United States Eventing Association

Last month we discussed a visualization technique designed to help us overcome challenges that are too risky to actually practice (like falling), but what about those challenges that aren’t risky? What about those that bother us but don’t threaten us? What about those that feel more dramatic than traumatic?

Those challenges could include overcoming a mistake (like pulling a rail), struggling to remember a dressage test, or coping with distractions on cross-country (insert dogs, plastic bags, and four-foot wooden squirrels here). These challenges will likely play a pretty recurring role in our lives and deserve our attention too so perhaps we should develop a few tools to help overcome them as well, and that’s where this month Pressure Proof tip comes in.

As I mentioned last month, overcoming challenges requires us to expose ourselves to them. After all, if we get nervous riding in front of crowds, we’ll never overcome it if we only ride in private lessons. I like to call this concept, replicate to eliminate because when we replicate (practice) a challenge we learn how it impacts us and how to eventually eliminate it. Luckily not all this practice has to be physical. In fact, while nothing replaces hard work and dedication in the arena, research has proven that visualization techniques (mental rehearsals) can have a near-equal impact on our ability to overcome the kind of things that overwhelm us.

While most of us already visualize our dressage tests, show jumping and cross-country courses prior to riding them, there are a few other visualization techniques we might want to consider adding to our pre-ride routines. Collectively these techniques are called riding-rehearsals, and each one is unique because of something called perspective:

1. Perfect Perspective: Here we visualize ourselves riding perfectly and imagining everything going exactly according to plan (which by the way, it won’t).

2. Problem Perspective: Here we visualize ourselves riding perfectly but then imagine encountering a possible (probable?) problem like missing a distance or pulling a rail, but instead of dwelling on it, we visualize ourselves coping well and finishing strongly.

3. Happiness Perspective: Here we don’t just visualize our courses, we visualize riding them happily! While most of us use mental imagery to prepare for our courses, the majority of us forget that we ride best when we enjoy and believe in ourselves (versus feeling tight, worried, and doubtful).

4. Horse Perspective: Here we visualize our ride as if seeing it out of the eyes of our horses (what must he or she be thinking when you point them towards that four-foot wooden squirrel!)

While each technique is really effective on its own, they’re often best when used together. For example, you could begin by (1) visualizing your jump course using the perfect perspective, and then (2) repeat the mental rehearsal a second time, only this time imagine encountering a problem like pulling a rail, followed by (3) imagining landing the fence with calm confidence and self-belief (i.e. happily) and then (4) visualizing rewarding your horse with a big grateful neck-scratch for finishing strong after a slow start. When we combine all four perspectives in this way we create something called mental-rotation.

Just like watching a movie filmed from many different camera angles, mental-rotation allows us to create a much more vivid and life-like experience, which is ultimately the key that allows us to replicate, “rotate,” and eliminate so many mental challenges.

We all visualize our course physically (how we’re going to actually ride), but how many of us forget to visualize our courses mentally? Even though most of us agree that some of our greatest challenges are mental rather than physical, we often forget to use visualizations to help us overcome all those distracting and defeating disappointments that are sure to happen along the way! Remember, we can’t always predict a problem, but we can prepare for it, and that’s the secret-sauce when it comes to mental rotation.

I hope you enjoyed this month’s tip and that you’ll give it a try. Next month I’ll share even more unique information about making riding rehearsals a part of you pre-ride program. If you’re a trainer our upper level rider and would like to take the Pressure Proof Coaching Academy’s instructor certification course (Equestrian Sport Psychology) just let me know. The course is online and self-paced. For more information visit https://pressureproofacademy.com/certifications/