The half-halt is a signal from an equestrian to horse that encourages rebalance.
A concatenation of driving aids and restraining aids are communicated from rider to horse, creating pause, without interrupting the flow. Half-halting requests the horse to prepare to halt, thus returning its body to balance, and then utilizes the energy created by this constraint to propel into a more true and compelling version of its forward gait.
Physically, the horse’s spine lifts, and the body gets aligned and organized. Another cool output is the mental rebalancing and reconnection between rider and animal in a split-second, almost psychically-transmitted acknowledgement of something that is happening both in the CURRENT moment of movement together, and simultaneously in the anticipation of something that is about to happen in the NEXT moment.