Today I had the pleasure to go on a nice trail ride on my Swedish warmblood gelding RI/LE. It went really good, even in the beginning I could ask him to trot calmly on loose reins. I did also a lot of yo yo game cause even if he’s sensitive to slow down, he has problems with stopping. But just after a couple of backups, his whole body and especially back felt much more engaged. Very nice felling, although it might also have something to do with the change of shims in the pad, but hopefully both. The last couple of times the pad has actually stayed in the same place on both sides, usually it would slide in under the saddle on the left side, but Not today :)

When we came on to our usual trot/cantering path I could feel him starting to collect enormously, not because I asked him, but because he wanted to do his typical bucking ritual. But he is such an obedient horse (has always been), so he didn’t do anything until I asked him. Although I didn’t really have the courage to ask him to canter, even though I thought it was fun last time, only thinking about sitting on my balancepoint and trying not to freak out about the fact that I was on a tall bucking horse. But today I was scared, I went RI and just,”lets do some sideways instead”. And so we did, we focused on the trot.

That was were I had my little breakthrough today. Cause I was still quite RI, and wanted him to trot slower and more connected, but without making him do it with the reins. So I though about how I’ve discovered the great importance of mirroring the horse’s energy. And I wasn’t doing it with him. Then Linda’s story came up in my head, how stupid she felt when she really mirrored Allures energy, but how lovely everyone said it looked. So that was what I did, and damn, his movements was... :O wish I could have not only felt them, but also seen them.

Thank u Pat and Linda for making this possible

/ Yours Naturally Joanna