Tuesday, June 26, 2012

The Secret To Dog Training

Student: Why don't you ever freak out when your dogs mess up something you are teaching?

Me: Because I am not that motivated...and it doesn't matter. My negative emotions don't help my dogs, they will only make things worse.

Student: Can you sell me some of this "Doesn't Matter" concoction?

Me: I wish! I would be a millionaire!

Student: Guess I will have to learn to care less huh?

Me: Yup...Drinking helps ;-) 
So does a course and/or book on mental management :-)

Don't you wish you took lessons with me?? LMAO!!

I LOVE my students :)

Oh...and LOOK
Even DOES sleep :)

7 comments:

Chris and Ricky said...

Haha! Yes I wish I took lessons with you! :)

Dawn said...

yes I do wish I took lessons with you.

Dawn said...

I absolutely wish I took lessons with you!

Steve said...

Loretta - Awesome advice and sometimes so hard to follow! Over the years I've been learning to "just let it go" and my dogs appreciate it!

You inspired me to add my two cents on my blog: http://bit.ly/MTNBab

Taryn said...

I think I've read every mental management book out there! And while they do make many good points, insights, and provide exercises to work with, I think it is very hard to override one's baseline personality....or would that be personality disorder ;-)

Karissa said...

Key phrase in that first sentance: "when your dogs mess up something you're training."

Well, I'm the trainer. If something doesn't go right, it's not my dog's fault. My dogs don't mess up, I do. What good would it do to freak out at them when I'm the cause of the problem? If something isn't going well it's because I'm not conveying my message properly -- so it's my job to either move on to something else or figure out how to make it work.

Maybe it's different for those of us who tend to work on our own? My experience with a lot of people taking classes or lessons is that they feel everything must be PERFECT during that hour or they feel like failures. When things go poorly they stress and worry that they'll always suck or something.

My attitude is more like, 'Well that didn't work today, let's try it a different way.' I've gotten very chill in my training.

Or maybe some would call it lazy....

:o)

Loretta Mueller said...

Chris and Dawn--you two are adorable!
Steve--glad I spurred some blogging!

Taryn--that's where the drinking comes in :)

Karissa--yes...it really does all come back to us. Lazy can be a good thing!