Customer Reviews

Getting in Touch: Understand and Influence Your Horse's Personality

5 star:		(14)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(4)

 

 

This focus of this book studies a horse's physical characteristics as providing insight into a horse's personality. Linda Tellington-Jones has complied information on over 1500 horses and in the process has noted some astounding connections between physical traits and personalities. She presents separate sections analyzing a horse's profile, muzzle, lips, ears, nostrils, eyes, chin, and jowls. Line drawings illustrate the various shapes, positions, or placements these features take. Linda then notes her observations for each physical type. For example, she notes that horses with small, complex muzzles tend to be "opinionated" and that "fine, fluted" ears usually mean the horse is intelligent, but ones with tufts in their ears tend to be willfulness and inflexible. After focusing on each feature, she has a section of horse photographs to allow the reader to practice analyzing the entire package. She includes her assessment of the horse's personality with each photograph.

Of course, while all of this made for interesting reading, I wasn't sure at first if it really meant anything. I quickly found her observations all the more fascinating when I started to take a hard look at the physical characteristics of horses that I knew. I would run home from the barn to compare the horses' physical features to the personality descriptions in the book. By and large, she's right! The most uncanny part was her assessment of horse personalities given particular or unusual facial swirls. The remainder of the book goes into how a horse's conformation and health (and soreness) may affect his personality. She concludes by briefly introducing her method of equine massage called "Ttouch." (This was the least meaningful part of the book for me.)

This book presents a very unique approach to understanding horses. It opens the horse person's mind to allow for different personality types and adjust how he or she may interact differently if the horse is withdrawn, uncomplicated and steady or if the horse is anxious, clever and timid.

I volunteer as a horse wrangler with a non-profit group and get to work with a number of different horses. I read this book cover to cover and carry it with me whenever I'm around horses. It is All the horse people I work with borrowed it so much I had to buy a second copy just for myself! The information in the book is very easy to read and understand. Every time I see a horse or look at a picture, I look for the "moose-nose", the "pin ears" and the forehead swirls. And its amazing how these characteristics are tied into personality! A must have book!

THIS IS A GREAT BOOK! What are those people thinking who don't understand the premise of Linda's book about reading your horse's personality? Perhaps they are making this technique more complicated then it really is. I've been using these skills for over 30 years and continually learn more about horses every year. It's fun to meet a new horse and describe their traits to their owner. This is also a very insightful method to know when buying horses.

I have to say that I've used TTouch on all my animals. Years ago when this was first being intoduced my ex-husband and I took our palamino quarterhorse, who had been 30 day wonder trained before we got her, to a private session. Imagine a freaked out mare, head held high, dancing and spooking at everything. Thats what Sugar was like. By the time we sold her she was steady and trusting again in large part due to what we learned at that session. It was absolutly amazing. I'm not saying this works overnight. Like anything good it takes time. Since then I have used it on everything ( and I do mean everything ) from dogs to my daughters snakes. And I have never seen it NOT bring an animals stress level down. I can't say enough about this. By the way that was 15 years ago. That should tell you something also. This has stood the test of time and been tried by thousands of people. Try it, you have nothing to lose. Better yet try it with you using the Centered Riding principle(Sally Swift) and I bet you get result that blow your socks off.

This book was awesome. It told you ways that you could tell its personality before you bought it. It was so interesting.

I initially purchased this book 4 years ago. We were in the process of looking for a horse, but had no experience. Our first purchase was based on what the sellers stated about him...ie. "calm, easy to ride." Turned out they were not very truthful. In this book, you will soooooo much valuable information on how to find the type of horse your looking for based on physical attributes of the animal. Did you know the number and placement of swirls on a horses head and body can affect his temperament? Using Linda's physical evaluations has enabled us to buy, not one, but 3 PERFECT horses for our family. I still consider myself "green" when it comes to horses, but after a lot of practice, I am extremely confident in my ability to judge temperament, and conformation. Just a few months ago, I helped a friend who has much more experience find the perfect friend. She swears I'm some sort of horse whisperer, but unfortunately I'm not. I've just taken my time and learned to look at the horse from top to bottom. This book has saved me so much money and heartache by helping me eliminate animals who would be too much for me. This is a book for new and experienced people. If you already have an animal who's presenting a challenge, this book can help you understand how your horse thinks and can help you change his/her personality by introducing T-touch methods to help improve your horses overall well being. I now have two copies because I took my first copy everywhere with me and misplaced it. This book is THAT good!

This book helped me understand my comlicated horse. I just sat out and watched her graze, and wrote down everything that she fell under. After words, I read everything and it explained her perfectly. Now She and I have an unbreakable bond!

If you are considering buying this book make sure you read all the reviews to ensure that you go in with your eyes wide open. Linda Tellington-Jones could be described either as airey-fairey mystic snake oil salewoman or unconventional horse woman. I guess it depends on your point of view.

The book itself is rather amusing, and if you buy it with a bit of a spirit of adventure - much like buy a ouija board for a bit of a laugh then you won't be disappointed.

The vast majority of the book looks at typing horse personalities by their physical features. This assumes that either a horse is affected by their physical features i.e. they may be more spooky because they have little eyes and can't actually see very well OR that a horse somehow manages to affect it's features through personality i.e a suspicious horse will have a screwed up little mouth because he makes screwed up little faces all the time ...

Of course the problem with this is ... well... we know what happens when people make these assumptions about other people. "Everyone with a big nose is obsessed with money" or "all fat people are jolly". It just doesn't work like that.

If you want a bit of fun, it can while away an hour or two comparing horse's pictures and their actual personalities and deciding whether they match the book's description.

At the end of the book there are some TTouch massage type movements - as always you can't just have a description of the movement it's got to have some fancy name like 'bearpaw' or something.

There is also a description of ground exercises - the most useful part of the book actually - in the last 5 pages. The dressage whip is called a 'wand' and they explain why and there is also a page explaining why they use a stallion chain on all their horses (I'm not convinced by that bit actually)...

If you are after some serious science or even practical horsemanship, give this book a miss. If you don't mind the odd wander in wonderland and a bit of entertainment give it a go.

For anyone who truly believes that horses have feelings and can make decisions.......This book allows you to learn how to bond with YOUR horse and read a horse just by their characteristics; it offers you insite on excersies you can do with your horse to build the bond between you both. I can say my horse & I would not be where we are today if it weren't for me studying Linda's methods...and to all the horses I work with in the horse rescue I am a part of, this book has allowed me to better understand of each of them and has allowed for me to learn and treat each of them as the individual they are with their own personalities, progressing at their own paces. Never be with doubt after you have studied the Tellington Method.

For me this is a great book. Very interesting information about a horses personality and how to each one depending on that personality. What I read about my horse was true. I really liked this book.