Strategy and consistency

Where do you get your information from?

How can you make sense of it all, let alone apply it to your dog?

You read, you watch, you listen but who can help you apply the relevant information to your own, unique situation?

Timing of reward is critical, your own behaviour is critical and how you use the lead is critical.

Not much to have to remember then is it? The problem with a problem is that it can appear to be a big one, and it is difficult to see a way out of it on our own, which is why you need help.

The struggle many people face is being consistent for sufficient time for a new behaviour to become established and permanent, this can require extensive proof from you and a great deal of repetition before your dog believes that you will behave in a new and consistent way, especially if your dog believes you will chop and change.

If you want your dog to be calm, you need to be calm, if you want your dog not to pull on the lead, you need to stop pulling on the lead, if you want your dog to walk on a slack lead, you have to praise that and stop telling them off for pulling.

Sounds so easy until you try it and your own learned behaviour takes over again and you revert to your own habits because habits are hard to break.

You will need help to keep to a new set of rules and a new way of engaging with your dog, if you continue to behave the way you always have, you dog will continue to behave they way they always have.