Purpose, Practice, Pilates, Prayer and Persistance

It's not always easy to reach a goal.  After SIX years I have finally become a certified therapeutic horseback riding instructor with PATH international.   This was a big goal for me.  I did not ride horses as a kid so I had to start from scratch.

My journey started on my 50th birthday when I decided that I wanted to do "something" with horses.  I didn't have much extra money so I signed up to volunteer at EquiVenture in Russiaville, Indiana.  I really enjoyed helping there so I decided to become an instructor.

Spring semester of 2006 I signed up for a class in therapeutic horseback riding at Purdue.  I spent an interesting semester there and began taking serious steps to becoming an instructor.

Having a clear plan and goal as laid out by PATH(the organization that oversees certifications) really helped me get through the whole process.  Riding, studying, volunteering and more riding were all part of the process.

I had to ride, and ride and ride.  However, just riding was not enough.   I found that I had to work even harder by going to a Pilate's class and doing strengthening exercises everyday.  Then I took more riding lessons and continued to work.

 Then came the big certification workshop in September 2011.  I had passed both written tests, the teaching test, 25 hours of student teaching only to fail the riding segment. Failure is such an ugly word.  But there it was staring me in the face.  PATH does allow one retake for the failed component.

I nearly quit.  I was totally discouraged. Both Ginger,my mentor, and my husband encouraged me to stay the course and give it one more shot.  So I hung in there and resubmitted the riding portion of the test in October 2012.

I did a lot of praying and just kept working toward my goal.  Ginger, my mentor was wonderfully  patient and instructed me in both riding and horsemanship.  In January of 2013 I received my official papers that I had passed the certification!  Thank you Lord!

What are some of your goals?  What kind of difficulties did you overcome and how?