26/07/2025
Stop Fixing Problems You Created
Thereâs no easy way to say this, so Iâm just going to say it plain:
A lot of the problems people bring to me â barn sour horses, buddy sour horses, horses that wonât load, wonât stand at the mounting block, donât stop, donât steer, donât pick up the right lead â didnât come out of nowhere. They werenât born that way. And most of the time, they werenât trained that way either.
They were made that way. And most often? They were made that way by the very people trying to fix them.
Now before you get your feathers ruffled, hear me out. Iâm not here to shame anyone. Horses are honest creatures. They respond to the environment theyâre in and the leadership they get. If youâve got a problem horse, that horse isnât out to make your life miserable. That horse is just reacting to what itâs been taught â directly or indirectly â by you.
So before you go looking for a fix, stop and ask yourself one simple question:
âDid I create this?â
Horses Learn Patterns â Whether You Meant to Teach Them or Not
Horses are masters of pattern recognition. They donât just learn what we intentionally teach â they learn what we repeatedly allow.
Let me give you a simple example. You ride your horse for 45 minutes, and every single time you dismount right at the gate. After about a week of that, your horse starts pulling toward the gate at the 40-minute mark. Two weeks in, youâre fighting to stay in the arena at all. You say, âHeâs barn sour.â No â heâs gate-conditioned. You taught him that the gate is where the ride ends, and he learned it better than you realized.
Same thing with mounting blocks. You let your horse walk off the second your foot hits the stirrup? Donât be surprised when he refuses to stand still. Heâs not being disrespectful â heâs doing exactly what he thinks heâs supposed to do. You taught him that.
Buddy sour? Happens when every ride, every turnout, every trailer ride, every everything happens in pairs. You never ask that horse to be alone, never train it to focus on you instead of the herd, and then act shocked when it melts down the minute its pasture mate walks away.
These are learned behaviors. And if you taught it â even accidentally â then youâre the one who needs to un-teach it.
Avoidance Creates Anxiety
I see it all the time: the rider knows their horse doesnât like something â maybe itâs going in the trailer, riding out alone, crossing water, walking past a flapping tarp. So what do they do? They just avoid it. Again and again.
And you know what happens? The horse gets more anxious. The issue doesnât go away. It gets bigger. Because now that thing is associated with stress, and the horse has never been taught how to work through it. The humanâs avoidance has created a mental block.
And then one day they try to address it â maybe they need to trailer somewhere, or theyâre in a clinic and someone pulls out a tarp â and the horse explodes. And they say, âI donât know why heâs acting like this!â
I do. Youâve been letting it fester. You taught your horse that he never has to face the thing that scares him. Until now. And now itâs a fight.
Inconsistency is the Fastest Way to Ruin a Good Horse
You canât train a horse one way on Monday and another way on Wednesday and expect them to understand anything. And yet thatâs what a lot of folks do.
Monday: you make him back out of your space.
Tuesday: you let him walk all over you because youâre in a rush.
Wednesday: you smack him with the lead rope for doing the same thing he got away with yesterday.
Thursday: you feel bad and let him be pushy again.
That horse has no idea what the rules are. And when there are no clear rules, a horse will either take charge or check out completely. Either way, itâs not going to end in a safe, willing, responsive partner.
Stop Saying âHe Just Started Doing Thatâ
I hear that phrase constantly: âHe just started doing that.â
No, he didnât. You just started noticing it once it became a problem you couldnât ignore.
Most bad habits start small. A little shoulder lean. A step into your space. A half-second delay in picking up a cue. But when you ignore those things, they grow. Horses donât suddenly wake up one day and decide to bolt, buck, rear, or refuse. They show you the warning signs first. Itâs up to you to listen and respond before it becomes a crisis.
So the next time you say, âHe just started doing that,â stop and think: Did I actually miss the signs? Did I allow this to build?
Horses Are Honest â But So Are Results
Your horse is just doing what it was taught. Maybe not on purpose. Maybe not maliciously. But consistently.
The results youâre getting today are a direct reflection of the leadership youâve given up until now.
And the good news is â that works in reverse too.
If your horse is a problem today, and you take responsibility, and you start showing up consistently, with clear expectations, fair corrections, and better timing â the horse will respond. Horses arenât holding grudges. Theyâre not being stubborn just to spite you. Theyâre not political. Theyâre not bitter. Theyâre honest.
They will follow a better leader the moment one shows up.
Final Thought
If youâre spending your time trying to fix a problem, the first place you need to look is the mirror.
Because if youâre the one who taught it â even by accident â then youâre also the one who can fix it. But only if you take responsibility.
Stop blaming the horse. Stop acting surprised. Start being the kind of leader your horse actually needs â not the one that avoids, excuses, and compensates.
The horse isnât broken. The horse isnât rebellious. The horse isnât hard to train.
Youâre just trying to fix something you created without first owning the fact that you created it.
And until you do that, nothing is going to change.
