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Game Changers: Some Important Discoveries In My Own Journey

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Game Changers: Some Important Discoveries In My Own Journey

As riders and teachers our particular approach, our techniques and methodology, our focus is very much a result of our own personal journey. It is shaped by the difficulties that we had to overcome, our own weaknesses, our discoveries, our teachers, the horses we have ridden, the books we have read, the other riders we have interacted with, and also by the students we have taught.

Occasionally, our personal journey leads us to discoveries that are real game changers for us. To others, they may be insignificant, but to us the world will never be the same afterwards. We can almost divide our riding career in pre-discovery and post-discovery. That’s how much these discoveries helped us improve our own riding. These game-changing discoveries will be different for everyone. In this blog post, I want to share some of my lightbulb moments that have helped me move to a higher level of understanding and practical skill. Perhaps they will be helpful for you as well, and maybe you can think of your own momentous discoveries and share them with us.

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The Historical Development Of Elevating From A Low Head Position

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The Historical Development Of Elevating From A Low Head Position

Looking at the development of equestrian art over longer periods of time, you will detect pendulum-like swings of opinions in many areas. There are fashion trends that are taken to a certain extreme. Then, opinions change, and the pendulum swings in the opposite direction until it reaches the other extreme. Although these developments are often based on correct observations in some areas, extremes are usually counter productive and often damage the horse’s soundness and overall health. It is always dangerous when an observation of one training aspect is made the only criterion for evaluating training progress and then taken to an extreme, following the motto: more is better.

One example of such extremes are two diametrically opposed opinions on riding long and low. On one end of the spectrum are those riders for whom stretching forward-downward is the highest goal of dressage training and the solution to all problems. Many of them believe that you are not allowed to do anything else in the training of your horse until the horse is able to stretch forward-downward. On the opposite end of the spectrum are those who categorically reject any and all forward-downward stretching because they believe that it puts the horse onto the forehand and ruins the horse’s legs.

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Turning The Pelvis With Ease

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Turning The Pelvis With Ease

This week's newsletter article is a guest post by one of our guest teachers in our courses, Catherine McCrum. Catherine is a Feldenkrais practitioner and Gestalt psychotherapist living and working in London. The Feldenkrais Method is a way of improving how you move and function in daily life with a particular focus on how your unconscious movement patterns and posture holds you back from doing what you want to do with ease and grace. She works with a wide variety of clients and students from athletes and performers to people with neurological difficulties. Her original training was as a ski coach and trainer which she finds very applicable to her relatively new love of riding and her horse.

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Listening to 'No'

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Listening to 'No'

When I returned to riding as a middle-aged person, my first horse had a very loud ‘no.’ He was cheerful enough about doing the things he wanted to do, but my goal—to learn dressage—prompted a storm of tantrums and hissy fits of truly epic proportions. This, of course, felt horrible. He was treated well, I thought, and the requests I was making were not very difficult. So why did he spend his time looking for ways to make my life hard? Why did he keep saying ‘no’?

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How To Switch Focus (What to do when it’s not going well)

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How To Switch Focus (What to do when it’s not going well)

It happens to all driven and focused riders at some point. We get so focused in on what we are trying to work on that we lose perspective or we forget to add in enough variety of other things because we want to “fix” this certain issue (and we want to fix it TODAY!).

On the one hand it is important to have a level of perseverance. Giving up at the sign of the slightest resistance or problem is not a path to success, but there comes a point where our dogged perseverance can backfire and make the matter worse. In those circumstances, we need to shift our gears, pivot in our approach, and shift our perspective.

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How to keep the training “fresh”

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How to keep the training “fresh”

A student in our Video Coaching Program has observed that her horse found the exercises more strenuous than she had anticipated. He seemed to be a little tired the next day and perhaps a little muscle sore. So she asked me how she should structure her training from now on in order not to overface the horse while at the same time giving him enough physical exercise during a time of year when the weather conditions limit her turnout and trailriding options. This is a problem that many riders and horses face. That’s why I want to share a few thoughts on this subject here.

 

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Riding And Emotions

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Riding And Emotions

Guest post by Marcella Becker.

Pretty much everybody that chooses to spend his time with horses puts their heart and soul in it. Certainly what motivates us all is the love of horses. Nonetheless, once we start getting really serious about our riding the entire project becomes at times laden with frustration. There is no rider who has not been at times (and this will happen again and again) right at the limit of their ability.

 

Release Your Fascia To Improve Your Seat

Release Your Fascia To Improve Your Seat

Only a supple, relaxed seat allows you to apply correct, fine aids. Any weakness, crookedness, or imbalance will have negative repercussions for the training of the horse or the communication between horse and rider and lead to problems. A friend of mine said the other day: “Horses have made themselves available to us.” They accompany us, are partners, and don’t carry grudges. Even after we have made mistakes they give us the great opportunity to further our development - mentally as well as physically. When we learn to become aware of our senses, to feel, to see, and to hear, our horses provide us with the great opportunity to achieve physical and mental balance. They teach us to find ourselves by observing our own behavior, our thoughts, and emotions.

 

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You have to fall in love with the process

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You have to fall in love with the process

To become a great rider (hell… to become great at ANYTHING…). You have to fall in love with the process. Because that is what it is about. It is ABOUT the process. In other words, you have to be willing to do the work. You have to want it bad enough to endure the struggle… to get back on the horse when you’ve come off unexpectedly… to come back the next day after a bad ride and do it all again (hopefully better)…

 

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Reasons Why Your Horse Is Not On The Bit - Part 2

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Reasons Why Your Horse Is Not On The Bit - Part 2

Everything is connected in riding. Rhythm, balance, self carriage, straightness, suppleness/stiffness,  back movement, rein contact, impulsion, collection (i.e. flexion of the haunches) are all interrelated and influence each other. Rider balance and horse balance, rider crookedness and horse crookedness, rider stiffness and horse stiffness affect each other in very direct ways. Any improvement in one area leads to improvements in all the other areas. Unfortunately, it works the other way around, too: a problem in one area will also have negative repercussions throughout the entire system.

 

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2018 Goal Setting (for Riders)

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2018 Goal Setting (for Riders)

It’s that time again! The New Year is upon us... and I'm willing to bet that you want 2018 to be the BIG BREAKTHROUGH year for you and your riding, right?  Have you set New Year’s Resolutions before and not kept them? I know… silly question. WE ALL HAVE! You know why? Because it is human nature, and the nature of resolutions sort of sets us up to fail. This is why...

 

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Reasons Why Your Horse Is Not On The Bit - Part 1

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Reasons Why Your Horse Is Not On The Bit - Part 1

I vividly remember one riding lesson that I had in my early days. My teacher told me: “Your horse needs to be more on the bit.” I was painfully aware of this because on the one hand it was hard to overlook, and on the other hand it was the one problem I was struggling with more than anything else. I would have loved to ride the horse more on the bit. But I didn’t know how. I wasn’t riding the horse inverted on purpose. I needed more practical, actionable information in order to be able to do a better job. Over the years I researched this subject in depth because it was so difficult for me for a long time and discovered many factors that are involved in riding the horse on the bit.

 

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Growing Pains

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Growing Pains

Sometimes we don’t realize how much we have already learned and how much we have improved. Our quality standards and our awareness have grown faster than our skills, and so we feel like we are riding worse than ever, although in reality we are riding better than we used to be, just not as well as we would like.

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If You Don’t Have The Back, You Have Nothing

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If You Don’t Have The Back, You Have Nothing

But maybe we should ask ourselves what “through the back” actually means, how it feels, how it looks, and how you get there. Does the horse really automatically go “through the back” just because the head is down? What is the relationship between form and function? What do I do when I release the reins and the head stays where it is, i.e. the horse doesn’t stretch forward and down? What do people mean when they talk about “the back” anyway? Who knows?! Sometimes everyone means something else, depending on their level of understanding and experience, and you have to translate their words into an objective, systematic, structural framework.

 

A question about elbows and hand position

A question about elbows and hand position

In one of our Facebook groups someone asked a question about elbows and hand position. She had been told by a trainer that she should keep her hands forward, close to the withers of the horse. Since she is not very tall, she has to round her shoulders or tip forward with her torso in order to put her hands where the trainer wants them to be. That compromises the integrity and the effectiveness of the seat, of course.

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