Sovereign Stables

Some horses spend their lives sitting in fields, and are never asked to perform any physical activities, so what I am going to suggest probably doesn't apply to... them. Broodmares, retired horses, whatever--- But many, probably most horses are asked to perform. The intensity of that performance might range from an occasional half, to 3/4 hour slow walk, to the outer limits of exertion, but whatever the intensity, one inescapable fact sits right there. And before I address it, I am going to try to phrase this in human terms--- Say, for example, that we live in a dictatorship, and on some given day, in any random town, someone just randomly chooses 50 people on the town street, out of offices, places of employment, wherever. These 50 are taken to the sports facility at a local high school, and are made to run laps, to lift weights, to perform the usual activities of the varsity players in various high school sports. What would we see? Well, take John and Mary. Randomly, those two are elite athletes.John happens to be an active military guy shopping, and Mary races mountain bikes, so they cruise through without much strain whatsoever. A few more, for one reason or another, are reasonably fit, and they too are basically OK. But many of those snatched up wouldn't be so lucky, would they? Some are elderly, some have underlying illness or injury, others are overweight, some are sedentary and weak----The physical activities forced on some of them would be a form of torture, even life threatening for a few. Why? Simple---They are being made to perform physical activity for which they are unprepared and unready. And yet, coming back to horses, humans do this to horses all the time. Some get hunted for hours, some made to sit and lift in dressage schooling, some to spin and slide, some to trot up long hills, some to gallop, and the same humans who would suffer greatly if it was dealt to them are OK with doing it to horses, and scarcely give it a thought. But all riders CAN, if they are tuned in to horse fitness, only require their horses to do those things that they have given them the ability to pull off without distress. Think about it---is this horse ready and able to do what I ask? Have I spent the time and effort to make sure he's up to this degree of work? Of all aspects of that word we call "horsemanship," this is "Horsemanship 101," the most basic of basics. THINK ABOUT THIS----

Sometimes we get stuck in the dark. It can creep up on us all, whether we’re jumping the big tracks, landing the last fence at Badminton or hacking down countr...y lanes on a Sunday morning. It doesn’t matter who you are, what you have, or how perfect your life may be...it just takes one cloud, and there you are, stood in the dark. To begin with, you stumble around trying to find a way out, but after a while, it can just feel pointless. Poles down, injured horses, poor results, bad falls. There’s no way any light is ever getting in and there’s no way out, what’s the point? But here’s the thing... Just as it only takes one cloud to bring the dark, it only takes one stray sunbeam to see the light...and sometimes those sunbeams just happen to have four hooves, two ears and a tail. Horses aren’t just our team mates, our partners in crime, our hobby, our sport, they aren’t rosette machines or a way to make money...for some of us, they are a light in an otherwise very dark world. They kick open the windows, they jump through the gaps and they let that light come streaming in. Galloping across stubble fields, finally getting that double clear, the unmistakeable sound of hoof beats in the sand as you canter down the beach... all these magical things make our world a bit brighter and one day, as your laughing, smiling and holding onto those reins just enjoying the moment you’re in, you realise that the light never really left, it was there all along... ...we just had to open our eyes.

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