Calm After the Storm

No, this is not a reference to the monsoon, but more to my calmed state after the end of Equest 2007, the recent South India Equestrian Association show held at my riding school in Bangalore. It's strange but true that the whole competition sent me into a frenzy of stress and anxiety that I can only equate to my early days of doing client presentations at work - I loved it after the fact but got so nervous beforehand that I was terrible when rehearsing (some may say it didn't get any better during the real thing!) At the show, I was worried that in the amateur dressage, my horse wouldn't canter, but he did; a co-rider was worried her horse wouldn't stop cantering, and sadly, he didn't, even in the parts of the tests that were meant to be walk or trot! Poor thing. It all got me wondering, why do I do it? It's not that I'm getting paid for it (I will never be that good!) so that rules out the reason that I had to suffer such stress at work. A couple of weeks after the competition, I can now answer that question. Because I love it. I love the grace and strength of the horse, the excitement of taking part, the joy of learning something new, and of course, the medals! I often feel my riding is two steps forward, one step back, but this week was many steps forward with much cantering with no hands or no stirrups, more dressage, and my first 'real' jumping on new horse, Royal Majesty. Terrifying and exciting at the same time, jumping is completely exhilirating but I have to remember not to squeal over the jump and frighten the horse! Luckily he is much more experienced than me and carries me along for the ride quite confidently. I guess we all have good and bad days at whatever we do, and I only hope that this streak of stress-free riding continues up to and through the next competition!