The Key is Balance!

Sherry helping Carol with her mustang Rizo.

After going to the NE Horse Expo in March it occurred to me once again that the key to good horsemanship or learning anything new is balance. I don’t mean the kind of balance where one stays upright without falling down, rather I refer to a mental and emotional steadiness which brings harmony.

A horseman who stays balanced has a stability produced by equality between two sides. When we learn not to lean too far to either side of the road and go at a reasonable speed we will have fewer crashes along the way. An aesthetically pleasing integration of common sense elements will keep you traveling in an upward spiral of success. When a balanced approach is taken your journey will be safer and you’ll have a lot more fun.

Whenever many horse people gather together you will find a variety of different experiences, perspectives, styles, techniques, and purposes being professed and applied. Even though we may all be involved in the same endeavor (HORSEMANSHIP) diversity does abound. But if one looks close enough you can find some common threads of similarity underneath the differences. It takes a discerning eye to recognize both the differences and at the same time the similarities. If you can learn to do this you will be able to stay balanced and your horse will thank you for it.

Part of the balance needed to succeed with horses is having a means of judging and deciding what is right for you and your horse. Every horseman will at some time have to cope with several often conflicting ideas, factors, or situations at the same time. To horse owners this can often be confusing and frustrating. Thus to learn what it takes to become really good with horses and develop a system that works for you and your horse it requires a balance of openness, skepticism and common sense!


Everyone of us hopes to find that holy grail of horse training which will solve every problem we have with our horses. We hope to find a perfect working system which fits every horse and every owner. The problem with every system is horses are masters at pointing out the weakness in any system. So it takes a balanced person who is able to work within a system yet think outside the box in order to resolve our weaknesses and allow the system to accomplish our intention.


I believe that if you are with horses it is because consciously or not, you desire to be challenged and to learn. However you will never learn anything new or gain deeper understanding if you go in with the attitude that a certain “way or training system” is wrong or not for you. I used to compete in rodeos and my beginnings with horses could be considered pointing in an opposite direction from where I am now. I have lived and breathed on opposite sides of two very different systems, but for me they were both pointing at the same thing… the horse! As I reflect on the people, horse and systems which have influenced my brand or style of horsemanship I see they share similarities as well as differences. I choose to focus on the common threads between those two systems which I have experienced, as the truth usually lies somewhere in the middle.


The horse doesn’t care what we call ourselves….natural, dressage, barrel racer, roper, cutter, trail rider, competitor, western, english, professional or amateur, the horse just wants us to understand him mentally, emotionally and physically. I believe I now have a better understanding of people and horses because of my diverse experiences and willingness to live somewhere in balance between openness, skepticism and common sense. Plus I have put myself under a proven training system and at the same time I allow myself to think outside the box when needed. I have also given myself permission to experiment and learn from my mistakes.


We can all learn and benefit from each other because at least in the basic form any performance or discipline you choose does not need to be different from “natural horsemanship”. No matter what activity you do with a horse a solid foundation is needed where you can carry freestyle riding into the finesse it takes to compete at higher levels. We will all be better off, especially the horse, if we begin to focus on the commonalities between our systems and celebrate our strengths rather than our weaknesses.

Happy Trails,

Sherry Jarvis

PS:

A balanced horseman has the ability to stay poised no matter what situation is thrown at him.