Slowing it Down

Sometimes I get so caught up in how freaking amazing my mare is that I forget she's still green, still learning, still a 'baby'. I tend to rush my rides- I get on, ride, get off, because of time limitations and that overwhelming amount of horses I have the responsibility of getting out. This works for most of them- Willie's always raring to go, Status needs to work as much as he possibly can, and Webbie doesn't necessarily need to be ridden hard as long as he stretches his legs. But if I hop on Rush and ask her to trot, you can bet your breeches it's going to be a bad ride.

This frustrates me to no end. When I have two hours to get three horses out, I needneedneed them to be ready to work when I hop on. And she just isn't. She needs 5-10 minutes of meandering, stretchy, loose walking before I can get working, and I never get a satisfying ride in unless I trot her on the buckle for another five minutes. I know all this- I know that she needs this ridiculously long amount of time before I can reasonably ask her to start reaching into my contact, and I ignore it anyways. WHY do I ignore it anyways?

I need to slow down. I don't know how I'll make it work, but I have to slow down or I'll keep having bad rides like the ones I had last weekend. We've kind of hit a road block in that she gets riled up and obstinate when I work on flat, then calms down through the jumping. I'm thinking I need to ixnay the jumping for now, until she starts actively working with me on the flat instead of going through the set WTC routine and fighting with me if I try to switch it up. Which stinks for me, because I love jumping, but I need her to start participating willingly in learning new things or else we're not going to make it anywhere.