Avoiding Premature Automation in My Judging

Last weekend I was supposed to do my first bout of scribing and that didn't happen, which was a bummer. I had spoken to the show organizer and signed up to scribe at two of their shows back in January, but when I checked in about scribing on the date that's literally been in my calendar for two months, I was told that the conversation that's literally in my phone had never happened.

To say I was bummed is an understatement, it's been a long tough two weeks and I was looking forward to getting half my scribing hours in over the weekend. And they wouldn't even let me sit (I need 10 sitting hours). So I'll be asking advice from the other people in the program about finding real scribe positions aaaand I'll be emailing everyone I've spoken to about scribing every week until the show dates. Lesson learned: be completely obnoxious.

It's fine okay

The reason why I was so eager to scribe or sit this weekend is because I'm literally driving up for Session D1 of Part 2 tomorrow! It would have been amazing to chat with a judge about their judging education the week before we start, but I'll have plenty of time to do that.

I've been studying hard and practicing judging... a little less hard. It's easy to quickly flip through flash cards while watching TV or taking a break at work or in between lessons, but the judge practicing requires a little more effort, so I need to put in more time there. Actually, as I write this post, I've got a bunch of youtube videos up and writing this is my break from judging.

It's definitely getting easier. I was having a conversation with a friend who was talking about getting a very low score from a judge, even though her stingy S judge trainer said that the test was very good. That judge gave her a 4 on gaits and I immediately was like "TWO OF HIS GAITS WERE PERVASIVELY IMPURE? YEAH RIGHT" and then realized how much I'd learned. I now have a really good idea of what each score for each of the collective marks look like (for the record, a four on gaits means that two of the gaits are pervasively impure, a five means one is pervasively impure, a six means all are pure but gaits are limited, or two gaits are good and one is pervasively impure, there's a whole system).

One of the ways I cope with stress is by buying plants apparently
this is not all of them (they did get spread out though)

But at the end of the day, it's just going to take a lot of time to get this knowledge so deep in my brain that I can sort of go on "autopilot" and that's okay. I mean, obviously I'm desperate to fully automate judging so that it's less fatiguing, but I have to resist that. Mary Wanless talks about premature automation in our riding as being a massive problem. We are taught to post as beginning riders when we have limited abilities and then we never change the way we post. I don't want to prematurely automate my judging because I want to be really good at that. I don't want to be the judge that automated too early to avoid fatigue and is just one of those judges that writes "5, off bit" or "7, smooth" on every single movement.

Because of this, I'm treating this almost like a physical skill at this point. I'm flexing my judge muscles until they get fatigued, then I take a break. At this point, I'm tired after judging two tests in a row at this point, my brain feels slow and foggy. So I'm taking a break right now and will go judge another two tests in a row and then take a break again. Perfect practice makes perfect, after all.

Me, currently, while judging

It's amazing to hear our top judges judge, I still vividly remember Mike Osinski judging for us as a demonstration. He has an amazing rhythm. He makes the test feel so much slower, while when I judge, I feel like I'm scrambling to keep up with the rider (pro tip, if you're going to go too slow or too fast in a test, go too slow! LOL honestly just do you, but if you ride in front of me any time soon, I appreciate a lazy horse). His comments are spot on every single time, they vary when there's a pervasive problem (one of the hardest things is to find 15+ different ways to tell a rider their horse has to be on the bit). His collective comments are very well thought out as well, they encourage the rider while also not skirting over the issues.

All of this seems to come so easy to him. It's part disillusioning and part inspiring.  At the end of the day, it's easy for him because he's worked hard and he's been judging for a long time now. I know I need to give myself some time to get to that point, not automate so quickly that I become a lazy judge.

Tomorrow I leave for the first session of Part 2 and I'm excited to exhaust myself learning. Luckily it's only two days for this first session!

Teaching Progression

So this moment the other day that I described yesterday, the one that showed me how far I had come as a rider and instructor, actually had way more to do with the latter.

I've been teaching for a long time now, kind of on and off in intensity but now it's ramping back up and I'm seeing a big difference in my teaching. It kind of goes along with my riding progression too, so I figured I'd put these posts back to back. Also I have way less time to write last minute blogs so I wrote a bunch of these kinds of posts to put up when I don't have time to write.

Here are some differences I've noticed in my teaching.

I have no teaching progression pictures so how about TC
progression pictures? October 2017

To August 2018

Way More First Toolkit

I still teach a lot of second toolkit, don't get me wrong, I think it's important for riders to understand what things should feel like and what they currently look like. None of my clients have access to mirrors, so telling them that the horse is off the bit is necessary for them.

However, I am VERY aware of what toolkit I'm working in and I make sure that when I use second toolkit language, I back it up with first toolkit language. Like "and ride him rounder by drawing him up under you with your calf and grabbing onto him with your upper inner thigh, think about dropping your shoulder blades into your back pockets and engage the lats, add 20lbs to each elbow but continue pressing the knuckles forward against that resistance" unless I'm teaching Peony where it somehow always becomes real R rated real quick.


Willingness to Help Clients Cognitively Restructure

As an instructor, it's super easy to operate within a client's current framework. Rider comes to me telling me that their horse is a dick and that they can't get him forward... it's easy for me to give the rider a whip and talk about the importance of free forward movement, while also implying heavily that their horse is a dick.

It's WAY harder for me to break down the rider's fundamental understanding of what forward is and how they are blocking it in their body, how it isn't the horse's fault. When someone hears that they are the problem or that their framework is wrong, it leads to them being... way harder to teach. It's easy to lose clients if you challenge the way they view their horse or the way they view dressage. It's real easy to retain clients if you tell them what they want to hear and push them along the path they're already on. You can even make it seem like you're being truthful while still just operating within their framework.

Being candid and slamming a client down a bit is HARD. Especially when you're dependent on your training income. It also sucks to have to confront someone just generally, especially when it's a sport they love so much, and especially when they're at a high enough level where they know they're not bad at this. Dragging someone kicking and screaming back to the basics only for them to shit on you and tell you and everyone else that you're a bad instructor... that's fun. But that's the risk. And until recently, it was a risk I hated taking, so I didn't take it often.

October 2017

August 2018

Working on my Teaching

Ever since the first Mary clinic, I've been focusing on my teaching as a skill to be developed. Riding Alexis' horse with her helped me understand recently that me taking lessons on different types of horses helps my teaching quite a lot. Riding TC well is important to me and it will be the primary focus of where I choose to put my money, and don't get me wrong, what I learn on him can be applied to a lot of different types of horses, but riding other horses with my trainers is important for my teaching.


More Confidence

Teaching new riders when you're first starting out is nerve wracking. I used to get a lot of anxiety going to teach new people.

Now that I'm working harder on my teaching, new riders are exciting to me. I see people riding and I want to get my hands on them, I want to Mary them, which is a silly thing Kate and I always say. I feel confident that I can help a lot more people than before.

In addition, if I can't help them, no biggie, I don't want clients to ride with me and be like "eh there are no other options so I'll settle for Megan," I realize that my program is not for everyone. And I also realize that I want clients who are dedicated to my program. And I just plain like teaching people who are fun to teach. If I feel like I can't teach someone or that they don't match with me, I'm okay with pulling back and sending them elsewhere.

Being a dick in October 2017

Being a dick in August 2018

Slowing it Down

Just like my riding, my teaching has been way more focused on the basics. I'm still a big planner and like to put my agenda on my riders a bit (unless they give me theirs), but I am way more dedicated to their education than their achievements. I want my riders to understand exactly what is happening under them and know how to get to that place. Whether that means an entire lesson on how well stuffed each side of the horse is (happened more than once recently) or an entire lesson on a twenty meter circle (can count on one hand the number of times I've had anyone to do anything but that), who cares. I want my riders to be educated.

Maybe this comes from the majority of my riders riding with me once a week or less. I want them to be autonomous and to think about their own training and their horse's training as something they are in charge of. I am there to guide and to educate, they are the trainers. Not that I would turn down someone who wants a more involved trainer, but it's hard with my full time job, my commute, and my own horse. Oh and I like to sleep and have a social life sometimes. Blasphemy.

October 2017

August 2018

I'm really excited with how my teaching is going these days. I know I still have so much to learn and so much this year is going to help with that. I am, of course, attending the Mary Wanless Workshop in early February. AND I'll be doing the L program this fall! Lots of learning coming up for the next couple of years!