When riding in the arena or at home, we often spend our whole time convincing our horses to work with more energy. When we finally feel that our horses are educated enough, we eventually head out and spend our entire time trying to dissipate our horses energy. By constantly riding at home in the same place, we miss the opportunity to educate our horses on the wider world.
A horse needs to see a lot of different things in order to get familiar and comfortable with them and this takes time. Often when horses see new things, it also comes with a high level of energy. The same energy we are looking for when riding at home on the arena. Our time out and about can be used to help the horse get comfortable being out and get them used to productively using their energy. So don’t constantly ride your horse in the very limited environment (the cupboard) at home.