No One Said This Was EASY!

Bleck...okay, thank goodness tomorrow is Friday. I'm WIPED OUT. But, I did learn something VERY important about myself today that I'd like to share before I go and sleep for the evening.

I am a VERY introverted learner, and I blow through MY OWN thresholds! How weird, right? I figured this out after volunteering to ride in a demo today. It was on the subject of leads and lead changes, and I was REALLY excited to go play with it. I volunteered with gusto, saddled my horse up, paid special attention to warming her up correctly for her horsenality, got to the arena, and played with everything that would help us set up for a good learning experience. Went great...then Prin started to get blocked in Zone 1. Then more blocked. Then more blocked...then...*zoom back head toss, fling fling fling fling!* and then Avery shouts "GET OFF!" But by then she had calmed down. Yet another round of pissed off Prin feedback. And this time, I didn't have my hands on the reins. I'm not going to detail that right now. I'm just too tired and it's still sinking in.

But what I can tell you is that the advice I received in front of 14 people sent me into a round of catatonia I've NEVER been sent to before. So I opted to sit the rest out (best for my horse, anyway) and I realized that the reason was because I am TOTALLY uncomfortable doing hands-on learning in a group situation. It explains everything; my dislike for conga-horse simulations, how little I get out of group lessons and clinic scenarios, and how much I prefer private one-on-one discussions and lessons, and why I can focus in the classroom (I can immerse myself in my head and notes).

Now believe it or not, this is SO going to help me to set my learning up for success. Because see, knowing this, firstly, I can set myself up into situations where I am comfortable, and it'll also help me put a guide-line on for stretching my comfort zone. It really helps to know where that line is, instead of feeling blindly until I ram over my own threshold. So, with that in mind...off I go to be an introvert.

Btw, I have pictures from today. Just need to find a computer that has enough brain power to handle them ;)

Savvy on,

F and P

Body Awareness?

I have that?! Seriously?! Well...now i do! In the past 3 days, I've really come to the realization as a person that I am really freaking inflexible. So the range of motion that I have (or actually, HAD now)was what was preventing my horse from having the ability to perform L3/4ish lateral maneuvers.

I have really thrown myself into figuring this out in this course, though. I've been aware of a lack of awareness, but I had no idea where to begin, and I"m really finding a new respect for the ladder the Parelli system has built up to help people figure out what their bodies are doing. I'm really and truly thinking about finding out where I can find one of those damn seat builders, I've learned so much on them. Also I'll be investing in a big exercise ball for ME (not my horse to attack...for once!)

So: what has come of this? RIBS! I HAVE RIBS! At the beginning of this course, I had NO IDEA how to flex my ribs correctly, let alone change the bend gracefully, and also cause my horse to move correctly based upon it. That almost 2 years of "C'mon, c'mon, it's just a half-pass right!" is really starting to make sense--you should see MY half-pass right! *Cringe* I'm so over feeling bad about it, though. I'm a student, and as a student, unless I do the same thing after receiving new information, I cannot make a mistake. That has really relieved some tension, for sure.

Other than that, I really am just going to start focusing on isolations, again. Prin and I both have some body awareness to keep building and playing with. I've opted to take the afternoon off to just play with little things (My LBI is going to love this, it's slow and varied)and see if I can build with the knowledge I already have, rather than totally overloading myself like I did last night. That was too far out of my comfort zone!

So anyway, savvy on, and seriously, one day I will have pictures for you...

Savvy on,

F and P

Mental Overload

Hi all,

Sorry to miss logging the past few days, but I promise it was the best thing I could have done for you all. I think it's so interesting, I've learned so much over the years, heard all the stories about how mentally trying these courses are, and still carried that mildly cocky mentality of "Oh, that won't happen to me!" Hahahahhahahahaha Oh my. I've already started to run the emotional roller coaster that Linda talks about in L&HB. It's fantastic because it's EXACTLY WHAT I SIGNED UP FOR (good thing I knew that when I was considering)but at the same time, it takes a lot of focus away from things like my social life. So sorry if I'm not on here as much as I'd like to be.

Okay so anyway, let me kind of give you a lowdown of what's been going on. Not too many details as I'm still trying to work it out myself, but here goes. Tuesday, we played a bit with horsenality/aptitude. Had far too many realizations about Prin that I didn't necessarily enjoy, but was interesting. I'll share my notes when I get home, since I conveniently left them in the classroom, about 100 yds and 2 doors away. Yesterday was all about leadership. We broke into horsenality-filtered remudas and learned some leadership, relationship, and interaction strategies to help our "horsenalities" grow (I was in the LBE group) Very interesting stuff, learned some great strategies for interacting with people of a less "WEEEEEEEEE!" nature-hehe.

Today has been all about fluidity and fluidness in horses. I spent the morning glowering and pouting about a bad day on the seat builder (they've got another one, a blue one, that's a bit more extreme than the mighty broncy, and it solidly kicked my ass today)

Later on, we had a demo about crookedness/straightness in horses, and Avery quickly chose Prin to use as her online example. How cool, right? Turns out Prin's blocking is mostly a physical problem (yes, I HAVE taken care of that mental/emotional for the most part! Yay!) Avery explained how to use the sideways game to my advantage in getting Prin's ribs moving how I wanted, and how to use the tracking of her hind end as a measure of the change. VERY helpful stuff.

So, now i"m off to go play with my poneh. It's a little cooler today, and I'm in a really mellow mood, so we'll have to see what happens. I have some ideas from yesterday as well as thoughts from today that I wanted to play with, but I'm seriously embracing a conspicuous lack of agenda right now.

Hopefully log again tomorrow or this weekend. Let me know if you have any questions and email me :)

Until next time, savvy on!

Love,

Fran and Prin