Wouldn’t it be amazing to live in a world where your every need or desire was met almost instantaneously? Theoretically, this would be a dream. We would be constantly comfortable, content, wildly happy. Sounds great, right?
No matter how much we may try, it is impossible to give our dog everything they want, just as our parents couldn’t give it to us as children. For those who tried, flash to the child having an inconsolable, out of control temper tantrum in public because he couldn’t get the toy he saw in the store or play with the red truck because Billy was using it. If whenever possible we are giving our dogs what they want, the moments when that is impossible become even more stark and stressful because we haven’t help our dog build the internal mental framework to deal with life’s inevitable frustrations.
As I like to say in my training sessions, I don’t always get what I want. In fact, I spend most of every day not getting what I want. And you know what, I’m okay!
Good dogs in traffic
When I’m stuck in traffic, it is frustrating. I do what I can to drive at off peak hours or pick a route that will allow me more movement, but being stuck in stop and go traffic at some point is inevitable. When I am, I don’t punch dashboard, grip the wheel and scream. I don’t plow down the sidewalk or abandon my car in the lane and storm off. I sit in my car, take a deep breath and say ‘wow, this is frustrating.’ Then I use my self soothing tools, taking deep breaths and thinking positive thoughts, like ‘wow, how lucky am I to have a car and somewhere to go?’ Or ‘isn’t it great that I usually don’t have to sit in traffic? This must be rough for daily commuters.’
Self soothing is an important skill because life’s frustrations are inevitable. When we meet our dog’s every need, we deprive them of learning to navigate difficult emotions. I see this on restaurant or bar patios where a dog sees another dog walks in and goes wild with desire, barking and jumping because they want to say hi. Either the owner ignores it, allowing their dog to bark frantically to the dismay of every other living being in earshot, or, worse, takes their pushy, excited dog over to say hi, likely to the dismay of the dog he is about to approach.
You probably didn’t know there was another option. We build our dog’s frustration tolerance in every small moment we can by asking our dog to ‘wait’ before he gets anything he wants. The ‘wait’ command is designed to build the muscle of self control. The more my dog associates exercising the self control he needs to calm himself down with getting what he wants, the faster my dog will be able to do it. The more we practice it in quiet, everyday situations, the more of a foundation my dog will have to draw on in more exciting and distracting situations.
Our rule is that we never give an excited dog what he wants. Only calm dogs get the food bowl put down, get the leash put on, get to walk out of the front door, load or unload from the car, get to greet another dog or person.
Not only is this GREAT practice for your dog to build his frustration tolerance and exercise impulse inhibition, you are also setting yourself up to have more safe and pleasant interactions throughout his life. When I see a dog dragging their owner towards me, I step aside and display body language to the owner that makes it clear I would like them to control their dog and keep it away from me. As a dog trainer, I don’t want to reward an excited mindset with attention. As a human, I don’t want a dog to barge up to me and possibly jump on me or get so excited he mouths me and gets slobber on my skin or clothes.
My dog responds very differently to a dog that drags their owner towards her, rushing, barking, sniffing out of control vs a dog who politely and calmly approaches, stops at a respectful distance, makes a bid to interact and then politely observes dog social greeting norms like circling and sniffing, dipping their nose away every three seconds to see if the other dog would like to continue the interaction or end it.
This sounds crazy, right? Most of us have never seen dogs have a polite greeting! Or haven’t known how different the two types of interactions look as we lump it into ‘dogs greeting’ which sometimes goes well and other times doesn’t.
Importantly, this isn’t about denying my dog any or everything! This isn’t a punishment or a mean training technique designed to torture our dogs. In fact, helping my dog build self control is immeasurably kind as we all inevitably encounter frustrations. Sometimes my dog wants something he can’t have and that is just the way it is. You may want a bite of my spicy food or to grab that steak off my kitchen counter or to lick ice cream off that random toddler’s face or to play with the cat.
Yeah, that's gonna be a no from me, dawg.
Other times, it’s something my dog can have, but not right now. I appreciate my dog letting me know that they are hungry, would like to be let outside to potty, are getting restless and would like to go for a walk, but I am also not my dog’s butler. I won’t leap up the second they give me a cue unless I have really messed up my owner duties and not fed them or taken them out for an excessive amount of time and the situation is now dire. Otherwise I acknowledge my dog and gently ask them to stop cuing me. Once they return to a neutral state, I can they say ‘Hey! I have a great idea! Would you like to go out?” That way what we are doing feels like it’s done on my terms and as a reward for accessing the calm, balanced mindset we strive to create in all the dogs we work with.