Awareness - seeing what's going on with a horse that I get in for training or a new lesson may take weeks to begin to get an idea of what is going on. Not everything that is going thru that horse's mind or the person's comes out in the first hour.  Just like getting to know a person; it takes time to find out if you want to be friends with them or not.
Mistakes? Maybe some people consider moves, requests and such mistakes, but I feel it's more like trying things to see what's going on and what's going to work. I don't consider those mistakes. You have to start somewhere.

"The key is not to prioritize what is on the schedule, but to schedule your priorities." --Stephen Covey

Now as many of you know if you've been reading my newsletter, this quote has been loafing about in the 'upcoming stuff' segment just about forever while I got taken and swayed by what happened yesterday that was so fascinating to write about - newest shiny object. But, while I was reading my beginning words on awareness and mistakes at the top of this segment, I glanced down and read the quote and lo and behold, it hit me in a much bigger way and I realized it was exactly the quote for this concept. Rather it's the concept itself.

I always have a plan. It's silly not to. But, what is the plan??? Maybe I want to work on the stump. Well, the stump is immaterial frankly. The stump is just a marker for how I'm asking my horse to move and what I'm observing about how he moves - physically, emotionally and mentally. If the horse doesn't respect my space while moving toward the stump - THAT's where we are and THAT's what gets taken care of. If he didn't respect my space that means he's left, right, forward or back of where I'd like and while that's fine, I'm going to take the opportunity to ask that he move something in a different direction. Now, even this is NOT a demand. I'm not MAKING my horse do what I want. I'm simply seeing if I can influence him to move them somewhere else. If his attitude tells me I can take my request and... then THAT's where I am. I'm going to see what's happening there. The stump is nothing. I may get over there or I may not. If I insist he get on the stump, that's prioritizing what is on the schedule. But, my priority is HOW well he would get on the stump and that includes everything leading up to the stump - which comes first. That's scheduling your priorities.

• "It's the little things that make a big difference."
• "How can something so simple be so difficult?"
• "I don't want fear in my horse, but I do want the highest degree of respect." 
• "You get out of the horse what you put in - the way you put it in." - Ray Hunt