Its been almost 2 weeks since my horse taught me one of the best lessons of the year. I take riding lessons to learn to be a better rider. I strive for excellence in everything I do – my family, business, and riding. My horse’s name is Silas and in a lot of ways we are very similar. He’s generally well behaved and easy to get along with but he has a slice of attitude and stubbornness. At our home barn nearly anyone can ride him – the pick for beginners on trail rides. Then we go to my trainers barn and, well, it’s often a different story. His work load is definitely kicked up a few notches every time we have a lesson. That’s generally what I attribute the attitude to. I wasn’t too surprised when we were trotting towards our jump sequence called a gymnastic and he kicked up his back heels. Two times later up they went again. Soon every single time we came to the gymnastics he was kicking his heels so high we literally stopped forward movement. This is one of his trademark moves and while it’s never gotten me off, it gets unnerving once his heels are (I’m pretty sure) higher than my head! I slily attempted to persuade my trainer to ride him. No luck. This was my issue to deal with. I knew what must happen. The next time Silas kicked out, it was absolutely necessary to his training, to the enjoyment of the lesson, to the safety of his rider and everyone near his heels, and to anyone (mostly me) who would ride him in the future, that Silas get a smack with the crop. But when a horse with a big attitude gets a good pop, there’s generally a retaliation. I had to be ready for Silas to catch some serious air! The first step to making sure you don’t fall off is to push your heels down. I jammed mine down so far my legs grew 2 inches! I had to get my position rock solid. My mission was clear. Silas had kicked his heels up in the same place every time. It was for sure coming. As soon as it happened I was going to put both reins in my right hand and with my left hand smack Silas behind my leg and then I would ride like a rodeo star for a few seconds before Silas was back on the ground and we could continue to our jump sequence like nothing ever happened. My heart was pounding and my stomach was flipping but everything in me was determined to stop this ridiculous behavior and not kiss the ground in the process.
We made our circle and trotted along the rail. We got to the spot where the crime had already been committed multiple times with no previous repercussions. Not this time. Silas was going to get it. His ears went back and his neck stiffened as his back end popped up
– 2 inches.
2 inches? That definitely was not worth a smack in the ribs. We went on to our exercise. Then we came around from a different direction. Silas must have been distracted last time.
Surely he’ll do it now.
Nothing.
Silas was absolutely perfect.
Seriously.
Perfect!!!
Not only did he not give me attitude, he trotted with the optimal pace to the jumps and we did them probably the best we had ever done them in the 25 times I’ve trailered to this barn to ride with this trainer over this same exercise. It was one of our best.
Maybe you’ve figured it out by now, or maybe not, so I’ll explain. Before I made up my mind that Silas was going to be disciplined and I needed to be riding my absolute best for when he retaliated, I was riding well. I had my heels down and worked on pace and was certainly going through the right motions. There was nothing incredibly wrong with my riding – to some people it might even be considered good. I was pretty sure Silas was just plain being a lazy turd or possibly he was uncomfortable from his tack. As things went downhill and Silas’s heels went up above my head I made a decision. The decision was to stop being just good – to stop just going through the motions of being a good rider – to be excellent. It seemed like my life (or at least temporary comfort) depended on it. When I stepped into my excellence, not only did I ride better, but there was a bonus: Silas stepped into his excellence. He was waiting for me to be excellent. He had it in him. I had it in me.
In the middle of the arena in the middle of my lesson I realized this wasn’t just about my riding skills and my horse. It was about my family and my business too. This was about life! I had been going through the “good enough” motions until I decided to be excellent and my excellence pulled someone else up to excellence – Silas. Have you been doing a “good enough” job? Have you been going through the right motions? Or have you decided to be excellent? Its nearly inevitable. Your decision to be excellent will bring others around you to excellence.
I’ve made my decision!
Be excellent y’all.
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