Here's an excerpt:
It's just a feel-good kind of thing - lots of posts about "Hey, look - my horses have fun in training doing this" and "My once-terrified horse is now okay with me leaning on his back! Yay!" and "Look! Science says R+ is good!" and respecting the horses' boundaries and yeah...most of the horse world isn't like this, so it's nice to see at least one person who is.Prior to the moment when DaVinci decided human touch was good, I got the feeling he thought that human touch was something to be avoided at all costs. Judging by his reactions, even worse than human touch was a human with an object in their hand. Any object, even seemingly benign objects such as a bucket or a soft grooming tool or a whole carrot would trigger a series of reactions, like bolting, snorting, spooking and often a lovely blast of diarrhea.
During his first few weeks with us, I’d appear near his paddock, make the sound of the click, drop food in his bucket and walk away. This proved to be a double reward, he received food and I (in his mind, something to be avoided) walked away. I honored what felt better to him. My presence felt bad to him, so when I walked away he felt better.
Soon he began to look forward to my appearance as I was always carrying something that felt good, food. Within a short time I could stand near his food bucket without him bolting. Even then, he looked like he was controlled by a giant puppet in the sky and his head was a yo-yo bobbing up and down, but at least he wasn’t running away.
