Horse Samurai

Fear of failure or fear of looking like a complete idiot stops many people from doing a lot of things and is one of the strongest forces holding people below their potential.  I know!  I’ve been there!  My general mindset (and one that is financially beneficial for me in my full-time job) is one of ‘worse-case-scenario’ thinking.  So I’m all too familiar with the thoughts that can run through a person’s mind if they let them.  I mean, in a world full of uncertainty with countless misfortunes that could happen to anyone, it is easy to see why most people want to play it safe.  Suppose I’m no good at [insert what it is you are striving for here]?  Suppose my grandiose idea doesn’t turn out like I want it to?  Friends/family say that I’ll never be able to pull that off, so why bother because I’ll just confirm their beliefs.  Unfortunately, I can think of a million more excuses or reasons NOT to try because I might flub it up!  AAARRRRGGGGHHH!

A little fear is a good thing, however!  For one, it can help prevent you from doing something really stupid like jumping into shark infested waters without any kind of protection or back-up plan.  But playing it safe has risks associated with it as well.  If you never dare to fail (gasp!) you will continually undermine your merit and abilities causing you to pass up valuable opportunities.  Look at it this way, the ability to fail, and fail BIG, is often what has left marks of spectacular success and innovation throughout history.

So how can you put fear on the shelf when it comes to your horsemanship?

Worse-Case Scenarios

One of my favorite and easiest things to do is to play the worse-case scenario game (Trust me, I am a pro at this!).  I think of the worst things that could happen by asking myself some questions: If I start dressage and fall flat on my face in the middle of a schooling show, how will I ever recover?  Well, despite possible needing to have my nose surgically straightened, the answer might be less scary than what you expect – more training and practice!  Is the fear of a few more months of training and practice strong enough to keep you from the show ring indefinitely?  I certainly hope not!

Don’t Miss an Opportunity

The biggest issue with not taking a risk is that there is no way you can ever exploit any new opportunities.  Sure, you might be able to live the quiet life, but you are also highly unlikely to create something new and leave your mark on the world.  Don’t let the “unknown” be your source of fear, turn it into an opportunity to explore alternate outcomes.  You never know what you might come up with!  Plan B might change the world!

Burn the Bridge

If you are not sure, if your fear is starting to make you doubt yourself, burn the bridge!  If success or failure are your only two options…don’t get stuck in the middle!  If you have a goal, but are afraid to commit, this will force you into action.  As soon as you take that first step, it will start to build your confidence and you will begin to accumulate experience and knowledge which will squash those initial fears.

Emerson said, “Life is a series of experiments; the more you make the better.”  What will you experiment with today?

A friend of mine (and fellow blogger) Dr. Penny Lloyd recently published a post entitled “1000# of Dominance” (www.ConnectiontheBestMedicine.com).  In it she discussed true power and balance, and what it means to different people.  I encourage you to check out her blog (and our conversation) and at the same time I thought that the topic was a great one worthy of further discussion.

What does true power mean to you when it comes to your relationship with your horse?  Does it mean that your horse submits to your demands and performs flawlessly?  Does it mean that you submit to your horse?  Does it mean that sometimes your horse submits to you (when you feel like it should) and other times you submit to your horse?

In my line of work I deal not only with a variety of horses, but also their owners.  In my “About” page you will see a quote that says “Show me your horse and I will tell you what you are.”  Why do I have this quote there?  Because I believe that horses don’t lie.  The truth about their owners (or handlers/trainers) eventually comes out and that truth tells me a lot.

I know killer horses that are lambs.  I know well-behaved horses that have no spirit in them.  I’ve heard the stories about how some horses are so terrible only to find that, when given the chance, the terrible was simply a misunderstanding.  And really, don’t most things in life boil down to understanding?

In my years of dealing with horses I have learned to think outside of the ‘typical’ or sometimes ‘trendy’ world of horses.  I don’t prescribe to any one style of horsemanship.  I don’t follow one particular horse trainer.  I don’t do only one style of riding.  I’ve learned to listen, to understand, and to find the balance.  Through those things I have achieved some remarkable things with horses – all done without the use of the latest training gimmicks, without expecting a quick fix, without abuse, and admittedly (at more times that I care to admit to) without really knowing what the heck I was doing.

For me, true power is about balance, connection and understanding.  It takes two sides of the equation to achieve that.  It may be instantaneous or it may take years.  But true power is not about power at all, it is about the relationship that you create.  As horse owners and caregivers we need to do our best to understand and embrace that…and the horse will respond.

I’m beginning to wonder if there is a phenomenon in the boarding world where larger facilities seem to attract crazy barn owners.  Why?  Well, I’ve seen to have had my fair share of them!  Sure, everything starts out all well and good.  My horses receive great care.  There is little to no barn drama.  The facility is well-kept, neat, tidy and well-managed.  Then just when you get lulled into a sense of ‘all is right with the world’, WHAMO!, the reality of boarding smacks you in the face.

You see for years I was fortunate enough to own my own place where I could keep my horses right out my back door.  I kept my barn neat and tidy.  My tack room organized.  My stalls cleaned.  My pastures picked and mud free.  My feed dust and mold free.  And the result was that my horses were happy and healthy and I had my sanity.  But then I moved…

I no longer have the option of keeping my horses in my backyard.  I have been forced to the world of boarding – and I want what I had.  Unfortunately that seems nowhere to be found – at least not within a reasonable or even remotely reasonable price range.

So I have learned to sacrifice many things that I had.  Some I can deal with (like the horses out my back door and a neat and tidy barn) and others I refuse to tolerate (like moldy feed and the safety of my animals).  But I have to say that the thing that really gets me is that many of the so-called expert barn owners are CRAZY!

Let me explain…

At one facility during the middle of the summer my horses had no water in 90 degree weather.  Now to me, this is not acceptable.  To the barn owner, since her Arabians could go without water in that kind of heat for days it should be no big deal that my horses ran out.  Really?

Then, at another facility, what was supposed to be full care boarding ended up with me footing the bill and the barn owner expecting me to unload hay, pick pastures, shovel delivered bedding into an empty stall, and do all the chores once a week – with no discount for boarding.  Hmm, where was that in my full care contract?

Enter in another facility yet – at this place the owner has gone through five barn managers in an eight month period, dug a 5′x5′ hole in my horse’s pasture (and left it unfenced for three days despite my constant complaints) in order to have a final resting place for one of her old broodmares, then expanded the hole to include two horses she wanted to put down, and never bothered to call me or even wait for a fellow boarder to remove my horse while they put the mares down.  Then she had the audacity to tell me that I was being unreasonable when I complained about all of that (yet again) and the fact that the carcasses were left uncovered for hours in a 6′ deep hole while my horse wandered the pasture.  Seriously?

Where do these people get their brilliant thought patterns?  I would never expect my horse (or anyone else’s for that matter) to go without water – EVER, to have to do all the work when they were paying ME to do it, or to leave a huge hole in a pasture and not wait five minutes for a horse to be removed before putting two down in that horse’s pasture.  I mean really, am I expecting too much?  I don’t think so!

So I ask, are there any sane boarding facilities out there without the crazy owners?

It’s that time of year!  Time to set those resolutions for the next twelve months and then promptly forget them (or choose to forget them) after about three weeks or so, if they make it that long!  I’m not quite sure where this whole idea of creating resolutions resonated from, but if we don’t make resolutions that we can keep, why bother?

I am a goal setter.  I think they are much better than resolutions because goals are meant to be something that you can attain.  Instead of the “I’m going to lose 50 pounds this year.” resolution, goals are much more specific (at least to my way of thinking) and manageable like “I’m going to lose 4 pounds this month.”  I like having the end in mind, but I cherish the little triumphs along the way.  I like knowing that I reached that goal and that I have something to strive for the next month.

With a horse it is important to think along the lines of goals instead of resolutions.  It is unrealistic to make a resolution to qualify for the Grand Prix when you have a horse that still doesn’t know the basics of collection.  But if you break things down on a month by month basis, you will likely be much closer to your ideal of qualifying for the Grand Prix than you would be if you began to train your green horse for the Grand Prix without having a good set of basics in place first.

So instead of New Year’s resolutions this year, I challenge you to set a goal.  Start by setting a goal for you and your horse that you fully believe you can attain by the end of the month.  It could range from getting your horse to load into the trailer or scoring high on your next dressage test.  The ‘what’ doesn’t matter to anyone else but you and your horse.  This is your goal as a team.  When you achieve that goal give yourself and your horse a pat on the back and set another one!  Keep striving to accomplish those goals and compliment each other and before you know it, you might just be riding in the Grand Prix!