[Chrysalis]

Horses are a great equalizer. They don't care who you are. If you need to learn something, like humility, they'll find a way to teach you even if it's to the point of the old brush the human off my back trick when in the bush on a trail ride.

Yes, self-discipline is required because if you get angry at the horse, the horse will certainly pick up on that emotion and depending on the horse's temperament might mean the horse retaliates. I read in a horse magazine that horses can sense your emotions when you touch them. If a rider is nervous, that rider better be on a very calm horse. Matching a nervous rider with a nervous horse is a very bad combination. Such a rider will tense up making the horse more nervous and tense. Then the rider senses that and the tension increases which in turn increases the horse's tension. Such an escalation is an accident waiting to happen.

As for trust, it works both ways too. I remember one horse in a boarding stable who only trusted one human...the owner. The horse came from an abusive background and was smart. The people who worked at the stable couldn't catch the horse from the field to put him in a box stall. Instead, he was the last one out of the field and the people left the stall door open. The horse would walk by himself and go into his stall. I don't know what the owner did to gain that horse's trust but leaves me imagining all the work she put in plus all the patience she must've had.