THE IMPORTANCE OF GOOD OBEDIENCE TRAINING
From the moment you obtain your dog, a very intense, exact, and detailed phenomenon begins to take shape that will immediately start to set the parameters for the quality of life you will enjoy with your pet from them on. From the first second you claim your dog a relationship has begun that will continue to develop, as both of you focus, contribute, and allow it to grow. Each of you brings many elements into this relationship, mentally, emotionally, and psychologically, creating a foundational "Arena of Behavior" within which you will contend for perspective, control, and responsiveness. According to the wheel of your experience, through every decision and action you commit, or omit, you will be teaching your dog. Weather or not you are ready for the relationship, or regardless of your own mental mind-set, you have begun a journey with a living, intelligent creature. One thing will become very clear, very quickly. Whoever has the best, most enduring, most usable strategy will control the relationship. Usually, it does not take long for us to realize that, WE are the ones who will need help!
Now, we are taught that dogs are not supposed to have strategies; they are supposed to follow their "instincts". Dogs are suppose to be illogical, irrational, somewhat retarded, without the capacity to remember, or the ability to be responsible. Accordingly, they cannot use trial and error, and do not understand normal instruction. They pretentiously have little sensitivity, do not feel or express emotions. They have to be caught "in the act", and trained with prolonged repetition. Yet it is not their stupidity that gives us trouble, or their "very limited" intelligence. As dumb as they are, we seem to be the ones needing help. Amazingly, while our dogs have learned to adapt, control, and conquer, we humans are the ones that seem to be having difficulty controlling them.
Through my years of work, I have learned how to help each dog develop and overcome their own mentality, to use the conditioning I put into their conscious mind, instead of always relying on the behaviors they had previously habitualized, that control their subconscious responsiveness. Through the training each dog learns to replace these old behaviors with the new ones I teach them, grow in maturity, expand their ability to communicate comprehensively, and through the process become close friends. Simply put, the quality and level of work you put into your dog is what you will live behaviorally with for its entire life. The relationship you build through obedience establishes the bond you will use to be successful with your dog. If you can't trust your dog when you leave your home, off leash in your yard, or the park, etc., you haven't successfully trained them in obedience.
A great many (up to 85% of dog owners) think that they have trained their dogs for obedience, when all they have really done is to teach them convenient tricks their dog can repeat on leash. The dog has learned these tricks called sit, down, stay, etc., and yet has been mentally untouched, and retained the behaviors that motivated the owner to "train" them in the first place. Who has actually trained whom? Has the dog changed? Is their behavior and performance what you desire? Or, has your dog simply learned how to comply in order to escape being scolded, jerked around, or made to endure more "instruction"? Is your dog different, correct, and obediently responsive in your home, your yard, around other animals, strangers, etc., because of your training? Or, are you part of the 85% that were unsuccessful? Many times, having gone through a program of "basic" obedience, a dog can be unchanged mentally and even display worse behavior than before that training. This is because the dog's mentality is still unchanged, and its habits remain either unchanged or fortified as a result. The program was not successful because it was not focused or strong enough to affect the needed changes in the mind of the dog that would transform the dogs' previously learned habits and mental structure, and replace them with proper behaviors. If used properly, obedience training should be the key to proper behavior.
Obedience training should be a positive, therapeutic, strategically designed instrument that you use as the key to developing proper behavior in your dog. It is the dog's ability to stop on command, ignore distractions, receive communication from their handler, follow their handler's commands, and respond wholeheartedly to those commands that will make all the difference, and make their performance special. A trained dog is a dog that does what they know. It is the quality their obedience training that provides them with the ability to perform.
Yet, how do accomplish imprinting your training into the subconscious mind of your dog, so that YOU can transform their behavior, and replace the behaviors you do not desire, with those you do desire? There is a five fold process which you must embody in your training. You must teach your dog to stop, focus, listen, follow, and obey your instructions exactly as given, develop proper communication skills, learn respect, loyalty, and behavioral perspective you instill them through your conditioning.
Because of proper obedience training, you and your dog will learn to function as one unit, and become a team, in order to be successful. This demands that you become a team leader, and they become an active and responsive part of that team. This is not to be compared to the dominance/submissive theories that have caused so much trouble in training. Performance is motivated by conscience leadership, not force, demands, or punishment. The level of performance you will attain with your dog physically will correspond to the level of understanding, trust, respect, sensitivity, and agreement you both develop mentally, and psychologically.
As you consider starting your dog in obedience, focus on the overall goals you have set for your dog, how you wish for your dog to respond, and what type of behavior you are really looking to develop in your dog through your training. Obedience training is not an end in itself, so structure your training to establish and perpetuate the specific proper behaviors in your dog. A great many dog owners teach obedience exercises are merely tricks your dog learns to perform instead of using the training exercises to teach them consistent forms of behavior. Instead, set your dog up to perceive and feel about your training commands the way you want. Dog training is a process of focusing and motivating your dog to make decisions in your training experiences which you can use to motivate proper behavior and performance from them in all areas of your lives.
THE MIRACLE OF DOG TRAINING
Proper obedience training builds your dog's mentality, the same way a body builder uses exercising to build a strong healthy body. Today top body builders have found that those people, who are truly developing their physical bodies to peak performance, also are changing their mentality at the same time. The same thing happens with your dog; it all happens simultaneously. It is a fact that as you train, your dog will actually develop undeveloped parts of their brain, (especially the conscious mind), and become more able to use their intelligence in ways that we can both understand.
Daily obedience training keeps your dog's mind clear, focused, and in good operating condition. Obedience training teaches your dog how to receive, communicate, and respond to you and your desires. It expands your dogs' conscious ability to understand and perceive things the way you desire.
Obedience also becomes the key in teaching your dog how to get the things they want as well. (Your dog has five basic needs; attention, affection, discipline, play, and food.) By learning to use obedient performance in a positive way to get what they want, your dog will also learn not to use negative, destructive, or abusive behaviors in their efforts to focus and control your behavior. Obedience training can enhance your dogs' position in the pack, give them added self-esteem, and build trust, confidence, and self esteem. It can be a great source of stress release for your dog, and eliminate most of their insecurities. By replacing behaviors that cause stress and trauma between you and your dog with behaviors learned through positive obedience conditioning exercises, your dog will learn how to feel fulfilled and content by performing these new behaviors, and will quickly incorporate them into their strategic catalogue of behaviors they use to motivate your relationship. In so doing they will become a "good" dog.
You are going to progress through several different levels of training with your dog. Many people come to me feeling they have failed because they have gone successfully through the first beginning level or two of training with their dog, who was, as a pup, behaving very well, but is now out of control. This is because, either, when it came time for the next level of training their trainer, their dog, or they themselves were not educated and mentally-emotionally ready to progress, or they lacked the proper knowledge of K9 behavior to know what their dog needed. Their short sighted, simple training agenda may have taught their dog to obey as a young pup, but is not geared to develop or resolve the behaviors desired in them as an adult.
Dog training is a living, natural process where your dog, through your conditioning experiences, receives instruction, and processes it from the conscious to the sub-conscious mind. They then, under your instruction, begin to apply that conditioning to actual life experiences. In the process, as the dog normalizes, personalizes, and habitualizes your obedience conditioning, the dogs' behavior is changed, and their performance becomes somewhat stylized according to your desires. There are NO short cuts, no magic wands, or artificial "tricks" that will help you skip from your starting point to where you desire to go with your dog. There are no gimmicks, artificial devices, or super methods that will circumvent the system and produce instant behavior, without causing a myriad of problems at the same time, and over looking behaviors you are just going to have to turn around and deal with tomorrow.
Dog training when done properly can be intense and very emotionally taxing. In order to make a strong decision it takes strong emotion, and often the sessions when your dog is making these decisions to stop, focus, receive, follow, and obey your instructions are emotionally stressful for you as well as your dog. However, they are also life-changing lessons for the dog where they will make quantum leaps in decision-making and as a result, performance. If you want the right behavior out of your dog, you've got to put it into your dog.
Here are some guidelines for your personal training.
RULES THAT WILL HELP YOU ACCOMPLISH YOUR GOALS
- Dog training, which, properly done is an art in itself. takes a great deal of knowledge and proper technique to perform
- Dog training is a living, evolutional mental process, which progresses naturally.
- The end-result is produced by what you consistently put into your dog.
- You need to concentrate on one thing, one step at a time: Your training must be broken down into the most basic, simple
elements; capable of being communicated and taught to your dog each time you instruct them.
- Proceed only at a pace that is right for your dog.
- Allow the dog to digest each lesson individually.
- Remember that each lesson is only a part of the whole process of instructional experiences you wish to imprint on your dogs' mind, so use your dogs' mistakes to teach, not to punish them.
- Each lesson is also an important step in reaching your end goal.
- If you are not giving your dog what they need, you are not training properly.
- Allow your dog to make mistakes, respond, learn, and correct their own mistakes, as they will, without fear of trauma and either physical, mental, or verbal abuse.
- Remember that your introductory sessions with your dog are going to have the greatest impact upon them. Use them to imprint the fundamental building block for your conditioning in a very positive and simple way.
- You must understand that what you are really doing is imprinting conditioned responses into the subconscious mind of your dog.
These guidelines should help you to establish a program of obedience training. However, you need to seek the help of an expert, to properly train your dog. I would be glad to help. Bob Taylor
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