{"id":1102,"date":"2018-02-27T21:35:39","date_gmt":"2018-02-28T04:35:39","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/articles.amazinghorsecountry.com\/?p=1545"},"modified":"2019-02-21T13:07:49","modified_gmt":"2019-02-21T20:07:49","slug":"a-quick-chat-about-focus","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/articles.amazinghorsecountry.com\/index.php\/2018\/02\/27\/a-quick-chat-about-focus\/","title":{"rendered":"A Quick Chat about Focus"},"content":{"rendered":"

You may have heard me talk about Situational Awareness in clinics or watched my video on it<\/a>.\u00a0 You’ve likely been told at some point in a riding lesson or clinic, to FOCUS or LOOK UP. Yes, it is important to look where we’re going, but FOCUS is more than that. Lets look at some of the underlying fundamental components.<\/p>\n

1. Visualization – See it happen before it happens.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Since what we do on a horse is dynamic \u2013 that is \u2013 it’s in motion, a good idea is to play a video<\/i> in your mind of what you are going to do before you do it. This starts with a vision of the actual path you are going to ride. Once you’re riding, keep thinking a few seconds ahead.<\/p>\n

Studies have shown that visualization can enhance the performance of competitive athletes. Riding a horse is no different. When you visualize something, your concentration is engaged, your coordination is triggered and fear and anxiety are reduced.<\/p>\n

2. Energy – Feel it happen before it happens.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Having an image or ‘video’ in your mind is certainly part of the equation. Now, infuse that image with positive forward energy \u2013 not only do you want to visualize what it LOOKS like, you need to FEEL what it’s going to FEEL like when you do it.<\/p>\n

We know that when your horse is truly following you, he’ll also follow how you feel about something. Is it scary (are you nervous)? Is it good (are you positive)? Are we moving? (are you exhibiting forward energy)?<\/p>\n

Consider for example a transition to a lope on the arena wall. You not only need to visualize the path (circumference of the arena) but the positive forward energy associated with the gait or transition. I’ve asked many students to think about times that they’ve experienced that sort of energy. Some say galloping freely down a trail with a big smile. One said, \u201cFront row at Garth Brooks!\u201d<\/p>\n

Now, energize your path with that!<\/p>\n

3. Connection \u2013 Do it WITH your Horse.<\/strong><\/p>\n

If you’ve watched my video on merging technical and feel<\/a>, this is part of it. Whatever you’re doing with your horse you’re doing it TOGETHER. You’ll find a connection with your horse when he is following you physically and energetically. The converse is that the horse is simply trained to perform a maneuver on cue regardless of what the rider is doing.<\/p>\n

Personally, I like to ride my horse with the feel that my hips are his hips and my shoulders are his shoulders. I also look forward and up off the ground. I find that the combination of those are important components in helping us achieve lateral and longitudinal balance, straightness and elevation…and maintaining a proper riding posture. You’ll find that when you work towards this, the horse begins to emulate you; to become a mirror of you in many ways.<\/p>\n

Sometimes<\/strong> it’s easy to get tricked into having a tunnel vision<\/em> focus.\u00a0 You look at your hands, or the barrel, or the cone.\u00a0 On a trail ride you might look at the EDGE of the bridge or a river.\u00a0 When you do that – and believe me I’m writing from experience! – your horse has no focus to follow.\u00a0 If you want to cross that river, look to the other side (that also keeps you from drifting)!\u00a0 Last week I messed up a flying lead change because my focus went to the barrel that we were using as a turn point.\u00a0 My poor mare had no idea what was going on in that moment.\u00a0 I could only laugh because I knew exactly where I’d screwed up.\u00a0 The next time, however, I kept my vision up and FELT us ENERGETICALLY on the path before we rode it.\u00a0 No problem that time!<\/p>\n

When you put these all together<\/strong> the horse will be able to follow you. Horses follow the energetic direction of other horses and the herd. Recently I was working my horse Ditch while riding my mare, Belle. He was at liberty and he was doing a large canter circle around our small canter circle. I’ll get a video of this soon! To achieve this required my focus be on the space around our whole circle \u2013 not just directly in front of me \u2013 and not just on one horse or the other. You’ll have an idea of what that feels like if you’ve done any liberty work in our clinics \u2013 it’s awesome!<\/p>\n

Feb 2018<\/p>\n

Scott Phillips<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

If you’ve been in one of my clinics, read articles or watched my videos, you’ll have heard me mention how important FOCUS is. Here’s a detailed explanation of how a simple technique can make huge changes in your riding.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1102","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/articles.amazinghorsecountry.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1102","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/articles.amazinghorsecountry.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/articles.amazinghorsecountry.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/articles.amazinghorsecountry.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/articles.amazinghorsecountry.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1102"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/articles.amazinghorsecountry.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1102\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/articles.amazinghorsecountry.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1102"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/articles.amazinghorsecountry.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1102"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/articles.amazinghorsecountry.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1102"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}