A New Day Dog Training

05/08/2026

What a week at Dalmatian Club of America National Specialty in Kingsport TN.
This sweet and awesome 18 month boy walked away with an Award of Merit!!

I couldn't be more proud of how this baby dog handled himself all week. Being the youngest in the Specials (Champion) ring and going up against the Top 20 Dalmatians in the Country and Grand Champions.

Cloud 9!!!

04/19/2026

A CONVERSATION ABOUT PERCEIVED VALUE:

A customer asked a dog trainer how much it would cost to train his dog

My friend gave him a proposal: $2,500 for 2 weeks of training

The customer responded: That’s seems really high.

My friend asked: What do you think is a reasonable price for this?

The customer answered: $1,000 maximum

My friend responded: Ok, then I invite you to do it yourself.

The customer answered: I don't know how to.

My friend responded: Alright, then how about for $1,500 I'll teach you how to. So besides saving you $1,000, you'll learn valuable skills that will benefit you in the future.

The customer answered: Sounds good! Let’s do it!

My friend responded: Great! To get started, you are going to need some equipment. You will need a collar, leash, long line, treat pouch, treats, place cot and crate

The customer answered: But I don't have any of those things and I can't justify buying all of those at one time.

My friend responded: Ok. Well then for an additional $200 I can rent my things to you to use for this.

The customer answered: Okay. That’s fair.

My friend responded: Great! We will start the training on Monday.

The customer answered: I work Monday through Friday. I’m only available on the weekends.

My friend responded: If you want to learn from me then you will need to work when I work. This training will take 2 weeks so you will need to take 2 weeks off work.

The customer answered: That means I’m going to have to sacrifice my pay for 2 weeks or use my vacation time!

My friend responded: That’s true. Remember, when you do a job yourself you need to account for unproductive factors.

The customer answered: What do you mean by that?

My friend responded: Doing a job completely from start to finish includes travel time, gas, prep time, clean up and feeding amongst other things. That’s all in addition to the actual training itself.

The customer answered: You know, I’m realizing that a lot more goes in to a job than what a customer sees in the finished project. Your proposal of $2,500 is very reasonable. I would like you to handle the training

CONCLUSION:

When you pay for a job you pay not only for the material and the work to be completed. You also pay for:

✔️ Knowledge
✔️ Experience
✔️ Custom Skills
✔️ Tools
✔️ Time to plan
✔️ Time to prepare
✔️ Professionalism
✔️ Work Ethic
✔️ Excellence
✔️ Discipline
✔️ Commitment
✔️ Integrity
✔️ Taxes
✔️ Licenses
✔️ Sacrifices
✔️ Liabilities
✔️ Insurance

If you request a service please don’t disrespect a service provider by trying to get them to lower their prices.

If their proposal exceeds your budget, there’s nothing wrong with getting other proposals.

Just remember.. you get what you pay for.

👉🏼 SERVICE PROVIDERS: Know your worth and be confident in it.

👉🏼 CONSUMERS: Recognize their worth and be respectful of it.

Sharing this to support all my friends, family and clients who are Entrepreneurs, Business Owners and Tradesman.

03/25/2026

Okay, so this is a word that gets an awful lot of play in the training world, and it’s definition has come to mean an awful lot of things. Many of which, are incredibly counter-productive, if not downright dangerous.

So let’s see if we can’t clarify a few things.

Socialization isn’t:
-About letting your dog freely interact with dogs at the dog park, day care, or with friends dogs.
-About allowing your dog to meet other dogs on-leash.
-About allowing all manner of people, in all manner of mental/emotional states interact/pet/pressure your dog.
-About exposing your dog to the sights and sounds of cars, buses, motorcycles, bikes, skateboards, joggers...and allowing them to freak out, panic, aggress, hide, bark etc.
-About exposing your dog to the sights and sounds of dogs, cats, and other animals, and allowing them to freak out, aggress, lunge, bark, growl etc.

Socialization is:
-About teaching your dog the proper responses to dogs. What is and isn’t appropriate behavior, and correcting the unwanted when it appears.
-About teaching your dog to walk by the barking, lunging dog(s) on walks and ignore them, completely. Correcting if necessary to achieve this result.
-About advocating for your dog and ensuring people aren’t allowed to pressure your dog, by touching, crouching down, attempting “kisses” etc. That means being a big boy or girl, and stopping others from engaging in unwanted, uninvited interactions.
-About exposing your dog to all manner of daily life “things” and ensuring a proper response. If aggression/arousal is present, it’s corrected, if fear/arousal is present (and causes an overreaction/fleeing etc.) it’s corrected. Ask your dog to learn to ignore and not care about these “life” distractions/concerns/temptations. Teach them to listen to the training, not the world around them.
-About teaching your dog to leave other creatures alone. The cat, the bird, the cow, the goat, the other dog, is simply none of their business. If they decide those things are their business, it’s your job to correct and clarify what is and isn’t their business for them.

Socialization has become a ridiculously simplified, dumbed down, all-encompassing idea. Free interaction and exposure have been presented as a panacea, the magic gateway to a balanced dog. That’s a whole lot of B.S. you’ve been sold, by a lot of people full of B.S. 🙂

Socialization is all about teaching your dog how to behave and exist in the world...properly. People have a belief that only interactions create a well socialized dog. They don’t understand that existence is almost always preferable, and more valuable than actual interaction. Yes exposure is critical, but exposure without 100% clear guidance, and corrections for poor choices, isn’t socialization, it’s chaos, and it’s not teaching your dog what’s right, what’s wrong, and that you’ll keep them safe, so they don’t have to.

A well socialized dog isn’t fazed by the world around them. And that doesn’t come from simple exposure and interactions without guidance. Ironically, that’s precisely how you create anti-social dogs.

Think on that for a minute.

-The Good Dog Training (Shawn O'Shea)

03/23/2026

ARE YOU WORTH COMING BACK TO?

There are many reasons why dogs don’t come back when you want them to. A dog’s genetics play a big role in this when an environment is far more stimulating and exciting and listening and coming back to you disappear into the background as genetic instinct takes over.

An exciting scent or seeing something to chase can all override a response to you.

Genetics aside, a common reason why dogs don’t come back when called is because it’s not a positive experience for them.

I often cringe when I watch owners trying to get their dogs to come to them when they call.
They call and call and get increasingly angry and frustrated as their dog keeps ignoring them.

When their dog eventually does come back, or has been chased and "captured” by their owner, they get screamed at, yanked about, smacked or punished in some way for taking so long and not listening. Why would a dog want to return to someone who does this to them!

Make coming back to you worth it by always making it a rewarding experience.

Have a little patience if it takes longer than you would like, let your dog finish what they’re doing before calling them, practice in different locations and environments and never reprimand or punish them for coming back.

There is never a guarantee of a perfect recall each and every time, but making it rewarding will greatly improve the rate of success.

-Dogs Disclosed

03/21/2026

Story of a puppy.

When this puppy was with his dog mom, his mom would do anything to protect him. His mom was assertive, firm, and fair. She ran a tight ship and provided very clear structure to the puppies.

The mom would not allow other people or dogs to come bother her puppies when they were not ready. She made the puppies feel very safe knowing that they would be fully advocated for at all time.

She would monitor the interaction and correct inappropriate behaviour between the puppies during play. There was a clear structure in place so no one was confused.

Then the puppy left the mom and went home with a human. The human family was so excited because this puppy was so cute.

They spent all their time hugging and coddling this puppy. They could not leave the puppy alone. They invited all their friends and family members over to see the "new puppy". They would allow many strangers and dogs to "say hi" to the puppy constantly.

All the sudden, the puppy's dog mom was no longer there to advocate for this puppy yet her role was not replaced by anyone. Not only that, the puppy is now surrounded by people and animals who would not leave him alone to give him the space he desperately needed so he could feel secure in a new environment.

The puppy was in shock and was confused. He had no one to lean on, no structure to go by. He had no idea how to cope with the stress and there was no guidance.

Instead of taking up the position of being the pup's advocate and filling the void left by his dog mom by offering this puppy much needed guidance, the human chose to act even softer and more unstable by trying to "comfort" this puppy with lots of affection, treats, and soft voices. They hugged him, baby talked to him, bought him lots of cloths, brushed him 290 times a day, and they kept allowing strangers and dogs to approach and greet this puppy because they were told this was "socialization" and would help the puppy to become more confident.

They took the puppy to pet shops to further the "socialization" where the puppy was overwhelmed with lots of people exhibiting very unstable energy with their high pitch voice who could not get their hands off this puppy despite his constant body language pleading to just be left alone. Again, the human did not stop anyone from getting too close too soon as the puppy's dog mom would certainly have.

The puppy was very shocked by how clueless and insensitive his owners were. He was used to having his dog mom keeping everything under control but his humans were not doing that at all!

Where is mom? Who is here to advocate for me?

Then the puppy was taken to dog parks and he was bullied. The human did not seem to notice. Everyone and their dogs were really aroused and excited. It was very overwhelming and no one was there to advocate for this puppy.

The puppy finally had enough so one day when he was on leash, he growled and lunged at these "rude" dogs.

His human freaked out over his growling. They yelled at him and then they hugged him and coddled him. This made the puppy more confused and insecure.

He expected his human to understand why he growled and step up to protect him assertively--as he was sure his mom would; instead, he was punished for asking his leader for help. Not only that, his human was not confident nor calm at all; they looked scared and stressed. How could he trust someone with such unstable and weak energy?

The human was heartbroken. They said, "we love him so much, why isn't he friendly?"

"We have taken so much time to socialize him, we have done all the right things, why is he aggressive?"

"We have been so nice to him, it makes no sense."

They felt guilty, and sorry, and frustrated, and betrayed.

The whole household was filled with what was interpreted by the puppy as, once again, a very soft, unstable, and weak energy. That did nothing to fill the void left by the puppy' mom. The puppy's craving for direction and protection was never even acknowledged.

Now the human stayed away from the puppy because they were scared of his “unpredictable aggression”. The puppy was not taken out so he was even more scared of anything outside of his immediate familiar surrounding.

How can this puppy trust someone so unstable, weak, and insensitive? How could he have confidence when he had no one to trust and count on? How could he be balanced and stable if he was living under constant anxiety and insecurity?

The family felt guilty about locking up the puppy so they decided to take him for a walk.

Once outside, the puppy growled, lunged, and tried to charge at a human walking toward him. The puppy felt that he had no other option. He had to take up the role of his mom and protect himself. He had to get the person away before he came too close into his space like others had done hundreds of times in the past.

The human was petrified. They could not believe it! What happened to our cute little puppy? We loved him so much, why?

He was locked up in his yard for a few months and when he became too big and destructive he was given up to the shelter.

Everyone cried.

They tried to be honest so they told the shelter the dog was “dog and human aggressive”.

He was very stressed and anxious in the shelter. He just wanted to have his space but he was surrounded by barking unstable dogs and lots of humans coming and going all day long all displaying unstable, chaotic, and emotional energy.

He kept barking and charging at the fence to tell them to back off.

All he ever wanted was just to have someone acting like his mom, someone who would offer him proper guidance and advocacy so he could simply follow and finally relax.

He did not care for all the nice scarves, all the cute leashes and colorful harnesses, all the home cooked treats, all the squeaky toys, all the expensive beds.

He just wanted someone he could trust, like his dog mom.

He had no idea why such a simple need was never met.

He was very frustrated, lost, confused, and stressed.

But it was too late...

He was not a cute puppy anymore.

No one wanted an aggressive dog.

After a few weeks in the shelter, he was put down.

The end.

09/30/2025

This is a huge topic! Helping and teaching dogs a calm mind set is key! Training started from day one of having that dog or that puppy to fit your lifestyle.

09/12/2025

08/23/2025

07/18/2025

07/14/2025

Breeding matters!

🌟 Why Choosing an Ethical Breeder Matters (and Why “You Get What You Pay For”)

Thinking about bringing a purebred pup into your home? It pays to buy thoughtfully. Ethical breeders aren’t the cheapest option—but they’re absolutely worth it. Here’s why:

1️⃣ Health Comes First
Truly ethical breeders invest in genetic testing and health screenings—for conditions like hip dysplasia, heart issues, or breed-specific disorders—so puppies are less likely to face costly vet struggles down the road .

2️⃣ Proper Socialization & Temperament
These breeders carefully expose puppies to people, environments, and other animals from a young age, helping them grow into well-adjusted, confident adults .

3️⃣ Commitment to Breed Standards & Preservation
They breed with intent—focusing on health, function, temperament—not just looks. Responsible breeders often limit the number of litters and use thoughtful pairing to maintain breed integrity .

4️⃣ Ongoing Support & Accountability
An ethical breeder will screen potential owners, ask thoughtful questions, provide health and lineage info, offer lifelong support, and even accept a dog back if needed—because they care about their pups for life .

5️⃣ True Value vs. Hidden Costs
Yes, the initial price may be higher—but compared to the potential vet bills, behavioral training, heartbreak and uncertainty from an ill‑bred pet, it’s a sound investment in long-term well‑being .

✅ Bottom line:

You really get what you pay for. Ethical breeders set the standard—prioritizing health, temperament, transparency, and lifelong responsibility. For anyone serious about getting a well‑bred, well‑adjusted companion and ready to support future breed health, it’s absolutely worth the investment.