My journey to where I am now and towards my (brilliant) dressage career began, I suppose, when I was born. This isn’t just an unfounded comment – I mean, don’t all our journeys towards anywhere begin at birth?
I can’t really remember when my relationship with horses actually started, but it must’ve been when I was pretty small. We have a family farm in the Freestate and horse riding was always part of every visit.
This means I have quite a solid background in the fundamentals of horse riding: knowing how to sit comfortably on a horse, keeping in control, sitting the different paces and (most importantly) enjoying yourself!
I reckon that’s not a bad way to approach life: be comfortable in what you’re doing; don’t let situations get out of control; go with the flow, match the pace; and enjoy what you are doing. In my ‘woman over 60’ mode, I can add ‘roll with the punches’.
When you’re a really active person and have spent nearly 60 years playing sport, your muscles and joints do tend to be affected by wear and tear. And you have to contend with things like a torn meniscus that keeps rearing its ugly head, or a tweaked hamstring that just won’t settle. But you keep on doing what you love. In my case, that means horse riding.
For people who don’t ride horses, I’m pretty sure it appears as though horse riding is horse riding is horse riding.
Well, guess what… no, not all horse riding is the same.
Just to make it clear: all types of horse riding do involve a horse and a rider (what else, right?). However, many factors, such as how you sit, where your weight goes, the manner in which you hold the reins, the length of your stirrups etc etc differ between styles of horse riding – and they make such a difference.
I always knew all of this. (Perhaps, not quite from birth, but pretty much always.) However, exactly just how much of a difference I only found out first-hand in my 50s.
That was when my daughter, Sarah, and I decided to take up horse riding in Joburg. Of course, being in a city, you can’t just frolic out into the veld, put a bridle on your barefoot horse and ride off into the sunset (so to speak). You are confined to what a stable on the periphery of the city offers. This means, above all, the English style of riding, which is simultaneously the same as the Boere style of riding I’d learnt and almost worlds apart.
The Boere style of horse riding is more relaxed and less formal than the English style. At the stables, I’m learning to ride in a much more precise way. When I’m being flippant, I describe English riding as: You just need to twitch a toenail and the horse will do something new. It’s not quite that extreme, but is very different from the style I was used to.
Just like horse riding, the world ‘out there’ is full of contrasts, many of which relate to a common situation, style or discipline. Then, you are exposed to a slightly different aspect of the common thread and you have to make a shift to be successful. It may be daunting to make the decision to look at things slightly differently, but doesn’t that make things interesting?
So often, you’ll hear, ‘You’re never too old to learn something new’. Guess what? As with any cliché, it’s absolutely true! In my case, it wasn’t about learning something new, but about shifting stride to embrace a different aspect of a sport I’ve been involved in practically my whole life.
Perhaps, a more realistic way of looking at things is to say: ‘You’re never too old to shift your stride to learn a new aspect of something familiar.’
Never be afraid to make that shift – a whole new way of looking at the world may open up to you.
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