Setting, Keeping Horseback-Riding Goals

The holidays can be extremely stressful for everyone particularly for those with horses. Along with holiday shopping, baking, and plan-making, the horses still need to be fed, cared for, and exercised. Often times, the horses get put on the backburner during the month of December; sometimes for the benefit of their own mental health albeit inadvertently. It's the perfect season to take a few minutes to unwind and reassess your past riding year, and create goals for the New Year.

Riding, whether it is competitively, trail riding, or even strictly for pleasure, is often goal-oriented. The goals can be as simple as trying to ride at least 3 times a week to winning a grand prix. Goals give riders something to work for, and serve as a measure of progress. I often recommend setting goals at the beginning of the year, and assessing them every 3 months or so. This gives you several "checkpoints" throughout the year, and plenty of opportunities to re-adjust if need be.

For instance, if your goal in January was to ride 4 times a week, but come March you realize you've only really made it out to the barn on average 2 times a week, then it's a great opportunity to sit down and evaluate. Perhaps going to the barn after work is too much of a time constriction, and you'd be better off going before work. In evaluation you may come to the conclusion that 4 barn days was an unrealistic goal and you need to scale down to 3 days. This ensures that you still have something to work for without the guilt and frustration of not meeting your goals.

In order to meet your goals, It is important to keep track of progress as well as set backs. Tracking what works, what doesn't work, and what you'd do differently is an excellent way of keeping your goals in view as well as offering a wonderful resource. For this, I recommend keeping a riding "journal" updated at least once a week, but preferably after each ride. It needs not be a long winding writing, or even an actual papered journal. A quick paragraph in an online blog can track progress and serve as a reference. It's important to note things such as attitude, behavior, and reactions, which can always be referred back to when hitting a trouble spot or a plateau.

Setting riding goals that are multi-dimensional, such as improving your jump and getting every distance at a horse show, gives you something to work for, as well as an immediate assessment. Setting more then one goal allows you to work on several things at once, such as riding 4 times a week, as well as getting out to at least six horse shows. They tend to go hand in hand, as an improvement in riding and extra saddle time will reflect in your horse show experience.

Whatever goal you choose to make, remember the keys to successful goal-keeping: Re-evaluate, track your progress, and reference back. Keep your goals in mind, and reward yourself at every "check-point" for the goals you've managed to keep. Keep a journal to record your progress and take the time to look back and reassess. You'll be celebrating next year when you congratulate (and treat yourself to something nice!) for meeting your goals!