How to mount your horse properly, with GRACE

What screams GREEN? A rider hanging off their saddle, clutching the leather like a monkey in a tree. How many people are taught to mount? How many leg-ups have you given? Do you mount from a fence, block or the tailgate of a pickup? Ever wondered how to mount with grace?

Here are the steps...
First, get your horse to stand still. By moving your horse back and forth, you can teach him to balance himself. Squaring up will help him support your weight.

Once he's stable, face his tail, put your shoulder to his shoulder, twist the stirrup and place your foot in the stirrup. Holding on to the saddle horn and hop around and face the same direction as your horse. Shorten your reins in order to direct your horse toward you and the hindquarters away from you, in case he moves away from you. This will cause him to pivot away from you and keep contact.

Now, you're facing your horse, look him in the eye and pull yourself up using the saddle horn. Don't grab both sides of the saddle, don't worry, the tree/bars of the saddle will brace against your horse's scapula and help to leverage you up.

At this point, you should have your body weight supported in the stirrup and be able to swing your leg into the saddle and sit comfortably.

There is one thing to ask, does your saddle slip, slide, shift or roll? If you horse has mutton withers, this could be an ongoing issue, but it could mean something more. For instance, if you mount and ride, noticing the saddle shifts off to one side most of the time, your horse could have a rotated scapula. How do you know? If you can feel along the back of the scapula and when it ends there is a knot of muscle, round or egg shaped, the shoulder is rotated. If there is a pocket behind the shoulder, leaving a hollow place, then you have a rotated shoulder.
Also, rotated shoulders lead to misaligned ribs. If your saddle slips down to one side, the ribs are lower on that side. If you horse has trouble taking a lead, the ribs are out on the opposite side.
By shifting your weight on to the opposite side or bar of the saddle, you can help your horse to shift those ribs over. Swinging them back into balance. If you focus on the pocket where the saddle slips, your horse will have trouble mounting, cantering and with lead changes.

If your saddle slips, slides or rolls while mounting, you can try mounting from the opposite side until the ribs are back in balance. This helps the saddle stabilize against the shoulders, withers and back. It is able to grasp the body and allow you to mount.

I hope this helps you mount more gracefully.
Hopefully, we'll get some mounting pictures up for you to see the execution of this.