Making time to ride: 7 ways to fit it in

Making time to ride doesn’t have to be so difficult – does it? As we each live busier and busier lives, sometimes it seems next to impossible to make our riding commitments stick. Here’s a few things you can try to help you get out in the saddle more often.

List it

Ever heard of the Eisenhower Matrix? It’s a great way of prioritising your activities ranked by level of importance and urgency for your day, week or even month.

Grab a piece of paper, and divide it into 4. Top left, decide what is Important and Urgent. Generally, this is crisis, emergencies or important deadlines, but would also include feeding animals (and family). These should be ticked off your list quickly.

 Top right is Important and Not Urgent. This section often includes relationships and family, and is likely where your horse riding will fall. Allocate a large amount of planned time for these activities.

Bottom left in Not Important and Urgent. These items need doing soon but are not important to you – so can you delegate them? If not, get them done quickly and don’t spend too much time on them.

The final quadrant is Not Important and Not Urgent. Usually television, games and social media fall into this category. In September 2016, Mediakix  estimated the average time a person spent on social media PER DAY was almost 2 hours!! But let me ask you – if it’s neither urgent nor important, could it be nothing more than a time waster, which you could be using more productively, for example, riding?

Negotiate like Samuel L Jackson in, well, the Negotiator

Nearly all of us are required to work to be able to afford our general expenses (most of which goes to our ponies, dare I say!). While not possible in all cases, there is a chance that you can negotiate with your boss for some flexibility in your work day. Here are a few suggestions that may work for you, depending on your work situation:

Can you start/finish earlier, or perhaps even later, to take advantage of some time with your family and horse?

Can you negotiate some of your break times to be at the end of the day, to leave earlier?

Can you negotiate time in lieu in place of overtime, and spread those hours throughout your week/month?

Look after your health

 It might sound cliché, but the better your health, the more energy your have and the more productive -you will be. Ensure to get a solid sleep, eat well and make time for exercise – remember, horse riding is exercise!

Save your daylight

Horse riding is an activity that favours sunlight, unless you are lucky enough to an undercover arena with lights. Have a look over your Eisenhower matrix, and highlight the activities that can be done in the dark, such as housework, meal prepping or (in my case) writing.

Organisation is key

When your time is limited, organisation is key to getting maximum value. Having your tack shed organised in a way that allows quick access to everything you need for a short ride will be guaranteed time saver.

At the same time, organising your desk can save you precious time that should be used wisely - riding, of course.

It’s time for a new mantra

When we become busy our focus can shift off our important priorities and onto random, unimportant tasks. This not only wastes our time but starts to change our views of the important tasks in our lives, in essence negating their higher priority.

This doesn’t mean that you should beat yourself up when other, urgent and/or important activity take away your ability to ride, but is definitely something to think about if your time is being absorbed by non-urgent and unimportant tasks.

Put some effort into making your horse more receptive to your training

Spending time now training your horse will save you loads of time when you really are short on time. Think about it - how much time do you waste:

• Trying to avoid being shoved around by your horse at feed time?

• Trying to put a bridle on the sudden giraffe?

• Chasing your horse around the paddock because he doesn’t want to be caught?

Spending the time to make sure your boundaries are respected & your horse enjoys spending time with you will save more time than your realise.

Actively involve your horse in your training!

When our horses feel a part of their training, they are happier to work with you! Click her to learn more

What tips do you have for making more time for riding?

 

Do you feel like you are letting down your horse?

Looking out to your paddock, a whimsical flutter of hopes and dreams overcomes your heart. Your horse is grazing peacefully in the back corner of the paddock and lifts their head, noticing you coming towards them. They let out a soft nicker and start trotting up to you.

And then comes the guilt, you remember it’s been a week, a month or ever years since your last ride. You think your horse is wasting away in the paddock and because of you it won’t have a good future. I’m not good enough for my horse, they deserve more, they would be better with a different rider, I can’t be the rider they need, maybe I should sell them and get an easier horse to work with, maybe I should give up altogether.

This is such a common process for the hobby horse rider to go through… regularly, sometimes even every day. You convince yourself, no I’ll just try a bit longer and maybe it will all come together for me. Maybe I’ll try a new instructor, or go watch some other trainers on YouTube.

There are 2 problems with this scenario: we are attaching our own needs and desires to live a fulfilling life to our horse (really they don’t care if they don’t reach their full potential, working towards their full potential is fraught with hard work, stress and anxiety, much easier to just eat grass), and you’re probably comparing yourself with professional riders, that are on different journeys, with different road blocks. We think “oh if we could just do that one thing riding would be so much easier”. You dedicate months and months and when finally you achieve it, do you celebrate and congratulate yourself and think yes riding is easy now?! Of course not, you now decide there are 7 new things that if only you could achieve them riding would be easy.

As a professional rider it took me 7 years + the 13 years as a hobby horse rider (I’ve now been at this riding business 25 years and teaching for 13), riding hundreds of different horses, teaching hundreds of different students to truly grasp an understanding of what is going on and how best to support each individual horse and I’m still learning new things every day, with every new student and every new horse.

 What a professional rider knows that you don’t

•  There are always hurdles and road blocks that stop you in your tracks and can take months of diligent effort to work through.

• All horses have to go through the same physical development process just the same as all athletes and that requires patience.

• When to just exercise your horse and when to push.

• Some days, weeks or months your horse can just be off, and that’s ok.

• Your horse will never perform as well at a competition as they do at home and so you need to be training at least a grade about the level you’re competing at and even then you still need the moon and the stars to align for your perfect competition day and on that day the judge will decide they don’t like your horse or your last name.

• There is no one solution, only effort.

• You can’t be good at everything. Find out what you are really good at with your riding and get help with the rest.

• The path to success. The reason why you feel stuck at the level you are at is because you can’t see what’s next. You can’t see what’s next because you’ve never experienced it before. If you were to apply all the lessons you have learnt to date on a new horse, guaranteed will progress to this point quicker, however you will also have new road blocks and obstacles you haven’t experienced before and will get stuck at because you are applying the concepts you’ve learnt to a different personality and conformation type.

Don’t have the time, money and inclination to become a professional rider but need some quick and easy wins? Check out our 3 weeks to becoming a better rider mini course.

A Trick to the Reins - the Independent Seat (Part 3)

If you haven't already read our blog the Independent Seat (Part 2), you probably should before you continue reading this.

As we improve our independent seat you will notice that you will need to use your reigns less heavily. In fact, the reigns will maintain light, even sided contact and conversation instead of being the heavy steering wheels and brakes they once were - your seat is now doing most of the "driving".

However you may notice times when the reigns become heavier and your contact needs to shift. A shift in the horse 

Tip #1:

Which ever rein you feel the most weight in is the hind leg the horse has left behind that you need to ride through. If your right rein feels heavier, they have disengaged the right hind and dropped through the pelvis. If you left rein feels heavier they have disengaged the left hind and dropped through the pelvis.

The trick to fix it is as follows:

Your butt cheek (on the same side as the heavy reign) should also squeeze to bring the hind leg through.

So not only do you need to learn how to use your hands and legs independently of each other but also each butt cheek! (As shown in the exercises on the fit ball in “3 weeks to improving your riding”).

Tip #2:

If both reins feel heavy they have disengaged both hind legs and are balancing on their forehand. If they are working behind the vertical they have disengaged both hind legs and are balancing on the forehand.

The trick to fix it is as follows:

Use your seat to cuddle your horse back into contact and into their hindquarters.

We are trying to create even balance of engagement to self carriage to thoroughness/ impulsion to frame. When we have too much rev or too much clutch we don’t have balance.

The Independent Seat (part 2)

Using your seat as a tool for communication

This article is best to read after you have done our course “3 weeks to improving your riding”. In this course we go into depth about the angles and lines we need in our posture that allows for maximum range of movement in both ourselves and our horses and also how to move and follow our horse. It includes 3 weeks of exercises designed by a personal trainer to help you hold this posture easier. This will also only work if your horse is working correctly in self carriage and connection. --Katie

Everything we are trying to do with our horses is to create more engagement, more self carriage, to create a stronger, more elastic top line so that our horse can move more freely, move with more power and agility, to reduce the concussion of the movement on their body and develop their core strength and soundness for a long and healthy riding career. The tighter we are through our thigh and the more we pivot at our knee and our hip in our dressage seat, even if we are trying to lean back to keep our upright, the more we are putting our horse onto the forehand. This is why all the angles and lines we discuss in “3 weeks to improving your riding” is so important. When we break these lines and angles we distribute our weight away from our centre of balance and then try to counter balance ourselves. Our horse then tries to counter balance our imbalance and both ours and our horses posture “shrinks and curls” to try and protect our balance. If we start with our center of gravity and work out, engaging the same balance points as we do on the ground we have the best opportunity of maintaining our posture and guiding our horse to maintain their balance, posture and center of gravity.

Once we understand how to do this and our connection is established we can then start to use our seat to communicate. This is our ultimate goal. The more we can communicate from our seat, the less we interrupt our horses flow and balance with our hands. If we do this exercise describe below without having established connection our horse will “jack up” and potentially also rear. Our horse needs to know how to sit into its haunches and lift through its tummy so that it is shortening its body in a way that lengthens the crest. Which is why we have our foundation exercises of self carriage that ensure our horse can first do all these things and that we also have an adequate feel of how to distribute the horses weight and balance effectively. Once these skills are established this is very easy. If these skills aren’t established your horse will let you know if you try this exercise. Make sure you listen to your horse and get help by someone who understands these principles if you are unsure.

Establishing a half halt with our seat.

Katie demonstrating the correct position in the saddle to improve your independent seat

First have all the prerequisites of self carriage established. Tempo changes, bend and changes of bend, transitions within the pace and pace to pace, shortening and lengthening the frame, rein back over a pole, trot poles and canter poles, introducing leg yield and shoulder fore.

Have the angles and lines of an independent seat as described in “3 weeks to improving your riding”.

At the halt:

• Cuddle your calves

• Squeeze your butt checks together like you are trying to hold a poo in

• Lift through and rotate through your pelvis like your practised on the fit ball in “3 weeks to improving your riding”

• Draw your shoulder blades together and open your chest

• Increase the angle through your elbows, taking your hands towards your hips gently, keeping a straight line elbow hands reins to bit.

The end goal is that the horse squeezes together and their head comes onto the vertical. Release the pressure for this.

To get this right you want to balance the amount of energy you are creating with your legs to the amount of wait you’re are creating with your hands.

Think about driving a manual car if you have the clutch out of gear it doesn’t matter how much you put your foot down on the accelerator the car won’t go. In a horse that understand self carriage and connection the contact is like your clutch you are balance the revs (forwardness from your legs) with the amount of clutch that is engaged (contact). If you don’t engage the clutch (contact) as you rev (legs) the car won’t accelerate with power (your horse will be strong out on the forehand). If you have to much revs (legs) to clutch (contact) your car will accelerate uncontrollable and do a burn out (your horse will take the bolt and spit you out the side). We are trying to find the balance between just enough rein add to say wait without stopping and just enough leg aid to say stay moving powerfully forward without rushing and this creates impulsion. When we go into this level of detail you can see why our foundations need to be so clearly established for both ourselves and our horses.

What we are trying to do here is establish this aid above which is our half halt by tightening and lifting through our seat to squeeze our horse together and lift the forehand.

We are not going to be riding like this all the time it is an add. We cuddle, squeeze, lift and draw our horse up and to us and then relax and allow our horse to move. We are creating a controlled tension which shortens, bounces and re-energises the stride and riding forward out of it.

As we ride forward our horse will going onto the forehead and we also have an opportunity here to create acceptance of the bit. As we relax and allow our hands forehand we are asking the horse to follow our hands forward out of the frame, to poke its nose out. Just before it gets to strung out, we cuddle, squeeze, lift and draw our horse in and up to us and then relax and slowly inch our hands forward encouraging our horse to poke its nose out seeking the contact. Rinse and repeat. This is your new half halt. The more often you ride this aid combination the stronger your horse will get through the chest and the shoulders and the more impulsion you will create.

This ability to shorten and lift into you is also your prerequisite to collection and why the transition from novice to elementary is so hard for some. If you have learnt how to get your horse into a frame by grounding them and putting them more onto the forehand you have to go back to scratch and relearn how to work your horse uphill into the frame if you are to achieve collection. The impulsion is a natural progression of self carriage that becomes collection.

Activating this seat aid is part of the puzzle. Your horse can only come uphill if you do first.

Afraid to Ride (Diary of an Adult Rider) - Part 2

So while I am a competent rider, I will admit to not always being a confident rider.

This became extremely apparent when I started working with Custard after I lost my mare.

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Custard is a gentleman and has never done anything to actually harm me, but there has been several moments riding him that have resulted in a shakeup of my confidence level, and they all come down to a mismatch in our training – I have been trained to expect a conversation with my horse when riding him, and Custard had no idea how to do this.

The first time he had a freak out while I was riding him, I ended up freaking too, as there was nothing I felt I could do to bring him back to me and I felt I had lost all contact - including the brakes. My brain was firing with images of how we would both end up dead, impaled on a fence picket.

Despite a lot of work and Custard’s increasing ability to talk with his rider, it’s still a niggling memory that flares up any time that he has to work a little bit out of contact – like at the moment, when he is trying to coordinate lifting his forehand in trot with a rider (or trying to get out of engaging his core by attempting to trot with a rider).

It was actually during one of those moments, in the midst of my heart-in-the-mouth moment, that I actually REALLY noticed my reaction – the anxiety increase, the need to curl into the foetal position, the clamping down on the reigns – I’m sure my face would have grimaced too. Nothing that a competent rider should really be doing to your horse, don’t you agree?

That moment got me thinking. If my confidence can impact on my competence, inversely shouldn’t my competence affect my confidence?

In that actual moment, after a minute or 2 of deep breathing and an internal monologue that consisted of phrases like “You can ride in trot”, “He can only hold it for a few steps so he is unlikely to take off” and my internal bitch piping up with “It’s time to put your big girl knickers on!”, that I decided to stop letting fear control my riding competence.

Custard and I had our first trot together the other day. It wasn’t pretty – we were both awkward – but it was real progress for us both.

Let’s hear it for big girl knickers!!!

UPDATE January 2020

It excites me to tell you that I no longer experience nerves when riding Custard in the arena. He has softened to our lessons, learnt that it is ok for him to say when he has had enough, and he has also learned that I won’t push him too far out of comfort zone (and never into pain zone).

The thought of taking him on a trail ride fills me with a couple of butterflies, but the great thing about that is I know only a small portions of that is nerves, and the rest is excitement!

2020 will be his year to have a comfortable, confident trail ride outside of the paddock - keep an eye on our facebook group for updates on our progression!

How to progress past the 'stuck' stage of your riding developement

How to navigate the road blocks that come up in the learning curve

Are you frustrated as hell repeating the same lessons? It never feels like you're progressing, the wheels are spinning and you're not gaining any traction?

I hear ya! Boy have I been there! I've learnt a couple of skills along the way to make the journey an empowering process allowing for personal growth and development instead of becoming demoralised and quit or forging a path that is an uphill battle the whole way. And I wanted to share them with you!

A few years ago I considered myself a good rider. I did well in my lessons, progressing quickly with the horses I rode and did well at competitions and was well on my way to reaching my goals with good results at states and official competitions. But there were a few stumbling blocks I kept coming across. Some discrepancies in my beliefs and my actions.

You see I wanted to be a high level, well-respected competitive rider and yet I had to compromise on my values for how a horse was worked to get there.

At the time I didn't understand but I just knew in my gut that I wasn't happy with the path I was taking. I still had the same goals but I wanted to get there in a way that didn't compromise the integrity of the horses musculoskeletal system, or emotional and mental health.

This might sound weird to some but I actually see horses as an EQUAL and not a means to win a ribbon or get a certain percentage at a competition. In saying that I do believe it is important to give a horse sound life skills so that they have the best opportunity they can. In such a cut throat industry, the majority of people are quick to assume that a horse acting like a horse, which can threaten the safety of the novice means it is "a bad horse", "untrainable", or "dangerous". 

Any hoo, I digress! I was trying to say this was one of those times where I just got stuck. I knew where I wanted to be, I knew the way I wanted to get there, I just didn't know the how. So let me share a few things I have learnt over the years about getting unstuck on my goals.

You don't know what you don't know

Ok this might sound obvious but you don't know what you don't know until you know it. If you haven't achieved your goal yet and you have a coach or a mentor showing you the way and you're saying, “YES, YES, YES!!!! I GET IT!!! WHY HAVEN'T I GOT MY GOAL YET?” Then guess what, you don't get it because it is in the experiencing of getting to your goal that is how you "get it" and it is in the knowing that you can "do it" that creates the belief and the knowledge that you can "do it" again. This is that epiphany moment where you strive and you struggle and you get frustrated and then all of a sudden it comes together and you go oh wow that was so easy, why did I find it so hard?! It is hard because you don't know what you don't know until you know it and then the world makes sense again!

Have you heard of the story of the 4 minute mile? In 1954 Roger Bannister became the first person to run a mile in under 4 minutes. A goal that people had been trying to crack for years. Within 2 months John Landy ran the mile in under 4 minutes. Since then its been cracked time and again and has been set as the standard to reach as an athlete. So why am I telling you this? It took 1 person to believe that he could achieve the impossible to crack open a whole new realm of possibility that is now the standard practice. Roger Bannister didn't know that he could run a mile in under 4 minutes, no body else believed it could be done and surely didn't know how he was going to do it. He just worked at his goal relentlessly never giving up and then he knew how. So this brings me to:

What is stopping you?

What had stopped every other person before Roger Bannister from achieving the 4 min mile? It certainly wasn't there ability. Because we know that only 2 months later it was broken again by another man and then time and time again after that.

So what is our biggest road block in achieving impossible goals? It is our beliefs and our fears. We are conditioned from birth by the people around us and it is their beliefs that create our belief systems. These BELIEF SYSTEMS protect us and give us meaning in our world and help guide us in our choices through their PREVIOUS EXPERIENCES.

However, they also come with their own limitations. These belief systems are protected by our FEARS because if we can prove what we believe is wrong it shatters our REALITY. So while we need to develop our SKILLS to make it possible, we also need to train our BRAIN to believe it is possible (this is why doing something just to prove someone wrong can be so effective. That kind of determination is powerful when achieving big goals). Because when we are aiming for a big scary goal and we don't believe we can do it we won't PUSH ourselves past our limits. When previous experience dictates that it is impossible we create our on limitations and we first need to crack open this belief that it is impossible to make it happen. 

"Life begins at the end of your comfort zone" Neale Donald Walsch

Review the foundations

So I know it is the LAST thing we want to do when we are trying to PROGRESS, but going back and reviewing the foundations is VITAL! Because it is in these foundations that lies the key to our success. Think about when you were at school when you first learnt the alphabet you had no idea why, you were just learning it because that's what you were told to do. Once you knew the alphabet you were able to progress with your skills and spell words with the letters that you learnt. This gave your understanding of the alphabet more depth, you now understood why you needed to learn the alphabet and now you are ready to start writing sentences. This gives you a better understanding of the alphabet and spelling words and how to use them. Fast forward to high school and you start learning about how to construct stories and the struggle of learning the alphabet is a distant memory (depending on how badly it traumatised you lol).

This is why we are talking about foundations, you are introduced to the basics at the very beginning but there is no way you can fully understand the depth and scope of these foundations when you first learn them and so you progress. You say "yes, yes, I get it, I want to move on, do more exciting things!". But the limitations to the depth of your understanding blocks how far you progress. Sooner or later you have to come back to those foundations you originally learnt and relearn them with the new knowledge you have about the process. 

For example, when you first start learning to ride you need your horse to stop and to go. Once you have achieved this you are ready to learn how to keep the horse forward. A lot of lessons are involved in this, you need to develop your seat, you need to understand how to ask a horse to keep forward from your aids, and you will probably have some hiccups along the way.

Guaranteed you will quickly come to understand why you needed to learn how to make your horse stop and go first! Once you are able to keep your horse forward you are ready to learn how to keep your horse balanced and the stop and go develops into tempo changes and half halts. This brings its own new set of challenges (how good are your brakes and your go? How balanced is your seat? What the hell is a half halt anyway? etc) And so again you need to review your foundations and how well established they are and how clearly you understand them. 

So if you are stuck don't say "I already know that". Review what you "already know" with fresh, more educated eyes, break it done and find the gaps in your understanding because this will be what you don't know that you don't know.  

"The more I learn, the more I realise how much I don't know" Albert Einstein

Self affirmation exercises and mantras

What does your self talk sound like? Are you constantly saying to yourself "I can't do this", "this is too hard", "why would someone like me be able to do this?", "I don't deserve this result", or are you saying "you got this!", "you can do this", "you've done it before, you can do it again", "you deserve to get your goals".

If you talk to yourself in a supportive and encouraging way you have a better chance of:

• Sticking it out when it gets tough.

• Reduced stress and improved resilience to stress and its negative effects.

• An increased chance of making the behavioural changes required to achieve your goals whether it be lifestyle, health, fitness, business or anything in between.

  The trick to positive affirmations ACTUALLY working is that you have to believe in it now and VISUALISE the future impact of these changes. Examples include:

·        I deserve to lead a good life and then visualise what a good life looks like to you.

·        Today I choose only healthy choices and then visualise what making healthy choices look like and telling a friend in the future how you made these changes.

·        I am a good horse rider and I am improving each day and then visualise what you want your riding and your horse to look like. 

These are just a couple of examples of how to use positive affirmations. To truly understand why you're stuck and discover the best affirmations for you to get unstuck, another practice is journalling.

"Whether you believe you can or you can't you are right." Henry Ford

Journaling

Journalling is the best way to transform current beliefs and self talk that are holding you back so that you become more supportive of your efforts and your goals. At the root of what is blocking us is a thought, or a belief that is no longer supporting or helping us. Journalling is like a free trip to the psychiatrist. A word of caution, if you have experienced a traumatic event you may want to work with a professional in this process. Throughout our lives from our earliest days as children we have rationalised our experiences with beliefs that makes sense to us at that age. We also take on the beliefs of our family, teachers and other role models and influencers. When these beliefs go on unchallenged they can seriously limit us for future success. 

For example, a child might be told you are a bad child and you do not deserve a treat. This belief  could become ingrained in the psyche so that as an adult you could trigger this thought inadvertently and punish yourself for being "bad" or develop a vice to deal with this emotional trigger. In the same way if you have had support through your struggles as a child, as an adult those words of wisdom will come back to you to help you through your challenges. So basically journalling is taking your current struggle and asking why, why, why, why, why until you get down to the root cause of the thought that is limiting your progress. 

Another example might be trying to overcome your struggle with wanting to improve your health but not sticking to your meal plan. Ask yourself why and really dig deep, what is the root thought form preventing you sticking to your goal. It may surprise you, it often surprises me! And from there you can create a new belief with positive affirmations and this is how you can truly believe in these affirmations and transform your life from the foundations which will have significant flow on affects in all areas of your life. 

Follow through and commitment

"Most people give up just before they are about to achieve success" Ross Perot

Think of your goal as an island that you want to get to. Where you are now is the mainland. The work you have to do is like building a bridge to the island. You have to STICK TO THE DAMN PLAN. You have to COMPLETE the bridge to get to the island. Once the bridge is forged each time you try to get to the island gets easier.

Where you are stuck is just an obstacle in completing the bridge that you have to navigate to get to the island. If each time you get stuck you start building a new bridge than all you will have is a bunch of half formed bridges and no success. But if you stop, REVIEW YOUR PLAN (look at the foundations), FIGURE OUT WHAT YOU DIDN'T KNOW THAT YOU NOW KNOW (fill the gaps in your understanding the lessons learnt that got you to where you are), ASSESS YOUR BELIEFS AND SELF TALK (make sure you are supporting yourself on your journey and enjoying the process) and try the heck again!! Because what got you here won't get you there, be flexible in your approach but commit to your goals and stick to them until you get there. 

"Failure is the opportunity to try again more intelligently" Henry Ford

The best way to stay accountable and stick to your goals is to join a community of supportive people with similar goals who will hold you up and cheer you on. We have a free facebook group designed to help people take small, easy to achieve actions to get them to their big goals and we would love to see you in there. Click the link below to join.