Right Brain Extrovert!

Tuesday
Everything is about the relationship! If you don’t do anything to compromise the relationship, then you will stay on track and be fine. This is where I went wrong today. It is funny, because I have a lot of knowledge coming into this course, and I have learned a lot so far in this course. But I am still destined to make mistakes that I know that I shouldn’t make! How interesting is that? And the funny thing is, I am totally okay with that! I have given myself license to learn and make mistakes while I am here. They always say that you sometimes learn the most/best by doing things wrong, right??!?!

With that said, I’ll give you the filter of my day…

We started out with discussions on Horsenality this morning. No matter how many times I hear this information, I always glean some new tidbit of information from it. One perspective that I gained was that LBIs need you to go slow to get them interested, whereas RBIs need you to slow down so that you can get their confidence. I had never thought about it quite like that before. LBIs need to be seduced to play with you, where RBIs just need to feel comfortable first.

The other part that I enjoyed revisiting was the 5 areas of confidence. Horses can have confidence in you as their leader, in themselves, in their herd, in their environment, and as a learner. They may be supremely confident in some areas, and not so much in others. The goal is to help them even out and gain confidence in all areas over time. I would say that Josie is most unconfident in changes in environment. This makes a trip like this challenging because it very well may take her two weeks to really become confident to the point that she is at home. I can see how staying for longer periods would really change that experience. HOWEVER, I am having many different horses show up, which is an AMAZING learning opportunity for me! I have to learn to deal with the horse that shows up, so I will gain many more savvy arrows over the next two weeks.

We had a really great session early this afternoon—I kept her pretty left brain and interested in learning. Then we went to our afternoon focus session and things went to pot! We were circling at the top of the hill. I must have passed her through some thresholds without noticing. All of a sudden she got RBE. We were in a new part of the playground which probably contributed. The goal of my focus group was to work on increasing laps on your circle game. Well, we started circling, and she was trotting along looking perturbed. All of a sudden—BOOM—she threw herself to the ground FROM THE TROT and started rolling. How interesting is that! She was clearly coming off of adrenaline. When we started circling again, she wasn’t paying attention to me at all. The instructor said to start rewarding her (stop the game for her) at the slightest try for when she would check in with me. I worked with that for a while with some good results.
By this point, I had a very HOT and tired horse. I decided to take her back to the pens for a bath. This is where everything went to pot. I had been asked by someone to lend out my clippers. They were up in the horse trailer, which is where we were at in the field. So I decided to get them while I was up there and walk back to the pens. So I took Josie over by the trailers. While I was digging around in the trailer, she was at the end of her 22 foot line going—what the hell are you having me look at all of these f***ing trailers for??!?!? Too much PRESSURE!!!!! And don’t even THINK about having me go near one of those damn things ever again! So this is where I went wrong. Please don’t judge me for it! I knew that I should probably stop and deal with the issue. But I didn’t. I was hot, tired, and just wanted to get back to the pens. So I started walking down to the pens with my clipper box and aerosol can under one arm, and 22 foot line and stick in the other. My horse was willing until we got to the part of the path that we hadn’t been on. Major spooking occurred, and she spiraled down to a RBE mess pretty quickly. I certainly didn’t help her avoid it, and I’m sorry for that. We eventually made it back to the pens and I got her brain back (with some supreme effort…). She enjoyed her bath, and then we went for a stroll back up to the trailers with Julia and Buzz. Things went better the second time. We ended the day on a good note.

That’s about all for now. This is an exhausting and exhilarating experience. We come home bone tired every day, but it is good to be in such a provocative zone. Every day will bring more challenges and experiences that will keep filling up my savvy cup.

Savvy on,

Molly and Josie