A "qualified" good lesson

As I've said in some of the recent posts, Willig has reverted to being scared of the exit door in the inside arena, and most of my rides for the last week have been (ugh) patiently going past that door. Although I managed to take him on one trail ride last weekend (a spook-fest, in honor of Halloween apparently), the weather hasn't cooperated for either me or J to ride him outside. So when my lesson coincided with only overcast skies (no rain or drizzle) and no downpours in the last 24 hours, I just knew Shannon would suggest we ride outside.
Both Shannon and I could see the "wild look" in Willig's eye, so she had us start on him focusing - with a nice inside bend (and nice is relative, since he was trying mightily to crane his neck for monsters on the outside of the fence) with impulsion. The main theme for this lesson is that I get scared and ride him slower and slower and slower, which makes it easier and easier and easier for him to leap out.
So we did walk/trot/canter both directions, and then Shannon told us to make a big circle and gallop. And she had to keep yelling "Gallop!" because while my leg was receiving the message from my brain, my hands were like "You're insane!" and fought it.
And just as when Shannon took us to NWEC to school and Willig did his rodeo loop, and she made us take off galloping (and redo the fence after each huge loop until he quit being loopy), it got the crazy out of his eye at home too.
He was perfectly nice until the &*#&(&# poodle came out with his human, and like a wild man (our Chinook is a wild lady too, so I get it, it's just that it's ALWAYS a training opportunity when I'm out there and never just riding) raced around in his yard. Willig got the wild look back in his eye, and when he had a particularly difficult time making the transition from canter to trot, Shannon had us halt, canter, and then do another gallop loop. This one was even harder for me to do than the first one, since I was watching him watching the poodle.
Given that, we had some quite nice jumping.
We worked on a bounce, then a double bounce, which Mr. Inconsistent was A-Ok with.
We worked on a vertical over flowers (ho-hum), a blue barrel under a vertical (he was looking, but jumped it each time, although Shannon had us repeat it until it was flawless - the looking was at the barrel (he refused some this summer) and pointed in the direction of the poodle).
Then we made a little course - the three cross rail bounces, right hand turn around to the flower vertical, left hand turn (which was much improved from two lessons ago) to the blue barrels, then big left arc to the wall.
His first time, we both saw it coming from a mile off, and he ran out to the right, and then it took me forever to stop him. I knew it was coming, Shannon knew it was coming, and Willig had every opportunity to keep it coming.
She had us ride back in front of it, halt, and he got one smack with the whip, and then I had to do it again. He did it kind of big, but did it.
Then we did the course a second time, and again, he took it kind of big, but did it. I know he can do it, because when I was working him a lot in the summer, I had him going quite nice over it.
So Shannon's main take away is that I am still not riding assertively enough. She can see him looking, see him thinking about refusing, but I just sit there and do nothing, but keep waiting for him to jump it - even when I feel the refusal coming also.
And he is nervous (and always will be nervous) about things he hasn't seen before (or seen in a while) and I need him to 1) trust me that he can do it, and 2) prefer to do it than face my wrath. Which is almost nonexistent.
We were at a dinner party the night before, and someone who used to ride hunter jumpers was asking me excitedly about having a horse. (I feel the pain of ex-horse riders who live in Seattle.) And as I was talking about him I realized that all this hesitation is coming from me. It's me who's holding us back, and it's because I'm scared. And the more I work without stirrups, the better I feel my position getting, and the more I jump him over big stuff, the more comfortable I feel heading towards it with my feet in front of me. It's just that I don't act fast enough to correct his refusals, and I think once I fix that, he'll stop refusing, and then we'll just improve and improve. So I have to act like he's not going to refuse (assertively, not passively) and be quick to respond, and then we'll be back on our upward spiral.
Overall, as Shannon pointed out, it was a great lesson. He did the bounces incredibly well, he had the wild look in his eye and hadn't been out, last year I couldn't even ride him at the poodle side, and the one run out provided us with an excellent teaching example.
Although I wish he was perfect and easy, this is pretty damn helpful for me becoming a better rider, and I think it also helps him learn to trust me.