Ep 8: Working Through Frustrations and Challenges
This morning, I was thinking about horsemanship and how it has changed my life. This is one of the thoughts that occupies my mind constantly. I’m always thinking about horses, and what I can do to improve my communication with my horses—which maneuvers and exercises will help my horse to be more smooth and fluid.
Yesterday, I was working with a young cutting bred stud colt. At this point in his training, he is a little unsure of himself and scared of some things. He was 100% different than the colt I rode right before him, and it made me think about the transitions that I have to make on a daily basis.
All of us are on a horsemanship journey where we learn a lot about horses and a lot about life. I remember very vividly the day that my journey changed. It was the day when I stopped letting my frustrations dictate my communication with my horse.
The first place that my wife, Bridget, and I brought after we got married was a little place with a trailer house and 10 acres for $27,000—if that gives you any idea how nice the trailer house was. At the time, I thought we were doing good. We started with a little more than nothing, but we did have a place to lay our heads down.
At this place, there was a day I remember as one of the worst training days I have ever had. It was like the rollover car wreck that wouldn’t end. I was frustrated with every horse I rode, and instead of working out my problems with each horse, I just carried my frustration over from the one before, quit, and started on the next one. By doing this, my frustration just continued to snowball.
When I got in the house that night, I looked at myself in the mirror and said to myself, “if every horse you ride acts the same way, you must be the problem.” I had spent all day trying to figure out what was wrong with my horses, when in reality, I was the one that had to change. I believe what holds a lot of people back in this industry is our thought process. We are our own worst critics. We have to have some humility and be willing to change.
Any pressure that exists is nothing compared to the pressure we put on ourselves. Our self talk can be empowering, but it can also be very damaging. And, it’s one of the toughest things to change. But, we have complete control of the expectations that we put on ourselves.
When I started to realize this simple fact, everything changed. Granted, there are still times when I fall into phases where I let negative self talk back into my vocabulary. But, when I learned that I could silence that negative voice in my head, I was able to make consistent progress. Any time those negative thoughts creeped back into my head, I told myself to quit listening to my own thoughts and to start listening to my horse.
When our horses get frustrated, we become insecure. But, the good news is, that our insecurities are manageable. And, we are in charge of managing these insecurities. Building confidence in ourselves and in our horses takes work, but it is doable through consistency.
You will see plenty of people who manage their frustration poorly—for example, those who scold their horse in the alley after making a bad run. The thing is, correcting your horse after the fact doesn’t help you. Some people say that in order to teach your horse to overcome a mistake, you have to correct the issue within 3-7 seconds after the problem occurs. I don’t know how accurate these numbers are, but I always strive to correct issues in a quick and timely manner so that my horse still knows what I are referring to.
Often times, when people fail to correct an issue within this timeframe, you will see them act out of frustration rather than teaching. When frustration starts to dictate your responses, nothing good happens. Learning to communicate better with your horse is everything. In my instance, I was the one that had to change. I was the one that had to make a transition.
Albert Einstein’s definition of insanity is continuing to do unsuccesful things in the same way that you have been doing them and expecting different results. When we look at change, we are often tempted to try to change everything all at once. I see many people fall victim to this temptation. If someone tries to soften a horse in their ribcage and it’s not working, you often see that person just stop and switch to a different exercise. But, that’s not always productive. Pick one thing at at time and get good at it. When you get good at that one thing, it is going to impact every other area of your performance.
If you are experiencing a challenging time in your horsemanship journey, do an evaluation—look at yourself, look at your horse, look at what you’re trying to accomplish, and think about what transitions you are going to need to make to get there. What is the difference in where you are and where you want to be? Sometimes, all it takes is reinforcing a fundamental. But, it’s a process. You have to fix things one at a time.
It is important to remember that we’re all in the same boat. You’re going to go through the same experiences as everybody else in this business. Horses don’t know who you are. Your resume is irrelevant to them. All they know is that this is unfamiliar territory. The key to becoming a better horseman is understanding that you have to listen more than you communicate. Your horse will tell you where you need to get better. The moment I understood that is when the lightbulb finally came on for me.
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