Like many amateurs with full-time jobs, I struggle with finding the time and motivation to ride during the winter months. Here in Virginia, we have fairly mild winters compared to the Northern and Mid-Western states, but I still find myself rushing home most nights to try and get a ride in before the arena freezes for the night.

I’ve been blessed with a wonderful off-the-track Thoroughbred who’s as intense about his work as I am, but if he has any more than two days off in a row, he starts to try to find new ways of injuring himself during turnout, so regular work is a must.

So many horsemen I admire learned to ride by the seat of their pants across fields or in backyards before civilizing their seats with formal instruction. In this day and age that’s much rarer, with society growing more litigious and more top riders than ever hailing from major cities. I’m a product of this trend, growing up in a non-horsey urban area. I learned to ride at the end of a longe line and in a ring, eventually showing hunters under the guidance of excellent horsemen who did their best to impart good horsemanship as well as correct position and style onto me.

To be honest, if I were horse shopping right now, I wouldn’t give my own current horse a second look. I spent many years bringing along young horses and off-the-track Thoroughbreds and selling them on. For the horse that ended up staying with me, being “mine,” I always had visions of a leggy, flashy, freakishly talented yet remarkably kind and quiet steed. You know the one—that imaginary horse that is the standard in our heads when we look at any other creature. Oh, and he’d definitely be a striking dapple gray.

I was warned this would happen. I’ve been invited to a Princess Party.

Well, not me, but my 3-year-old daughter, who needs a driver.

For most of my adult life, my weekends have fallen into one of three categories: compete a horse; go to see a horse for sale or present a horse who is for sale; or do random catch-up farm work like getting in hay, cleaning stall mats, etc. Decorating tiaras? Not so much.

As an amateur rider with a terrible mental game—just ask any poor friend who’s had to help me get ready for cross-country—I jumped at the chance to attend a sports psychology workshop with Kip Rosenthal at Virginia Intermont College, Oct. 25-26. 

The mental game is obviously one crucial aspect of competition, and it’s one I think many people neglect entirely or have a difficult time mastering. Almost everyone takes lessons in jumping or flatwork, but studying the art of staying calm and focused? Not so common.