2019 was… long.

It was in many ways both a terrible year and a wonderful year – but one thing stayed the same: for every beat of my heart, for every breath in my lungs, God’s grace was there to carry all of us through.

January-May, I’ll be honest, totally sucked. It was a long, long five months of being so deeply buried under all kinds of work and personal issues that I didn’t get to spend any time at all with my horses. In the beloved’s words, “Firns need horsies and sunlight to thrive”, so I just wasn’t happy. I had just started working at the Arab stud, though, and I rode there every day as well as riding Tilly, so at least I stayed moderately fit and still learned something.

I showed Faith at HOY 2019, where she was really good right up until the part where she bucked me off in the working riding. After that I took the longest break from competing personally that I’ve ever taken. Thunder pretty much hung out in a field for nearly five months. I did the logical thing when one has no time to ride and bought a new horse, too – Lancelot.

In April, the Arabs had their auction. It was really awesome to be a part of that, and it was a great learning curve to be behind the scenes at an event of that magnitude. I rode Lancelot at the auction (as he’s the only progeny of Silvern Lance under saddle in the area) and he blew me away with how chill he was. We even jumped a few fences and he was perfect.

May saw everything change for the better. I sorted out my finances, hired an instructor to teach the beginners at my yard for me, and finally had my schedule open enough that I could work on my own horses again. I left Faith for the end of the year, since she was still growing up anyway, and put Lancelot and Thunder into work.

June, July and August saw me taking more lessons and getting the two guys fitter. Thunder was muscular but ridiculously chunky and unfit; the more inherently athletic Lancelot could go on forever but needed a ton of muscle tone. In fact, I did little other than rebuild fitness and muscle tone for most of the last half of 2019. I showed Tilly several times in both dressage and jumping, but Lancelot and Thunder stayed home except for lessons until October, when I showed Thunder at elementary. He was wonderfully relaxed; so was I.

Arwen, who had been in work with a child all year, went to Standerton Show in September with me and absolutely cleaned up. She won every class she walked into bar the working riding championship, where she was reserve. It was one of my best rides ever on her and I loved it.

In December, I held the biggest pony camp at my yard yet, which was a resounding success. I had worked really hard throughout the year to stabilise the yard as a business, and it’s been turning a little profit ever since, enough to support my own horses. We also ran a really fun and wonderful Christmas show, which I desperately enjoyed.

Overall, when it came to achievements this year, I kind of felt like I’d really underperformed. Looking back, though, I learned a lot and we did well when we did compete. Just turning the yard around financially was a feat in itself and something that might not have earned any ribbons or show photos on Facebook, but will certainly help to support my riding going forward.

In my heart, though, God accomplished so much in the space of twelve short months, especially when it comes to riding. In March/April, I was the closest I had ever been to giving up on my competitive riding career. I never stopped loving horses, but the overwhelming time and expense required just made me feel like it was never going to work out. I had to find a way to be okay with that. I had to figure out where riding fits in my life when it is not the only thing in my life. As a teenager, horses were my entire life – even though I would never have admitted it, they were my identity. There was nothing else out there for me. I lived for it, and it wasn’t healthy. It became an idol, as surely as a golden calf, and the Lord was good to me in making it seem like it was being taken away.

Because I found out that life is so much more than riding and I am so much more than a teenager who rides. I am a child of God, and there’s more to me than just one thing. My success or failure in the saddle no longer defines my worth as a human being. And once I’d learned that lesson, Abba Father was gracious in giving me back my riding, and for the first time since I was a kid I genuinely love it again. I’ve always been committed to it; I’ve always been devoted to it. I’ve always loved horses. But the feeling of sitting on a horse and letting it dance – it was always worship, but now it is joyous worship. It doesn’t just teach me and connect me to my God in ways that nothing else can. It brings me joy, a pure, radical, heavenly joy, one that comes straight from the Hand of the King.

2019 was hard, but it was good to me because God used it. And now I’ve never been happier in my life, nor more determined to take on the challenge of my great equestrian dream. I might achieve it. I might not. It’s in the arms of the Lord, but I know that He has a purpose for me in the trying, and I know that every breath is joy and love and grace to me.

I deserve to die for my sins, but not only did He give me life and Himself, He gave me horses and a beautiful view and a career that I love and a tiny house on a horse farm and a man who loves me like breath – and I am so, so happy. Genuinely, ridiculously happy, thanks only to one thing: the love of the King.

Forever and ever, glory to that King!