I continue to need lessons to slowly learn the blindingly obvious, once learned

I had a dressage lesson today, where I bemoaned my fair, but disappointing, dressage scores, particularly the 5 on a right 20 meter trot circle, where, irony of all ironies, he was counterbent - to the LEFT (the side Mike has to basically wrestle me into bending at all towards even when we're already going left).
Mike had three suggestions for moving from 6s to 7s:
1) Increase the connection. I'm riding all kind and soft, with the attitude "oh, please, Mr. Willig, won't you pick up the connection, wouldn't that be nice?" instead of telling him and then picking it up, like the assertive person that I am (when people are using the nice word (assertive) instead of their other choices). This is probably the same problem over fences, that my fellow boarder observed ("I didn't hear you growl when he was intending to refuse?")
2) Increase the bend. Look at his inside eyelashes. Make him do it. We practiced this by clamping my outside hand onto his withers, and then pulling my inside hand to my hip bone. He can do it; and he doesn't mind doing it. It's my pansy attitude.
3) Make him sparkle by trotting on the verge of lengthening. Don't ride it delicate or conservative - it's 5-6 minutes of my life - ride every second and ride it hard. This extra oomph is what's missing - I get timid at a show because I don't want to mess up, so I ride the test conservatively instead of going for the 8 and maybe breaking in a movement and getting a 4.
The other things we talked about:
- I drew a picture of what I thought shoulder in, haunches in, renvers, and travers looked like, because I'm having trouble with where he is and where I am and how I ask for them. And it turns out, that's because I was visualizing them wrong. So Mike re-drew them, then also showed me on the ground, then at the end of the lesson, made me ride each one. I have some kind of mental block about this, so I'm going to have to study the drawings, practice with my body, and then practice, practice, practice. The big thing I got out of today, was - like using my canter aid further back from my last lesson - I'm not moving my legs (outside leg aid, inside leg aid) just squeezing like an anaconda - so how in the world would he know which of those he's supposed to be doing?
- If I want Willig to "sparkle" in his tests and start getting 7s and 8s instead of 6s (something the test scores have consistently said this year is pretty much that we're on the cusp and need to take that step), I need to RIDE him like a 7 and 8 during my rides; not just with Mike. This is the "slowly learning the blindingly obvious" part of the title of this post. Sometimes it is embarrassing how long it takes me to catch on to something that is really common sense. If out of 14 rides, 13 are lazy, why in the world would he think the 1/14 is the goal?
- I struggled with riding into the corners from our last lesson. That's because I was overdoing it. Mike said for Training and 1st level, it's ok to start your corner 5 meters from the corner (about quarter line between C and M, for example) and then end it about 5 meters from the corner (about the letter, which I think is 6 meters). So I don't have to ride him deep in the corner (yet - they do at upper levels).
- The 7 minute warm up? While not ok at a recognized show, Mike said a younger horse or a horse at the lower level can be ready to go - it's a mental block on my end. And I immediately thought of other times I wouldn't neurotically be there two hours ahead of time (traffic jam, flat tire, won't load, forget something), so that ended up being a good opportunity to think and learn about how to handle that differently in the future. (Although yes, we probably would have had more sparkle with my 45 minute warm up. And ok, probably the refusals in show jumping were because I didn't warm up there either, because I didn't like the footing.)
- Make Willig respond. The first time is ok, but he better go by the second. And it shouldn't be me doing the work but him. When I give the canter aid, he better canter that second - not when he feels like it four seconds later.
- For example, the stretchy circle needs to stretch by the time we start the circle, not half way around. When I ask for shoulder-in, I want it on the first step, not half way down the arena.
- His leg yields were very nice. Think about being a waitress holding a very heavy tray and keeping everything together the whole movement - don't let him wobble half way after he starts really nice.
- I think there was something else brilliant, but it's escaping me at the moment.

Non-lesson thoughts:
When I was cleaning his feet before I rode, he kicked me with his hind feet (made contact with first one, I was ready for second one), so after I rode I utilized my very dusty and rusty horse massage skills, and woo-weeeee Willig had some knots. I feel sorry for him. So I gave him a vitrolin rub and tried to rub out the biggest knots, and I'll try again this weekend.
I also finished reading the Pony Club D manual, where I somewhat horrifyingly learned a few things I didn't know. There's an adult pony club called Horse Masters, but it doesn't look like anyone has started one in Olympia yet.
And for the next two recognized shows, I'm going to volunteer for each of the segments and try to learn through observation (something I have been woefully inadequate on for a few years now), and then MAYBE sign up for NWEC.