What Happened Before What Happened Happened

Yesterday was my first time focusing on carrot stick riding. I have played around with it before, but mostly just experimenting and nothing major. Last night was one of our first times trotting with the carrot stick and it went so well! He really listened to my body, and if he didn't he responded nicely to the carrot stick. We played with the question box and even did some trot figure 8s. I might have moved a little to fast though, so I will be sure to slow it down in the future. Anyways, he did great!

When I got home from riding I saw that Samantha had commented on one of my old videos, asking whom the horse was. The horse was Icon, my last dressage horse. He was very talented and was supposed to be my Junior/Young rider horse. He was trained to Prix St. George, so he knew a ton and was very obedient, but he had no desire to be with me or me with him. We didn't have a relationship at all. Every time I rode him it was like training someone else's horse, not my own. We were just coworkers.

The video she commented on was this one:

I had actually forgot that it existed! This was back in June of '08, and I didn't start parelli until Sonny in October of '09. Here I am riding bridless without a carrot stick, savvy string, or any foundation. Last night I was thinking "Well that doesn't make sense. I am playing in level 3 with my parelli horse and we are just starting carrot stick riding and I could get my old horse that I didn't get along with to do figure eights without anything!?" But the more I thought about the more it started making sense. I know I have heard Pat talk about obedience, but what came to mind is one of Linda's recent blog posts: "Yes, they are safe and obedient, but they are not necessarily exuberant". That is what I had with Icon. I could ride him bridless because he had been micromanaged and was taught that he had to listen to everything I did with my body. He did not care about me, about being with me, or anything like that. He only did what he did because he knew he was supposed to.

Considering I want to start dressage naturally more than anything in the world, I would give my left arm to have my dressage horses back. Never ever would I regret Sonny or trade him for the fanciest dressage horse. After watching that video, I have never felt so good about my decision to sell them. Icon was a great horse, but we didn't have any sort of relationship and neither of us cared to. It would be hard to put the relationship first when I didn't care to have a relationship with him. And even if we managed to get past that point, bridless riding would have been cake. But probably not because our solid foundation and excellent relationship, it would have came easy because that is what he was trained to do.

I miss my dressage horses all the time. But, I am so grateful to have a fresh start with a horse that hasn't been micromanaged to obedience. I may have breezed through bridless riding with Icon, but how would I ever teach it to another horse if I didn't teach it to my first levels horse? At the same time, I am also grateful for my outstanding dressage horses! They taught me so much about using my body first, then my legs, and then my hands. They had already made me sensitized to everything that I need to excel at now in order to teach Sonny bridless riding. I am so lucky to have the background that I have, and the horse that I have now!

Icon and me at a show in 2007.