Put the days away

Had a dressage lesson last Friday and I was feeling sooooooooo tired, low energy, blah, you know the draggy fatigue I’ve been complaining about for oh, 3+ weeks now? It was kind of a hard sell, particularly on a Friday night (hello hang out on my couch time!) PLUS I was dog-sitting my friend’s dog, so he came over just before my lesson.

Mr. Oats learns some fancy moves! I wish I was sitting up more…

But anyways, despite the myriad excuses of why I didn’t want to, I did. And it was great!! Not perfect, ha are they ever? But just genuinely good. I learned some really interesting exercises and have since practiced them on my own with Oats.

I have been wanting to improve his counter-canter and work towards flying lead changes- clean and proper ones, not grab-and-leap ones. So on that note we worked on canter-walk transitions, which have historically been a challenge for us. Walk-canter? Sure! Canter- walk? Nope!

We developed the canter-walk by coming in on a circle, using a touch of shoulder-fore and then spiraling in to the walk. Like, circle, coming in using shoulder-fore and 1-2-3 WALK.

It was cool! On the left he was super! On the right= struggle bus. Ahhh well.

We used the basis of that exercise to then go large and focus on walk- pick up counter canter- go straight along the long side in counter canter and then walk, pick up true canter for the short side, back to walk, counter canter and rinse, repeat.

It was really neat! We were getting it!! 🙂

So pleased with how Oats is really learning his stuff through these exercises. And we’re not like, drilling him to death on it- a few run-throughs, he gets the idea, more importantly ‘I’ get the idea, and we’re good!

I even practiced it a bit yesterday and was quite happy with how our amateur fumbling went. Whee!

The only thing a shark respects is a bigger shark: Thursday jump update!

Actually, my Thursday jumping was very mellow. I was wanting to kind of keep things relaxed (my legs are STILL killing me) and wanted to focus on one thing- slowing down my brain.

I have problems with getting too excited jumping, and blasting around the course, rushing, motorcycling with my body, not being straight. It’s due to anxiety, of course.

Blast from the past- Oats at our old barn.

So, we worked over small, small fences, x-rails. I still, of course, tried to get excited and start rushing, motorcycling, etc. but in the end? I was able to slow it down and get straighter and calmer through the corners. It was good, and my legs started not cooperating by the end by sliding backwards, like they had a mind of their own…ARGH. Anyways, it was funny but I kind of missed that insane adrenaline rush that comes with *gasp* jumping fences higher than…2ft. HAHA.

Old barn with Oats.

It felt like, oh well, that was ok. Not, PHEW! We survived!!!!

Hm. Maybe I’m more into the buzz than I even realize?

Oh well! Good Oats, and good me, haha. And get with the program, legs. Jeesh.

One thing I’d like to pick out is when Oats and I had problems (and boy, did we have our fair share) how easy it is to pick out a ‘reason’ he is being a shit-head. And it’s normal, but I want to reiterate that sometimes it IS THE HORSE and his attitude- not the tack (valid sometimes), seasons (valid sometimes), chiro (valid sometimes) or ulcers (valid sometimes).

Yeah, check those out – but always keep in the back of your mind that it very well could be the HORSE and you have to work with that, not make excuses (like I listed above- reasons can be come excuses very easily. Trust me. I am an expert excuse machine).

I’m lucky that I have trainers that have helped me handle Oats, even when he is being a massive jerk. So much so that his status quo is ‘not jerk’ most of the time. Except maybe in flat classes at the Appy shows. Jesus, those are never going to be his forte.

But it bums me out when I see people fighting the same fights with their horses (online, in person, wherever) when it’s pretty clear they are finding reasons or making excuses, and something’s gotta give.

I’m happy with Oats most days, but he is an animal and not perfect. Hell, neither am I! So basically it works out well.

Dressage under fire

Went to my dressage lesson with more than a little trepidation yesterday. Let’s review why, shall we?

So easy

• I am going through a lot of pressure with my parent drama.
• Oats doesn’t respond well to dressage on a good day.
• I was exhausted.
• I had taken a lot of time off doing dressage- a few weeks, due to holiday/illness/weather. The last lesson I had last week was a jumping one!
• I am an excuse machine?
• I was wearing new boots. Ouch!

Yeah, so. There’s that. I was luckily able to side-step my parental drama for a bit- by telling them I was unavailable, which was 100% true. On Tuesdays, I have enough time to get home, take my dog out, unpack my lunch things, grab a snack, get dressed and drive to my lesson, of which I am always late for.

But, I sucked it up and did it. Nothing makes me feel more genuine, more ‘myself’ than riding and challenging myself in lessons, even if I SOOO don’t want to do it beforehand. I’m always glad I did!

So, how did it go?

Well, like many things in life, not 100% great but not 100% bad. Oats fought back a bit, was a bit sassy, but slowly we are improving. We did some polework and the horses got pretty fired up and testy with each other. Funny, you can tell we hadn’t done a group lesson in awhile because it seemed like both Oats and Chanel wanted to chase each other!

Oats’ newest evasion is hopping into the canter when the trot gets too difficult. He did that A LOT. Man does it feel awkward!! We cantered through more than a few trot poles!

I do get tense and clingy when he does it, because sometimes it feels like the ‘hop’ is the first step into ‘launch into outerspace’ for me. It did NOT get that bad, he did try some bs behaviour (this is still Oats we are talking about…) but he tried. And tried and tried. That is what is important to me, that he TRIES at least. I do want to encourage his ‘tries’ and don’t want to shut him down when he gives me some more effort. It does tend to be a bit nerve-wracking though!

So, it was both good and bad. I left feeling more like myself again. That was a good thing.

I am also going to try out a supplement to give Oats some more positive energy. I feel like he needs a little ‘more’ this winter, perhaps due to his age (13? I think?) and to get him more ‘oomph’ and less balky and rude.

Why I’m not a New Years Resolutioner

So, I guess I’m going to continue feeling cranky and crabby. My parent drama really came to head yesterday, just before I was going to check out a new gym- Steve Nash Fitness– to test out their group fitness classes (that I had a free pass for, for a few months). Needless to say, the group fitness classes didn’t happen and will probably have to wait.

My New Years Resolution

I’m still not feeling great about it, but I am trying to be supportive. As it turns out, that is harder to do than I thought.

So, I have my dressage lesson tonight and quite frankly, still feel very brain-drained. Emotional turmoil is tiring. So tiring.

But anyways, when I was trying to plan my new workout class yesterday, and when I was at my work gym today for my usual 30-40 minute daily workout, I was struck again by the ‘born again New Years Resolutioners’.

You know the type…Typically flabby, middle-aged women but sometimes men, try-hards who are ‘going to get this year off to the right start!!!”

They sport all the gimmicks- FitBit, new running shoes (in neon, though I have neon shoes too haha), iPods gripped in their hands, all they do is talk about their new naturopath and their recommended holistic treatments, and spend all of their time lolling around on the mats or foam rollers instead of doing any solid workouts.

These are people I have NEVER seen at the gym before January 1. I have my regulars, hell, I am a regular, haha. I listened to one woman talk to another in the change room (sidenote: why do people take freaking forever to get changed, arranged, and IPodded up? Get in, get changed and GTFO!!!!!).

They were saying about how going to the gym was such a better idea than trying to run after work (agreed- I only run after work in spring/summer/fall, as it’s too dark and unsafe in the winter) and how they were all prepared this year!!! They had all the songs they wanted loaded on their iPods, they had bought new running shoes, they had the newest workout clothes….

I just wanted to say- I, sporting my non music, my cut-off gym pants, and ratty tank-top, enough with the STUFF and enough with the BS and get on a machine and GET GOING!

Enough with the talk and rolling around. Get up, get in and get out. Rinse and repeat. You have to do it every day (and for me, I’m talking years of the same routine) that it becomes a mindless exercise to get to the gym and get down to business. If I had to wait for a friend? I’d never freaking go. You know why? Because THEY would never go!

I mix up my workouts though– I do get really stuck in a rut sometimes (hence the trying out of new group fitness workouts I mentioned earlier) but it’s too important to just GO AND DO IT. Don’t wait for a new year, a Monday, a new you, a friend, anything.

You can’t rely on trinkets, gadgets, new clothes, other people, the weather, anything. You have to rely on you. That is the only thing I have literally learned, doing this. I am a lunchtime warrior, haha.

And I am no saint with this either. I am a dessert-with-lunch-and-dinner type of person. I workout too much sometimes for no reason. I don’t necessarily have any good goals – though this year I am proud to say I signed up for an Island Run series!! Yeah! I am trying to fix my knee problem, though that is very slow going.

People are literally excuse machines. I can be (about my riding/jumping/showing goals, because I am an anxiety-riddled huge chicken who has something to prove, apparently), but I am NOT about my workouts, or the amount and intensity of riding I do – which is tons, and quite intense.

Me this year

I’m doing it. And sometimes, that’s enough, because I do it every.single.day.