Learning With Ray Hunt

I had the pleasure to work at a ranch that hosted a Ray Hunt clinic a couple of years ago. Ray and Tom Dorrance are considered the founders of the modern natural horsemanship movement. Ray is getting up in years and doesn't ride anymore, but he still puts on a whale of a clinic. If you ride in a Ray Hunt clinic you have to leave your ego at the gate. Ray is v-e-r-y blunt. He doesn't try to spare your feelings. He's very upfront about the fact that he's there for the horse. 

But, if you can let go of that ego, you can learn a lot about yourself and your horsemanship from Ray Hunt. Since I was working the clinic, I didn't get to ride, but I got to watch almost all of it. And what I took away wasn't some new technique, but rather a new way of thinking - realizing that to be the horseman I wanted to be, I needed to be more in tune with my horse. I needed to approach everything from his point of view.

I've posted before about one of my favorite horse books, Ray Hunt's Cowboy Logic.  Ray is a master of the sayings that often sound simplistic but are actually quite profound. They can take a while (sometimes a lifetime) to truly understand.

Whenever I'm struggling with my horsemanship, with creating the partnership that I want, I come back to this book. If you don't have a copy of this book yet you should get one. My copy is signed by Ray:   "Ray Hunt. Think! 6/12/05"

I'll leave you with a couple of Ray's sayings that will make you "think."

• "Make the wrong thing difficult and the right thing easy."
• "Recognize the smallest change, the slightest try."
• "It's amazing what the horse can do in spite of the rider."
• "The horse will teach you if you listen."