Learnaholics Anonymous

Confidence is an interesting word , we want our  horse to be confident,I want to be confident , I sometimes pretend to be confident when I am not to get my self through something and I have thought Dundee is confident when he is probably not there yet . 

Trailer Loading and doing his feet has brought this home to me , I realy need to be confident in what I am doing and am getting there having lessons with Max and studying is helping me do the right thing at the right time .

After two plus months of watching a lame horse go from bad to worse, then having no definitive diagnosis from the vet. I have been questioning if I want to stay in horses at all. In part I still am asking myself that question as the prospect of searching for yet another partner seems too hard to comtemplate.  I know the fat lady aint singing yet and the lameness issue with Bea is far from over.  When the splint she is now suffering from heals we could still be paying yet another visit to the vet if the lameness remains.

Today I moved out of my comfort zone again !

Its that time of year when the grass is much more interesting to Dundee than myself . So rather than DD having  the game of getting me moving I decided to experiment with him .

As Bea goes from bad to worse lameness wise it makes sense to divert my attention onto my other lame duck Gemma. She can't be ridden due to a pelvic problem fortunately she can still play, run too though if she overdoes the running bit she tends to be stiff in the morning.

Playing with Gemma has become somewhat of a habit and tends to be a leveller as what is too much for Bea at the moment makes little difference to Gem.

Playing with Gemma is something I haven't done for months.  Gem is an Arab X Connemara and has intelligence and spirit.  Probably far too much horse for me when I got her but then I didn't know any better. 

Wow ! What a day we had yesterday , Max came over to gives me a lesson . As it was so hot and i didnt want to overdue it with Dundee , we worked the lesson around preparation for riding . 

I hadnt realised quite how important and precise the porcupine game needs to be for riding . But it is now all fitting into place .We played with lateral flexion and preparation for the indirect rein and hindquater yield , once DD knew what we were asking he responded realy well .

Playing with circles is not Bea's favourite occupation.  She can't see the point in them even with treats.  So I tend to change it up alot to get her focus, if I get the balance right we tend to get any number of laps at trot and canter.

I am normally quite an independent soul used to , battling along on my own to get things done . Since studying Parelli , I have realised  success doesnt necessarily happen like this .One needs Attitude , knowledge , support ,Tools , techniques , time and imagination .