You'll love it here if...
you believe dogs are sentient beings with thoughts, feelings and emotions.
you're committed to using force-free training methods.
you are committed to high quality food and natural health care.
you aspire to a deeper level of communication with your dog.
you aspire to a deeper level of teamwork with your dog.
This ain't the place for you if...
you think dogs are commodities, lawn ornaments, or "just dogs".
you are perfectly happy using "training collars" that pinch, choke or shock (aka nick, stim, bump).
you think your dog should work for the sheer joy of pleasing you.
your ego is all tied up in your dog's performance, breed, looks, behavior, etc.
Still not sure? How about this:
Are you willing to set aside what you think you know to listen and learn from your dog?
Are you willing to commit 30 minutes a day (in tiny pieces) to working with your dog?
Are you ready to learn new ways to play with, teach and interact with your dog?
Great! Just one more thing...
“Behavior means the way of acting. Behavior is ‘the actions or reactions of persons or things under given circumstances.’ Behavior means ‘conduct, actions bearing, comportment’. Everything in the way you or I, or our dogs, appear to one another is behavior.”
It's all behavior.
Lest you think I've got some 'quick fix' for you, let me be perfectly clear: There is no magic wand for dog training! Every interaction we have with our dogs is teaching them something. It's a process that shifts behavior over time - for better or worse.
Human nature makes us more likely to notice what's 'wrong' than what's 'right'. It's easy to focus on the behaviors of our dogs that frustrate or annoy us. But, to a large extent, their behavior is intimately connected to ours. They read our body language and tone of voice, as well as our emotions and attitudes in many subtle ways. They react to us as much as we react to them.
Generally speaking, dogs are far better human trainers than we are dog trainers. However, they lack the ability to think ahead and formulate a training plan. Our ability to educate ourselves and be proactive in changing our behavior affords us the huge opportunity to positively influence their behavior (and minimize any negative influence we might have had).