The Writerly Advice "Show, Don't Tell" For Trainers

by Lisa Trovillion

I read a post today from a Grand Prix trainer talking about teaching the student how to balance a horse in a methodical, systematic way rather than just telling her to execute a half-halt. I've synthesized down the content of the post, which was much more complex and nuanced, but I believe this was the gist of it. Or, this is what I took away from it. See, this is the problem. We as human beings rely heavily on words alone to convey our thoughts and emotions. The thing is, a word can mean various things to different people the same way as a color may look to be a different shade to different individuals. Having worked for years as a linguist/translator I'm acutely away of the micro-layers of meaning behind many words and expressions. In preparing or correcting translations from one language to another, fierce debates had been known to break out and carry on for days over the meaning of one little expression.

So, getting back to riding and the meaning of half-halt--a word that doesn't even exist in the dictionary by the way--what do we do when all we have is our very anemic and flat language to use when describing the dynamic, shifting and subtle art of riding? We try to give the feelings names and to codify this terminology into the lexicon of horsemanship so everyone will be on the same page and know what we are talking about...but we still have trouble. Debates still rage over what really is connection, on-the-bit, half-halt and a dictionary of other terms. Are we seeing or feeling the same thing as the horse person standing next to us when we call it by a certain term? The more I ride and train, the more I realize I had no idea what a half-halt really was. We humans are blessed with the gift of speech, but it is still an imperfect form of communication. We want to communicate with horses, but our language is of little to no use there. We have to translate our intentions into their language. When we become expert at doing so, it seems it is very hard to translate horse language back into human in order to teach others.

How good are we communicating with others? Not very, it seems, on too many occasions. The word is our building block to form sentences, paint images, share emotion, impart information, convince or coerce others. Words are powerful, but their meanings are at times obscure. In writing, we often are told to "show, not tell" because I think it's felt on some level that words are not as clear as action. Although I believe that piece of advice is sometimes overused (I've read stunning novels from authors who "tell" almost the whole story), the point is well taken. Words can let us down. The same in the world of riding. If our instructor stands in the arena shouting "half-halt!" and we think we are doing one, but are instead stopping the forward action with too much hand and not a re-balancing through the horse's body, can we really say we have learned anything? Can we instead have more instructors who, like writers, are warned "show, don't tell" and coach us into accomplishing the desired action without every putting a name to it. Perhaps then we will be freed from the tyranny of the horse terminology and further on the path towards becoming communicative riders.

Writing it Right, by Lisa Wysocky

As equine authors, we all want to get not only the story right, but also the horse part of it right, too. Everyone here is an experienced horse person, and has a broad base of knowledge that we incorporate into our books to share with our readers. However, it is amazing the number of little facts that creep into the story line that need to be researched, not once, but several times. We need to be thorough on our research because, if we get it wrong, at least one reader will step up to call us on it.

I think we’ve all read a book where the author gets a basic fact wrong and it takes us out of the story. That should never happen. Even in fiction, there are facts: a horse is measured in hands, a hand is four inches, there is no palomino color in the Thoroughbred breed. If we as authors get it wrong, we have done our readers a huge disservice.

I showed Appaloosa horses for many years, and the question of their point system came up in my newest Cat Enright cozy mystery, The Fame Equation. I knew how it worked. Or did I? After reviewing the current rulebook and a number of websites, I finally went to the source and called the person at the Appaloosa Horse Club who was in charge of their points system. Yes, I was right. But if I had not been, I would have alienated a lot of readers, and worse, my readers would have lost trust in me.

Quincy is a solid colored registered Appaloosa, but he looks so much like a

Thoroughbred that even his vet and farrier worked with him for

three years without realizing his actual breed.

Authors can never assume.

That is the real concern. If a reader cannot trust an author to get a basic fact correct, what about everything else the author writes? How many other mistakes, factual errors, or misconceptions are there in a given book? I write both equestrian fiction and nonfiction and am sure to find at least two credible sources for every fact I am not 1000 percent sure of. That is maybe a little over the top, but I have written a number of horse books and no reader has yet called me on a fact. I’m sure that day will someday come, and when it does, I will welcome it, for readers are truly the final authority.

• • •

Lisa Wysocky is an author, clinician, and registered PATH instructor who helps people learn about themselves through horses. Find her at LisaWysocky.com.

Back to School and Fresh New Starts

Although the weather is still hot and dry here, the subtle (and not so subtle) signs of autumn are all around me: the burning bush is turning red, the stores are displaying Halloween decorations, and the kids are back to school. I don't know about you, but I always equate the autumn with new beginnings, a fresh start, a chance at a new adventure. When I started each new school year with a stack of blank notebooks and sharpened pencils, I vowed to myself that this year would be different. This was the year I was going to (fill in the blank here.) Depending on the given year, it could be get better grades, be more outgoing, try out for sports, or as simple as not procrastinate. Usually by mid-October, however, the shiny new promises I made myself were as scuffed and neglected as my back-to-school shoes. Walking around in life puts a few smudges and dirt on those idealized vows.

Nonetheless, I still make new plans and search out new opportunities in the fall and this year is no different. Since I've been struggling with my present work in progress (or WIP for short), I'm tempted to jettison the tiresome task for something fresh and new. There is nothing like starting out a new work, be it a short story, novel or poem, when the fire of inspiration is on you. The words seem to fly like electricity from the brain cells through the arms to fingers, words of sheer genius madly spilling across the computer screen or notebook page. Then you hit the slump, the saggy middle, the problematic plot stopper, the self-critical editor...the mid-October blahs. What then? How do you get that "back-to-school" new beginnings promise back into your work? Do you buy a new, fancy pen and notebook? Do you look through pictures to inspire or turn to your writing manuals on plot and characterization? Sometimes. Or, do you jump ship and start a new project and just pray that the old one will come to life again in the future? Every writer has a different answer to this same dilemma.

I'll tell you what I'm doing now with the old WIP when I'm sorely tempted to fall in love with a fresh, new project instead. I'm doing something to help me become intrigued by my old characters, to re-discover and re-invent the theme that originally inspired me, and to get back to the "butt in seat, hands to keyboard" discipline that any writer needs to not only succeed but just finish a book! Not unlike bringing a horse back into work which has been laid off due to sickness or injury, I've had to start slow and review the basics. At first I took my story which had been on "stall rest" and lost all its muscle out for a ride and found it just couldn't keep up, so I went back to the barn and did a complete assessment of where the weaknesses were. Having identified two-dimensional characters, stilted scenes, plodding plot points, I fixed or eliminated these "lamenesses" by drawing up entire profiles of my main characters or by painstakingly mapping out timelines or sequences of events. Surprisingly, by doing these "fundamental exercises" I not only improved the story I had, but also became excited about it again. I gained new insights into the characters' motivations, I saw new ways to keep the suspense turned up, and I fell in love with this old WIP in the season of new beginnings. I guess those old, scuffed shoes still have a lot of miles of adventure left in them after all. What's going to inspire you this fall during the season of starting over?

Show your horse the world

Tonight I rode JJ up and down hills in the semi-dark, with a howling, biting southerly wind, and made him canter underneath big thrashing pine trees while other leaves blew across the ground at us. 

Yesterday I schooled him by the Pony Club club rooms while the local emergency services were there for a training exercise - ambulances and fire engines with their lights going, the helicopter flying in and people standing all around.

On Sunday we schooled next to a rugby tournament with plenty of yelling and whistles and hooters and speakers and crowds, and he was very patient with the small children who ran up and wanted to pat him, and the dogs that barked and lunged to the ends of their leashes at him. 

       

So when people say "I can't believe you ride your horse on the road" or "Wow he's so brave/bombproof", here's the thing. I have gone out of my way to train him so that he is that way! 

   

If there is a miniature horse convention at the measuring stand, or dog agility training, or a bicycle race with paletons of riders, or someone zorbing down the hill at the park, JJ gets to go and see it, and then gets ridden nearby so that he learns to a) see the world and b) still work despite what's going on around him. 

       

This is why he's brave, and why I can ride him on the road with buses and cars and motorbikes and cyclists all zooming past and he doesn't bat an eye. 

  

  

And don't get me started on the things I've taught him to jump over...

which is why fill doesn't bother him either in the jumping ring! 

Today we're off to our first show this season...it's just a local schooling show but I can't wait to get him back in the ring and ready to roll!