I saw a post from barrel racer Fallon Taylor that caught my eye. She said, “be the beginner”. What she went on to say was that if you hit a ceiling in your discipline – try something new – be the beginner. For her it was riding jumping horses. But what stuck out to me the most was when she said, “It’s in the failures that character is built and every person at every level has once been the beginner.” I get calls all the time asking who gives lessons to beginners – I only know a few that I would recommend, why, because a lot of people in our industry don’t want to teach beginners – for whatever reason. I personally love teaching beginners. They are a blank slate with no bad habits from anyone else. Littles are my all-time favorites to teach. I love hearing the giggles for the first time when we trot. If you haven’t guessed, my favorite class to judge is leadline. But so many in our industry don’t want to take on beginners, and while I understand it can be frustrating when someone doesn’t get what you’re trying to teach them, let me ask you – what have you done to help them? Years ago, I had a dad whose daughter took lessons with me, his son had autism but LOVED to ride. He asked me if I would teach him. I told him I wasn’t a certified special needs instructor, but he didn’t care he just asked me if I would try. So, I did. He wasn’t verbal and he didn’t understand the typical instructions of heels down, look up so I had to learn some creative ways to teach him, and I did. By the time I left that stable he could guide his horse by following me unassisted, stopping, backing up and even sit a trot – although I always kept him on a leadline and ponied him when we were outside of the arena but only as a safety measure. What he taught me was that I needed more than one way to explain something, to break it down into the smallest of parts if need be. After that experience I accidentally came across a book by Wyatt Webb called “It’s Not About the Horse”. Webb is a psychologist that uses equines in therapy and is part of the reason I went back to school for psychology, but I digress. I accidentally bought this book thinking it was horse related – and it was – but not the way I thought. It did, however, add another tool to my teaching toolbox. You see, horses mirror what we are feeling. If we’re resistant, they will be too. So, I stopped focusing all my attention on the rider and started watching my horses as well – and that opened a whole new window for me. You see, we all learn differently, and when we as instructors stop trying to teach every student the same way, it will make a world of difference to the students. If we want our sport to thrive, we need to be the ambassadors to the next generation of riders – the beginners. Because we all were beginners once – so be the beginner again and challenge yourself to give a leg up to the next ones.
Appy Riding,
Tracy