| Bluebird Lane Blog |
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The warm-up is one of the most important, and often overlooked, parts of the ride. Sometimes people approach the warm-up as something to be gotten through in order to get to the good stuff, but this line of thinking can be a mistake. Giving attention to warming up properly can set the tone for your whole ride, and really increase your chance of successfully achieving your goals that day.
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One of my clients was filling me in on her ongoing training with her young Fjord gelding (she is doing an awesome job with him!) and she used a phrase that I really liked and wanted to share with you.
As she introduced her horse to new experiences, outings, and adventures, if things didn’t go quite the way she envisioned they would, and consequently didn’t measure up to her expectations, she would tell me, “I had to find my lemonade”.
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A reader, Katie, wrote to me after she had read my Gumby article on using the power of visual imagery to help with your riding and training. Katie shared her experience with her own horse, who can be difficult at times, and I wanted to discuss part of her comment, because she raises a really important point:
I don’t know as I’ve come up with an image for my young mare and I, but I think your urging us to do that, and your example of how the image of Gumby worked well for you, is very important and useful. Whenever she’s difficult, the line: “This horse could hurt me”, comes to mind. It feels rational and careful, but it may not be.
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Last week we started talking about The Three Pillars of Your Riding Foundation. I explained how the foundation which you are building to support your success as a rider rests firmly upon what I call three pillars. These are: the Pillar of Focus, the Pillar of Fundamentals, and the Pillar of Fitness.
The Pillar of Focus is all about your mind-set and applying the power of your attention on a daily basis towards bringing your riding goals to life. Focus also encompasses your ability to keep your attention oriented firmly on what you want, not on what you DON’T want, every moment that you are riding.
Today we are moving on to the second support for our riding foundation, the Pillar of Fundamentals.
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No matter what discipline you ride in or what level you ride at, your horse needs to go forward willingly from light leg aids. If you need to use strong leg aids to get your horse to go, or to keep him going, eventually you are going to be working harder than he is! When that happens, riding becomes more like work, and less like fun.
We call this phenomenon, when the horse does not respond immediately to a light driving aid, “behind the leg”. When your horse is behind the leg, you don’t have true influence over him, because he is deciding for himself whether or not he is going to respond, when, and how much.
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One of the biggest challenges of riding a good half halt is getting the timing right. This is especially true if you are riding on your own and don’t have someone there to remind you to release immediately after the half halt.
We all know that the release is every bit as important as every other part of the half halt, but sometimes when we’re alone and not getting the feeling, we can suddenly realize “OMG, I’m holding too much and not letting go.” Only by letting go do we allow the half halt to do its magic. If you are getting a heavy, leaning, or pulling feeling in your hand, ask yourself honestly, am I releasing quickly enough?
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When training a horse, setting goals and having a plan is important. I definitely do that. But, it can’t be the most important thing. As Dwight D. Eisenhower said, “Plans are worthless, but planning is everything.” He said this in the context of preparing for battle, but it holds just as true in the context of preparing to make progress with your horse.
Horses being horses, things are not necessarily going to proceed 100% according to your plan every time you get out into the training area. You need to stay flexible in your approach when the horse doesn’t seem to remember what you thought he already knew, and therefore you can’t move on to introducing new material. The most important thing is to be totally in the moment with the horse and listening to what he is telling you when you ask him questions.
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A while back I was in this seven week program on creativity, and on day one they started off by presenting us with a challenge. It was a contract to sign, and the contract said that for the forty-nine day duration, we would commit to totally giving up the following:
Complaining, Criticizing, Gossiping, and Whining.
Whoa! Stop and think about that for a moment.
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