Welcome to Enya Explores, a series of interviews with industry experts and riders just like you. Here we cover valuable insights and practical tips to improve your and your horse’s health, happiness, confidence and success.
Part 1 – 4 things you should know about your riding mindset
These days there is a growing awareness around rider mindset, and rightly so. What we think and feel when we work with our horse makes all the difference – not just to how we ride and how our horse performs, but the experience of our ride – whether we’re confident and happy, or looking the part but actually a nervous wreck.
The bad news is improving your mindset takes ongoing commitment – unlike downing a sav blanc before your dressage test as a way to settle the nerves, it does require awareness and practice. The good news however, is will absolutely transform your progress with your horse, your performance in the ring, and your general confidence and enjoyment of your time in the saddle.
For this series of articles I spoke with Selina Iddon from Equestrian Confidence, an equestrian mindset coach certified with the International Coaches’ Federation and a keen horse rider, to find out how you can develop your mindset to become a better rider.
In this instalment we look at some of the basics about how to approach improving your mindset. Future articles will look at four different mindset techniques that anyone can use to influence their riding for the better.
1. Your thoughts and feelings are always there. You decide which ones to strengthen.
Selina says “We are never without our thoughts and feelings but we can choose which ones we want to focus on. Mindset makes us conscious of them and gives us a choice.”
“Our mindset is just like our physical strength. We all have muscles in our body, and we can be conscious of them and go to the gym to work them the way we want to. It’s the same with mindset. We don’t have to work on it because we are going to have feelings regardless. But if we want more of the feelings that are going to help us as riders, we can consciously choose to work on them.”
2. Don’t bury unhelpful thoughts; try to understand them.
Quite often if we feel negative thoughts or emotions like fear or frustration, our first instinct is to push them away. Unfortunately that tends to make them worse.
Selina says “Many years ago, shortly after I started riding, I was standing on the mounting block with a calm horse, but for some reason I felt a grip of fear – I even had tears running down my face. And my instinct was to say ‘This is totally irrational, I’m still going to get on and go.’ I would stop trying to feel my feelings and fake it. Trying to do this actually further destroyed my confidence more because I wasn’t able to understand or manage those feelings.”
Rather than trying to ignore negative feelings or make them wrong, accepting and understanding why you have them is a much more productive approach.
“To improve our mindset, it’s important that we understand these feelings. Then we are able to be okay with them and still get on and do what we want to do, without losing connection with the horse. Doing that is a really powerful approach.”
3. Trying techniques to improve your mindset? Do those that make you less comfortable.
When it comes to improving your riding mindset, there are so many techniques, trainings and coaching available; from NLP (Neurolinguistic programming) to equestrian-specific meditation.
While many methods are effective, it can sometimes be hard to know where to start. Surprisingly, Selina says it can be beneficial to start with techniques you might feel less comfortable with.
“The way the human mind works, is it’s naturally going to want to stay in its comfort zone. So if you see something that makes you think ‘that sounds nice’, it’s probably not going to get you out of your comfort zone and get you the best results. Whereas if you see an option that occurs as a bit more confronting – whether it’s an exercise or a coaching program – I would start with that.”
4. Any work you do on your riding mindset will also enhance other areas of your life.
For anyone who wants to put more focus on enhancing their mindset without taking the step to invest in a coach, Selina says anything to increase your awareness of your mindset will help, whether it be practicing mindset techniques or listening to a related podcast. The most important thing is consistency.
And once you get more aware of your thoughts and feelings, you will find improvements out of the saddle as well.
“Quite often our horses act as our mirror, and whatever is going on with our riding will often be happening somewhere else in our lives. So if we can focus on recognising our state of mind what’s causing it, we see improvements not just with our horse, but across the board.”
In the rest of the series we will explore some simple but very effective exercises that will improve your ability to ride at your best, while being confident and in harmony with your horse.
About Selina
Selina has been coaching for more than 15 years in various capacities and running her own mindset coaching business for 8 years. Her formal life coaching certification was through Authentic Education delivering the International Coach Federation curriculum.
Selina has specialized working with Equestrians for the last 6 years in addition to business women and mothers.
You can follow Selina on Facebook at Equestrian Confidence, or listen to her podcast Aussie Mindset Mentor.
About Enya
Enya is an EA Level 1 coach and 1*/2* eventer who has been riding for 20 years and coaching for 10 of them. Her favourite thing about working with horses is that we never stops learning, and loves tapping into the knowledge of specialist experts to enhance the skills of both herself and her students.
