My Life, Naturally!: Soaring With Eagles (Part 1)

This past weekend was a major boost to my confidence and I'm so excited to share my experience at the Level 3/4 Clinic with Parelli Professional, Jesse Peters. As Jesse so adequately described it, sometimes you have to soar with eagles in order to bring out the best in yourself. That's exactly what this weekend was about, challenging myself, my horsemanship, and my expectations! I've decided to write this as a series of posts because it would be a book if I didn't. So, without further adieu, I give you Part 1: Set Up For Success.

Rydel and I taking a break from the heat

Leading up to the clinic I had mixed emotions about whether or not we should even be going. I was worried we would be too far behind the other participants and that perhaps because of my lack of confidence and practice with freestyle that we should just wait and do the level 1/2 clinic. However, my lesson with Juli was a turning point for my confidence and she really helped me see that we do have what it takes to hold our own against other level 3 students. In the days after our lesson I started playing a lot with our upward transitions and was thrilled to see major improvement! Suddenly, we were able to go from the trot to canter on the circle using only phase 1. Even better, she would stay completely calm and ask a lot of questions rather than feeling the need to go right brain. We also rode a lot more and I paid a lot of attention to my keeping my focus. The day before the clinic we had the best ride yet, during which time I didn't have to pick up my reins once! :D

The day of the clinic, we arrived feeling ready to go and spent some time warming up online. The focus for me was on staying at the end of my 22 as much as possible, getting good upward transitions, and waiting for Rydel to ask a question or make a change before moving on to the next game. Because there is so much to do at the playground, it is really easy to become task oriented and move too quickly for an RBI, so I tried to incorporate a lot of moseying and undemanding time. One thing I noticed is that Rydel seemed to be having a lot of trouble moving her HQ around to give me her right eye, something we had trouble with in the past. Jesse came over to help and told me our hide your hinny game is broken and that I need to be really making it a game to get her to give me the other eye. Working on this would be key to our liberty sessions later. Jesse took over for a bit and played "if I were you...I would be embarrassed to show my tail." Pretty soon she was offering her other eye every time I asked for a hind quarter yield!

Parelli Professional, Jesse Peters with Rydel

Throughout the day Rydel and I both became more comfortable and confident. Things that were major challenges for us just a year ago at the playday we now a breeze and Rydel was offering more and more!