Waning and Waxing

Like the moon, my goals seem to change monthly! Ga!

While it seems to be good to evaluate and re-evaluate goals per my mental management class, I wonder if what I do would be considered THAT or like… giving up.  

Or being flaky. Uncommitted? I don’t want to be those things but I am a bit transient.  I’m famous for very big ideas and little follow through. It’s not like I am not adverse to hard work. But I feel like reality kind of catches up to me.  Oops, out of money.  Ru-roh, you really can’t show every weekend.  And then I get to thinking…eh… is this really what I wanted? And I wane… 

Here is where I’m coming from today.  Last year, The Dog was really doing well in AKC. Minimally showing and we could have gone to the nationals.  So I thought, YEAH! Let’s go to Tulsa! Show a little bit more, and we are THERE!  Granted, I had the 26” venture (another diverted goal) but we are so not there.  QQ wasteland.   EIGHT MONTHS. 

I sat there Saturday and Sunday, really trying to figure out what the heck the deal is.  She and I are gelling. Her contacts are spiffy.  Her jumping has improved greatly since I improved my handling.   I don’t feel nervous, or bored, or like I am doing any of the weird pinchy over/under handling of yore.  I have found a way to approach AKC that allows me to engage in every course. What gives?  

Things that came to mind (this is the waxing part I think)- well, ok, she was slower.  Not too much but could be a factor. And per the ‘cycle of training and trialing’ we are technically in the preparatory phase not competitive. But the big one:  last year I was running much more in survival mode (aka weird pinchy over/under handling).   Watching runs over the weekend, I saw a lot of that.  My reaction was never again. Then I thought beyond that, so what do I value?  I value the best run possible and I do NOT define best by qualifying or winning or fastest. Just quality.  I am learning now how to have quality on demand.  My hope is that with time that will result in things like qualifying and winning and fastest, but for now, a quality run by my standards will do.  Based on that, I’m not sure my values realistically align with that organization.  After a serious THINK, my thought is that I just don’t care enough about qualifying every single run. Which is kind of the point in AKC; they don’t make a lot of room for the wildcard. 

So anyways.  I think I will take a break from AKC and see what we can get together as far as quality on demand.  I’ll move our nationals goal to 2014- see, not giving up! Just giving time to align with reality.

***

Speaking of preparatory phase- oof-da! Super unglued on Friday.  Two very wild and crazy runs.  One positive was a nice running DW, right off the bat.   Saturday’s only goal was to reconnect, which we did.  Her JWW run was my favorite of the whole weekend, very fast and tight.  Another rocking DW in standard, this time into nothing.   Yesterday the judge hated our contacts and I wildly contest the calls on her teeter and DW (into super nothingness).  I guess that being "in" doesn't count if you don’t have stopped contacts. Hm. I stand by the run though and only frowned upon the dropping of the panel.   Our last run in JWW was fair, one insane off-course call-off hear the end.  She was all of a sudden very excited about a line of jumps, and adorably sheepish when she came back.

So, thanks to all that, some training comes to mind to get to our quality on demand state:  Everyone’s favorite- Jumping grids! Including but not limited to: jumping into me! Bounce into extension! Speed circles with spreads into tunnels!  What fun.  Also, teeter as always and some tough weave entries. I discovered one we really haven’t worked much.   

Insanely elated with her dogwalks and start lines though.  Driving both! Even breaking the start line, little bugger! 

Our one run on video. The contact-hater judge getting her upper arms workout.  I still like it, happy (almost broken) start line, drivey contacts and an @$$ pass at the end for fun.  

And The Pup's weekend of pouting encapsulated in one picture: 

"SCREW YOU! Not sharing, it's all I have in the world!!!"

She was very angry at no fun time. At one point she got all "WTF" over only getting to do the practice jump and escaped into the ring. Luckily they were just course building, but she definitely wanted more action. Maybe I'll show her again someday.