Never one to turn down an opprotuinty to go on TV, I agreed to be there on Friday. I’ll let you know how it goes.

They asked me to share with the audience some tips on dog training and behavior. She also asked me to send some key points on what I was going to talk about, so I decided to share with you first what I am going to talk about.

You see, I have been teaching for years that the focus should not be on the dog. The real focus has to be on the owner.

Years ago while attending a seminar, the great dog trainer John Rogerson stated: “If you want a good dog, learn how to become a good dog owner.” That one simple statement changed the way I looked at dog training.

I had been taught that the dog was always at fault if the training did not go well. Your dog won’t sit, down or stay?

The dog is being stubborn.

Your dog is pulling on leash or won’t come back when called?

The dog is being dominant.

Your dog won’t pay attention?

The dog is neurotic.

Everytime the dog did not perform, the dog was blamed.

Here’s a question for you.

Is it the dog or the trainer?

I was orginally taught a dog training method that was very popular in the 1950’s. Put a choke chain on the dog and give a correction. If dog does not respond, increase the intensity of the correction. If correction does not work, increase the intensity of the correction, If the hardest correction you give does not work, label the dog as dominant, stubborn, neruotic, genetically defective, or make up a label.

As you can imagine, this led to a lot of problems; dogs that developed aggressive behavior, dogs that became scared, dogs that developed destructive behavior and dogs that simply shut down.

The amazing thing is that there are still trainers out there training the same way.

Anyway, I am going to share the four steps to becoming a good dog owner on the show.

The four steps are:

1. Good management skills

2. Exercise

3. Leadership

4. Train using positive reinforcment

I will expand a little further in my next email. I’ll also let you know how the TV show goes, so stay tuned…

All the best,

Eric

P.S. If you really want to learn how to become a great dog owner, check out: The Dog Training Inner Circle

I had just ordered my coffee and I knew the women serving
me was new. She was very polite but messed up my order.

I told her it was no problem and took a seat to wait for
her to make a new cup.

As I was sitting there, she told her boss that she had messed
up – this is where it got interesting.

The “Boss” started to royally chew her out. She ripped into
her telling her all the mistakes she had made that day. The
boss added that she had better “get it together – FAST!”

I felt bad for the lady and asked her how long she had been
working there. She told me that it was her first day.

I handed her a very generous tip and walked away.

As I sat at the table, I thought about an email that I received
a few days ago.

In the email the person said that she had recently adopted
a dog and she was having a tough time. She said that she
went to a trainer who informed her that he never uses treats
and the dog learns who the leader is.

The email went on to explain how her dog is now starting to
show signs of aggression.

I’ll never understand why anyone would think negative motivation
would work better than positive motivation.

The employee serving me the coffee is eventually going to
become aggressive with her boss. She’ll put up with it for
a week, maybe months, but eventually she is going to give
the one finger salute and scream some words unfit for this
Rated G family friendly email.

In short, she is going to hit her level of tolerance and become
aggressive.

Every person, every dog has a tolerance level. My wife has a
much longer tolerance level than I do.

She can get cut off while driving, sit through rude behavior at a
restaurant, long lines at the department of motor vehicles and still have
a smile on her face.

I run a little hotter.

My tolerance level is much shorter.

When it comes to training, if you use negative motivation it is
just a matter of time before your dog hits his tolerance level
and becomes defensive and aggressive.

It is much better to approach training with a positive attitude.

I’ll never understand why anyone would think treats would be a
bad idea when it comes to training.

I’ll guarantee this – using treats will NOT put your dog in a bad
mood. Using force, pinch, shock and choke collars will.

Anyway, start using positive motivation to train your dog. You
won’t have to worry about your dog going to the dark side.

All the best,

Eric

P.S. One last thing – When a dog does go to the dark side, it can
be verrrry difficult to bring them back. If you want to make sure
your dog never goes to the dark side check out The Dog Training
Inner Circle.

Every day I get email from all over the world asking me training questions. There is a common question I get all the time. The question usually goes like this: “I have a boxer and I know they need to be trained differently than other dogs. Do you have any boxer training tips?’

A lot of dog owners think that training is breed specific. Here is the secret:

Training is NOT breed specific. In fact, it isn’t even animal specific.

A dog, cat, horses and even chickens are trained using the same principles of behavior. Check out this video on chicken training. Please leave your comments and questions below.

Getting a C on my report card was a big deal. Most of my grades hovered around D’s and F’s.

Thinking back on my scholastic career, I think I suffered from having a Grasshopper Mind. You see, I had an extremely difficult time concentrating on anything longer than a few minutes.

If I was bored with the subject or the teacher, I was gone mentally.

I’m sharing this with you today, because not too long ago I was working with a dog that had a grasshopper mind.

I learned about grasshopper mind a few years ago after reading a business article. In the article, the author stated that:

“The Grasshopper Mind is an ancient concept that likens the actions of a grasshopper flitting through the grasses to the mind that flitters around from one idea to the next. It’s unfocussed. It’s tenuous. It’s temporary.”

I think a lot of the readers of this would agree that their dog has a grasshopper mind. That they can’t get their dogs to focus on them and follow through with commands.

If you think your dog suffers from grasshopper mind, I’m here to help. Here are three steps that will help overcome this common dog problem:

1. Pay attention to your tone of voice and body posture. Dogs pay very close attention to the sound of your voice and posture. When you lower your voice, it can put your dog in defense mode. A perfect example is when the owner calls his dog to come. If the dog does NOT come, the owner will often lower his voice and firmly state: “JUNIOR, I SAID GET OVER HERE NOW!!!” This is a sure fire way to get your dog to switch into grasshopper mind and ignore you. (Watch my video on Dog’s Body Language for more info)

2. Use a strong reward to teach your dog to pay attention to you. Dogs spend a lot of time under some type of confinement. When they are out on open ground, or if there is something interesting in the area, they will ignore you. When you first start working with your dog, you have to teach attention just like any other command.

The first thing I teach new puppies is attention. Spend time teaching your dog his/her name and use a strong reward.

3. Become interesting. Dogs that get loose will avoid their owners and run up to complete strangers. This happens because the stranger is someone new and interesting. You can become fun and interesting to your dog by moving faster, don’t run towards your dog, get her attention and run away from your dog. Doing this will make you much more interesting and appealing to your dog.

There you have it. The three steps to overcoming Grasshopper Mind in your dog. Spend some time following the three steps and give me an update on the results.

All the best,

Eric

“No problemo,” I tell her and off we go. I was
not expecting to walk through the door and get
attacked – not by a dog, by a person.

The person was Rachael’s cousin’s wife, Mary Ann.

Ryan, her cousin, and his wife, Mary Ann, had come
up from New Jersey to attend the party and they brought
their new little dog, Lucy, with them.

Lucy had a few issues that Mary Ann wanted me to help
with and was anxious to get started. I had barely walked
through the door when the questions came at me faster
than bullets coming out of an M-16 on full auto.

Lucy is a great little dog and Rachael’s cousins were in
luck because I was going to compress six weeks of dog
training lessons into one hour.

I was going to show them how to stop the jumping, walk on
leash, come when called and show them what to do for the
separation problem they were having.

I think they were skeptical that I could accomplish such a
feat, but only because they had never seen me work my magic.

One hour later, Lucy was a different dog and Rachael’s cousins
had a better understanding of dog training. You see, I had
shared with them the secret to dog training.

It is a secret that I did not learn from any of the dog training
“gurus.”

You see, I learned it from one of America’s founding fathers – Ben Franklin.

Ole Ben was a master of persuasion. I became very interested in persuasion
and started to think about it and teach dog owners to use it instead of force.

Here is the definition of persuasion: “The state of being persuaded or
convinced; settled opinion or conviction, which has been induced.”

I especially like the last part, “which has been induced.”

The best way to train is to induce your dog into doing the commands.

For years force was used and it has backfired tremendously.

Don’t believe me?

Take a look at the statistics – 4.6 million reported dog bites last year. That
number probably doubles if you were to add the unreported dog bites.

Man’s best friend?

Not according to the statistics. Listen, I have been in the trenches training
dogs for a long time and I have seen first-hand how negative training methods
have caused a lot of aggression in a lot of dogs.

Anyway, as I said earlier, I don’t see her cousins too much and compressed
the six week course that I teach into one hour, but I told them they had to
continue their training using the Dog Training Inner Circle website.

They agreed and went home happy. Another day in the life of your friendly,
neighborhood Amazing Dog Training Man.

If you’re ready to learn more about training dogs Ben Franklin style, you’re
in luck because you can still take advantage of the Cotton Anniversary Special.

You can get my dog training products at an incredible half off.

Cotton Anniversary Special

This won’t last much longer, so don’t delay.

Check it out here…

All the best,

Eric