Ep 24: Lightness is one of the most misunderstood words in dressage

From performanceriders.com this is the Pabry podcast. I'm Nat Foxen and each episode I challenge World equestrian Games top 10 dressage writer Brett Parbury to explain and discuss what I call a Parburyism. That's a pearl of wisdom I've written down over the years of working together in our performance writers programs. Brett doesn't know what today's pabraism is. Let's get into it. Hi, Brett, I've got a Pabraism for you today that I reckon you've been hanging to get to this one for ages. Are you ready to hear it?

I think I might know what it is. You've got me. But I think I know it is.

Because you kind of mentioned this quite a lot in previous episodes and I thought he is dying to talk about this topic. The potteryism is lightness is one of the most misunderstood words in dressage. Okay. We're talking about lightness. Why do you always say that lightness is misunderstood?

Well, I thought this one would be coming only because we've already covered off one of the other most misunderstood words in dressage, which is forward in a couple of episodes ago. But I knew this one would be coming. So, you know, I wouldn't really go as far as saying that lightness is one of the misunderstoods overall in all. In all horsemanship, because. And everybody mentions it, right? Everybody. So online trainers, trainers on the ground, Western trainers, everyone. And the problem I have with it is that the moment you mention lightness to a person, they instantly think that lightness is in the hands. Like lightness in the hands. That's what they think, right? So that almost forces this notion of I need to have the horse light in my hands, which of course the end product of dressage. Yes, we should be aiming for lightness, but it's not just as simple as lightness in the hands. And what I see, what I see from riders going around looking with this notion of in this word. Because you've got to imagine riders, dressage riders are riding around the arena with words and phrases and ideas in their head. Right? That's. That's the thing. There's. So if one of those words is, my horse has to be light, I want lightness. Oh, he's a bit heavy right now. Oh, I want light. I want the horse light. This word sort of rolling on repeat in someone's head. And then if the understanding of that word is it has to feel light in my hands, then don't be surprised when the rider rides very much with their hands. Right, so. So. And what that happens is you get riders riding from the front to the back, rather than the back to the front. And alternatively, there's another version which is too strong. But let's just stick with this for now. So someone riding just from hand don't get on my hands. They often will end up riding the horse to be empty in the connection and empty and afraid of touching the bit or. Yeah, very much not wanting to connect through their whole body. So, yeah, that's why I would say if we're using the word lightness when we're coaching and when we're helping writers build their skill set and build their system, we must get it in the right context the same way as with the word forward, it must be in the right context.

Okay, so we've covered off what writers sometimes think with this concept of lightness, and we'll dig more into how that can lead us down a dangerous path. But let's talk now about what lightness actually means to you and what you. What meaning you would like that word to have for your writers.

Well, what it used to mean to me, the mistakes that I just explained. So I grew up, of course, in different horse disciplines, and lightness was always mentioned, and that forced this little bit of a emphasis on the hands. Now, what lightness means to me now is an end product. So the end product of the horse becoming lighter through the whole body. So I want to feel, not only with my hands, light lightness, but I want to feel the horse light in the shoulders, light in the back, light in the hindquarter, light in the neck, that the neck is light, and that can only come around from this development of impulsion balance, a half halt, that gets the horse up underneath you, that's not holding the horse anywhere. And this systematic training of the horse to not want to pull longer and go against the hand and pull their body longer, to actually be a relaxed round. They're round and relaxed over the back, but not relaxed downwards, actually up and round, but relaxed round, not being forced or held round. And there's a difference there in that top line. So the horse is using their top line in a way in which they're letting it go and they're using their core. That whole combination of the correct posture, the amount of energy, the half halt that sits the horse up and back and takes weight behind and. And. And the product of that, where the horse gets lighter in the shoulders, and then, of course, the balance, or let's call it straightness and balance, that produces a lighter horse and then if the product from there is lighter in the hand, that's good. But it was done, the lightness was achieved by so much more, so many more components than actually just getting the horse feeling light in the hand. And that's, that's why I'm quite strong, passionate about this, because it's very easy to ride around and go, oh, my horse is leaning on me. Oh, he's got to get him off, get her off the reins, get her to give this way or give this way, and then start to ride from the front to the back.

So the lightness is more of a whole body phenomenon and it may or may not result in a certain degree of lightness in the hand. Is that right?

Yeah, yeah. It becomes a lightness because the horse gets more and more in self carriage. So. And also might I say the rider becomes more in self carriage. If the riders in self carriage and then all of these ingredients that I just spoke about, when they come together and the horse understands it and the horse develops enough that they can understand to travel, let's call it canter, cantering with energy in a round shape. Back on the hind leg, on the half halt and the rider sitting really balanced in his self carriage. And that horse finds a nice sweet spot there where they're not pulling long through the reins, they're not leaning left or right, they're working with impulsion. But the half halt or multiple half halts have put the horse into a lovely balance on the hind legs. That moment of self carriage should be the moment the lightness is achieved and, and that then is rewarded by the rider removing pressure. Any pressure. It could be any pressure. Like even sitting lighter in the saddle is making things more comfortable for the horse, that the horse then wants to stay in this place. So it's almost like when the horse looks itself or looks and feels its bit best as a dressage horse. Round, short, active, using their back, moving through their whole body, but up and in self carriage, the rider should disappear and go, right, now be a dressage horse by yourself. Like, it's a bit like training a dog, you know, if you say to the dog, okay, I want you to sit there, please. Now I'm stepping back now. Stay sitting there without me help, without me giving you a cue until I give you the next cue and then come to me or whatever, you know what it might be. So, and it's like when. And you know, I apologize if this sounds a bit foreign, but when farmers educate their dogs to go and get the stock, you know, that Farmer's sitting back and they've taught the dog bits and pieces and they're giving directions here and there, but when the dog's working, the farmer's saying nothing. Yeah, yeah. The farmer's not whistling around all the time going, whistle, whistle, whistle, whistle, whistle. They give a whistle, the dog responds to it and they be quiet again. So. And they let the dog be a working dog. They let the dog do its job. Well, we're exactly the same. When we get everything to feel good, the horse yields in front of us, impulsion balanced round back on the hind leg, disappear and say, right now be a dressage horse all by yourself and then I'm going to just give you little guidance aids. And that's the moment when we should feel the self courage, the lightness. We should be prepared to disappear and see if there's a problem. If there's a problem, it'll turn up very quickly.

For anyone in Australia who's been watching the mustard dogs shows like me, they will appreciate that working dog example you gave.

I mean, I grew up on a farm, right. So my dad actually trains dog trialing dogs, right. And, and you know, but that's, I just like to bring those same concepts into another format, let's say, or another genre of animal training to show the relevance. I think in dressage we get a little too just dressage focused and we lose the relevance of we're training a horse to do a sport or a job or whatever and we have to apply the same animal training techniques that are applied worldwide. And then if we decide we want to do this as a sport, we need to apply the same sport techniques that are used worldwide in other sports. So you're always looking out over the fence to see what other people are doing to try and improve what we're doing.

Just a quick message from us. If any of the ideas discussed today resonate with you and you'd love to dive deeper, head over to performanceriders.com there's a bunch of free content for you and there's loads of opportunities as well to work with us by enrolling in one of our training or mentoring programs, performanceriders.com so the part reason we're discussing today is lightness is one of the most misunderstood words in dressage. Brett, I would like to dig a bit little, little deeper into a couple of things you've mentioned so far. Firstly, when we're talking about lightness being a whole body phenomenon from the horse, when you then think about the feeling you do have in the rain, are there Any red flags or green flags there? In terms of what we do feel in the hand, can it be too light or too heavy or too drawing?

Yes, of course. Like. So the. The likelihood that it's going to feel perfect all the time is minimal. It'll. The horses are always looking for what way will be the best for them, so they're always challenging those that. That posture that we're searching for, because, of course, what we're asking them to do is the hardest. It's much harder than what they would prefer to. So they're always going to be searching for ways out of it, you know, and the obvious one, when you talk about the reins is either pulling longer, because as a horse pulls longer, their back can drop downwards and their core, their belly can push towards the ground and their neck can pull longer and the horse can splay themselves onto the front legs more. Because the front legs, of course, is where they prefer be. So. But the whole skill in training dressage is how to get the horse. Oh, sorry, that's my Jack Russell sleeping.

And that's him sleeping.

No, well, she's just having a little. Little coughing thing here. So. Yeah, the whole thing is, the whole skill involved here is how do I teach my horse to be round and short, lifting up in the core and using their back without forcing it, you know, and of course, riders that either don't have the patience or maybe don't have the skills or whatever it might be will force it. And of course, you know, that can be also construed as being dressage. But the ultimate goal for us is to teach the horse to do it where they actually develop the strength and they can do it by themselves. That's the goal. The more we train them, the more they should do by themselves. Now, that's a bit of a hard one to achieve because you've always got to be there to help them. Don't do this, don't do that. That's good. Really good now. Oh, you've done it again. Don't do that. And you're always. That's the conversation you're having the whole time. But, yeah, ultimately, when you disappear or when you soften the aid, whether it be rain, seat, leg, body, you know, you're sitting in a neutral position, that is to reward the good moment. So. So when it comes to reins, and I must say, because the reins sit in people's hands, I would say 60 to 70% of conversations I have to the riding public all involve the reins, like the frame. And it's also the Bit people can see so, so, so people can see a neck position, they can see it from the saddle and they can see it from the ground. And of course, because dressage has this, this strict thing about, you know, the neck must be round, pole at the highest point, nose, you know, at the vertical, roughly, and neck steady. It's very obvious. You know, I could train my, one of my elderly uncles to see this. Who's never seen a dressage horse. You go, oh, by the way, just look for that neck to do that and right, that's good and that's bad. But what the point we miss here is the actual most important part of the horse is their back. The back is, is the most important. The neck is a, is a way to, to get into the back, to get the back to let go and let, and, and neck position and the alteration of neck position and longer, shorter, rounder, higher, lower. All these variations is the way in which we get better control of the back. And when we have better control over the back, we get better control over the stifles, the hocks, and the whole of the hind legs. So that's, that's the conduit into the horse, the, the connector into the horse. So to answer your question, I know it's a long winded answer, but to answer your question, the most important thing we need to feel in the reins is adjustability. Not lightness, certainly not resistance, but adjustability that is comfortable for the horse and the rider. So what might the horse, for example, like, let's say a, a thicker jawed, slightly duller horse will have a higher tolerance for bit pressure, pressure on the bit than a light, thoroughbredy style, light neck, refined head. They'll tend to drop the bit a little bit more. So you're looking at what is going to be comfortable for the horse. And then of course, some riders have a higher tolerance. I have a, I don't have a very high tolerance for pressure in the reins. I find that I, if, you know, my natural thing is to not want to have a lot of contact in the reins. And sometimes I have to remind myself, okay, is it adjustable? Is the horse comfortable? Is the, you know, is this bad? Well, I need to then adjust that. I need to take this extra 2, 2 grams in the reins.

Right.

So yeah, it's what's comfortable and what's adjustable.

Comfortable and adjustable. I love those. I mean, you're saying how when we ride around we have these words in our head. Those are two great words to have.

Yeah. Is it comfortable? Is it adjustable? And of course we all want it to be light, but you got to remember it's got to be the right light. It's got to be the right light.

The right light, yeah. I love that. It's got to be the right light. And that brings me to my final question, which is about writers who are working their way through this idea and they're thinking, well, it is light in my hand. So in that case, can I assume that the rest of it's all right? But then we've got to work through, don't we, Brett? These issues of, like you said, the. The neck is the conduit, our way to access the horse's back. So it's not just as simple as thinking. If it feels light in the hand, then that means it's good everywhere.

That's right. And that's where as riders, we need to work on the skills of having a 360 degree awareness of the horse that's underneath us. So, yes, it's much easier to pay attention to what you can see and what you can feel in your hands. As we develop ourselves as riders, we need to get way more focus on all the bits we can't see. The back, the ribs, the belly, the core, the hind legs, the hind feet, the tail, the shoulders, the front feet, all of those things. We need to actually develop a feel for that. So as we're riding around, and I'm not saying that's easy to do, but I just want to make people aware that that's a skill we need to develop right as we ride. Now, I do that by when I lunge horses, I watch the way they move. When I ride past the mirror, I look at the horse, I try to look, when I'm looking in the mirror, at all of the bits of the horse I can't see from the saddle. So I can. Then when I look away from the mirror or when I ride away from the mirror, I have in my mind, okay, when I looked in the mirror, that hind leg looked like this and that shoulder looked like that. So when I ride away, I'm still trying to keep this visual in my head of what that looked like, and I start imagining, oh, that hind leg, I think it would look like this now, and then the shoulder would look like this and the neck position would look like that, and therefore the whole picture of what's underneath me would look like this. Now, of course, if I then watch a video and I go, oh, gee, it was nothing like I thought, then I can adjust my look. But what I'm Trying to get to here is, as you're playing with this stuff and developing it in your mind, you're actually getting better at it. Just by going through that process, you get stronger at having an awareness. And that over a period of time, of practicing that over and over and over and over and over and having a focus on it, you'll be surprised. The writers will be surprised how they can start to have a. A way more awareness of the whole horse. And. And. And then they start to go, ah, now I know the. The bits of light I need to feel, and it isn't just in my reins. It's. It is a shoulders and neck, an active hind leg, whatever it might be. So, yeah, it is a. It's definitely an awareness that needs to be strengthened or developed by practicing it every time you ride.

Yeah. Okay. I love that it's time to wrap up this conversation. It's been a really good one. About this idea of lightness and something that we've touched on in the second half was about those probably more productive ideas that we can have in our head when I. When we're riding. And that's adjustable and comfortable. And it seems to me, Brett, hearing what you've said today, that having that word lightness in our head as, like, a goal is probably not that useful, because it sounds like it's actually just something that happens as a result of really good riding through the whole body of the horse and focusing on these parts that we can't see. Then lightness is like pulling the rabbit out of the hat. It's not something that we're actually actively trying to achieve while we're riding.

That's right. Like, it's. It's. It should be along the lines of when it's described, you have impulsion. You have, you know, the horse over the back. You have them balanced, you have them straight, you have them round, you have them on the hind leg, back, you have them collected, and then they're light. Right. That's the word. That's kind of the. That's the way we should describe that. And rather than us chasing horses around that are on the front legs and pulling long, like wanting to get long and lean out over their front legs and run around on the front legs and then go, oh, by the way, get off my reins. Get off my reins.

Oh, yeah, you're heavy.

You're heavy. You know, so that's. We've got to think of it as. In that process that. That process develops the light, the lightness is the end product.

It's the end product. Love it. Thank you so much, Brett, for this conversation.

Pleasure. Thank you. Ra.