It came to me this morning that the best way I can describe what I learnt on the course was that sometimes self preservation can sometimes lead to self destruction. Constantly worrying about whether you and the people around you are safe is very very hard work. Worrying is soooo draining and you just end up going round in circles and possibly even a bit mad!!!!

Don't get me wrong, I have learnt that safety is paramount if you are going to be a confident rider. But the fine line between worry and self destruction is planning for safety and then going and doing the thing you want to do as safely as possible.

We were taught over the weekend to take very very small positive steps towards achieving our dreams, so that each step, no matter how small, was then going to have a positive result, and therefore build confidence each time.

My plan for this morning was just to mount my horse with confidence and without anxiety, however, after I found out about my husbands fall yesterday on the way home from the course, I decided to ask my riding instructor to come out and ride my horse around the same route instead so that my mare could have a positive ride in the same place.

Whilst tacking up my mare was being really nippy so I thought I had better start working on one of my main goals right away: to be the owner my horse would choose. As such I stood by her side and started to stroke her neck and shoulder. The nipping decreased and then stopped completely after about 5 minutes. I stayed in that same spot for another half an hour. My mare's head was right down and her eyes were closed. It was heaven for both of us.....

I then groomed her and tacked her up and just as I was finishing my instructor arrived. He put his hat on as if about to mount, and I found myself saying "Actually, I'd like to ride her for the first half of the hack, and then you can take over when its time to take her round the big field where Charlie fell off". We got going and we were chatting away and before I knew it we were in the big field. My instructor said that he'd be happy to get on whenever I was ready to which I replied " That's fine, I'll trot her round it and then perhaps you can canter her round afterwards. Now, this is a big field, and I mean really big ...approximately 30 acres. I giggled with happiness all the way round as I remembered that it had felt this good the day I had first ridden my mare at the sales livery yard where we bought her from. I felt, happy, safe, exhilarated, and whats the word?????.....confident! Yeeha!

Now, some of you might be expecting and willing the next bit of the story to describe how I then decided to canter her around the field and not ask my instructor to do it. Well, sorry to disappoint, but as I mentioned earlier, one of the key strategies to gaining confidence that I learnt during the weekend was to take very very very small steps at a time, and to keep repeating those small steps successfully before moving onto the next step. So, I halted my mare and then handed her over to my instructor who cantered her around the big field for me and I sat on the gate and watched that amazing sight feeling very inspired indeed.....

Later that day the saddler came to check my mare's tack and he asked me to trot her down the road to have a look at her saddle. Well, in my 'this is my first horse' naivity, I thought he meant in hand and so I brought back a headcollar and lead rope from the tack room. "No, I meant with you riding her", the saddler said. "Oh", I said, thinking what an idiot I must be!!!! Now, if the saddler had asked me to do this on Friday before the course, the fear would have been coursing through my veins. I would have done it, but I would have been very very nervous. I can't say that my brain didn't ask me if I should be nervous, because it did, but my immediate reaction was that no, everything would be fine. So off I rode down the road and trotted all the way home. The people on my course will know what a massive moment this was for me as it was the primary goal that I had listed out within the first hour of the course starting. Alleluia - mission accomplished. Not planned by me but as a twist of fate brought about by a request from my saddler - weird or what?????