I was chatting with two dear friends the other day, one a trainer and one a rider.
We were talking about how doing energetic work can facilitate what we want out of our riding. The rider uses the EquiTations visualizations and, additionally, she and I’ve been having occasional conversations about the things that are holding her back in her riding.
As the discussion progressed, the trainer mentioned how she thinks that everyone could benefit from my – or similar – coaching. And then she said, “The trouble is, getting people to admit they have a problem.”
UUUUGGGGH.
I’ve said this before – and I feel more and more strongly about this as Performance Energetics grows from its fledgling phases.
This.is.not.about.having.a.
This is about giving ourselves the tools and resources to be the absolute best that we can be. It’s about a willingness to know that training is a multi-faceted deal – one that asks of us to develop not only the physical skills required to ride, but also the mental, emotional and energetic skills to excel.
If that’s what we truly want, of course.
Last week, in The Conscious Rider, I shared a three part series called the Communication Foundation. In it, I was offering my thoughts on why I believe that communication with ourselves is a foundational piece for success in the saddle.
It was inspired by a video of David O’Connor where, after an example of jumping bridleless, he said, “We learn to compete before we learn to ride, and we learn to ride before we learn to communicate with our horse.” My observation here is that there is one more component that we get to bring into the conversation: we learn to communicate with the horse before we learn to communicate with our self.
So I shared this audio series. And the rider listened to it and took away from it the pieces that resonated with her. And she was telling us how she was sharing this with one of her barnmates, encouraging her to have a listen herself.
And here’s where this gets really fascinating.
She said, “I was telling her about the pennies in the jar.”
And I looked at her, curiously. I hadn’t said anything about pennies.
I offered, “That must have been someone else? I didn’t say anything about pennies in a jar…”
She said “No, it was you. I don’t know exactly what you said, but it’s like a jar full of coins. You know, the quarters and the dimes and the nickels – they’re all the same color. The pennies – they’re different. So that’s all you see. It’s like the thoughts that are holding us back. They’re all we see…”
Brilliant.
Now, as I said, I didn’t even mention pennies. But this rider took what she needed and framed it in a way that made sense to her.
I’m totally stealing it.
Because it’s totally true.
Sometimes, the thoughts that are holding us back are all that we see.
Ahhhhhhhh.
Yes.
And having that awareness is the first step on a very, very cool journey.
Want to join us?