Them lucky people....

Imagine, if there really was something such as "pure luck"... It would mean that no matter what you do, you have no real control over the outcome of your situation. It would mean, no amount of effort on your part could steer you in the direction of your choosing because all was down to luck.
It would mean you might as well not try...not fight for what you want, believe in, dream of experiencing. It would mean you might as well give up trying and resign yourself to watching all them other lucky people who have everything handled to them on golden plates.  All you had left was some form of hope that luck would turn for you.

Now, imagine, if believing in luck (or lack of it) was what was stopping many people from doing their best in what they wish to focus their life on.

You know that saying - It takes 10 years of focused effort to achieve an overnight success? I like it. I think it sounds like said by someone who didn't believe in luck but who got up and barefoot walked a path others couldn't be bothered to walk. It sounds like said by someone who knew there would be many who chose not to notice the scars, the bruises, the cuts but instead saw someone arriving with an effortless smile on their face, happy to have found something of value.

I don't believe in luck. I prefer to believe in invisible but powerful hustle instead ;)

Day 31: Rowers, talents, stats and nutella :)

It might be that it is true what they say about childhood memories. You know, that bit where supposedly everything seem to last very long when you are 7 or 8 but is closer to a seven blinks of an eye when you get older.

When I was seven and woke up to snow outside the windows, that snow stayed for a month or two. Today the snow was there at 8am, all white and cold and wintry just as a snow is. I then got on a train and travelled for about an hour to arrive at a rainy platform. 

I taught in the rain and patchy snowfall as if the place couldn't decide whether it was autumn or winter, and then arrived back at the station from which I set off to be greeted with a low yet still bright orangey sunlight glittering on everything that snow was no longer on. 

Walking back home...

I made it through the first daily blogging month, how hard can it be to carry on ;) So many little moments that one can dress into words and leave on here for a few people to read. Like the fact, that I like watching the rowing boats out on the river. They row at all times of day, all weathers. I don't know much about rowing at all but feel somehow inspired by their even, relentless water journeys. They are there when I walk in the mornings, sometimes barely visible in the misty fog that gathers over the river, they are there when I walk back, coach's voice over the tannoy spurring them to make corrections. Sometimes moving smooth and silent, sometimes with a novice splash and ragged course. 

Someone once told me that you don't need much talent for rowing - you just need to turn up for training and do your best. I don't think they were right. Turning up in life and trying one's best in what one does in whatever circumstances is one of the rarest talents I see...

My fab riders today braving the rain and cold :) Talent is overrated, it's the hours in the saddle, being with horses in all conditions and developing empathy with them that make real riders,,,

It was a great month, eleven more to come and hopefully each one will beat the other in some ways :) My little Aspire Equestrian coaching blog has grown as per my plan and had over 14.000 views and over 10.000 visitors this month! I am over the moon that so many people have found something worth their time on there and I hope to double that by March! :) 

Tomorrow is my day off teaching and I look forward to a lie in, cup of tea and Nutella on toast in bed and some reading (real printed reading ;) 

Until tomorrow!

Wiola

Day25: Habits and changes

Videos from yesterday's and today's sessions all processed, notes made, feeling productive ;) On main photo is my teenage rider on Foundation Programme. Very excited about her progress, lovely young rider. 

It was a working Sunday for me this week and I am now questioning what on earth was I thinking starting this 365 days blogging challenge as all I want right now is to hit the pillows! Euphemism for going to sleep in case you thought I was angry at my pillows or something in those lines.

I do know what I was thinking though: I wanted to kickstart my daily writing habit. It's like brushing ones teeth, once you develop a habit life seems odd without it. The most powerful tool to success - a habit.

My late afternoon and evening was spent over my notebooks. I am starting to see the benefits of these little daily analysis sessions.
I decided to tweak my coaching services a little. I want to stop offering my Intensive Training Days for riders from outside of the programmes and focus my simulator sessions on certain dates. The Training Days are good to run but in reflection, I enjoy them mostly with my regular clients. They do have more sense when I know what points I want to work on and how an intensive session can add to the rider's tool kit.
I will still run my simulator sessions and seat training for non-programme riders as I have been as those are very specific, great fun and a challenge at the same time. They are very good for making significant changes in the seat biomechanics which I very much enjoy.

This move will allow me to make the training days more attractive price wise to my programme riders and to generally align the Academy's coaching goals with the value of continuity. More about it soon.

For now, night night :)
Wiola

Day 23: Finding the barriers

Take a deep breath as you look at that picture. Can you sense that wonderful, sharp freshness of the air that hurts your lungs and throat just a little bit but you can't wait to inhale again? That's how it was this morning indeed. My kind of office ;)

Vet's decision on Jo-Jo is to carry on with our remedial schooling month. He is starting to get the scheme and lets me move his legs into different positions without bracing each time. Slow, gentle relaxation movements like this let him tell me straight away if anything hurts too much to bare and I can stop immediately.

He enjoys the little massage rather a lot now too and was horizontal from relaxation today. In the arena, I am mainly observing and learning where I can push and when I need to back off. We need him to work out a better way of moving and that means finding out where the barriers are and moving them an inch at a time.
His pattern right now is to work well, then over-react at something, face me, plant his feet and either change direction or refuse to move. I am letting him work out he can't have it that way with me so it takes some time as I have to wait him out on some occasions.
I follow the thinking of making the right thing easy and the unwanted thing difficult. He is a clever horse and I can see he is getting the idea. He is also stubborn and likes things his way at times so I have to be careful not to start a battle with no winners.

Some more thoughts and pondering time on the Academy's structure and logistics for me today. Sometimes we get on with day to day tasks without letting the mind wonder about bigger picture often enough. At first, it feels like I am staring at the white wall wondering about my sanity but the more I stare, the more details seem obvious - you know, like little cracks in paint work, small pattens, brush strokes, uneven surface here and there.
I can't say I can see the brick work beneath yet ;) but some ideas are forming!

Day 19: Frosty, sunny Monday

Very gentle mobility/relaxation movements where the horse can stop whatever hurts or is uncomfortable at any time

Horse language in all its complexity is really quite simple - as long as we learn to observe and listen, we will probably hear everything we need to know. There is knowledge required to interpret what we see and hear for sure but many a time, signals are clear. 

Today was my first morning working with Joker one to one. I spent some time with him just going through the body work/massage I have learnt as it's good at finding tension areas in horse's body. 

Relaxation is the key with rehab horses. 

We had a glorious, sunny morning, just a touch of frost but it's always easier to layer up for dry cold than icy downpours. After handling all of Joker's legs I was rather warm! 

Work wise I gone back to basic groundwork just finding out his push points and keeping everything comfortable until he has more trust in me and let me cross some discomfort boundaries. 

All Joker's shoes are off and my hooves obsession kicked in immediately. There are some interesting points about his hooves which correspond with the way he uses himself so I might take some sole shots to keep track of any changes.

My afternoon rider on Foundation programme rode the best yet, my train on way home was only 20 min delayed (ok, I'll skip how freaking freezing it was at the station ;)), I de-frosted in a super scented bath and got myself a decent to-do list for tomorrow. I class that as a pretty ok day :) 

Until tomorrow!

Wiola

Day 17: Superb day on all fronts :)

Teaching in London today. So very happy with all my riders, just uploaded the videos and got them organised so I don't end up with a backlog as that's almost impossible to catch up with considering the amount of footage I take.
I also like the riders to watch the videos as soon after the training as possible when all movements are still fresh on their minds (and bodies) as I feel that's when visual feedback is most effective.

I would love to chat some more today but I am pretty knackered so will just show you a little snippets from today :)

I hope the weekend is treating you well wherever you are :) How's your winter riding going?

All the best and speak tomorrow!

Wiola

The cat and the Mark Rashid book that happen among teaching hours

I swear this cat hunts me. Not for meat, mind you, but for play. He waits for the right moment like when I stand still for a minute or there's a change over of horses so I am not occupied. Then he runs over for his share of attention :)

I also picked up this book today while waiting for a lift back to the station. I wish I had to wait a little longer because the book was "Horses Never Lie" by Mark Rashid, one I wanted to get my hands on for a while now.
It reads fast and I managed a couple of chapters before setting off and hope it's still at the yard next time so I can fit in more pages ;)

From all strands of "natural horsemanship" Mark Rashid's lessons of the horse's nature and thoughts of training agree most with me. There are, of course, bits and pieces that one can take out of any system and find it beneficial for different horses in different situations. However, for me personally, Rashid's view of relationship between horse and people is most intriguing and worth following...

Taking a moment

Blogging everyday means whoever reads the posts will experience my rather eclectic interests ;)

This 365 days of posting project will definitely allow me to document many moments that pass by quickly and as I am not keen on Facebook or Instagram much for photo sharing, the blog diary is just a perfect fit. Even though I have been writing paper diaries since childhood and blogging since 2007 I don't think I have ever done a daily record so far.

Equine de-mudding was heavily on the agenda today not surprisingly since the weather isn't particularly helping with clean legs and dry bodies. The conditions were great for teaching though - zero wind, just a little chill in the air, quiet and fresh :)

As a non-driver I do a lot of walking. Sometimes it's a right pain in the ass but most of the time I love the simple pleasure of relying on my two legs to take me places. One thing I do more of when I walk is notice my surroundings and appreciate details on daily basis that would otherwise almost definitely escape me.
I like stopping and taking it all in on my way home - like these guys! They live their mysterious lives on a small pond which I pass often and if they are lucky they get a slice or two of my bread. I am not sure what type of ducks are the incredibly colourful ones - do you know?

If you like them too, here is a little video:




Lovely ducks aside, walking is an amazing way to stay fit. Having done many different sports with low joint impact as a complimentary routine to riding, I find walking ingenious. It's also perfect for thinking of new exercises for riders and horses and planning of their training. Some people have ideas under the shower - walking is my own creative flow generator!

Early morning walk to station awaits me tomorrow, hope you have a great day :)

Last two months in honest review - life as it happens

Last two months I'd been mostly searching...for answers and for the right opportunity to come along for my London clients. I finally gave up on one of the ideas and that is the one which was based on finding more riding schools to work with. I am not saying no to it fully but for now I feel that if I haven't made something happen in 2 years then it's probably best to become more creative. Without going into too much detail riding schools are either already fully booked and sorted with own activities or have excuses for not opening up to new ways of providing riding education.

The bonus of working with a good facility is of course the access to that facility, to the infrastructure, to comfort for the riders. However, I had a good think about it and I came to conclusions that after all, primary vision for non - owners branch of Aspire Academy is to provide top quality riding tuition for riders without own horses NOT plush time in cosy coffee rooms (even though I do like those :). 

That's when I changed my approach and whilst continuing to search for a centre on smaller scale, I put 90% of effort into finding another solution...I'd been testing a "share a horse for lessons" scenario for a while now and decided it could be the way to go. Owners of the types of horses I am after often welcome a financial contribution to the upkeep of their horse whilst the type of rider I am after to teach is eager to build relationship with the horse they train on. It is not easy for a learner-rider to find a share horse simply because the owners are worried that the horse might end up mistreated or ridden badly due to simple lack of knowledge of the inexperienced sharer. The situation is different if the learner rider actually takes well structured, long-term planned lessons that not only teach the rider but might also school and improve the horse...

I'd emailed and messaged (good old Facebook) pretty much everyone that I thought might help me move forward with this development but for many weeks I had no luck. Either horses were not suitable or the place was just that little bit too "out in the sticks" or there were other reasons that would make the logistics impossible like the horse being only available on Mondays 7am...you get the idea. 

In the meantime, various funky things were happening, like this bite on my eyelid a few weeks ago!

Waking up with an eye swollen shut is not a very amusing welcome to the day

Not sure what my immune system was thinking but it decided to blow up half of my face as well as the eyelid, working on laptop with one eye was a challenge and was also surprisingly tiring. I also had to teach in sunglasses so I didn't scare anyone and that was a little inconvenient too since it was a week of fog and rain ;) It lasted about 5 days but felt like 5 weeks. Kudos to all one eyed horses jumping and eventing out there, just moving around people and horses in walk was hard enough! 

Finally, I found a yard with several owners looking for sharers. The yard that is very easy to get to and so the big trial begins this month. Of course it wasn't without a drama that almost made me lose the remaining hair that still hangs on to my head but all seems ok, for now at least! 

If as many riding schools' owners say it is not possible to accommodate certain structures into the schools' set ups then perhaps it's time to change the set ups...Sharing a horse for lessons might not be for everybody but if it is for the kind of person that Aspire programmes exist for in the first place, then maybe that's the path to take. 

I have so many plans for next year. I don't know if it's the age, the stress, the various things that needs sorting out but taking forever to do so or what but for the last couple of years I lost quite a lot of my usual courageous ability to make plans. Fear of failure maybe, not sure. I am glad I managed to shake it off to some extent. 

Some big changes coming up next year too. One day I am feeling invincible to take them on, the next one I'd rather be hiding under the duvet ;) On those pathetically fearful mornings I tell myself that the clock is ticking, the time is passing, the worst that can happen is that someone will say no. 

If you are doing something different or entrepreneurial in your life do let me know what you are up to and how you deal with your challenges! 

Three weeks of dashing between countries and counties

On way from Lodz, Poland to London, UK...the commute with a view :) I am not a big fan of flying but could stare at cloudscapes for hours...the ones on this flight reminded me of  heaps of semi-melted marshmallows floating on top of a giant mug of milky hot chocolate! 

The last three weeks were a whirlwind of travel, organisation, emotions and restlessness. You know how we are told by "experts" to have a good rest when we feel tired to re-charge and avoid fatigue? Well that is all good for when we do feel tired. I often feel betrayed by my own lack of self-preservation which allows me to work for insane number of hours per day and carry on each step on some inexplicable source of energy. Then, as if all of a sudden realising that it was a mistake, I come crashing with the sofa, laptop and a cup of tea as the only places and activities that seem remotely possible.

The clinic in Poland went really well. Seeing the riders develop their relationship with the horses and that in turn letting them achieve better results in training is what I enjoyed the most during the weekend. I do believe that to teach an animal anything at all, we must get into its brain, it must understand, comprehend the task in a way that allows it to follow instruction with as little physical and mental resistance possible.

Photo from clinic at Stajnia Sabat, near Warsaw, Poland. I used this picture in the last Aspire's newsletter, love that quote!

If you struggle repeatedly with a training issue with your horse, double and triple check he understands the question. So many times we focus on resolving problems with exercises and equipment instead of finding a different way of approaching the subject in the first place. Even though I've been working with horses for over 20 years and I can see signs of their intelligence every day, I am not so sure about efficacy of training methods that suppose human-like intelligence in an equine. In fact, I consider it quite offensive to the horse ;)
Let's say, young wolves learn about hierarchy by many herd behaviours including eating certain parts of an animal they hunted and killed. They don't sit in a classroom and learn about history of canis lupus genes.

Same horses. Their learning process is different to ours and it is the trainer's/rider's duty to either learn it from someone or discover it from behavioural signs the horse gives. The moment we train horses' physical attributes without treating them like people, or dogs, or children, but like the species they are, we get content animals happy to work with us. It's fascinating to observe how athletic abilities improve with mental coherence.

My lovely cousin, Karolina, who works so hard on regaining trust and build a good relationship with Krater whom she has on loan and who has various unpleasant training experiences behind him . They've made a huge progress together in the last year :) 

More pictures from Poland HERE. My clinics in Poland are a great way for me to visit my family which is both wonderful and a little sad. I enjoy every moment and savour it and go ahead quite happily but there is always this element of sadness in goodbyes which underlines the price one sometimes has to pay for pursuing path less travelled.

My beautiful little niece enjoying some pressies :) She's such a character already despite only being around for 3 years ;) 

Meet Tymon, my fab little nephew, 10 months old and I've only seen him handful of times...

The time pass so quickly when I am there. Between coffees and window shopping with my mum, joking around with my brother, driving about and chatting with my dad, dinners and evenings with my aunt, cousins and grandparents before I knew it I was back in the clouds.

My book for the flight - a gift from my Aunt - fantastic read, click this sentence  to see the English version. 

A couple of days at home with Rick with few lessons with regular clients fitted in and then back on the road again - this time to North Yorkshire. There is an interesting mix of clients that sign up for my clinics there from professionals working in the industry, through to teenagers eventing at lower levels, inquisitive adult riders to happy hackers and (a first this time) children.

Several regular riders who I have seen previously signed up this time too and that's probably what I enjoy the most - seeing riders change and progress over time, helping them find some more answers to various training questions, come up with exercises that awaken body awareness and make schooling more effective, chatting through issues. I had Ceri (Pure Essence Photography) taking pictures at this clinic and you can see the full set on Aspire blog HERE.

Very clever 3 year old TB off the track. Starting in-hand work here, learning to walk on a circle. He's got an amazing attitude and willingness to work. 

Now I am back and having a few quieter days to get back into the swing of things and give my body a little rest. I need to upload all the videos I took from both clinics which takes a while on a not so fast internet connection! So far I managed almost all Poland videos so now I have a set from Yorkshire to do.

The autumn has truly arrived in London home counties. It's chilly albeit still sunny at times with equal amounts of rain and rainbow :) I am not too bothered about the change of seasons, quite looking forward to it. So many things to reflect on, think about, make plans - perfect filler for dark, winter evenings.
This year is very much a transition year from all the training back to teaching and re-building the Aspire programmes and although I am very much in-the-present kind of person, I also have started to tentatively look at next year. There will be a lot of make-or-break situations in 2015 and I am anxiously awaiting the challenges.
But for now, I do like sitting here with my laptop, writing, reading and just feeling grateful for all the fabulous opportunities I have experienced so far :)

Beautiful mornings and planning for the first go at the second draft

I love teaching in the mornings especially in the summer we are having this year. The sun comes out early, strong and warm, with a slight breeze to break the heat. I love walking onto a freshly graded and flattened arena surface that no one yet rode on and just take in this ordinary, rectangular piece of ground that comes with so many emotions. It's so true when we say that we often forget things, places, faces but we never forget how they made us feel :)

My favourite artificial riding surfaces are the light coloured ones, love the silica sand and fabric but any light surface is a winner. I guess it reminds me of a white beach sand and makes me feel calm and zen ;) Having said that, riding on grass is also high on my likings. Not too manicured and not too flat with some gradients to challenge the feel for balance and proprioception in the horse.

Last several days were busy teaching and I have done some serious walking miles running around. Two days of writing ahead of me now and I must keep up with my schedule. I prepared the sketch of the contents I need to cover tomorrow and on Thursday and decided to get on the second draft of the book from the instructional side - in other words I am first drafting the second version of the "learning to ride manual" rather than the "riding instructor's diary" part. At first I planned to just let the writing flow and let myself cover whatever first draft subject comes to me on a given day but I changed my mind. I decided I need some skeleton, a discipline and structure, and then let some creativity develop within that rather than jump from one subject to another.
I am planning to do two 3 hour blocks with 30 min breaks for main draft of the chapters that are on the table tomorrow and I am quite excited to get started on them.

Apart from the above, I am also working on the August newsletters to send out to Aspire subscribers and making a plan of action for the next few months as far as organisation of my teaching goes but I will tell you more about it in a few weeks time.

Now I have few more emails to write and then will hit the pillows I think :)

Putting in the hours

Ball games with Woody after morning teaching followed by long hours on the laptop 

Someone asked me this morning why put so much emphasis on rider centred approach in my coaching programmes. I gave my answer but the subject kept coming back to me.
I think that, eventually, we all ask ourselves, what am I contributing to this world and how do I feel with it. .
The way I see it is that every well educated rider can educate many horses and give them a great life. This thought drives me every single time I give a lesson.
If I focused on producing lovely horses, I would not have the same sense of job/life satisfaction. If one is lucky enough to do both, great. There are many good riders out there who can bring on horses well. There are not that many good, all-round coaches.

I feel it's important to have a challenge in ones life, something that makes you feel that you are always learning, always striving for the better, giving something back and making good use of your skills. To me, rider centred training is one of those challenges.

Recently, I'd been working on getting the hang of online newsletters. I wanted to find a free service that would do the job of sending some "limited edition" content, news and advice to all my email subscribers. Yesterday, the first bi-monthly newsletter finally went into cyber space together with a little special shout out with some very interesting, unlisted videos on sports psychology that I was kindly given for use :) My aim is to prepare some special bit of content for each of those newsletters including video tutorials and advice that I would not normally put on the blog. If you would like to subscribe,then pop over to Aspire microsite http://aspir1.wix.com/aspireequestrian2014 , scroll down a tiny bit and add your email into the box :)

http://aspir1.wix.com/aspireequestrian2014

Regarding the habits and doing not-so-enchanting-but-necessary business-y stuff that I wrote about few days ago: I started with a little routine. For now, I put aside 30 minutes every day to sit on, what I call in my head, "a how not to drown strategy" ;) Apparently, it takes at least 2-3 months for a habit to form - I hope my head is still in one piece at the end of that formation process but I know once it's there I will be fine. Habits are power ;) Like in riding, training and coaching.

Until next time :)
Wiola

Why it's vitally important to believe in Unicorns

My little niece - wonder what's on her mind ;) 

Last couple days were an interesting mixture of various troubles through which I'd been stubbornly moving through and some lovely moments which I have been happily embracing.

At the moment everything comes down to sorting one thing out and ten others appearing with tripled force screaming for solutions. They give me headaches and certainly bring decent amount of stress with them but that's when the Unicorns come in...

Don't worry. I have not succumbed to a mental illness (just yet) - I simply believe in delusional optimism as a way of dealing with nay-sayers and general negativity, whether real or perceived one. You can't be any more delusional than when you get on your unicorn and ride into happy fields! 

On a more serious note, we all know that stress and anxiety can drain you and demolish your health. The problems one might have won't get better from hours of grief (a loose term here, can mean anything from crying your eyes out through to screaming, hair tearing to over-eating) over them although of course there might be people out there who possibly prefer to see you depressed and in black head to toe rather than trotting on a rainbow coloured pony. After some time of submitting to the doom and gloom in the past and realising fully it was not going to make anything any better I now fire fight all little bits of self-pity or resignation. One day I hope to burn it all. 

Being consciously delusionally optimistic doesn't mean not seeing the problems, it just means moving on regardless, finding little paths that can take one back to the main road at some point.  For some inexplicable reason, if you keep moving, even if sometimes that takes you through some nettles, armpits high grass or muddy woods, you end up coming across solutions you didn't think possible. 

I hope to be able to share with you some exciting news in a few weeks time but for now, if you are doubting anything that you are doing or feel like there are always two steps back after one taken forwards, rest assured you are not alone... Keep on it. Get on your unicorn and keep riding...:) 

Logistics

Woody trying to convince me to quit working and get playing instead :) 

I will soon share with you a wider picture of the doubtfully colourful, logistical maze I am trying to navigate since May this year but I need to ease myself slowly into my daily writings before I do so. Right now, I am feeling semi-content after managing to organise my week ahead without major disasters which didn't escape me in the week just gone. 

The summer is wonderfully hot here this year which attracts flies, storms and sleepless nights. Some horses really struggle with the heat while others thrive and work very well. Riders are mostly in the first category so we are planning the lessons around early mornings and late afternoons to escape the strongest rays. I seem to deal with the heat fairly well here although it is worth noting that British heat is not quite comparable with Portuguese or even Polish one from the central regions. 

Sunny mornings are great to wake up to regardless the temperatures. I have started a bit of a habit of list making the day before for the next day so I don't waste too much precious time I have in the mornings before setting off on my teaching journeys. 

Tomorrow morning I have to write my newsletter for everyone who subscribed by email to Aspire microsite (if you haven't, please feel free to go for it :) it's free :) ) or Aspire NewsBook. It will be the third one I will be sending out and I try to make sure the content is interesting and exclusive and so it feels special to receive it :) 

Then I am off teaching and will probably be back in the early evening assuming transport gods are kind! Once home I will have my next blog post to finish for Monday about timings in training and two video feedbacks for my online clients across the pond. 

Hope you are having a lovely weekend :) 

Wiola

From a Chapter: Late March. Reflections. Norway. Virtual Coaching. Planning.

- Have you never thought of getting a proper job? You know, your studies and all... - my grandmother looks at me with her light-blue, watercolour like eyes. Her face small and wrinkled. She isn't being spiteful or dismissive. Tone of her voice is loving, bemused somewhat, suspended between concern and disbelief that someone might indeed seriously consider a future of travelling around and teach horse riding. There is a shy smile on her face and the fact that she speaks quietly tells me she isn't sure if she should ask this question at all.
I leave out the little detail, the fact that I would love to travel even more, teach all over Europe or maybe even beyond, stay at small, shabby stables and big luxurious centres, anywhere where there are grassroots riders wanting to explore and learn.

My grandmother worked in a textiles factory. She spent thirty three years of her life working in conditions that would most probably be considered high-risk nowadays and which certainly did damage her health. Overwhelming noise of machines, fumes, smell of vinegar, hot steam. She worked three shifts, sometimes only having several hours off in between them. She's over eighty now and despite her questions, she believes everybody should do what makes them happy.

Textile Factory, Lodz, 1934

 

When she asked me about that proper job on this snowy March afternoon, just as I returned from Norway where I had a great time running one of my Aspire Coaching Weekends, I waited for a feeling of defensiveness that I used to get when confronted with other people's views on my chosen way of life. The feeling didn't come though. It doesn't any more.

At 34, it's very clear to me, that life is an extremely short affair. It always seemed that way but as time goes by, the infinity loops back at me. I guess it is possible to derive some pleasure out of living to someone else's design but my genetics forgot to implement such coding.

Teaching riding, as long as not done mechanically, is more than "a proper job". Although dismissed by many, I believe the discovery process we experience whilst training, is enriching and fulfilling. When we take time to understand the training process, ditch contraptions we put horses in, give up on training methods that cause pain to both rider and a horse, then the sessions become a self-discovering journey. Even for very young riders.
If as a trainer, you can help a rider to get closer to that fulfilment, you are doing something worthwhile. And that is all that, in my opinion, really matters. In any job. To do something worthwhile.

In my view, riding & training are like books & arts :) Neither is absolutely necessary to survival but both feed those parts of us that are able to give back to life what's most enjoyable: dreams, senses, emotions, passion, dedication, adventure, freedom.

I start telling my Grandmother about my recent work and I can tell that although she listens, she will never comprehend my take on it.

The weekend was a superb experience, as ever in Norway. I love working with people there, there is a lot of hunger for knowledge, for new ways of learning, for different ways of looking at the same thing.
Below are some images from the weekend:

Train arrives to take me from the airport to Oslo centre. The station is tiny and remote so the funky, modern train that pulls in looks completely surreal and out of place. The top of the train says "Lillehammer" - the name I recall from the 1994 Winter Olympics. It makes me smile :)

Oslo. Electric cars, cheerful colours on buildings and much less snow than in the suburbs.

Simba the cat on my many layers. To those who think it looks cold on the photos - it was not that bad. As they say, there is never a bad weather, just a bad choice of clothing. I was well prepared this time and didn't notice the cold at all. Only the ice like crunching of snow under my soles gave away the -19C  that visited at night ;) 

Video analysis in a cute little log cabin/wooden mountain cottage. 

Sunday morning. On way to the indoor arena for in-hand work with the horses.

Yummy, home made cakes! Delicious :) best served with horsey chats ;)  

In-hand work session

Some of the riders in action: 

On the above photo, the 4 year old TB youngster, Red, is being babysat by a racing pony, Naomi. This was Red's first time ever in an arena. In Norway, race horses get normal riding horse education as well as race training. Naomi races too with her young rider. 

I was shocked to hear today that Red fell over on the track this week and fractured a bone in his knee. He is a lovely horse and although he will never race again, I really hope he makes full recovery and is able to dressage happily. 

And finally, Maria (with Fame) who organises my coaching weekends there. She used to write a lovely blog (HERE) but is nowadays rarely seen in the blogosphere. Wonderful host and a great friend. 

I received a really generous feedback from the riders and although it feels wonderful it must be said that without those riders' open minded approach and their obvious enthusiasm for their horses, none of those fantastic moments would be possible.

Now back home, I am preparing the notes and virtual coaching plans for those riders who signed up for it at the weekend. After some reflections on how Aspire training has worked in the last 2 years, I decided to transform my usual online training plans into a separate Aspire Equestrian E-Academy: Virtual Coaching Club.

If you would like to receive more information about it, or if you know someone who struggles with transport/access to trainers and would like to experienced motivational, committed coaching, please leave me a comment (add: "not for publishing" in the comment and I won't make the comment public) with your email address and I will send you full pdf.

Next Mobile Coaching Weekends are coming up also in the UK. The first one will be near London, on the 18th and 19th May. Please feel free to share the below poster with anyone who you think might want to join in. If you have any questions, email any time as per details on the poster.

There is another exciting weekend coming in June (1st-2nd June) and you can stay in touch with all Aspire training activities by joining the Aspire Coaching Weekends 2013 on Facebook or email me so I can put you on my mailing list.

*****

- Yes, I probably could get "a proper job", do something good - I say to my Grandmother and for a moment she looks surprised. Or hopeful. I find it hard to guess - but instead of that Gran, I decided to do something amazing...;)
She laughs and I wonder if she truly got it. But I don't ask.

Disclaimer: Please do not be compelled to quit your jobs (unless you really feel you should) to also do something amazing. Keep your jobs that pay you nicely so you can afford the amazing horsey training... ;)