Naturally Trained
Trust-Based Horsemanship
Spend a few minutes here. Read the philosophy, the mechanics, and the eight-week arc before deciding whether this is the kind of training you've been looking for.
The Naturally Trained Method is built on three words you'll see again and again on this page — communication, timing, and trust. Everything else on the site, from the lead-rope exercises to the trailer-loading work, comes back to these three ideas.
It is not a system of dominance. There is no place in the method for tools that work through fear, pain, or restraint. There is no leader-follower hierarchy imposed on the horse. What there is, instead, is a language: a clear ask, a clean release, and a rider who has learned to notice when the horse has the right answer — and to get out of the way the moment it does.
The method was assembled on working ranches across the American West, in roundpens and alleyways and stock trailers, with horses who had every reason not to trust a person. It works because it was learned from the horses first, and only later translated into words for riders.
What follows is the shape of that work — the principles, the eight-week arc, the three mechanics behind every exercise — laid out plainly so you can decide whether it fits the partnership you want to build.
The signature program moves through four chapters. Each one builds the listener the next one needs — a softer eye in Week 1, a softer hand in Week 4, a softer seat by Week 8. Results vary by horse and rider; this is the shape of the work, not a guarantee.
You and your horse learn to read each other on the ground before anything else happens. Leading, yielding the shoulders and hips, finding the comfortable stopping distance. By the end of week two, your horse is looking at you differently in the pasture gate.
Focus: communication, not control.The three mechanics get named out loud. You practice a clean ask, a clean release, and the timing that ties them together. This is the chapter most students rewatch — it is where frustration turns into a repeatable conversation.
Focus: timing, the silent half of training.Tarps, flags, the trailer, the wash rack, the open gate, the dog next door. You take the conversation your horse now trusts and walk it into places that used to be hard. Confidence is built one small, willing step at a time.
Focus: willing curiosity over compliance.The same three mechanics, applied from the saddle. Soft feel on a longe line, then under saddle, then out on the trail. By the end of week eight, you have a horse who is looking for the answer instead of bracing against the question.
Focus: a partnership you can actually feel.Every chapter includes written lessons, demonstration video, weekly office-hour calls with a clinician, and lifetime access to the growing library. Begin with the free 7-Day Foundation to feel the first chapter before you commit.
Behind every Naturally Trained lesson there are only three mechanics at work. They are simple to name, and quietly difficult to master — which is why the program exists at all.
Pressure is not force. It is a clear, consistent, well-timed request that gives the horse something to find the answer to. A squeeze of the leg, a lift of the rein, a step toward the shoulder. The ask is honest, and the horse always knows when it is being asked.
CommunicationThe release is the entire training. The moment the horse gives the right answer — a step, a soften, a yield, a breath — the pressure disappears. The release teaches. The release is what the horse is actually working for, on every single rep.
TrustGood timing means the release arrives in the half-second the horse is trying. Bad timing — late, early, or absent — is why most horse owners feel stuck. Chapter Two of the program is built almost entirely around rebuilding this one instinct.
SkillNo gadgets, no gimmicks, no dominance framework behind the curtain. Just a clear ask, a clean release, and a rider learning to notice the try. That is the whole method.
I didn't invent this method. I paid attention to it. Every honest piece of it came from a horse who had no reason to trust me, and trusted me anyway once I learned to get out of the way. The work of Naturally Trained is just me writing down what they were already teaching.
Maren has logged more than 11,000 hours of one-on-one colt-starting and problem-solving work since founding the company in 2014. The method is named after the horses who taught it.
Every number below comes from the 2023 internal graduate survey, third-party course reviews, or our own enrollment records. Results vary by horse, by rider, and by how consistently the work is practiced — these are the honest averages.
Across 41 countries since the program launched in 2014.
From 3,217 verified reviews across the full course library.
Loading, pulling, herd-separation anxiety — within 8 weeks of consistent practice.
The free 7-Day Foundation series, downloaded by riders since 2019.
Method certified for low-stress handling by the International Association of Animal Behavior Consultants, membership #L-44081.
Named "Best Online Equine Education Program" by Equine Insight Awards. Featured in Equus Magazine (March 2022), Western Horseman (July 2023), and The Horse UK (September 2023).