not on point, but on purpose?

I’m (re)reading a book right now about facilitating collective movement, and the author made a beautiful observation about the importance of focusing less on being ‘on point,’ and more about staying ‘on purpose.’ In other words, less of the discrete moment in time, and more of the big picture long view. 

testing our new Schockemöhle Air Silent bonnet!!

This felt timely to me after having a bit of a bust at the Loch Moy starter trial. Guys. I hemmed and hawed about entering this thing. See-ed and sawed. Whiffed and waffled. Well.. Mostly just the whiff. Classic clown stuff. 

I entered the show. Then literally scratched later that same day (getting a refund minus office fee). Then entered again, paying full price (again) PLUS late fee. And have literally goose eggs to show for it LOLsob.

did a little last minute grid too just to be safe

But ya know. Here’s the thing. I really love this event. The place has fantastic vibes, produces super reliable experiences, and I just ya know… love them. Loch Moy also has a lot of atmosphere, but in a not-unfriendly way. It really felt like such a perfect first event of the year.

Plus, I volunteered for the Saturday classes and could do all my course walking then… Leaving Sunday wide open for designing the most Doozy-friendly show schedule possible. 

loch moy requires competitors to bring their own pinny numbers… but my personal life has been hectic and both nights i missed closing time at the print shop by like 15min… DIY it is!

So with all the NQR-ness and missed time, I thought about maybe just signing up for a dressage test of choice. Or maybe just a CT? But ultimately I chose to enter the full HT, figuring if the mare felt good we’d just keep going. But if there were any issues? We could stop at any time. 

My sense was that… I’d regret it more for not at least giving it a shot, than if we had to call it early. And ya know. Here I am now on the other side of having had to call it early and… Honestly I feel great about all of my choices (well aside from all the wasted office fees LOL). It was a net positive experience.

walked the course the day before after volunteering — it look great! had a ditch option!

The cross country course looked literally fantastic. Some of the jumps were pretty small, sure, but eh at this point in our education, easy is fine. More importantly — the course had a ditch option, and a truly lovely water option that would allow us to jump all our jumps AND try out the water, but in an almost zero-risk sort of way. Perfect!

course also had a reeeeally nice water option. you could go direct through the water alllll the way around to that little jump just behind the car. OR, and my plan, you could do the jump option instead of the flagged water entry (was a pleasant starter table we’ve jumped before) and then go thru the water to the next jump. best of both worlds!

I was also determined to really ride each phase intentionally and accountably. Particularly the dressage. I wanted to really put our recent lesson to work, ya know?

But first, we arrived on the grounds about 2 hours prior to go-time so Doozy could have plenty of time for hand grazing, hand walking, and general familiarization. Last fall she was cool as a cucumber walking around all the rings, but on this day? Mare was lit up. I was grateful for the rope halter, to say the least. 

doozy was decidedly less quiet on the grounds than she had been last fall. we got there tho!

That didn’t give me the greatest feelings about surviving the warm up — but eventually Doozy seemed to remember where she was when we passed through the parking lot, and arrived back at the trailer after about an hour a much more settled horse. And in fact, was a dream for getting tacked up and hacking back over to the dressage rings. 

Then she could have knocked me over with a feather by how quiet and pleasant she was in the warm up ring. We spent a long while walking around, practicing changing bend and getting both my legs on and asking her to soften and give… And guys, the feeling was fantastic. She was super chill, and I truly believed we were about to *finally* ride a test that wasn’t characterized by purely trying to survive lol. 

look how excited i was to go do our dressage

But, womp, I picked up the trot and she was a little off again. Same friggin thing that’s been plaguing us. Siiiiiiigh. 

So ya know, obviously that was that. I dismounted, and we strolled placidly back the trailers, pausing by the show jump ring and all the other hallmarks of a busy bustling horse show. Absorbing as much exposure as possible before going home again. 

i asked the steward to take a photo of us for proof of the goodness before dismounting…
womp womp

And to be perfectly honest, Doozy was so completely relaxed by the end of the (very short) day that it was impossible not to see the value in the experience even if I remain frustrated by trying to understand what’s bugging her. 

Realistically, we probably would not have had a perfect test, but it might have felt a lot more rideable than anything from last year. The show jumping may have been dicey in places (there were a few spots on the course that looked less favorable to us than last year’s course). But the cross country I expected to be an absolute dream, and have zero reason to think otherwise. 

the exposure is so good for her tho

Which… is maybe another reason why this day was a net benefit. For me, a big part of feeling ready and comfortable and confident about showing revolves around having a relatively reasonable set of expectations. Navigating uncertainty is not among my chief strengths as a human. 

But on this day, I’m legitimately proud — proud of Doozy for venting her early season fizz quickly and efficiently enough to be a sweetheart in the warm up ring. But also proud of myself for setting up a healthy mindset and head space ahead of the show. That’s something I’ve been working on for years at this point — given my general tendencies toward anxiety, overthinking and vague existential dread. 

Being able to sleep well the night before, go through all the motions without obsessing, and get from point A to point B with just one foot in front of the other — all without once saying, “Eh maybe I don’t actually wanna.” To me? That’s a clear win. YMMV.

filling the tank before heading home <3

It’s also reaffirming to me that we’re on the right track with Doozy’s general training and education. It IS actually getting easier, and she’s growing and maturing as reasonably quickly as can be expected of a sensitive redhead. 

Tho obviously… That still leaves the NQRness as a literal and figurative sore spot from the day. So that’s something that will need a little further examination and exploration. Maybe the saddle needs another tweak - did we go too far with the flocking? Or maybe it wasn’t the saddle after all? TBD I guess. Tho we were already scheduled for a regular check in with our favorite chiro / acupuncture practitioner this week anyway, so we’ll start there. 

So ya know. Stay tuned, I guess lol(sigh). In the meantime, I’m just going to appreciate that while our “season opener” may not have quite gotten “to the point,” maybe it still supported us in our purpose. For now, that’s good enough.