Rainbows, not onions

Because of the busy adaptation schedule, I haven't had a dressage lesson from Shannon in a while.  After my lesson this week, I've decided that learning to ride is more like a rainbow than peeling an onion.  While the peeling an onion analogy works very well - there's always another layer under the layer you're at - also, I cry - I like my new rainbow analogy better.
It's like this:  pre-horses, I was dimly aware of a world that I wanted to be in that I knew existed but I had no idea of its scope.  Those first few rides were like the big bang - from nothing to everything all at once.  But since then, it has been a gradual process of going from close to dark, to dimly lit, to black and white, to shades of gray, to primary colors, to the basic rainbow, to the whole palette of nuanced colors that exists.  Why I like this analogy is that my progress is like this:  I'm in solid black and white world, and I'm happy there.  And then I have a lesson, and I see this amazing flash of brilliant blue, and I know there is more.  And then one day the blue stays a little longer in the sky, then a little longer, then I realize the sky is always blue, and there's a flash of green for the grass. 
Because what I've found is that wherever I'm at, I think that's the end.  And then I get these tantalizing hints - if I pay careful attention - that there's a whole other layer of complexity in the world that I wasn't aware of.  And each time I take one of those steps, I know I don't ever want to go back to the comfortable world of black and white because the world is so much richer the more color it gets.
My lesson with Shannon was like that.  I had a huge giant flash of magenta - I finally FELT the inside leg to outside hand.  It was only for a second - Shannon says three strides but I only really felt it on the final one - but there it was.  It was just that one moment, but now I know it is there and I'm not color-blind (like I was beginning to suspect I was).
We worked on a lot of new nuanced (to me) stuff.
My left hand likes to turn sideways (knuckles on top) and break at the wrist.
I keep my feet in the dressage stirrups in my jumping position (little toe on outside bar) - I need to work on my foot a bit deeper in the stirrup and even between the bars.
"Bend more" does not mean chin to chest.  It means in the corners, look at the inside eyelashes.  Every corner.  But then go straight on the straight lines in between.
Poll should be highest point.  This is so easy and yet I completely and utterly forgot about it.
Try riding with my stirrups a hole or two shorter since I am still struggling in the dressage saddle to get my heels down.
But also - this was a flash of azure - when I slump over and let my left arm drift forward is when Charlie goes on the forehand.  When I am jumping and have my hands planted in his neck, or I am riding with my hands in his neck because Shannon has told me to - or when I am sitting in a proper frame with my elbows bent and not stretching my arms long - this goes away, and suddenly we feel connected.  I haven't gotten a good enough grasp of this to fully explain it, but all of a sudden I saw and felt what I was doing wrong this whole time, fixed it, and felt the fix work.
Spiral in and out is a good exercise I have let slip because I have been doing Major Beale's.  Think about leg yielding.
In corners, push Charlie around like a wheelbarrow (this is tied to the flash of azure) - don't pull him around by the inside hand. 
There was probably a lot more than that, but my tiny brain got full.  I think I could add to the analogy that as you develop, you go from a tiny little palette to a bigger and bigger one.  Right now, it doesn't take much new paint for mine to get full and things to start leaking out my ears again.