I follow a guy on Facebook, called Tai Zee Kin and he wrote something that resonated with me.

“In the academic world, there is no ‘stupid question‘. A professor or lecturer should never say ‘dont ask me stupid question’. However, there are ‘lazy questions’.”

I get asked a lot of questions and I am happy to answer them.. but I would like you to also try and figure out the answer. Do not just rely on me to spoon feed you the answers.

Example 1 :
Q: Coach, in cross country, can riders just choose whatever jumps they want to do? (referring to some cross country jumps having options)
A : Some fences have options. Not all jumps have them. The straight route is often harder, but faster and lesser number of jumping efforts. The option is often easier, but longer and has more jumping efforts
Q : So how do the riders normally chose what route they want to take?
A :  I am happy to answer that but why don’t you give me some suggestions or why you think a rider may choose the long or short route.

Example 2:
Q : Water supply has been cut off so I can’t fill up the water bins. What should I do?
A : Why don’t you tell me what you think we should do?? What options are available?

I felt that these 2 replies promoted a better discussion / more thinking, instead of just giving him/her the answers. Sure, this made for longer conversations and a bit more effort required on our part but this is our responsibility as coaches / mentors.

At the riding school, we do have a lot of young adults coming to ride or to do internships at the riding school. One thing besides teaching horse riding and horse handling skills, is that we try to teach the ability to think and to solve problems.

I think that some people are too lazy to think and to figure out the answer or solution to a problem. It is laziness that is the issue.. if you are too lazy to use your brains, you will eventually be perceived as stupid.

Logic and common sense are often your best answers to a problem.

Sometimes there are really just stupid questions