Horsenality challenge and breakthrough

So, I decided I needed to ride Walker yesterday, as I have had a terrible cold, and it had been about a week since Walker and I had ridden together. Haven't had a cold like this in so long, it has been no fun. Anyway, wow, was Walker relaxed yesterday. As time goes by, Walker displays more the traits of a left brained horse, and yesterday was a good example of that. We have been playing with his trot and canter departs on the ground to get them to be snappier. Walker is really starting to much more balanced whoa vs. go. Some days he is definitely got more whoa than go, and my friends at Starfire barn north of Dallas would be amazed by that development! They were witness to the crazy Walker, the horse who ran over my Parelli instructor Grady attempting to get him to jump barrels and my friend Nancy in a marathon trailer loading session. On both counts, Walker just lept over them in a right-brained demonstration of pure fear and athletic ability. Not fun.
We played with the question box until he calmly did some simple lead changes, then we played follow the rail. One area of the arena he consistently does not like is the judging stand. Today, as we passed by it, he moved sideways away from it. You have to understand that for Walker, this is a mild response to what he might see as a danger to him. At times, I have been surprised by Walker spooking at something, most often something I don't ever see, feel or hear, with a sideways four footed leap of 4 feet. I have to admit, I have not always stayed in the saddle when he's done that! So a small sideways move is nothing for Walker. Based on his mild response to something fearful, I decided to handle the scary judging stand differently today. I asked him to go sideways back towards the judging stand, all the way to the fence. He was obviously not comfortable as his nose was in the air and he got bracey, but he did not move away either. I stroked the fence for about 20 seconds, then asked Walker forward, which he did happily, anything to get away from the vicious, mouth breathing, claws extended judging stand. The next time by, he was much calmer standing there, even putting his head down as I stroked the fence again. The third time we went by, he offered to go sideways to the judging stand and then he stopped there all by himself! What a breakthrough for Walker and me! I fed him cookies, hopped off and gave a nice hosing down. Then I hopped back on bareback and we had a very slow, relaxed walk out to the turnouts.
Who would have thought seven years ago that my crazed right brained extrovert would ever have been able to walk relaxed bareback with me anywhere?