I am of the mood to respond to the consent / R+ element of this thread as there is a lot of commentary that shows people don’t understand the basics of it, here to give a view if people are open minded enough to listen.
I am not entertaining a pile on, not engaging in that so happy to discuss, ain’t wasting my breath trying to chip away at entrenched argumentative brick walls.
Yes you can get horses to willingly work with you and get everything you want to get done using full consent based training - I professionally train everyone from youngsters who are a blank canvas, through horses that can’t / wont acccept stuff they need to know because someone has buggered them up somewhere along the line, up to rehabbing the horses who have reached the end of the line with traditional / normal methods - those who’s NO has become an emphatic Eff off and they are deemed dangerous enough in handling / riding to be facing PTS.
I set up training scenarios to make yes a palatable option and reward even the tiniest increment towards what we are working on. This engages them into offering stuff as they trust the experience is going to be pleasurable and if they say they can’t they are heard.
Sometimes I have to be quite creative to get started and I love the challenge. It’s really affirming to see time and time again how accepting their no because they aren’t comfortable / or are unsure, and working out why and what to do about it, turns horses who’s only answer was no into a yes.
I mostly use this for general life skills / husbandry stuff - leading, meeting scary stuff - traffic, machinery / animals, tying up / parking, walking into/onto/ off things, grooming , touch, medical stuff - temp, examinations, injections, teeth, worming, blood draws, hoof handling, clipping etc, etc etc.
I am not standing by a horse with a pair of clippers waiting for them to nod at me so I can crack on 
I don’t waft, I’m not completely woo, I wears steel toe capped boots - not sandals, I wear a woolly hat or a skullcap not flowers in my hair. I have horses sent to me from all over the country because what I do works.
And, Yes you can train a horse under saddle to do pretty much anything using R+
I start on the ground, I use targeting, vocal cues, shadowing and shaping to ask horses to move towards me, rather than pressure / release to move away (If you’ve ever worked with foals you’ll know they naturally push back into physical pressure, we have to teach them it means move away from it, why bother when you can get them to follow through their natural curiosity?)
So stuff like mounting, body positioning, rein aids, stop / go increases & decreases in pace and tempo, lateral work, jumping, lunging, long lining.
Add a rider who is initially passive but then I start putting simple touch cues in place, combined with verbal / target initially but faded out = basically adding buttons that aren’t escalating aversives and reducing the size of cues until we’re down to minimal movements. No different to following a training plan using pressure based cues.
Yes sitting on is adding pressure of sorts and weight aids are pressure based - that’s physics, but be mindful that irrespective of our ideology we are usually asking horses to step towards where our weight is leading them and this follows on nicely from physically following a target.
So once this is all in place my riding cues don’t look any different to anyone else’s, they’ve just been put on the horse a different way
This is just a really simple basic overview of how I (and others) work. I am well aware there are some people who are like religious zealots, not my bag.
Do I care how other people work, nope you do you. I’ll do me but when I know it can be done lightly and without escalating into kicking, hitting, whipping, fighting, aggro and upset for all concerned right up to the highest levels hence this thread - I’m happy on my path.
Do I compete - no, not any longer but that’s a personal choice I made 15 years ago, give me a few years with my youngsters and never say never though.
Have I been trained traditionally - yup and worked with horses professionally that way since the 1980’s
Am I trained and well versed in pressure release methods - also yup, I just figured me and the horses prefer other ways.
Do I ride - yup, most days! I school, hack out, jump, go to clinics and lessons, gallop along the beach……whatever we feel like…and yes, if my horse says nope I need to figure out why, not just plough on regardless
