The Canter: Influencing its Energy

To better understand the canter is to have had better connection at the trot. By connection I do not mean with the hand, but with the seat. Time and again I find more riders ask me about flying changes than anything else. To me the changes, for a healthy horse, are easy. The problems are mainly with the rider not finding the connection. It is more than just the horse recognizing the change of aiding or change of balance. It is about horse and rider communicating through energy direction and exchange.
If there is one misunderstanding that shows up worse at any time, it is the 'between leg and hand' concept at the canter. The 'between' is really between the rider's seat and the horse's mouth. The seat(and torso) is the 'clutch' or power regulator and coordinator of the effects of the rider's hand and leg. So if you really want to know 'between leg and hand', stand up and notice what is between your leg and hand.....your SEAT!!! And the seat makes the canter, not leg, not hand.....but seat!
Poor dull school horses hardly recognize seat when they have spent so much time patiently waiting upon beginners with their awkwardness. For a beginner to try his canter aids out on a very highly trained horse, he would quickly discover that something in his own understanding was radically amiss!
The feel of the canter seat is a diagonal glide with a slight roll from outside hind toward the inside fore. It is not a rocking motion or rowing motion as so often observed. There are 3 steps from the horse and one moment of suspension.....4 beats, if you will! If there is no clear moment of suspension the speed and energy of the canter are not right. I call this a precipitous canter which rather runs along. Some horses are prone to this problem at canter. Reworking the problem through the seat(or clutch) can make quite a difference and restore natural beauty to the gait.
Although a horse trotting out of balance can pick up the canter , forcing a horse to choose canter in this way is rather chaotic and stressful. Better to build energy for the task and work at creating order in the leg coordination.
There is no question that true horsepower is at work to get a massive body off the ground for a moment of suspension when 4 feet are in the air. Canter is but a jump through the air! Keeping this in mind, it is important to remember that for canter to result from an aid, the horse must know what he is going to be asked to do with enough warning for his level of fitness and understanding. Therefore, the rider can only expect a good response if there is enough 'readiness' in the horse. The 'readiness' is created in the seat.
Imagine you are in a car climbing a steep hill. If the car is not an automatic, you will need to shift gears(employing the clutch) to create more power to get your car up that hill. Your seat then acts as a clutch to 'ready' the horse to 'climb that hill' and transition into canter.
To help visualize how the seat moves at the canter, imagine that you are sitting on a small rectangle. The rear edge of the rectangle is parallel to the cantle. While the front edge is parallel to the pommel. The sides are parallel to your sides(and the horses). This is a SMALL rectangle but it has 4 corners and 4 edges. The rider's torso balances over this rectangle, compressing down onto it and carefully, with good self-control, shifts the load of the torso above the seat between corners and edges.
So, eg, at the canter, the rider will take the load from the outside rear corner and shift it to the inside front corner of the small rectangle. The more refined the understanding of this is, the more you can appreciate that the motion is so very slight that it is more so a burst of energy flowing in a precise direction from a short burst of power in the form of a physical response to an intent that originates in the rider's mind.
If you had poor muscle coordination through the torso and were put on a horse blindfolded and asked to try to stay upright and centered, you would feel a million tiny twitches from tiny muscle fibers firing off in response to an inner system that 'wills' you to stay upright. With our appreciably better coordination we need to search even deeper to maintain a bolstered torso over a lowered diaphragm, chest wide, shoulders relaxed back and down......all while the torso remains 'calm'. The rider's waist is full now and wiggle-free but supple enough to take the effect of the body situated above it down into the seat where it becomes stable and well organized within the rectangle. In addition to the load carried in the rectangle, is that which is partially carried in the thighs. The tone of the thighs is essential to a light seat that frees the horse and frees the rider's joints. These joints need to be slightly open and movable inside the quiet outer flesh of the rider. Only 'open' joints can send energy through to the horse AND only 'open' joints can receive energetic messages coming up into the cantle from the horse. Coordinating this weight distribution just right makes you a pleasure for the horse to carry, opens the doors of his willingness to cooperate without fear in a relationship with you and helps extinguish inherent difficulties he may have in general.
All good relationships are free! So why clamp the legs on the horse's sides and choke the good nature out of him. Use legs with care. If he pulls in the reins, he may need to be fed more power through the seat or the seat balance and weight distribution may need to be checked. Is the torso bolstered well enough? Perhaps more power is needed to help the horse climb in front! He is throwing plenty of energy up into the cantle....are you open to catch it? are you holding, 'mixing', building, 'cooking' in your 'oven'...your dan tien, low in the abdomen? are you 'open' enough to release it in the right amounts?
If the horse is not using his back well he may rock his head and neck up and down. More leg won't correct this, but more bolstering of the rider's torso helps resist and redirect the forces that induce this rocking motion.
Just as in trot, the energy coming up into the cantle is fed into the rider where it is 'reworked' and then directed forward and down into the 'hopper' near the withers. Become aware of the place where you are directing the energy. It is specific.
By the rider keeping his body over itself and minimizing the driving aids whilst holding and compressing the power coming up from beneath the cantle over softly open movable leg and hip joints, the clutch does the job of building the horse's OWN power before that power is then employed.
The feeling is of the hips of the rider riding up to the mouth of the horse in a regular rhythmical glide. It is a glide because the rider uses his flexible joints to fold and keep his body still relative to the horse. As the horse rolls in the canter wave, the rider glides on the wave. The rider adds to this the image of suspending his head from a cloud and then he can really begin to appreciate how this glide operates in harmony with the horse.
I am of the opinion that horses wish to move in balance but they also like to conserve energy....it is consistent with their sense of self-preservation. If the rider gives the horse the chance to move in balance beneath him then ease(and conservation!) is in the realm of possibility!