‘Finding Neutral’

This year I’m focused on finding real balance in my life… I’m trying to measure my time for the things in my life that are important to me – Family – Personal Horsemanship – Business, and I have set achievable goals for my future success with a plan that has a clear pathway. Time to find the ‘holes’ in my foundations, and fill them in!

Of the 4 Savvies, I find Freestyle the one that is most difficult for me.  ‘Turning Loose’ of control has always been a personal challenge!  ‘Trust they’ll respond, be ready to correct – not more one than the other’ is an emotional battle for me.  When I was filming my levels back in the 90’s (was it THAT long ago?) this was the thing that I had to return to again and again to complete my goals.   And along the way I’ve realized that this applies to the other areas of my life.  Being aware of it has helped me in ALL my relationships, and in my progress in teaching, horsemanship, business life and people skills…the 4 areas Pat told us we would need to work to keep balanced if we were to be successful Parelli professionals.

I’ve been thinking about ‘the power of neutral’ – I think it describes this balance perfectly.  Neutral is that place where you are ready to slow, ready to go, ready to change gears but the engine is still running, and the fuel is flowing…..it’s not quitting time, not a loss of energy, it’s a state of ‘readiness’.   The battery is charged, the spark is there, the fuel tank is full and the driver is in position for the next move.  All that is needed is a road map and a desire to travel.  That’s the feeling I’m looking for each day now, and it’s given me much to think about as I seek it.

My family always gives me inspiration and I have many stories about my kids that relate to horsemanship…some of them are pretty funny.  I tell them often when I’m teaching, and the students seem to get something out of them, I think it gives them a way to relate to the lesson, especially if they are parents themselves!

Erinn and Bobby

Here’s one story that taught me a lot about ‘the power of neutral’….

When my daughter Erinn was a toddler I was at the beginning of my Parelli journey.  I was really trying hard to accelerate my progress in the program to become an instructor.  It was sometimes very frustrating, as I had very little ‘me time’ to play with my horses.  I didn’t have a babysitter or relative to help out, and I had to wait until she went down for her afternoon sleep before I could sneak out to the little paddock beside the house and play with my horse…and every day I hoped she had a looooong nap!    One day, as I was sitting on the chair beside her bed patting her back to lull her off to sleep, I realized that she was training me!…It was taking longer and longer to get her to sleep, and the moment I stopped patting and started to rise…veeeery slowly so as not to wake her up…she would grizzle and wake up, so I would sit down and start again.  And each day I was doing this more and more and getting more and more frustrated with it! When she would finally drop off, I’d be so frustrated that my playtime with my horse would not be so good, and it would be shorter because she would wake up at the same time regardless of how long it took for her to go to sleep!  One day I was reading Pat’s book ‘Natural Horsemanship’, and suddenly the phrase ‘patiently persist in the PROPER position’ rang a bell in my brain…hang on!  I’m NOT in the proper position for this!  I decided that I would apply my new horsemanship knowledge to my toddler, why didn’t I think of that before?!  I could improve my horsemanship without being ‘outside’ with my horse!  So I made a plan…..first, MY position was going to be sitting at the table in the kitchen, next door to her room, reading ‘Natural Horsemanship’ by Pat Parelli, while SHE went to sleep in her bed by herself.

FIRST challenge…. at ‘sleep time’ I tucked her in, said goodbye, went out her door and sat at the table…..and realized she was right beside me already.  NEXT step…don’t speak, make no eye contact, just put her back and repeat …SAME RESULT….OK, PATIENTLY PERSIST IN THE PROPER POSITION….same result….OK, NEVER SEEN THIS TAKE MORE THAN 2 DAYS…..for the next 4 HOURS we played this game…..after the first hour she stopped coming to the table, but would stop at the doorway, whining the whole time….after 2 hours I figured I had NOTHING to lose, so I kept going.  I was prepared to TAKE AS LONG AS IT TAKES SO IT TAKES LESS TIME….”god I hope this works” I was thinking!…..REPEAT PATIENTLY…then instead of going to the door she sat on the side of her bed…REPEAT PATIENTLY…finally she fell asleep WITH ME SITTING AT THE TABLE.   I was exhausted emotionally and mentally, and I’m sure she was too. But I’d also read in Pat’s  book, that if I did the right thing, next time it would take HALF THE TIME OR LESS…so I figured tomorrow’s session would take 2 hours or less, but I was happy to stick it out! After all, I’d spent the last 2 years doing the same thing and getting the same mediocre result, anything was an improvement!  And my horses could wait for a few days for me to play with them!

The next day….I tucked her in bed, walked to the table…she got out of bed…I put her back in….I repeated this a few times over the next 10 MINUTES….and she fell asleep while I was sitting at the table.  I actually didn’t realize she was asleep for a few minutes! YEE HA!   Then I went out and played with my horses for 2 hours.  I never had to sit beside her to get her to sleep again, she was like a little light bulb with a switch after that….I could put her into bed and happily know she would give me a precious 2 hours to myself within minutes.  And I also learned that I didn’t need to be frustrated about my lack of horsemanship time, that every hour of every day is an opportunity to improve yourself…one of the defining characteristics of a Parelli student.  That experience with Erinn helped me with every float loading session I’ve ever done since then.

Erinn sleeping

Balancing life is a wonderful challenge for all of us!  I like the saying ‘Everyone has to find success within their own personal harness’.  When we feel frustrated because our financial, personal, physical, emotional, mental or situational harness makes us feel restricted, we just need to remember that everyone else, no matter how apparently more ‘privileged’ they seem to be, is feeling the same difficulty.  But those times are when we have the most opportunity to grow and gain confidence for the next ‘opportunity’.

So here’s to finding life’s balance…I’ll let you know how that’s going, I’m sure to find a wobble here and there, or fall off the tightrope occasionally, but that just makes it more interesting…..

Tagged as: Christine Corbidge, Parelli Media