Expecting Instantaneous Results

Skybreaker Hitching Post May 2013

I’m reading this thought provoking book right now called “The Circle,” written by Dave Eggers. I am only about seventy-five pages in, so I cannot come to any grand conclusions yet, though so far I am intrigued. Basically there’s this girl, Mae, who has recently been hired at one of the most prestigious and fastest growing internet companies in the world: The Circle. The California based company links users’ personal emails, various social media accounts, banking accounts, and any online purchasing with what they call their universal operating system, which offers a single online identity, as well as a new age of human behavior and transparency.

I immediately gravitated towards this book as I read its brief description on Amazon, mostly because we live in a digital age. I remember being in middle school and my entire class would share one giant and ancient computer. I remember not having computers in my life, and now I cannot imagine life without iphones, ipads, or computers. My generation lives in a fascinating time because we were alive when there was minimal technology and now we are completely surrounded by such power. Most of this technology has redefined life, and yet there are major flaws. Namely, this new age is about instantaneous results and endless communication, which results in high expectations, less patience, and less time to ponder ideas and concepts.

So, how do we merge our fast paced world with that of our horse lives? Can they coincide, or coexist? What positive attributes can we draw from the digital world, while injecting those conveniences into our horse world? Just because we live in a world that is moving a million times per nanosecond, doesn’t mean this madness has to follow us into the barn, into our lessons, or into our riding…does it, or doesn’t it?

Valonia summer 2013

If I have learned anything over the past eighteen or so years, it would be this…Riding horses does not translate into instantaneous results. Unless you are extremely fortunate, or have a box buried underground filled with $90,000.00, then you know that learning to ride, or training a horse takes a great deal of time. Denny always lectures all of us on the art of patience. He continues to stress the fact that learning how to do something WELL, takes a great deal of time. You cannot learn to ride, see a distance, or make perfect riding decisions over night.

These decisions, these techniques, and these skills require time, practice and patience.  You can wish, pray, cry or scream, but nothing takes care of learning how to ride like time does. In this small horse filled world, we long for magical solutions, quick fixes and overnight success. Of course there are some instances in our riding world where instant gratification takes place, but mostly we are building are towers of success day by day. We can’t miss any blocks, and we can’t leave any holes left unfilled. Rather, we have to take the time and energy into creating our masterpieces, so that one day we can sit back and begin to reap the benefit.

Back to merging our worlds… it can be done. We have to start by extracting those positive benefits from our digital world. For instance, having someone record you ride on their ipad can be very rewarding and helpful. You can go back, watch, pause, replay that video and study what you like and what you don’t like. You can send updates of you and your horses to your family with one click of a button. There are countless benefits to living in this fast paced age. Similarly, the slower, more methodical horse world can teach us to slow down, relax and enjoy what’s right in front of us. Do you ever go on a two hour hack, just you and your horse, and get lost in your thoughts, while leaving your iphones, ipads, and ipods at home? Living in a fast paced world is exhilarating and frightening at the same time, though when joined with your horse life, the results can be fascinating and extremely insightful.

 

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