Having soft hands while riding is one of the ultimate horseback goals, and the biggest beneficiary will be your pony. In the tips in this article, I introduce you to some simple but fun physical and mental exercises which will assist you in achieving soft hands.

The 2 physical exercises are described first.

1. Tie two lengths of reins to a powerful fence. Ropes or even baling twine will do rather than the reins. Hold them like you would hold reins. With each hand, take up contact of not less than 10 pounds. Soften your arms to adjust the reins, weights. Move to 5 pounds from 10, return to 10 and then move again to 2 pounds. Get used to the sense of weight changes on your reins. When you are talented at it, you can carry this technique over to your riding if you feel that you are getting a bit too strong.

2. This exercise has to do with relaxation. It’s a part of your physiology that the tighter you tense any muscle, the deeper it relaxes on release. Get your strong hands tired, real tired. Make fists of your hands with the reins held in them. Clench your muscles and pile on the strain until your arms begin to shake. Relax and release the stress. Repeat several times a day, and shortly you can bring about muscle relaxation without doing the tightening routine first.

It’s time now for the mental training. We use imagery for our purposes.

1. Persuade yourself that you are holding highly vulnerable baby birds in your fists, not the reins. Just a little of additional pressure and you crush the fledglings. It is very important that you work your imagination with great clarity. Think: what sort of bird are you holding? What’s its body color and its beak’s color , what does the feeling of its feathers remind you about? What do you really think it is trying to convey with its chirping?

2. Make believe you are gripping an egg in each of your fists. If you squeeze a touch too much, you are going to need to clean up the mess you create!

3. Pretend that you’re on horseback, with no bridle. You are holding only a silk thread that leads to the horse’s mouth. Even bearing that in mind your pony responds to the very lightest of touches.

4. Think of the bit in your horse’s mouth as a razor blade. You need to be as sensitive as a master surgeon or you will finish up cutting the horse’s mouth.

All this imagery function to launch you off on your quest for soft hands. The most acceptable images you can conceive of is really personal. Think about a soft hands image what jells with you. Keep visualizing it whenever you can, whether you are on horseback or off.

Horses are Heather Tomspassion and she enjoys sharing her extensive knowledge through her 100s of articles with other horse lovers www.horsehorses.net/