October 24, 2019

The Most Important Things I Learned From Riding with MW Weren't Position Changes

There's a lot you get out of riding with MW.  There's the obvious - thighs of steel and being in better harmony with your horse's movement - and the less obvious - the communication framework, and learning how to learn.

Part of what makes Mary's methods so successful is that she not only uses images and language that make sense to the rider, she also makes that communication structure standardized and repeatable, because unlike most clinicians, she also has a series of clinics in which she teaches trainers how to teach.


A lot of her images are designed to build on each other.  So for example, in my first clinic with her last May, I heard "weight in your thighs, make a wall with your stomach and push your guts against the wall, lean into my push" and several other things on repeat over three days.

Last weekend, I heard simple phrases that combined the first clinic's images together, like "remember your laces", which stood for "imagine there's a string zig zagging from side to side starting at your abs and going down past your bikini line to 2/3rds of the way down your thighs, like a corset, and you can pull on the string to tighten it".  The "laces" trigger reminds me to do several things she taught me in May with a single phrase, because I've internalized the first set of images.

This is how you learn - you internalize the A-F concepts, and then you get a G and an H to work on, and you keep internalizing and learning down the alphabet.  She had a good metaphor about how people learn riding that made me feel better about myself and I suspect I'm not the only one, so I'll share it here.

Mary telling Connor the Cincinnati geography isn't his scene, and asking him if he misses the mountains of Wales 😂

A naturally talented rider (let's call her Charlotte for no reason at all 😁) might be born innately knowing the A-G skills - the second she sits on a horse she accidentally does the basics correctly, so she never had to struggle through learning them.  So by age 15 or 16 Charlotte's already working on K and L, and then quickly she gets to Y.

But when a less naturally talented rider (let's call her Jen) asks Charlotte how to do X, Charlotte can't break it down as deeply as Jen needs her to in order to understand it, because half of Charlotte's recipe for X is "be born knowing A-G", which is a recipe ingredient Jen will never possess.

So Jen thinks X is this mysterious movement that she'll never master because she's a bad rider/not smart/a slow learner/etc, when at least part of the problem is that Charlotte isn't explaining X in a way that someone at Jen's point in the alphabet would understand.  (And side note, that explains why I can't get a straight first toolkit answer when I ask upper level riders things like "how to ask for collected canter").


I wasn't even gifted the letter "A" at birth, and have had to scrap and struggle for every letter I've learned.  This is why, as grateful as I am for being included in Karen's clinic and as cool as it was to ride with an Olympian, I have to admit KPG wasn't nearly as effective with my lesson as she was with Karen's.   KPG is one of those naturally gifted riders who, I suspect, has not had to teach many lower level riders yet.

So it's not that I'm a bad rider or slow learner, but it IS that I'm not a naturally talented rider and that's important for me to understand.  That needs to inform who I choose to ride with; there are instructors out there that will start too far down the alphabet for me to get anything out of riding with them.


This is part of the reason CGP - who has been riding with Mary for 10 years - has been so effective with me, and it's also part of the reason I've had a great lesson with my own trainer since the Mary clinic, which she attended with me.

My trainer can now say things like "Remember when Mary talked about the water wheel..." and jump a whole bunch of alphabet letters with me, and likewise, I'm also much more capable of articulating back to her what I'm feeling - something that Kate can attest I have not always been good at.  But my lessons now are a constant flow back and forth of feedback and communications, and they're better for it.


I'll leave you with one final anecdote that illustrates why this communication stuff is so important.  There was a trainer riding in the clinic this time, riding with Mary for the first time, who made some great positional changes, but when Mary asked "How is this different from your old position?", the rider kept saying variations on "It's different." And Mary would reiterate, "But HOW is it different?" and started to get frustrated after several awkward minutes of this, back and forth.

Finally Mary said, "It's great that you made these changes in your position, but all this is for nothing if you can't articulate what's different.  You will go back to riding the way you were before."  Basically - nothing sticks until you understand it enough to describe the change out loud.  And that nails it for me - in addition to helping me make the physical changes, she's also given me a language for them, and that has made all the difference in actually helping it to stick.

Me five months ago - I have since sold every single piece of tack he's wearing except the polos, the pad and the irons, lol

26 comments:

  1. Really interesting. I have worked with clinicians who work like this and I get a lot from it. However, when I try to describe to other clinicians what I'm feeling that is different they seem to be baffled.

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    1. Yeah, I am not someone who buys 100% into something to the exclusion of everything else, but because this way of teaching is working for me so well, I'm also not looking to ride with anyone who isn't familiar with it right now. Luckily I've got 2 options for regular trainers and 2 options for clinicians that come around regularly, so I can do that. If it works for you, it really works.

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  2. Man would I love to ride with her. Like you, I don't think I came installed with even A and I'm very literal about instruction (for instance, though I was always told to put my outside leg back when asking for the canter, no one told me that I could then put it back to the girth - I rode that way until I was in my 20s). I've really appreciated my lunge lessons recently because it's all about body awareness.

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    1. Well Mary would tell you keeping your leg at the girth is an outdated misnomer from when girths used to be much further down the horse's barrel and you can't both have your leg at the girth and ride in a sound biomechanical position, so there's that :) But yes, we are very much the same in how we receive instruction. You would LOVE her, I hope you get the chance someday. Short of that though, her books are JUST like getting a lesson from her, they're worth picking up if you don't have them.

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    2. I will add that Erika is very much like you Jen, in that she also "gets" the horses mentally and emotionally so your horses trust you. That, and you both like to have fun and you both can laugh at your mistakes. I think that is big deal in a horse's eye.

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  3. I do love this. I'm so excited for you and your progress and traction you've gained over the last year.

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    1. Thank you. Big thanks to you and Megan and JenJ for starting me on this path and encouraging me to ride with Mary in the first place.

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  4. You got that big beautiful brainscape of words blossoming! I am so excited for all these changes in your riding and I am jealous!!! I want to ride with Mary!

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    1. Yes I do! I totally want you to ride with her too, having gone to her workshop you have to be chomping at the bit to actually ride in front of her.

      Serious offer, you know it doesn't really matter what horse you're on for stuff like this, if you ever want to ride with her when she comes here, you are welcome to ride Connor if you can get yourself here.

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  5. Mary seems like a really cool clinician! I've only ever ridden in one clinic (with KOC), but audited many. There is definitely a big difference between the way clinicians teach. I love the ones that bring in really cool imagery and ideas, it helps it stick with me and make sense.

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    1. Yeah, the imagery is really easy to remember and use later on. Sometimes some of the more nebulous descriptions go in one ear and out the other on me (sad but true!)

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  6. I love, love, love, my coach, but yeah, the one little thing is that she's a lot more talented than I'll ever be, so sometimes the 'how to' stuff is a little lacking for me and my level of body control. On the other hand, 'just go do it, try to piaffe' is kind of empowering for a rider like myself, lol ;)Love your Mary clinic recaps, it's priceless when you find someone who can communicate in a way that resonates so easily with you.

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    1. I think that hits on the nail on the head, if someone told me to "just piaffe" I wouldn't be empowered, I'd be out of luck, lol. But if you work well that way (and I know you also have the horse that understands piaffe already) then that's great.

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  7. I agree in part, but I think just like some people are natural riders, some are natural teachers and the two are not mutually exclusive! As well, someone can intuit that a position change feels different/better but not be able to articulate it, and I wouldn't assume that means they won't continue to replicate that feel.

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    1. I agree on the first part, natural riders can learn to be good teachers, just like unnatural riders can learn to be good riders. The second part, I think it depends on how you learn. For me, being able to describe it has helped it stick, because I can think of one word and cascade all these images with it. I intentionally didn't go into it here, but that's also why blogging works for me - it gives me a chance to sit down and put into concise language what I've changed in my riding.

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  8. There's a great quote attributed to Einstein that essentially says if you can't explain a concept to a 10 year old, you don't really understand it yourself.

    I love Mary Wanless! ❤️ She weaves together so many elements of the learning to ride experience. I especially appreciate how she allows for varying learning styles. Her analogies really resonate, and her teaching style is super fluid.

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    1. Yeah, she's definitely one of the most effective clinicians I've ever ridden with. Everyone improves start to finish in typically obvious ways.

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  9. This is really fascinating to me. Perhaps one of the reasons some of us click with some instructors but not others? Maybe some are not teaching us where we are in the alphabet? Wish I could have made it! Stupid real world job. But loving your write-ups!

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    1. I think that's it. It's not that there are good and bad trainers (although that is true, it's not what I'm referring to here) it's that there are trainers that can meet you where you are mentally and trainers that can't. And you have to know where you are and what type of teaching style you need in order to find the right one for you.

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  10. This is an exceptionally good post. Thanks Jen, though I still think that you are more of a talented rider than you think you are. Maybe it is because you "get" the horses mentally and emotionally. They quickly learn to trust you. That alone is a HUGE talent that you were born with.

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    1. I appreciate that! I do think you can be both a good horseman and a not naturally talented rider. I'm the same type of learner in CrossFit as I am in the saddle. It takes a lot of effort to get things from my brain to my body parts, but that doesn't have any impact on how I handle the horses and seek to understand them.

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  11. Super interesting way of explaining the learning concept. I think so many of us ammies are solidly in the same boat as you. I know I am, anyway. It is important to not be hard on ourselves and just keep working on things! Finding an instructor(s) that work for you is a key.

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    1. Absolutely. I think this is something most of us feel in our bones, but it's not something I couldn't have articulated before last weekend.

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  12. This is why I enjoy riding with different trainers. Some are just better at explaining feel than others. I really like how MW wants to make sure you understand what's happening and doesn't just care that you do the motions.

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    1. Yeah, it's an especially effective way of teaching I think, and I've seen her teach every level of rider from someone who had never done Dressage before to GP Dressage riders at this point.

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  13. I always really enjoy your write-ups & I think you hit a really important nail in your last anecdote. I definitely believe that it matters very little what the trainer's name is or how famous they are but it matters very very much how well they can communicate with you & you with them. Communication doesn't always have to be all verbal either -- there are some teachers who are extraordinarily gifted at using methodical exercises to "explain" to you & the horse different concepts. Because if you don't understand what happened & why it happened & how you got there, it's going to be real hard to repeat it unless you're just lucky. And I'm not lucky.

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