’t develop with pressure; they develop with the direction of the forces, measured intensity, and frequency. Proper motion is the therapy; a muscle never works alone; a percentage of the forces produced by one muscle is transmitted to adjacent muscles through fascia. Fascia lines and closed kinematics chains connect the whole physique. A local back muscle adjustment is compensated by adjustments of the whole thoracolumbar spine muscular and fascia systems. Any local adjustment can lead to compensation worse than the original issue. The proper education of the horse’s physique corrects the muscle imbalance through proper education of the whole thoracolumbar spine muscular system, including the fascia. The rider is the one who can correct muscle imbalance, and the rider needs to feel the real problem, not the problem covered up with a band-aid. “Simply trying to release a contracted muscle without considering whether it is compensating for dysfunction in another muscle group could further imbalance and stress the affected joints.” (Elizabeth Uhl DVM, PhD, Dip, ACVP)
The greatest of our ancestors hinted at the existence of a more subtle interaction with the horse, but they did not have available the knowledge to explain their intuition the way I explain it today. It should not surprise that principles based on an elementary understanding of the horse’s body function are contradicted by advanced knowledge of the horse’s body function. Paraphrasing Albert Einstein, “Intelligence is the ability to change.” Instead of repeating the same aids and expecting a different result, we can guide the horse’s mental processing toward more efficient coordination of the horse’s physique, conversing with our whole body.

Everyone can enjoy the pleasure of guiding the horse’s mental processing toward body coordination adapted to the athletic demands of the performance. Biotensegrity opens the portal to the world that every critical mind is dreaming of. It was difficult to try to coordinate the body parts. It is much easier once we understand that the horse coordinates his physique, not us. Our job is to create situations that allow the horse’s mental processing to explore efficient body coordination and assist the horse’s processing to keep him in the direction of efficiency. This relation appears impossible if we think about obedience to the rider’s aids. It is indeed difficult as long as our mind is set on obedience. A friendly and intelligent partnership is possible and easier when we can evolve from mechanical thinking to a relation with the horse where the integrity of our whole physique influences the integrity of the horse’s physique.

I post every day in our Simple 24 and Master One courses the work of a young mare named Devina D’Or. The mare is intelligent and a talented athlete. She evolves without any constraint, from not knowing how to lunge to exploring greater suspension in her trot in a matter of weeks. The next step will be backing her. Her entire education is recorded and posted. Devina expressed some difficulties, but instead of judging and punishing, the dialogue is about teaching her to use her physique efficiently. The usual leadership is nothing less than a dumb abuse demeaning the capacity of a young horse to process sophisticated body coordination.

Jean Luc