Remember to Breathe

Here's a photo of Lily practicing a leg wrap on a friend at last Saturday's Pony Club meeting in Aiken.

I think we're all holding our breath. The national news makes me go fetal, and I don't dare open anything from my 401K. So I've turned off the news. The sun still shines. The horses aren't worried. And really, now, you can't live if you're not breathing.

Lily learned this lesson the hard way on Saturday at Pony Club. She had a great clinic with Richard Lamb, who told her group that they were all really good at one thing: not breathing. So he had them count (he also suggested singing but didn't get any takers) out loud while then went through a gymnastic and then over some jumps.

You could watch them all relax as they counted. The horses relaxed. The kids relaxed. The parents relaxed. Just remember to keep breathing. And counting or singing (I would have made them sing Christmas carols but I wasn't in charge).

All was well until they were winding up. Lily and Buddy approached a jump. Lily had quit counting -- and breathing. Buddy hesitated, then overjumped it. When they landed, Lily's weight was on her hands (on his neck) and knees (somewhere on his back/sides) and she was stiff from holding her breath. She was not relaxed, counting, breathing and going with the horse. To her surprise, and mine, she wasn't able to recover and instead, after several strides on an increasingly stiff and alarmed horse, she fell. It would have been a nothing fall, but she landed almost tangled up with him and as Buddy turned to gallop away, his hoof kicked her. It wasn't an intentional kick, but he hit her calf. Fortunately she had on tall boots. Even more fortunately, nothing was broken. She really hurt and needed ace bandages and crutches for a few days, but is okay now.

Richard Lamb was very kind and consoling. But he did happen to mention that it wouldn't have happened if she'd been breathing.

Sounds so simple. Just breathe. A good lesson for every situation.

Comments

[greyhorsematters]

Breathing=relaxing. My daughter used to do the same thing around a course. Her instructor had her just breathe in the corners to get her thinking about it and from then on it was easier to breathe the entire course. Good post. Sorry to hear about Lily, poor kid, must have hurt like the dickens.

[Chris]

Great pick up from the instructor and indeed an invaluable lesson for life in general - especially when things go a bit awry!

Love that they practice bandaging on each other :D

[Victoria Cummings]

I'm so glad that Lily is okay. I'd have stopped breathing if my daughter fell off. Yes, breathing. How can something so simple and natural be so hard to do and remember? And how amazing that it is the answer to so many problems.

[risingrainbow]

Whenever I'm standing on the rail at a horse show, I always tell the riders I know going by to breathe. Like you said, it's so simple but the first thing we quit doing when we're stressed.

I'm glad that Lily is OK. Rick Lamb is great!

[kathyc]

I'm glad she is okay.

[photogchic]

Glad to hear she is ok. I do a lot of counting when I ride and really work to "exhale" when I want to stop...funny how all that little stuff matters.