May 25, 2006: Remembering the Point

I had a lesson on Quila with Fabian, our Bereiter, today. It was the first time I’ve ridden her with anyone other than Jürgen or Jennifer in the last few years for more than a few minutes, and it was a really great lesson--a lot like going to a clinic, in that he saw us from a fresh perspective, although his approach was classically German, just like Jürgen.

It took him no time at all to recognize our greatest problem: Quila likes to run through the bridle, and sucker me into a pulling war. (Jürgen yells at me for this all the time). Before I learned to half-halt her effectively with my seat, she usually won, since I had very little else to use against her if I couldn’t bring her under control after the umpteenth half-halt. That’s no longer the case, provided I remember to use my tools--and that was exactly the point of my lesson today. Fabian pointed out to me (time and time again--he was quite honest, and made me, unfortunately, painfully aware) that the more wrapped up I become in what I’m doing and the harder I am concentrating, the less likely I am to use my new tools, and the more likely I am to revert to my old habits. So we do quite nicely working on straight lines and in painfully boring voltés, but throw in something interesting, like counter-canter, or single loop canter serpentines, a leg yield, or anything that starts to hint at moving up a test (or, heaven forbid, like moving up a level), and Quila gets excited about it. “Yippee!” she says, “we are leaving the humdrum routine behind, and life is finally getting interesting!” I would quite agree, except her yippee is often associated with running through the bridle and taking matters into her own hands. All well and good, since I recognize it, and I know how to correct her... but the danger lies in how I correct her.

With Fabian, we kept life simple today, and the lesson focussed on a single issue: that single bad habit. We didn’t worry about developing stamina and carrying power. We didn’t worry about thrust or throughness. We didn’t care about quickness to the leg, though all of that improved, secondarily.

Instead, I have to say thank to Fabian today for patiently stretching my limits of concentration, and helping me to work on new riding skills while focussing on the most important old one: riding those half-halts correctly from my seat and legs, and leaving my naughty hands in their proper proportion. In Quila’s defense, she’s not entirely to blame for wanting to blow-off my seat/legs and not always listening like she should, either: for years, I flopped around on her back like a dead fish, with no seat to speak of--it’s an entirely new thing to her to have my seat be educated and suddenly mean something.