But, she’s not wrong.
It’s amazing how much environment changes your thinking. One of the reasons I switched back to my old trainer (so, my current trainer) is because I knew she doesn’t mess around. She’s a tough coach, she doesn’t mess around and she pushes students to actually ride the horse.
Such a novel concept, I know. Who would have thought that would work?
I was riding Stu, and he was feeling a bit frisky. He’s still in recovery mode from his recent hospital visit, so we had been taking it slow, but now we are amping it back up again. He’s certainly telling us how ready he is to work, as his energy levels are through the roof now (for him I mean, he didn’t suddenly turn into a race horse.)
My rides are focused on getting him to actually move out. He’s been a turtle his entire life, partly because his mother was the most laid back creature in existence, and partly because I’m a bit intimidated by how fast he moves when he’s moving like he should. (I’m such a stereotype of the middle aged woman with too much horse, sigh.)
So this is me admitting it, yes, I am a weanie. For the last few years, I haven’t asked him to move out because it feels much safer to do the western pleasure shuffle. I was wrong, I know.
But my trainer isn’t having any of that. Despite not actually being in a lesson, she happened to be in the ring while I was riding. She told me she wants to see a real trot. (I’ve been working on the walk, so I am proud to say that that has become much bigger, with a nice swing.)
So I asked him to trot. And he said, “What an absurd request.” For you see, I speak horse, and that’s what it means when he violently throws his head down and bounces.
Before I would have been scared, and probably pulled him up, circled, lost my nerve, maybe cried in the tack room a bit later. But since boss trainer is now here, she told me to send him forward.
So I did. I got after him immediately and sent him forward. Well, what do you know, he gave me a bit of a tail flick, but he got over himself. Rinse and repeat a few times. He sprinted down the long side, breaking into a canter, I circled him, he broke, and I pushed him on again. He did a little head flip, I pushed him on.
Basically the answer to everything was push him on.
He was not happy to that he had to actually work. It’s a big change for him where he’s only had to give minimal effort. Of course, I knew that wasn’t working, which is why he’s now at a new training barn, but I can’t help but feel like it’s been wasted time before. Why didn’t my old trainer push me?
I know some people advocate for a kinder approach to riding, they don’t want to be screamed at, or feel belittled, but I think there’s a spot in-between drill sergeant and allowing people to give up. Before, if I said something like, “he’s being crazy at the trot,” the answer was more “walk him around a bit to get him comfortable.” Now it’s, “Make him trot.” Lean into discomfort. Push outside the boundaries.
The only way to learn and advance is to push outside what is comfortable. I’m glad I’m doing it now, but it stinks that the last few years fell like a waste. I’m not going to dwell on it though, because frankly my motivation to ride was basically non-existent since I was dealing with so many young kids.
So I didn’t care enough to try to actually try, I just went with what was easiest. But I care now though, and I’m going to be pushing. I’m thrilled with the amazing progress we’ve made in just a few weeks. To make it even better, technically I haven’t even had a lesson since he’s still recovering, it’s just my trainer giving me about 3 minutes of instruction while she’s giving someone else a lesson.
It’s so weird to me how little I was pushed before. Every time I ride now, there’s a noticeable difference in how Stu goes. He starts out the ride being a jerk, and by the end he’s an obedient horse. None of my lessons for the last few years went like that. It was more like, he was a jerk in the beginning, and he was a jerk in the end, but we found some tiny win to end on. I really feel like this was because there was no pushing. It was just accepting that he was a jerk, and I was a weanie, and hopefully next time will be marginally better.
I’m not trying to cast blame on anyone because I know I wasn’t fully committed. In the end it was my fault. But overall, I’ve noticed a big trend in a different style of horsemanship. It’s more permissive, with emphasis on just allowing the horse to do what it wants. It wants to be gentle and kind, which is admirable, but horses don’t communicate like that. I was taught the more traditional, pony club way, with firmness and boundaries, but I’ve literally seen trainers being ripped apart for promoting it. I’m shocked there’s been such a change. Instead of pushing the horse forward, people people are getting animal communicators to find out why he’s “unhappy.”
I want to explore this way deeper, but I need to gather my thoughts and do some research on this. As a whole, I agree with kindness to the horse, but I feel like most people have been kind to horses for decades now. There’s always going to be overly harsh weirdos, but that’s not the norm. But most people, since the time when Xenophon wrote his book on horsemanship, have considered the partnership of the horse above all else. But since the invention of the automobile, and horses became leisure animals, there’s definitely more emphasis on the welfare of the horse.
Hopefully my weanie days are behind me. But I’m really interested in the general vibe of horsemanship since the rise in social media. So stay tuned.