Have you ever felt that fear start up when you think about going to ride your horse? You have the thought, what if the wind starts blowing? What if he is frisky? What if….Insert yours here!
We can all play the what if game for days looking for the things that can go wrong. What if, we change that around and look for the "what if" that are AMAZING? Wouldn't it be wonderful to think about riding your horse and be flooded with feelings of JOY?
It is possible and if you were ever that FEARLESS KID, it will come back to you!
I had a horrendous accident and I let it HOLD ME BACK from enjoying my riding. I had to make the DECISION to change my FEAR to COURAGE and get my riding back! Once I made the decision, the process opened up for me and here are the 3 key steps that I went through to getting back into the saddle again and riding my horse.
Step 1 - Health. I know this sounds massive, and for some, this will not be an issue at all, but for me, getting older, I needed to get my health back. One of the reasons kids are fearless is because they don’t have aches and pains. I changed my diet a couple times until I got it right and in doing so, my migraines disappeared (BONUS), my flexibility improved tremendously and so did my confidence with my balance and strength riding. I also had to get my mindset fixed but both of these are complete topics on their own. The other part of this was my horses health and mind. These four elements - Rider Health, Rider Mind, Horse Health, and Horse Mind - all have to be functioning for courage to prevail.
Step 2 - Knowledge. This one was so hard for me at first. How do you go about getting the knowledge you need. The horse trainers I talked to didn't "get" the fear, they didn't have fear. They just said "GO CANTER" or whatever it was because they didn't connect with my level of fear like the horse connected with it. I also tried going to "coaches" but they didn't "get" the combination of rider and horse feeding fear off of each other. I finally found an amazing coach that really helped with cutting the ties to the fear from the accident and I worked through an anchoring process, using Stress Away on my right wrist and Thieves on my left wrist to ANCHOR calm and courage respectfully from a smell to a feeling. These two pieces of knowledge were a huge start.
Step 3 - Experience. This was the hardest part at first. I had to put myself into a "what if" things go amazing place and fill myself with those emotions. I had to use my Anchors to set it into my mind and body. I had to create an amazing vision for what I wanted the ride to look like and then I had to GET ON and ride. I created exercises to help build the confidence and courage as I went and those first few rides, where I had complete peace and joy were worth every minute of working on this process.
So in a nutshell, these are the 3 things that I found worked for me: Health - Rider and Horse; Knowledge; and Experience. Following these 3 pieces of foundation, are so important so that you can enjoy riding your horse again in Confidence and Courage! Think about how grateful your horse will be to not have to deal with your fear any more!
We can all play the what if game for days looking for the things that can go wrong. What if, we change that around and look for the "what if" that are AMAZING? Wouldn't it be wonderful to think about riding your horse and be flooded with feelings of JOY?
It is possible and if you were ever that FEARLESS KID, it will come back to you!
I had a horrendous accident and I let it HOLD ME BACK from enjoying my riding. I had to make the DECISION to change my FEAR to COURAGE and get my riding back! Once I made the decision, the process opened up for me and here are the 3 key steps that I went through to getting back into the saddle again and riding my horse.
Step 1 - Health. I know this sounds massive, and for some, this will not be an issue at all, but for me, getting older, I needed to get my health back. One of the reasons kids are fearless is because they don’t have aches and pains. I changed my diet a couple times until I got it right and in doing so, my migraines disappeared (BONUS), my flexibility improved tremendously and so did my confidence with my balance and strength riding. I also had to get my mindset fixed but both of these are complete topics on their own. The other part of this was my horses health and mind. These four elements - Rider Health, Rider Mind, Horse Health, and Horse Mind - all have to be functioning for courage to prevail.
Step 2 - Knowledge. This one was so hard for me at first. How do you go about getting the knowledge you need. The horse trainers I talked to didn't "get" the fear, they didn't have fear. They just said "GO CANTER" or whatever it was because they didn't connect with my level of fear like the horse connected with it. I also tried going to "coaches" but they didn't "get" the combination of rider and horse feeding fear off of each other. I finally found an amazing coach that really helped with cutting the ties to the fear from the accident and I worked through an anchoring process, using Stress Away on my right wrist and Thieves on my left wrist to ANCHOR calm and courage respectfully from a smell to a feeling. These two pieces of knowledge were a huge start.
Step 3 - Experience. This was the hardest part at first. I had to put myself into a "what if" things go amazing place and fill myself with those emotions. I had to use my Anchors to set it into my mind and body. I had to create an amazing vision for what I wanted the ride to look like and then I had to GET ON and ride. I created exercises to help build the confidence and courage as I went and those first few rides, where I had complete peace and joy were worth every minute of working on this process.
So in a nutshell, these are the 3 things that I found worked for me: Health - Rider and Horse; Knowledge; and Experience. Following these 3 pieces of foundation, are so important so that you can enjoy riding your horse again in Confidence and Courage! Think about how grateful your horse will be to not have to deal with your fear any more!
Come join my "Cheerleading" group cheering each other on in this journey. If you don't experience fear, come help those of us that do and if you do have fear, it is a safe place to share, learn and grow! Click here so that you can enjoy riding your horse again!
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