I was fighting back tears, rather unsuccessfully…..
my first thought …….
Is this menopause?
Seriously.
I’m not a cryer.
I’m actually a pretty tough cookie. I even have a few not-so-nice nick names at my day job because I don’t get “emotional” about terrible situations. Many years in emergency medicine will do that to you.
But here I was……… crying…….. about riding.
“Good grief” I thought, “there are people drowning in the Mediterranean, being bombed in Syria, and starving in Sudan. I am NOT allowed to cry about this.”
The tears were coming none the less and it reminded me of the last time that had happened.
It was <cough> about 15 years ago. I had been doing a series of clinics with a top instructor. This was a pretty intense program where you did a week long clinic, and then came back a month later and took part two.
I was SOOOOO excited.
I was learning so much, and was accomplishing things with my horse I never dreamed was possible. The teacher gave me a list of items to accomplish and I went home determined to get them all done by clinic number two. I had 30 days and I was going to make them count.
I practiced every day. My horse learned everything perfectly and I was ready to be the teacher’s pet star pupil at the next clinic.
I’ll never forget just how it went down.
We basically had to take a test of sorts where you perform all the things you taught your horse. It was kind of like a dressage test where you show all the moves your horse has learned.
I WAS READY.
The day we arrived I was running through the list (very successfully) with my pony and the instructor walked by. She commented that it was looking good and was that what I was going to show her tomorrow?
I’m not gonna lie, I was kind of hoping to show her right then because everything was falling into place, but I said, “Yes, tomorrow it is!”
Tomorrow rolled around and <of course> I volunteered to go first.
She walked over to see what I’d accomplished in the month I’d been gone and that’s when
everything unraveled.
My trusty pony who had done everything perfectly the night before, kind of….. lost his mind and started galloping around like a lunatic. I couldn’t stop him, I couldn’t control him, I couldn’t do anything I was going to show her.
She had me restart a couple of times, and then said, “You can try again another time.”
That’s when my chin started quivering and I was unable to speak.
And then…….to add insult to injury……………
she said, “See what this is doing to your emotional fitness?”
And thankfully she walked away.
I – lost – it.
I started sobbing.
I had worked on a short list of movements for a month. I was aiming to impress. I had huge expectations……. and instead….. my horse lost his cool and then I completely and totally lost mine.
I hid in my trailer and cried……..for an hour.
It was definitely the lowest moment of my career training horses.
But I learned that day that I wasn’t in control of myself. My horse acted like that because I was nervous and excited……… and he read everything I was doing in the situation and probably thought he was doing what I wanted. I’m sure if I had used the same intensity of cues that day as I had the night before, his performance would have been perfect.
I couldn’t control my emotions or my body and that affected my horse. With this very humbling, and very public revelation………….I did eventually get control of myself, and a few months later……….we redeemed ourselves.
It was the last time a riding issue brought me to tears……………until last week that is……..
<to be continued>
That was me at my last lesson with the horse I was trying to sell. After three years of being frustrated I'd finally decided he wasn't right for me, but kept going to lessons to keep him tuned up for potential buyers. There was something just not *right* with how he felt, my instructor thought it was all in my head, and I couldn't take it any more. I walked out and didn't ride him again except to show to buyers.
"Emotional Fitness," I've never heard that before but it totally makes sense. Every once in a while I get a strong urge to drop what I'm doing and shriek profanities while hurling loud breakable objects at a hard surface. It seems to happen most when I'm honestly trying really hard to do a good job and everything that could go wrong, does. My "emotional fitness" must be directly attached to my give-a-damn.
PS you are a very cool lady.