03/25/2026
You know why it takes like 10 years to train a dressage horse to Grand Prix?
Cause it's f*cking hard, that's why.
Today I rode a big, wobbly, 5-year-old who still thinks the world might end if he has to carry himself properly for more than three strides.
He braced the second I asked for anything resembling dressage, poll tight, hollow back, hind legs trailing like they were on vacation.
I half-halted softly. He popped his head.
I tried again, lighter. He shortened but stayed braced.
Forward came back, tension stayed.
Rinse, repeat.
At one point I caught myself thinking the same old lie: "If I just did this better, he'd get it."
Then I remembered: no.
This isn't about me being bad.
This is about the sport being brutal in the best way.
The brace is normal.
It's not failure. It's not evidence you suck. It's proof the horse is alive, feeling, thinking, reacting. It's proof you're asking for something real. Something that goes against a million years of survival wiring.
We spend years (years...) chipping away at that brace. Teaching a flight animal that carrying himself (and me) won't kill him. That softness is safer than tension. That the rider asking for collection isn't a predator on his back.
Our instincts fight it. We want control, security, quick fixes.
The horse wants to run from pressure, brace against uncertainty, protect the parts of them that feel vulnerable.
So we override all of it. We stop gripping when we want to hold. Stop pushing when we want to force. Stop fixing when we want to correct. We stay soft in the face of resistance. Patient in the face of chaos. Curious instead of frustrated.
And slowly (so f*cking slowly) the brace starts to fade.
Today, after twenty minutes of brace-and-release, brace-and-forward, brace-and-breathe, something shifted.
Not dramatic. Not Grand Prix.
Just one moment where it felt right, relaxed a little over his back, softened and let go for two whole strides.
Then the tension came back.
But those two strides?
That's the long game.
Years of meeting brace with softness until the horse starts to believe that carrying himself isn't scary. Until suppleness isn't something we impose, it's something he offers because he trusts what we ask.
If you're riding a young one right now and feeling like you're getting nowhere, hear this:
You're not failing. You're in the middle of the hardest, most beautiful part.
The brace is normal. The wobbles are normal. The frustration is normal.
Keep showing up soft. Keep asking without demanding. Keep releasing when the answer is "not yet."
Until then? Embrace the brace.
The softness you're building doesn't happen in spite of the resistance. It happens because of it.
Every brace met with patience is a brick in the foundation of trust. Every wobble you don't punish is proof that safety exists here. Every moment you choose release over force, you're teaching them that maybe (just maybe) carrying himself won't kill him.
That's not failure. That's dressage.
And in 12 years, when that horse is floating through Grand Prix like it's nothing, no one will remember the wobbles. But you will. You'll remember every braced step that taught him to trust. Every moment you chose softness over force. Every day you showed up when it would've been easier to quit.
That's why it takes 10 years.
Not because the movements are hard.
Because the trust is.
~Stephen Forbes
The moment we finally get through the brace, pure magic, and it’s what keeps us going and going and going✨
✨Soft answers to brace, release instead of resistance, safety instead of survival mode.✨
Thank you Stephen your word and light are shining 🌟
