02/12/2025
This class applies to every dog, every puppy and every owner and trainer. From the day you receive your puppy you set the tone for success or failure for the lifetime of your dog. Please read this and be it a dog who will be herding livestock in a trial or a pet who will be a member of your family in your home and day to day activities this wonderful piece of information that pertains to all.
One of the most powerful steps you can take as a trainer is to change your mindset from,
‘How can I get my dog to do it’ to
‘How can I get my dog to Want to do it’—
Stress for dogs, often comes from the teacher, not the task.
For some dogs, the resentment for the phase of work that was forced upon them, stays with them and could have been avoided if the handler had changed their approach.
For example, if you make a new concept difficult, even inadvertently, such as,
having expectations of how quickly your dog should learn, how proficient he should be, the wrong set-up
or if you try to force behavior, it could be that you are creating the stress that your dog then associates with that task.
—At the onset of training, it’s extremely important to differentiate, is the training issue one you can change VS. is it a genetic predisposition, that you can improve and manage but not organically alter.
Trying to force a dog to ‘push through’ an issue that stems from their genetics (ie too much eye, inherently wide, inherently fearful etc) is almost always to the detriment of the dog.
Instead, this is when you need knowledge and experience to help your dog or the self awareness to seek help from an expert.
Just like people, dogs can get bored when you do the same thing too often,
frustrated when it’s too arduous or disheartened when too often being told ‘you’re wrong’.
Instead of trying to accelerate your dogs training timeline, focus on your consistency, development and improvement as a teacher.
It's your continuous effort to adjust to your dogs response and body language that will help your dog become the best he can be.
Handlers sometimes find themselves waiting...for the day when they, win the competition, succeed at “X” , are acknowledged by their peers, or other.
Don’t let the pursuit of tomorrow diminish the joy of today, for you or your dog.
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