August 22, 2019

Takeaways

1. Judges can surprise you.

I need to photoshop a circus ball under his three feet on the ground here 😂
I don't think I actually would have scratched, but I thought about it.  And I'm choosing to ignore the fact that the judge may have listened to the complaints registered by other riders to the TD after Saturday's ride, because that's not helping anything if she did listen, and if she didn't, I totally kicked ass.  But it's a good reminder that even a judge you think you know can surprise you when you get the score sheet.


2. Lean into your imposter syndrome


I am riding passably at rated Second.  The me of two years ago is in awe of that.  The me of today still feels no more competent than I did the day I first took a lesson with my trainer.  I have to keep in perspective that this is a sport where we ASK to be criticized, and we're never going to stop getting criticisms, being worried about moving up, all of that.  So I choose to lean into the imposter syndrome and not let it get me down, because every single level is going to feel this way.  Riding Second IS cool, take that, brain.


3. Talk to people at horse shows!


I made a new friend this weekend in the most kindergarten way possible.  I was unloading Connor and she said "Hey, I like your pony" and I said "I like your pony too!" and we ended up talking off and on the rest of the weekend and by text after she left.  We're both adults riding ponies who work in similar industries and she works for one of my customers, so we had a lot to talk about.  We're going to try to show together again in the future despite the fact that she lives four hours away.


4. Two tests in one day is still not possible right now BUT probably would be with some canter conditioning

Literally dying

Once we hit 1-3, our days of doing two tests in a day were done.  So I could probably fix this one.  As it is, we both come out of the ring just exhausted, and that exhausted feeling starts when we hit the canter work in the test.  Winter priority maybe?

5. Showing on consecutive days is worth the price of rated shows.

Not set back against him in my body here, HOORAY GO TEAM


I haven't shown rated in two years, and I didn't realize how much I missed showing on back to back days.  Being able to take the judge's feedback and the visual feedback from the photos and implement it the very next day was so much more helpful than showing once and leaving.  For example, I noticed in the photos (thank you Karen!) from Day 1 that I was set back against him in my position, and I was able to fix that in Day 2 and it made a huge difference.

11 comments:

  1. Lots of great takeaways here! I especially like leaning into your imposter syndrome.

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    1. It's so hard to actually execute on that but it's important I think

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  2. I feel your "lean into the imposter syndrome" so hard right now (even if mine isn't about riding lol). So many good takeaways!! You and Connor look 🔥

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    1. I bet you are, but you shouldn't be! Get out there and own it!

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  3. love "lean into your imposter syndrome" I just listened to a podcast where they discussed keeping a brag file which I guess the blog would be if I didn't denigrate myself so much, so I'm keeping one on paper.

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    1. Interesting! I keep a "kudos" folder in my work email but I don't go back and read them, I just keep them for promotion time. Not a bad idea to do that in other parts of my life though.

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  4. I really love these. Some helpful things here for me to think through!

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    1. Good! Hopefully showing is in your near future too :)

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  5. I love that you made friends with another pony riding adult. "I like your pony" is always an excellent starting line.

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    1. Me too! Why isn't it that easy to make friends as an adult outside of horses?!

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  6. It's funny that no matter how far one progresses, one always kind of tends to feel like you're making it up as you go. Embrace it!

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