Succeeding in Agility free essay sample

In the late 1970s, a group of equestrians did something no one had ever thought to do before: train their dogs to complete a jumping course. This new discovery quickly became popular and developed into the sport we now know as dog agility. In its simplest form, agility is a sequence of numbered obstacles, from jumps and tunnels to teeter-totters and weave poles. A handler must guide her dog through the course in the correct order and ensure her dog performs each obstacle correctly. If an obstacle is not completed the right way, points will be deducted from the team’s final score. Their â€Å"run† also must be under a set time called the standard course time. This is determined by the yardage of each individual course. Some competitors become engulfed in the technicalities of the sport. They spend hours upon hours every day researching ways they can make their runs a millisecond faster. We will write a custom essay sample on Succeeding in Agility or any similar topic specifically for you Do Not WasteYour Time HIRE WRITER Only 13.90 / page They obsess over training and push their dogs to be as fast as is physically possible for them. Qualifying and placements are the only things they care about. They seek to compete at higher level competitions solely for the attention they will receive. If their dog does not perform the way they would like, they punish him. They take all the fun out of the sport for their dog, and in turn, themselves. They are not passionate about their dogs; they are passionate about winning. These people are successful in the sense that they accomplish what they aim for but are considered unsuccessful in the sport. Almost any experienced participant in agility will tell you winning means nothing. While getting first place or competing at the national/international level is a great feat and something to be proud of, the most important concept in the sport is the bond formed between a handler and her dog. Nothing in the world can compare to the feeling you get just running beside your best friend and knowing you are both having the time of your lives. A team does not have to be the fastest or even the most accurate to be successful. Success in agility is celebrating every moment spent with your companion. Success is being proud of your dog, even on the worst days. Success is finishing your worst run ever and praising your dog like he just won a national championship. You could be the person whose dog cannot even clear one jump without knocking down the bar and still be as successful as the person winning first place every time she step into the ring. Success in agility is a lot deeper than just winning. It is all about the special moments experienced with your dog and loving him in spite of everything. After all, in your dog’s final hours, you won’t look back and say, â€Å"Man, I wish Spot had won more blue ribbons.†

Hunahpu and Xbalanque - The Maya Hero Twins

Hunahpu and Xbalanque - The Maya Hero Twins The Hero Twins are famous Mayan semi-gods called Hunahpu and Xbalanque, whose story is narrated in the Popol Vuh (â€Å"The Book of Council†). The Popol Vuh is the sacred text of the Quichà © Maya of the Guatemalan highlands, and it was written during the Early Colonial period, probably between 1554–1556, although the stories within it are clearly much older. The First Hero Twins Hunahpu and Xbalanque are the second Hero Twins in Maya mythology. Like all Mesoamerican cultures, the Maya believed in cyclical time, including periodic cosmic destruction and renovation, called the ages of the world. The first pair of divine hero twins were the Maize Twins, 1 Hunter Hun Hunahpu and 7 Hunter Vuqub Hunahpu, and they lived during the second world. Hun Hunahpu and his twin brother Vucub Hunahpu were invited down into the Maya underworld (Xibalba) to play the Mesoamerican ballgame by the Xibalban lords One and Seven Death. There they fell prey to several trickeries. On the eve of the scheduled game, they were given cigars and torches and told to keep them lit all night without consuming them. They failed in this test, and the penalty for failure was death. The twins were sacrificed and buried, but the head of Hun Hunapu was cut off, and only his body was buried with his younger brother. The Lords of Xibalba placed Hun Hunapus head in the fork of a tree, where it helped the tree bear fruit. Eventually, the head came to look like a calabash- the American domesticated squash. A daughter of one of the lords of Xibalba named Xquic (Blood Moon) came to see the tree and Hun Hunapus head talked to her and spit saliva into the maidens hand, impregnating her. Nine months later, the second Hero Twins were born. The Second Hero Twins In the third world, the second pair of hero twins, Hunahpu and Xbalanque, avenged the first set by defeating the Lords of the Underworld. The names of the second set of Hero Twins have been translated as X-Balan-Que â€Å"Jaguar-Sun† or â€Å"Jaguar-Deer,† and Hunah-Pu, as â€Å"One Blowgunner.† When Hunahpu (One Blowgunner) and Xbalanque (Jaguar Sun) are born, they are treated cruelly by their half-brothers  but make themselves happy by going out every day to hunt birds with their blowguns. After many adventures, the twins are summoned to the underworld. Following in the footsteps of their fathers, Hunahpu and Xbalanque descend the road to Xibalba, but avoid the tricks that captured their fathers. When they are given a torch and cigars to keep alight, they trick the lords by passing off a macaws tail as the glow of a torch, and by putting fireflies at the tips of their cigars. The next day, Hunahpuh and Xbalanque play ball with the Xibalbans, who first try to play with a ball made of a skull covered with crushed bone. An extended game follows, full of trickery on both sides, but the wily twins survive. Dating the Hero Twins Myth In prehistoric sculptures and paintings, the Hero Twins arent identical twins. The older twin (Hunahpuh) is depicted as larger than his younger twin, right-handed and masculine, with black spots on his right cheek, shoulder and arms. The sun and pronghorn antlers are Hunahpuhs main symbols, although often both twins wear deer symbols. The younger twin (Xbalanque) is smaller, left-handed and often with a feminine guise, with the moon and rabbits his symbols. Xbalanque has patches of jaguar skin on his face and body. Although the Popol Vuh dates to the Colonial period, the Hero Twins have been identified on painted vessels, monuments, and cave walls dating to the Classic and Preclassic period, as early as 1000 BCE. The names of the Hero Twins are also present in the Maya calendar as day signs. This further indicates the importance and antiquity of the myth of the Hero Twins, whose origins date back to the earliest period of Maya history. Hero Twins in the Americas In the Popol Vuh myth, before avenging the fates of the first twins, the two brothers have to kill a bird-demon called Vucub-Caquix. This episode is apparently portrayed in a stela at the early site of Izapa, in Chiapas. Here a couple of young men are portrayed shooting a bird-monster descending from a tree with their blowgun. This image is very similar to the one narrated in the Popol Vuh. The myth of divine hero-twins is known in most Native American traditions. They are present in myths and tales both as legendary ancestors, and heroes that need to overcome various trials. Death and rebirth are suggested by many of the hero-twins appearing in the form of men-fish. Many Mesoamerican Indians believed that gods catch fish, human embryos floating in a mythical lake. The Hero Twin myth was part of a suite of ideas and artifacts that arrived in the American southwest from the gulf coast beginning about 800 CE. Scholars have noted that the Maya Hero Twin myth appears in southwestern United States Mimbres pottery about that time. Updated by K. Kris Hirst Sources Boskovic, Aleksandar. The Meaning of Maya Myths. Anthropos 84.1/3 (1989): 203–12. Print.Gilman, Patricia, Marc Thompson, and Kristina Wyckoff. Ritual Change and the Distant: Mesoamerican Iconography, Scarlet Macaws, and Great Kivas in the Mimbres Region of Southwestern New Mexico. American Antiquity 79.1 (2014): 90–107. Print.Knapp, Bettina L. The Popol Vuh: Primordial Mother Participates in the Creation. Confluencia 12.2 (1997): 31–48. Print.Miller, Mary E., and Karl Taube. An Illustrated Dictionary of the Gods and Symbols of Ancient Mexico and the Maya. London: Thames and Hudson, 1997. Print.Sharer, Robert J. The Ancient Maya. 6th ed. Stanford, California: Stanford University Press, 2006. Print.Tedlock, Dennis. How to Drink Chocolate from a Skull at a Wedding Banquet. RES: Anthropology and Aesthetics 42 (2002): 166–79. Print.-. The Popol Vuh: Definitive Edition of the Maya Book of the Dawn of Life and the Glories of Gods and Kings. 2nd ed. New York: Touc hstone, 1996. Print.