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Lots of people ask me for help because their horses won’t stand still for grooming, mounting, shoeing, while mounted, etc. Most people think they need to move the horse around until he wants to stand still. This practice has its place, but it’s not a cure-all for every problem we will encounter with our horse. When this practice is used for a horse that moves while saddling the horse usually learns to stand still right up until we start to fling the saddle onto his back and then he moves away. 

Often times when a horse isn’t standing for something the human should quit being so eager to work on the horse running him around and be a little quicker to work on themselves. Here’s an example. If a horse isn’t standing to be saddled, put an imaginary box around him and become very aware of any body part that is ABOUT to get out of the box. The greener the horse is, the bigger the box is. When any body part is ABOUT to get out of the box simply help the horse move that part into the center of the box BEFORE it steps over that line of your imaginary box. If he steps over that line then we were too late. When this happens simply pet the horse and move the box so the horse is now back in the center of the box. Don’t run him around. Don’t move him into the original box. Don’t do something to him because of our mistake. If we can get really good at this, the horse soon learns he can find peace with us when he’s inside that box. He begins to learn how to JUST BE without us trying to control and micromanage his every move.