Experience Counts
The more you know about all aspects of horsemanship, the more well rounded your “education”. I am fortunate to have experienced horsemanship from many different disciplines and many different teachers. The more you experience, the more fascinating one aspect becomes.
Horse’s have only a few basic “root problems”, but each individual can have a different presentation of the problem. When you have seen so much that you begin to group various behaviors around the basic root problems, you begin to realize that:
A good rider can ride through the behavior, but it takes a good horseman to “see”, and solve, the root problem.
Basics are Essential
I find the technical aspects of dressage addictive. The many movements and transitions, however, can be problematic if the basic requirements of movement off of the leg, balance, connection, half halts, and some sense of rhythm and self- carriage are not being adequately addressed.
Left unconfirmed, deficiencies in these basics insure that a rider/horse pairing will be unable to move up the levels.
Behavior Speaks Volumes
Most problems are solvable when the rider decides not to ride through it, but to find out first, what the objection is about. This is where experience is the “difference that makes the difference”.
The wrong behavior from an aid isn’t about the aid, it’s about what the aid means to the horse.
Experience the difference…Let’s ride.