"I have been raising a family for the last 20 years and I need help with my confidence. I was a fearless rider when I was younger, but now I am nervous. Last year I got hurt and I am not sure if I want to just hop on, now. My horse is very pushy on the ground when I lead him."

“Confidence” is leadership in action, and "Fear” is your brain telling you that you don't have control. No doubt, to some people the fear of getting hurt or of doing the wrong thing can be crippling. There are two types of fear - irrational and rational. An irrational fear is a morbid fear. It is an intense, persistent fear of certain situations or activities. The main symptom of this disorder is the excessive, unreasonable desire to avoid the fear. A rational fear is a reasonable fear that can be healthy. If you have a morbid fear of heights, you would not just climb to the top of a tall ladder and say, ‘I am cured.’ No, it takes baby steps to build up confidence.

Just because we take horses out of their natural environment does not mean they do not still have the need for leadership, or fear what they do not know. Horses are instinctively herd animals, bent on survival at all costs; and fear is what drives a horse to fight or run from what they do not understand. It is for this reason that we, as their stewards, need to give them leadership for their soundness of mind. If we fear that they are going to hurt us, we have lost control of the horse. The horse will know this and will lose confidence in our ability to lead. At this point, the horse will take it upon himself to control his own body and activities, leaving us as a subordinate part of the herd.

We can unknowingly teach our horse behaviors that can cause us to be fearful. A good example of this is…

Fox hunting is a sport with a long tradition. Originating in the 16^th century in the UK it is now practiced around the world.

Fox hunting traditionally involves the tracking, chase and sometimes killing of red foxes by trained fox hounds, followed by a group on foot or horseback.

The Master of Foxhounds Association of North America (MFHA) http://www.mfha.com/ listed 171 registered packs, one of them Kenada Foxhounds , just outside of Rockdale, TX, who hosted the hunt this sunny January weekend.

Amy Adams Strunk founded Kenada Foxhounds in 1984. Since 1987 the hunts are recognized by MFHA.

Amy (on the grey horse in the photo above) is currently the Master of Foxhounds (MFH). This means she is responsible for the hunt and controls the hounds. The hounds are trained to listen to her horn.

The Master of Foxhounds is also supported by a few more riders called the whippers or whipper-ins. The whippers make sure that the dogs get back with pack. Linda Ray Meyers (after a run-away dog in the photo above) of Post Oak Creek Ranch in San Antonio (http://www.postoakcreekranch.com) and some other riders, like Polly Powell, have been with Kenada Foxhounds from just about as long as they have been hunting.

Kenada has access to the about 8,000 acre large Bud Adams Ranch. The ranch is about 6 miles long and has 14 miles of river frontage butting the San Gabriel River and Little River.

Bud Adams Ranch raises cattle, has about 1700 crop acres and produces pecans. In good years the pecan crop can be as large as 650,000lbs of pecans. Can you imagine? I have no idea how 650,000 lbs of pecans look like!

In between the cattle pastures, hay fields and crop fields Kenada Foxhounds has set up 2.5 to 3 foot coop style jumps for jumping the fields.

Kenada Foxhounds organizes…

In a world full of horse trainers, clinicians and equine professionals competing to make a mark for themselves, many find new ways to reinvent the wheel; however, several try to put their knowledge into some package where we may identify with it all. In the equine world, leadership is the key to survival and many of these professionals communicate their opinion of equine behavior and how we should cope with this dynamic. The question now becomes, what form of leadership is right for us?

In the human world, some people define leadership simply as getting people to work to achieve common goals and giving people a reason (motivation) to work (active leadership). Other people hold that leadership is the ability to influence the behavior of others, to set up goals, to formulate paths to those goals, and to create and guide toward good behavior (passive leadership). Isn’t that what we want to accomplish in the equine world - to influence and motivate safe behaviors? Many leaders have always wondered how active or passive they should be. The active leader risks exacerbating the problem by tackling it; the passive leader risks being overwhelmed by a problem that festers unchecked. Peace, order, and good government are noble aspirations, but they should not dictate passivity in a treacherous world. Sometimes, the only way to achieve peace, order, and any kind of reasonable government is to be proactive, even aggressive, as demonstrated by the many wars that have been fought.

Now to answer the question of “which leadership is right for equine training”? Mark Rashid, a well-respected clinician, presents very simply and nicely his definition of “Passive Leadership” in this way:“There are two types of leaders in a herd situation.  The alpha, or lead horse, that rules by dominance, and passive leaders that lead by example.  The passive leaders are usually chosen by other members of the herd and are followed willingly, while alphas use force to declare their place in…