Not only do I love horses and love to train them, I also relate to them. Sometimes I act a lot like horses do and I think that is one of the reasons I feel so at home with them. Horses, by nature, are very easily scared and they nearly always react before stopping to think if they really need to be scared. They get scared by things that seem silly to some people, like a shadow or a weird sound the wind makes. Just like I do. They are emotional and sensitive and their feelings can be easily hurt. So much like me. If you haven't spent much time with horses you may not realize all this about them. You may not know that horses can feel angry, sad, left out, and jealous just like people. For example, if I haven't seen my horse Cody for a couple weeks, when I do come he won't walk up to me or even face me. Instead he will give me a brief, sour looking glance over his shoulder and then face his rear to me and run away when I walk up. It is clear that he feels hurt that I have not come to him for so long. When I train Cody's brother or when I used to train his sister and give them attention first, Cody would hang his head, stick his tongue out the side of his mouth and not respond to me when I would later come to him. When one of the horses is separate from their herd, they get anxious, and if they are left too long by themselves they get depressed, not wanting to eat and they get a sad look in their eyes that goes to my heart. I know how it feels to feel lonely. When Cody's sister had to be kept by herself for weeks because of a problem with her foot, she got very thin and depressed. Horses are amazingly smart and have many feelings and emotions very much like humans. They can also be empathetic, like I am. There are times when I felt very heavy with sadness or when I had been sick and was still not that strong, and they responded with much more than their usual gentleness and would look at me with beautifully, calm sweet eyes that appeared to be full of empathy. They sense when someone is not very strong, like a little child. I have seen them switch from being rambunctious, and mischievous with me, to being slow, very gentle and calm with a little child. They clearly know that this little person is delicate. Horses are very smart. For example, whenever I would work the horses, I would close the gate in the middle of the two pastures to keep the other horses away and lead the horse I was working into the round pen and shut that gate. Then I would ask them to walk and jog around the pasture. One day, Cody's brother Jody walked very deliberately to the middle gate, pushed it shut with his nose, walked to the round pen, went inside and pulled that gate shut with his chin! Then he started walking around in the inside of the round pen, glancing out at me from time to time to make sure I was watching him! Jody had actually gone through all the steps I do when I am going to train! He was telling me clearly that he wanted to be trained. Horses are not only beautiful and fun to ride, they are creatures with amazing depths of emotion, personality and character and each one is as unique as each person is. You just have to spend a lot of time with them and be sensitive to what they are telling you about themselves and you will find out what amazing creatures they are.