Preconceived ideas...

Over the years, i've seen a lot of people who seemed to really be struggling with their relationship with their horse. I mean, it's my job to help people with challenging relationships with their horses so I suppose I see more of this than the average person but that being said, it certainly does seem that the preconceived idea of relationship can sometimes get in the way of horsemanship. What I mean by that is for some people, the idea of what they're trying to create, what they've already decided their relationship will or should look like, actually gets in the way of appropriately observing and responding to what their horse really needs, from a horsemanship perspective. It's like trying to put a puzzle together with the wrong picture on the box... If you think you're putting together a picture of a panda bear, you will gather all your black pieces and all of your white pieces and try to fit them together in color groups. This is a good strategy for putting together a puzzle of a panda bare... but what if it's not a panda? What it it's a Zebra? If you THINK you're putting together a picture of a Panda but it's actually a picture of a Zebra, you'll be at it forever! Struggling to make your puzzle pieces into a picture of a panda when in reality, the final product is going to turn out very different than the one in your mind. The saddest part about it is that the picture of the Zebra might be quite beautiful! Maybe even more beautiful than the picture you THINK you're putting together of the Panda, but unless you can let go of the preconceived idea that you are creating a picture of a Panda, you may never see the Zebra.