Well, I just had a very thought provoking conversation. Although I admit most all the thoughts were mine. And the conversation itself. And . . . well. . . the provoking part, too. (I amaze myself, lol). SOOO anyways I've been thinking some interesting stuff recently.
I haven't been able to play with the horses for the past 2 weeks, so it's given them some down time, and me too. I can only hope it's for the good, but I must say it's really causing me to learn a lot more. Even being outside with the horses just petting them usually teaches me something, usually some kind of theory, or a characteristic of one of the horses I hadn't known about before.
And so during this conversation today, I realized 3 things: 1) I am very bad at asking questions, 2) I over-analyze my horses WAY too much, and 3) I'm still waiting for an attitude change.
1) It kind of dawned on me just how bad at asking questions I am. For starters, I realized that I normally ask questions I think I already know the answers to (specifically pertaining to horses, though). Like when I'm unsure about something, but have an idea, I'll e-mail someone and ask them to tell me what they think. And then they'll usually regurgitate something like what I'm thinking, so I'll go "good, I was on the right track" and then go try it. But, see it seems like I can't do it all by myself. I need their go ahead. So, on my personality chart, you can definitely put a check mark in looks for reassurance.
But to exaggerate on that, it seems that I can't distinguish easily between when I need more knowledge and when I just need to go out and try something. Like I'll usually go look for more knowledge, when it's just a technique I'm lacking. Or I'll look for more information about reading horses when I've actually got a technique issue. It's all so confusing.
2) Now, I'm going to go about this in the most positive way I can, because I can see this post is turning into a "here's all my faults on a platter" so I'll try to be nice here. I also am still upset at my lack of progress. I won't deny that it gets hard for me to pretend to be satisfied with where I am when I am not. And part of the reason I seem to not make progress is because I can't tell when to ignore something, and when to pay attention to it. Like Moose throwing his head up when I try to halter. Predator inside me says to "ignore him, he'll let me halter him". And I usually always listen to that. But then I also say, "well, what if this is important, though, and I should wait to halter him?" Well, then I start second-guessing myself, and paying attention to it, and getting all bothered because I just spent a day "doing nothing" and nothing tangible came out of it.
3) I also found out another thing about myself, to elaborate on the knowledge vs technique issue. I used to think I was very resourceful, and I guess I still am, but I found out that I have the resources, but somehow not the tools. I mean, there's about a bazillion self-help articles out there, but there's only so many you can read. That's because it's not the article that changes you. It's what it does for you. And so I've probably read more of my fair share of natural horsemanship articles on line, always looking for another tip or bit of insight, but after a while it just becomes words on a page. None of these articles can do for me what I need right now. Not saying they're bad, but I think right now I am in a position where I need someone to sit me down and spell out what to do when, because I need an attitude change and a good mental slap in the face. Unfortunately, I feel like I've been here for a little over 6 months now to be perfectly honest. But I'm still waiting to make the change.
I want to be the horse's perfect partner in order to get him to be my perfect partner. And in order for that to change, I need help with patience, like these 2 famous quotes of Pat's say:
"Slow and right beats fast and wrong," and "Take the time it takes so it takes less time."
Well, it appears that I just can not seem to heed them. I want the end result very badly, but I'm dissatisfied with anything except progress. In other words, I want to go to heaven, but don't want to die. Can you see how frustrating this is? It's like being between a rock and a hard place. The only way out is to fly, but in order to do that first I've got to learn to use my wings. And I can't seem to get them working. I get stuck in self-doubt, low confidence, over-analyzing, confusion, mistrust, denial, all the normal bad things that assail someone when they're already unhappy. (love how life works, eh?)
So, I'm still not sure how to get out of this rut. I see many people using the Parelli program and getting absolutely fabulous results, and I long to be one of them. It's just that I'm still standing in my own way, and until I can get myself straight I'm not sure what I'm going to do. Hmm, maybe I'll go read some more articles. . . ;)
