‘Yee-haw: this is what trying and succeeding feels like’

Eternal giver-upper Xenia Taliotis takes on a series of sporty challenges in the Arizona desert and suddenly feels a new horizon ahead of her

If God loves a trier, then it’s safe to say that I’m not on his Christmas card list. In all aspects of life, I’m a non-trier, a give-upper. I never willingly confront challenge and when faced with a difficult situation, be it physical or emotional, work or relationship-related, my default is, sadly, defeat.

Admittedly I’ve come through some tough times – the death of my partner, the suicide of a dear friend and cancer being three that nearly killed me – but as for willingly trying to overcome, achieve or better myself, nope, I can’t say that I have.

Until recently, this was an irritating niggle – one of many faults I felt unable to correct (defeat, defeat, defeat), but a chance encounter with an old acquaintance who’d given up eating Marathons to run them (or, if you’re younger than 40, who’d traded snacking on Snickers for racing in sneakers) gave me the impetus I needed

to try to change. While I had no ambitions to follow in her blistered footsteps, I certainly did need to be fitter and stricter with myself – to stop being that person at the back of the gym having a little lie down while everyone else was rigid in plank, and, just as importantly, to stop finding excuses for wimping out of things I find difficult.

One week later, I’m bent double in a stable at Lori Bridwell’s Arizona Cowboy College (cowboycollege.com) in Scottsdale, cradling a horse’s leg in one hand, while digging stones out of her shoe with the other.

On paper, this one-day introductory course is supposed to give me the most elementary of cowboy skills – grooming, saddling up, riding – but in essence it’s to teach me self-discipline and how to approach tasks methodically.

Watching my every move is reality TV star and cowboy king Rocco Wachman, who’s got his motivational pep talk down to a pithy, but effective, one-liner: “If you don’t do this properly, you could die.” One way or another,