An Equation for a Valuable Lesson

What do you have when you take: 1 two year old horse+12 panels+one state sentinel?

I’ll tell you, you have an equation for one valuable lesson…and not just for the colt. 

I can remember watching all the cowboys break horses at Liberty Ranch when I was little.  Back when my idea of quality ranching was as simple as telling all the hands, “If we just keep the cows with the cows, and the horses with the other horses and we don’t get bucked off at branding we will have a good day!” I also remember thinking, “Someday that is going to be me stomping those broncs!”  Eventually I was able to begin doing just that, and this summer marks my third consecutive year of breaking colts for the ranch, unfortunately I guess 3 years isn’t a big anniversary to everyone else so I didn’t get a party. (Sad Day)  I did however get a valuable lesson.

            There is an old cowboy quote that reads, “Whoever said a horse is dumb…was dumb.”  This saying proved very true for me.  I was working with a beautiful red roan gelding who was doing magnificent on his first ride, we were on a fast track to becoming best friend; I mean drink morning coffee over a nice can of oats best friends now. That is until we got to the point where he was supposed to start trotting figure eights in the round pen.  Instead he vapor locked and decided it was time to go all NFR on me.  This happened twice, which resulted in me wanting to go all CAPS LOCK on him.  Luke, a good friend of mine who happens to be the definition of a “top hand”, saw all of this transpire.  He promptly trotted his colt over and asked, “Why do you keep having the same argument with that colt?”  I simply replied (at a high volume), “I don’t know! I think he’s just hot, mad, and really doesn’t want to do right by me anymore no matter what how hard I try!” (This overconfidence stemmed from the fact that I believed, key word believed, I was the next Clinton Anderson on my way to win the Road to the Horse)  Luke then told me to attempt to get my horse to move out again, only this time he had me make some extremely small changes in what I was doing with my reins and body language.  Of course the horse did exactly what I wanted him to and we proceeded to work figure eights like we were attempting to win the county fair.

            The lesson here was simple: I was putting all the blame on my colt, when I was the true cause of my own problem.  Too often when we encounter a difficulty or something begins to not go our way, we automatically try and find some other person, machine, or even a horse.  We play the blame game and fail to see the error of our own ways, when in reality if we look to ourselves first we may realize that the problem was self-caused.  Think of how many times you have seen someone wrongly place the blame, or even of a time when you may have done it yourself.  Think of how that felt.  I know that after I accused my colt wrongly I felt like packing my tack on the spot.  So I encourage you to do what Luke made me do: Don’t falsely place blame until you are 100 percent sure that it isn’t actually your own fault.