Tuesdays: For Garbage & Grattitude

So.... This blog is for me, from my heart, for the purposes of cleansing and renewal, if that doesn't do it for ya than stop reading now and save us both the grief :), or continue, be soft and careful with my vulnerability, and perhaps some beauty will come of it.

At our house, Tuesdays is garbage day.... So in the spirit of tossing out the old and bringing in the new, I thought I would take a little time to count out what I'm grateful for in this now, and from the last few days. "Gratitude is the bridge to love," so hopefully putting some gratitude out there will send some more love back me and my families way :).

For those of you who don't know I spent the weekend with family in Orange County. My step mom, is there currently fighting the battle of her life.... Literally, against an unfair, unrelinquishing, and intense foe.... An unknown and rapidly growing cancer. So this week, my blog reaches out to her, her spirit, her strength, and all her "ninjas," fighting this incredible battle. 

Ok, so back to gratitude .... I'm writing this as I lie in a hotel room in limbo between leaving the hospital and arriving home.... Because my flight was delayed in OC, I missed my connection in Denver, hence the hotel room. So, what am I grateful for? Lol.... Hmmm :)

Being here right now allowed me a conversation with a close friend I wouldn't have had, a friend that reinforced that she will always be someone I can call on and count on when and if I need, so I'm grateful for that.

I got to watch a young woman, (Left-brain Extravert!) direct, comfort and soothe passengers in the direction of comfy and cozy beds, doing far more than she needed to, and showing us all how much she clearly loved her job. Beyond that, her spirit was clearly contagious, and inspired a young man to take people to hotels that WERE NOT the ones that he drove the shuttle for! Just in an attempt to make our lives easier ;). So I'm grateful for that.

I'm grateful for free entertainment on my flight from OC to Denver and a fantastic interview with Hugh Jackman, reminding everyone to live every moment like it was the first time you've experienced it.... Because it is. So I'm grateful for that....

I'm grateful for no one booking the seat next to me on not One, but TWO of the legs of my flights this weekend.... Very grateful for that :)

I'm incredibly grateful for the doctors and nurses tending to my family, but especially the nurses ....Spending these last few days in the hospital makes me so incredibly grateful to all of the amazing nurses out there. There are a lot of you out there who choose to put love and passion into horsemanship and this journey as well as spending countless hours helping those in need, so I have met you in multiple capacities. Having this experience, I truly can't thank you enough..... Your balance, care, sympathy, effectiveness, efficiency, support, pride, and love is unparalleled anywhere in our workforce. Thank you for all you do, you are overworked, underpaid, under appreciated and incredible. I'm so grateful, as is my family in our time of need. THANKYOU, you all know who you are.

Which brings me to my last point of gratitude before my body crashes more completely.... I'm so grateful for my family. We are what many would call broken, splintered by divorce, and reconnected by choice. And I love you all. Your senses of humor, your care, your concern for others and your love has become so apparent through this challenge. So I'm grateful for that.

And to finish, I'm grateful in advance.... For two things.... First for the day when perhaps I may need one of you, a shoulder to lean on, and knowing you'll all be there completely in your own way and that will make it magical .... And I'm grateful for a day down the road where we will all again be seeing Turquoise not because of twisting the observances of morphine into conversation, but because we will all again be on a tropical vacation laughing and enjoying each others company without the backdrop of a crisis.

So, toss out the old and be grateful for the big and small this week, gratitude is the bridge to love and as we all know, love conquers all. 

Controlling the Feet: Reverence for Lead by the Leg

Here is another old journal entry from playing with Fin on Lead by the Leg:

First off, here is a little theory about why lead by the leg can be important. As Pat says horses are naturally claustrophobic and panicaholics. Secondly, their legs are their main mechanisms of both Flight, AND if they have to Fight. As such they are generally extremely protective of them. In essence the base of all horsemanship is teaching the horse that we can control their feet, movement, speed, etc. In natural horsemanship, we try and do this with as much partnership as possible, in normal horsemanship... well, I'd rather not go into it, but we have all seen horses FORCED to submit their feet to the will of predators. Because of this, lead by the leg exercises are both extremely important, and also extremely delicate. So make sure before you begin you have true reverence for what you are asking of your horse... you are asking him to give over both his fighting and flighting mechanisms. Not only this, in natural horsemanship we are also asking that the horse do this willingly as a partner :)

This exercise is explained in much of the Parelli material, so Im not going to go into depth about the "hows" because their are plenty of ways to find that out. If you do have questions don't hesitate to ask, and I will try my best to answer your questions.

Lead by the leg is essentially a porcupine game. We ask horses to respond in what way we ask by using a rope around one of their legs. But obviously, we break this down into as many steps as we can, to make sure the horse feels like a confident learner, and there is no fear or breaking of will involved. The best way to begin is making sure you have a solid friendly game with ropes around all 4 of your horses legs, often times you will notice that even in this step your horse has slight opposition. As I mentioned before, be aware of, and have reverence for, how much we are actually asking of horses in this exercise, build slowly, and don't be afraid to go back a step if you find resistance. Remember as we develop a partnership with a horse, often times we see brace and opposition appear in one step of a system, and ACTUALLY the challenge is the step before.

After your friendly game is solid, make sure you can just softly ask your horse to pick up his foot. Remember the skeleton, mind, flexion, weight, feet. See if you can get SO good that you release before your horse actually moves... that you release when he thinks about moving ;) As Pat would say “Cause him to think about it, then allow him to do it.” This way, everything you ask of your horse happens in a release! Remember your phases of porcupine on the rope, and that driving game can be used to back up porcupine game if your horse is being left-brain and non-responsive.

The other important thing to remember is to not release on a brace... but the ideal would be to make the steps SO small that your horse's answer is always "yes," that they don't even really think about bracing.

This exercise can be progressed, as with most things in Parelli, as far as your imagination can take you. Can you play all 7 games from a lead around one front foot, around one hind foot? How softly can your horse respond to that porcupine game? Remember all our porcupine games are related... how soft is your horse on the bridle? Your legs to go forward? Your seat to stop, and back? Lateral movement? Leading? Tying? We ask SO much of our horses on an every day basis in terms of their porcupine game, so take some time to develop it as one of your horses’ strongest skills!

Holes Vs. Strengths: Part 2 Developing Vs. Helping ....

Here are some more of my musings on Horse development and my sessions with a 2 Year old Hanoverian in Australia named Finn.

He was pretty high to start with, almost bordering on RBE, but more just energetic LBE. Anyway, I played with him with a few of the conecpts we have been focusing on while encouraging more movement since he was feeling pretty extraverted. We started with some changing eyes, consistency of movement on circle game and he started to come down really nicely. From there we went on to some of the slower stuff I really want him to understand like porcupine in his legs (lead by the leg), and such.

After this I decided to go back to our friendly game in motion at walk and trot to see what he remembered from the week before; it started out pretty well at the walk, but sort of disentegrated as he began to really LEAN on the halter in an effort to escape me, and not be consistent in his gait. The horse developer in me (it is a VERY small part, haha, as I tend to be good at helping PEOPLE find success, but not great at helping horses through challenges in an efficient way... This is a constant effort for me in SELF -development, because I want to be a phenomenal horsewoman as well as instructor)... Anyway, The horse-developer in me knew that I needed to help Finn to calm down, focus, and stop trying to run through the pressure on his halter, he needed to understand that that door was closed, respect that boundary. Especially before anyone got up on his back.

SO, I played wiht an excercise I had seen Kalley do quite a bit with the horses we had assigned to us in Florida, and also one I had played with with the yearlings at Atwood. I sent Finn out on the circle and when I felt him start to lean and want to leave, I took a hold of the lead, didn't pull, just HELD, and asked him to yield his hind end. Essentially, if the horse is circling to the right, this is closing the outside and left door of the halter, asking them to face you; or taking a hold of their inside hind leg is another way to look at it. Fin knows this game, but he was blasting through the pressure, and running and reacting, instead of responding, in essence he was not acting like a partner.

For a few times around I was reaching down the rope, holding asking him to yield, and then changing direction and repeating the same process on the other side. He was reactive; running through the pressure and pulling back, and running off the other way. This was a perfect example of where a horse-development specialist would be able to take this horse THROUGH this challenge, to help him (especially a two year old) to understand that no matter what, as Kalley would say "1+1=2;" when I hold here, and put pressure here, it means yield. I knew this! And I began to try and play through it in that way... But then I lost my confidence :( Finn gave a rather large reaction (again... remember he is not responding, he is reacting. You can think of this as lack of respect because respect is "an appropriate response to pressure applied appropriately" I was applying pressure appropriately, and Finn was reacting, in essence not holding up number 1 of his 4 responsibilities, Don't act like a prey animal, act like a partner.) Anyway, I decided that maybe I was pushing him too far, and I didn't believe I had the ability to bring him back from that edge.

That is what horse development is all about, according to Ray Hunt, its taking a horse to the edge of their ability, their threshold, their emotions, and then confidently bring them back; this way they gain more and more faith in human leadership. I found I was right at that threshold and I backed off because of lack of faith in my own abilities.

I then took my classic instructor stand point, and began to play with Finn softly in Backwards S's and changes of eye until he was down and participating more, just like I would show a student how to do. So, whats wrong with this? Where are the holes?

Well- firstly, Finn wasn't safe to ride. He had pushed into that Halter pressure, and never truly softened to it. As a colt-start, that button needs to be full proof, no matter what, when I reach down this lead, it means yield your hind end, and soften your nose. Secondly- He hadn't learned to have faith in human leadership. Pat says Isolate, Seperate, and recombine. I had isolated the issue, seperated out how to help him. But I hadn't been able to succesfully recombine it all together into a picture that made sense to him. Instead I had played around the challenge. He hadn't really learned that 1+1 is ALWAYS 2, even when Im high or excited.

At this point since I had lost my confidence I turned him over to Kerryn. She was able to address the challenge and help Finn through it. Mostly to see how strong Finn's understanding of pressure grew to be in just 15 minutes, but on a selfish level also to see how CLOSE I had been to the right answer. I had taken him right to the edge, and after only a little bit more he was able to turn over to Kerryn and really understand that the answer is to think and respond, instead of reacting, no matter what. So even though I lost my confidence in my horsemanship, it was a bit of a surprise to see how close I had been :)

On the drive home Kerryn said it was ALL but painful watching me as I was SO close to the right answer and then backed off because I lost confidence in my own abilities. As always, just like with horses though, you can't push someone over that edge, they have to find that faith in themselves ALL ON THEIR OWN :) Here's to trying again next time!

Warm up Strong to Ride Soft

While I was in Australia I got the chance to play with a beautiful LBE Hanoverian named Fin. Today I went through some of my notes and found some cool gems I thought I’d share with you all! Hope you enjoy!

Whenever I play with young horses I think so much of what I have learned from Kalley, over the time I have been lucky enough to spend with her.  Kalley has given me so many tools, and so often when I’m playing or teaching I hear something she has said to me. It is simply awesome how having "arrows" as we call tools in Parelli helps you to be more confident. The more tools and knowledge you have, the higher your confidence is... which is what makes this such an incredible journey of learning. In contrast, however, we all also go through those moments in Parelli, where the more you know, the more you realize you DON’T know. Makes me think of one of my favorite quotes "The larger the island of knowledge, the longer the shore of mystery."  For me this was so incredibly true in my learning from Kalley- As a little side note, one day in a mastery Program meeting we were all going over highlights from the week, One person's highlight was learning that they didn't actually know how to play the 7 games! haha! Or even how to put a halter on! This can just show you the level of depth of understanding there is to EACH little task that we complete with our horses.

So- As I was feeling through and testing various games with Fin, I was really thankful for the time I’ve spent with Kalley... as well as all of the second hand gold I got from Kerryn and Dr. Jessie while working at Atwood Ranch for 10 months. It was amazing for me to realize the tools that I DID have in terms of being able to feel through where I felt Finn's successes and challenges were. I began by walking away from him, Belly-button off of him, and swinging my stick and string in a friendly motion, check! He understood the basics of Friendly game. Then we moved on to porcupine game which was also light and polite, not perfect, but he had a solid understanding of moving away from steady pressure, and it was GREAT for a two year old without that many sessions. The first challenge I felt was as we moved into driving game in his right eye... his first instinct as I asked him to yield his front end was to lift his head and nose into pressure, not strongly, but this was a little opposition reflex. How interesting? I continued to play with him softly changing eyes, and doing some backwards s's to increase his confidence with this. Fin was exceptionally soft and willing, and for the most part a LBE, although as a learner he had moments of RBI.

In the second session, I also played with him again on the ground, but this time I had a goal! The first time I played with him and saddled him for Kerryn, she had to spend quite a bit more time with him on the ground in order to feel confident getting on him... "warm up strong to ride soft." Basically... I had once again, tended to "not bother him" as I played with him, but because he was young this didn't set him OR Kerryn up for sucess in their ride; hence why she pushed him a bit and played with him more on the ground. Any guesses what my goal was for our second session? I decided I wanted to warm Finn up strong enough, that Kerryn felt he was confident and ready to ride.

Knowing that he had a bit of right side brace, and a tendency to be sensitive, almost bordering on reactive at times, I thought a great game to teach him would be friendly game in motion. So I began by getting nice confident circles at the walk and trot to the left before beginning to throw the stick and string softly over his back. He was slightly skeptical, but soon enough softened, and began to understand that the difference between neutral and energy up applies no matter which gait he is in, as well as that his job continues to be maintain gait, maintain direction, look where your going, and act like a partner. AHA! So now for the right side... I tried to maintain the same neutral in my body as he went out at the walk, I softly lifted the stick and string... and sure enough... EXPLOSION! Not too scared, just thinking his job was to run forward, and then being a bit LBE, that was kinda fun... So I had to then pick up my intensity to match him. And we were off... lol... running and buckin, and throwing the string over his back, until finally he flicked an ear to me and I stopped, so he stopped and looked at me. We repeated this excitement a few more times until he finally softened, and began to trot round me in beautiful flexion and relaxation as I threw the string over his back. We stopped and rested as he blew out a few times. I was then able to saddle him and get some of his nicest changes of direction yet. I handed him over to Kerryn and crossed my fingers lol :)

And she took him to the middle and mounted up... ;) Yay! I love setting goals for myself and meeting them!