Today I was reminded yet again just how much of our sport is mental. One of my horses is young and boisterous and I have heaps of fun on him. The other is shy and self conscious and, well, a worry wart! After my ride on the second today, I stared into his eyes, with tears in mine. Sounds pathetic or corny, I know, but I was just so ashamed of myself.
A horse that requires great compassion and empathy and the constant encouragement and care of his rider looked at me with a hint of sadness in his eyes.
On a particularly windy day this horse was behaving as his somewhat frustrating inattentive and anxious self, and instead of using my intelligence and gently using gymnastic exercises and transitions to engage him in the work, I got angry with him, and I had to stop myself in the middle of the arena, take a deep breathe, before I took that anger unfairly out on him. I knew of course that if I reacted with force toward him, this would result in an even more tense and upset horse and possibly set me back in training; even more so make me incredibly mad at myself.
Brilliant riders, who we all aspire to be, are those riders who can distinguish between the emotion that is needed and the emotion that should be left at home. They can use the adrenaline of competition, but not be restricted by the pressure to do well. They can put aside their relationship issues, or family domestics, and for the time they enter to the time they leave the stable, they are at peace with themselves and with their horses.
Sounds easy, but the reality of letting all of that go and being focused on you and your horse everyday is challenging even for the most elite riders. Added to the stress of their own personal world is the pressure from clients, buyers, sponsors, pushing them for results. It is very easy for us to watch on and criticise, as we do not always know who is calling the shots or for that matter, writing the cheques!
At the end of the day, however, it is the horse we are looking out for and it is the goals of the sport itself that must work hard to ensure that a horse in harmony and self-carriage will be the one rewarded and thus reap the results the owners are striving to achieve. Again, lightness comes from the top!
So, how is it that some riders are able to let go of all their unuseful emotions on the horse, while others unfairly punish the horse just because they have had a bad day.
Last month's young gun, Chloe Vell, like me, aspires to find the mental focus and concentration that the brilliant riders produce and she knows that she must leave all her everyday troubles outside the stable. "I can't say that I have lost my temper on a horse before, but they are sometimes frustrating," said the 15-year old.
Chloe believes that on these types of days, is it best for the rider to just give the horse a rest for the day. "Usually, someone watching shouts to me to leave it for another day and I try to," she admitted. Typically a person known for her calm personality, Chloe says this helps her a lot to keep a calm head on the horse, but that it also comes down to rider self awareness. "For the most part I consider myself to be at fault instead of the horse, as it is me training them and not vice versa. If I feel cross or tense I tend to walk on a long rein to think about what I hope to achieve and whether I need to ask the horse in a different way."
She highlighted a very good point, because often we as riders need to remember that the horse typically acts a certain way due to something we have done! "When a rider loses their temper the horse will sense everything she is feeling, and depending on the type of horse they will either shut down completely, start to be naughty, or can become nervous."
Olympic rider Ingrid Klimke stresses that a horse can feel a fly so of course the horse will feel any tension coming from the rider and if you are in a hurry, or in in a worry, you cannot open your head! "If I feel tense on the horse I press my teeth together," Ingrid explained. "That shows me that I am too tight and need to relax, which means that I walk and think of why my horse is doing this and why he has no chance of understanding me. I must then try harder to feel as the horse feels, and support my friend."
As Ingrid points out, if a horse is arguing, perhaps we have asked him for something too early, perhaps he is tired, perhaps we should consider that we may be stiff, or pulling on the reins, or uneven with our leg aids. The solution is not to push more, or ask more, but to step back, and ask, "what could I perhaps be doing wrong?" If you cannot find an answer to the above, you do not then get angry with your horse, but begin to ask all the other questions. Is his back sore? Does he need shoeing? Is he just picking up on my bad morning and is telling me that perhaps today we should go for a nice long walk?
All the riders I admire would automatically step into problem solving mode, knowing that any emotional attack on the horse will only exacerbate the problem ten fold! When you go out each day to your horse, consider how lucky you are to, A:have a horse, and B: be in a sport where a beautiful animal lets you train and mould him, from a wonderful view up high.
Practically born on the back of a horse in Los Pallacios, Andalusia, horseman Jose Mendez was trained at the Real Escuela Andaluza del Arte Ecuestre in Jerez and studied the art of equestrian with Filipe Graciosa, Guillermo Borba, Francisco Cancella d’Abreu, Reiner Klimke and Nuno Oliveira. Throughout his long career with the horse, Jose has learnt that the only reason a rider uses force on a horse is when he lacks the knowledge to train correctly or the intelligence or compassion to search for a different way.
"Force begins where knowledge ends," said Mendez. "If you remember this and resist becoming harsher when you are not getting the results you want, if you instead seek to understand why your horse cannot give you what you ask and then seek new ways to teach him, so his body and mind can do what you ask, then you will develop a deeper bond with your horse as you seek gentle answers to your training challenges. The more you learn, the more your horse will appreciate you."
The choice is yours, you just have to be willing to work for it everyday. Be a rider with emotion, not an emotional rider. Use feeling, but don't be led by your feelings. Feel the excitement of competition, not the pressure to win. Know when to push your horse, and when to back off. Bring your personality into the arena, but do not let it interfere. Be safe, but not scared
And finally just enjoy it and your horse will too!
by Sarah Warne for Eurodressage
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