Contributors

Dressage


Dressage (a French term meaning "training") is a path and destination of competitive horse training, with competitions held at all levels from amateur to the Olympics. Its fundamental purpose is to develop, through standardized progressive training methods, a horse's natural athletic ability and willingness to perform, thereby maximizing its potential as a riding horse. At the peak of a dressage horse's gymnastic development, it can smoothly respond to a skilled rider's minimal aids by performing the requested movement while remaining relaxed and appearing effortless. Dressage is occasionally referred to as "Horse Ballet." Although the discipline has its roots in classical Greek horsemanship, mainly through the influence of Xenophon, dressage was first recognized as an important equestrian pursuit during the Renaissance in Western Europe. The great European riding masters of that period developed a sequential training system that has changed little since then and classical dressage is still considered the basis of trained modern dressage.

Early European aristocrats displayed their horses' training in equestrian pageants, but in modern dressage competition, successful training at the various levels is demonstrated through the performance of "tests," or prescribed series of movements within a standard arena. Judges evaluate each movement on the basis of an objective standard appropriate to the level of the test and assign each movement a score from zero to ten - zero being "not executed" and ten being "excellent." A score of nine (or "very good") is considered a particularly high mark, while a competitor achieving all sixes (or 60% overall) should be considering moving on to the next level.

Monday, December 11, 2023

Daily Practice, Self-Care to Improve your Riding

             Utilize Self Care and Improve Your Riding

                  Carousel Coaching                    Dec. 11, 2023

All rights reserved

 

Utilize this as an exercise when you have time, with your journal:                               

 

      Aspects of ourselves

                     Character Traits  (same as values) these are relating to space and time. Honesty, love, compassion, organization, patience, respect.) Again these are things about ourselves that we want to nurture. We may have to look past what other people have made us think about ourselves.

                     Personality Traits (help us to be who we are) these just are, there is nothing to measure. Confident, humorous, imaginative, loving, direct.

                          Part of self love is getting to know these things about ourselves and make peace with them. Without comparing ourselves to others why are these characteristics special? What do we look like when we are acting on them in a positive way? What might it look like when we ignore or don’t like parts of ourselves.

 

              With the horses it is easy to get overwhelmed sometimes with the competitive aspect and then think that our own self worth and characteristics are not worth anything. We try to conform to the way other people want us to be, or what we see other people doing from a distance.

             Yes! There are certain practices that will help to bring you success!

                           Such as being disciplined, choosing good healthy food over junk food, working out, stretching, having lessons to improve your riding etc etc.

                            There are other things that create your special you that do not need to change or conform to the wishes of society or friends. These things are what make you you. And by trying to bury them, hide them or change them you are going against your true nature and living out of balance.

                           It takes time of self-reflection to start to find these traits and characteristics that are truly what you are about. Then it also takes time to cultivate or get to know your true identity. From then you want to grow the positive aspects of yourself and be brave to take them out into the world.

 

                          How to help myself travel on the right path and have success?

                  Take care of yourself and give yourself some love!

                          Be careful not to just ask it from other people. You must not ask someone to love you more than you love yourself. And…. If they do not show you love, enough love or the right kind of love, this must not reflect how much you love yourself.

                         We are all a work in progress. So! loving yourself and accepting yourself where you are right now does not mean that you might not want to improve certain aspects of your being. However, if you only focus on the negative remember, you will only continue to get more negative.

               For example someone might say; I love that I am funny, energetic and have a love for horses. I would like to improve my discipline so that my love for horses turns into a successful show career.

                But what if they said; I am not disciplined but I am funny and energetic. Can you see where this is going. One sentence is uplifting and gives something to work toward the other is going nowhere.

 

              When under pressure you will find that positive attributes will help you persevere, whereas negative thoughts and beliefs about ourselves will be self-fulfilling.

“If you think you can, you can. If you think you can’t, you are also right.”

 

                                     Be the guardian of your mind. The way that business works in America is that they make you feel like you have or identify with a short coming or a problem and then they offer you the product that will solve it. These short comings are put into your presence daily on the computer, TV, radio, bill boards and magazines and then the advertisements sell you the product that will fix your flaws.

                                       If you can hold your positive self-vision in your mind and heart all of the time these ads will not infect you. In my email I get a million hits with subjects like “lose weight fast”, “look younger now” or “improve your relationship”. When I see the titles, I might say to myself I don’t need to lose weight! or my relationship is just fine thank you! I actually have the conversation and put it out there so that it does not infect me.

                                    When you come from this place of self-acceptance and love you can actively look for things that will improve your life and what you want to do, but you do not allow other peoples fears or judgements to infect you.

                  Taking care of yourself daily will reinforce to your mind, heart and spirit that you really are good enough. This confidence will spill into your riding, work, and relationships.

                  What ways can we take better care of ourselves?

                                     Spend alone time, meditating and learning (or just figuring out what is interesting and we might want to learn.)

                                      Respect yourself with your self-talk. Allow yourself to grow do not judge mistakes

                                     Eat right and stay hydrated

                                     Exercise

Important thing to remember!!

                You were not born knowing everything! So! it is ok to ask questions, make mistakes and look for ways to learn. You do not have to be the knower! As you do this you will find that you can give a hand up to those that have less experience than you, but you can also look up to those that have more experience.

 

                        Homework:

                                    Take a couple of days and listen to your self-talk. Write down some things you hear regularly, good and bad.

                                    Also, listen to some ads, look in magazines or TV and Facebook and write down a couple of these products that use this tactic of making you feel like you are lacking something or need to fix something to sell their product.

                     Share with me at nancy@carouselcoaching.com

                    

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