It is the end of a long day. It’s been busy and it was hot! You have been up since dawn and now you need to give three more lessons in the evening.
The last thing you want to do is to give three more lessons. A nice cold drink while watching the sunset would be more enjoyable than standing in a hot dusty arena with sweaty horses.
But… your riders don’t know how busy you have been. Their ride is the highlight of their week. You just can’t stand there being tired and grumpy!
So, you pull yourself together and say: “Let’s get the show on the road”. But because you are tired you space yourself a little and try not to include too much. I would walk out of these lessons and think: “That was the worst lesson of my life”. And I would feel somewhat guilty because I put so little in.
Then came the biggest surprise. Almost all the riders in the lessons patted me on the back and said: “Bert that was one of the best lessons you have ever given. I really enjoyed it!” Now I was really confused. Didn’t I just confirm to myself that the lesson was horrible?! So, what made my students say it was a nice lesson?
In my “worst” lessons I stuck to just one subject and the riders were able to “get it”. Each time we repeated the exercise riders would get a bit better at it. In the end they had a good grasp of what we tried to achieve.
A win-win situation for all!
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