If you have ever rode a horse that spooked, you know how fast it can happen.
Before you can react to your horse spooking, your horse has likely finished spooking or he's half way through it.
In other words, it can happen so fast, you wouldn't know it until it's over or it's half done.
In the meantime, you could be seriously hurt.
That so, be especially mindful of how you work to take the spook out of your horse.
Doing it wrong could make your horse worse and very dangerous.
So what is the worst mistake you could make? Although opinions vary, I say the worst mistake you could make is going too fast.
What does this mean? Here are some examples.
If you're trying to teach your horse to do something such as changing gaits, you don't want to rush his understanding that you want him to go from one gait to the next in an instant.
Instead, you may want him to make an easy and calm transition.
So while you're teaching this, you don't want to rush to hurry and get him to move from a trot to a lope.
Rather, you'd want the transition to be deliberate and quickly gradual.
Let him learn that it's okay to take his time understanding what you want him to do because he does NOT know what you want him to do.
You must patiently work with him in a way that's not putting so much pressure on him that he can't think through what you want.
The reason he can't think through what you want is he's feeling fearful and you can't give him too much to try to figure out.