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Zen the Mustang

Zen is an 10-year-old, 14.1hh Mustang gelding gathered from Meadow Valley Mountains, NV on 12/06/2020 and adopted on 06/22/2021.

09/13/2026

Oops! I didn’t realize I haven’t posted… all year 😅 I haven’t been using social media nearly as much, but I thought I’d at least shared an update earlier this year, but turns out that I didn’t!

Zen and I had an awesome spring with a lot of breakthroughs and new experiences in both riding and liberty. We worked with some new folks, taught a clinic together for the first time in 2022, rode in our first group lesson, AND went to our first ridden show and scored a 66% in our Intro A test 🥳

Summer was a lot slower as I prepared for an transitioned into the new semester, but today, he came back from his break absolutely on fire! Our first rides back are always short and more for me to figure out where he’s at mentally and physically, and it’s so cool to have a horse who’s ready to step up his game even after time off.

I can’t believe that it’s been five years with this handsome little Mustang! He challenges me to improve every time I work with him, and is at the same time so so forgiving to my learning. I couldn’t be luckier to have him!!!

01/01/2026

Zen is jumping into the year of the horse with quite a bit of enthusiasm! Happy New Year to all ☺️

09/22/2025

Zen was on fire today!! His behavior was incredible, especially for a windy night as it was getting dark, and he had more energy has he had in a while! I’m excited that he’s been starting to respond to subtler cues, and while he’s still green (by my fault entirely!), riding him today felt very much like riding a horse who knows “normal horse things.” So proud of him! 🥰

09/06/2025

Very proud of Zen and a longtime student of mine, Victoria Wilson, for being the first one other than myself to ride him in THREE years! 😱 I believe that most horses should be able to be ridden by multiple riders (not any rider, but more than one), though with my inconsistency with being able to work Zen, I didn’t want to put someone on him until I thought he was fully ready.

Zen is a very good boy who’s never done anything dangerous under tack (my grand total of two falls from him in four years have been ba****ck and bridleless, one of which was our very first day ever cantering and the other was in a huge field without proper preparation, not at all smart of me 😅), but when he spooks, he can scoot rather quickly, and with such a tiny body, there isn’t much to hang onto! I know falls, or even near-falls, can decrease confidence in both people and horses, so I really wanted to minimize the risk of a fall or near-fall.

However, Wednesday was maybe the quietest he’s ever felt, so it seemed like a great day to try a new rider—both Zen and Victoria did wonderfully! Zen’s language is pretty specific, and Victoria picked up on it quickly and very little got lost in translation! Thank you to Victoria for being the first one in three years to give Zen a spin, and to Amy Skinner Horsemanship for giving Zen his under saddle foundation and keeping us progressing in our lessons!

08/29/2025

Long time no post, but very proud of this boy! Great lesson today despite being interrupted by the vet needing to stab him with his vaccine 😅

Great transitions on the ground and body control under saddle, then standing tied to tame that mane and tail for a change 😂

He’s clearly so exhausted because his life is so hard! 🤣

Huge thanks to Amy Skinner Horsemanship for keeping us on track!!!

04/17/2025

And a fun little blooper! Zen did the teeniest little shy at a dressage letter that’s been in this ring, you know, the whole time he’s been at RRF 😂 I do blame my tucking his forelock into that side of his cavesson and it starting to come out, so it’s entirely possible his whole right eye was covered at this moment and the letter could’ve “jumped” out at him. But look at that hind end engagement—piaffe, here we come! 🤣 Video in the comments since apparently I can’t upload a picture and video at the same time 🤨

04/15/2025

Zen felt amazing during our most recent ride thanks to trying a saddle from an awesome friend that finally feels good for me and fits him without sliding much! I wont sit on Zen in a saddle that doesn’t fit, but even ones that look appropriate sometimes slide around thanks to his barrel shape, and while a breastplate would keep it from sliding severely it didn’t keep the smaller slips from happening that are still somewhat unbalancing (and I prefer not to over-tighten the girth whenever possible).

So we’d been riding in an older treeless saddle, but it both slipped and left me behind the motion, which exacerbated the slipping because I was never able to be truly balanced. It’s incredible how much confidence feeling balanced can create—and if I feel this way as the rider, imagine how much of a difference it makes to horses when they’re truly feeling balanced?

Everything I learn about tack from cavessons to saddles is that it doesn’t have to be fancy or expensive, but it absolutely makes a huge difference for it to be functional for what you’re trying to do with it. And without Zen having to compensate for me constantly being out of balance, he could really move!

04/04/2025

Some fun in the jump chute today! I’m pretty sure that second jump (2’) is the highest Zen’s ever jumped—we don’t do much jumping! Theoretically, the goal of a jump chute is for only the horse to jump, but Zen wanted some emotional support, so it became a workout for the both of us 😂

Three years ago, I was ONLY comfortable working with Zen at speed in protected contact, and rightfully so—he didn’t have the emotional regulation to canter anywhere near me without lashing out. And you might notice that I only reward him for certain behaviors: 1) Targeting my hand, and 2) Completing the jump (then at the end, I do reward him for offering a polite calm trot up to me just because that was really sweet, ha, then we finish with our end of session/break signal by me dropping food on the mounting block, which means that my asks are done, and he’s welcome to offer more, but it won’t be reinforced—to keep him from offering behaviors when I’m trying to clean up/leave the arena, and to keep him from getting frustrated that he’s not being reinforced for anything he offers).

My +R is far from perfect, but I try to put measures in place to prioritize safety and enjoyment while decreasing frustration and overstimulation. You’ll notice when he follows me at the canter, there are moments his ears go back and he gets ahead of me—no problem, I just don’t reward until he’s back in his default position and targets my hand so he doesn’t get the reward for ”chasing,” which can become dangerous. We keep most of our +R walk/trot for now and don’t play with speed often, and do so with plenty of breaks to try to avoid frustration building :)

04/03/2025

I’ve been skimping on Zen footage! We’ve been up to plenty the last month, but I end up getting busy most times I think of posting something!

Zen and I have had a couple of rides and several groundwork sessions at the new place, and he‘s been great! I figured I’d share a little piece from one of my lessons with Amy Skinner Horsemanship, with a question—what do you think is happening in this moment, and happened just before? Answer in the comments 👀

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