Tales From The Trails

A Good Watch and the Art of Dog Training

An interesting philosophical proposition………..a good watch of what?

As one whom runs a business centred on dog training, dog walking, and pet care, I can report that the answer is: you cannot have a good watch without wearing a good watch!

Of course, there is the modern trend to consign High Street Watchmakers to the same retail heaven as Woolies and their balls of rubber bands…..we all has phones now.

And as we all know, phones can sing, dance, cure your baldness (iphone app), make your coffee (pomegranatephone), AND tell you the time.

But the phone in your pocket could end up with your dog in a rocket.

Let me explain…..

Here is Paddy Paddywhack, my ickle Celtic Springer Dog Training Client, Springer by name, Springer by nature. Paddy Paddywhack likes to react. So Marty Smarty decided a little Guided Walking was in order.

Guided Walking is a fantastic mind/body workout for the average canine. By hooking up Paddy Paddwhack to a double ended lead attached to a harness and head collar, I can steer him like a horse on reins.

I get the ‘feel’ of Paddy, he gets the ‘feel’ of himself.

Suddenly, Paddy Paddywhack gets to realise that each paw, leg, shoulder, rump, and various other body parts gets to reach places in a manner other than bungee jumping, especially when he sees the scary thing.

This body awareness involves cognition.

Cognition involves a new awareness of his environment.

Awareness of his environment involves making decisions.

Making decisions involves realising there are choices, such as the scary thing isn’t so scary when Marty Smarty carries sausages.

It is almost an epiphany and is a wonder of dog training to behold.

For such dogs in such moments, a ‘shake off the stress’ dance always occurs. The invaluable point here is to know at which stage of the walk the shaking away of the stress occurred. This is a measure to judge improvement.

Therefore, as a kitted out dog walker on a wet walk with confused pockets carrying keys, coins, treats, toys, your marbles, do you really want to miss the magic moments by dogging around for your moby?

Or in the case of Paddy Paddywhack, do you really want to let the little fellow have a cheeky ‘eyes off the ball’ moment whilst you are faffing about?

It is very important when dog walking and dog training to avoid minefields, stray rockets, and bungee jumps!

Now you can appreciate the importance of a wrist clock. It aint just a watch for telling the time, it is a watch on your powers of observation, and upon your prowess of your timing.

Also, lady, get off your phone, your dog is harassing mine!

(BTW, always carry your mobile as well; your dog may need to order a burger)

Happy trails and kindest regards

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Boredom and the Art of Dog Training

Boredom, what is it?

As I run tails and trails everyday, this is a question that keeps me up late at night!

(How ironic that the topic of boredom would not be a key to the Land Of Nod – albeit my better half has begged to differ of late!).

According to workplace psychologist CD Fisher, it is…….ZZZZZZ…sorry, what was I saying?

I dozed off, must have bored myself already!

Anyways, as CD Fisher was saying, it is “an unpleasant, transient affective state in which the individual feels a pervasive lack of interest in and difficulty concentrating on the current activity". (Darn, I still keep phasing, one second Bourne Ultimatum on telly, next second... what was it, Fisher Price toys?....current activity?...electricity? Boy, this article is hard).

One sink face dive later...I'm focussed now.

As we were saying, in Positive Psychology, boredom is described as a “response to a moderate challenge for which the subject has more than enough skill”. In other words: Bored Puppy Syndrome.

B.P.S. is a great point of entry for dog training, B.T.W. It takes a bored puppy to know a bored puppy, which is why kids make such intuitive trainers. And why intuitive trainers should kid around.

Mondays thru Fridays, Smarty Marty keeps his appointment with Paddy Paddywhack, trekking the Jersey Farm Bramble Ramble. I love my sojourn with Paddy Paddywhack, but my heart sinks when I see the same drab hedgerows aaaGen! At which point I could go autopilot……..no wait, I wouldn’t engage autopilot, as that would involve active thinking. More like autopilot would disengage me, and I could become all “M Poynter Esq, Job Walker, instead of “Smarty Marty, Dog Walker”. After all, I kept my appointment, didn’t I? He had a poop!

Nah, hang that for a game of Brain Draining, that is just salaried somnambulance.

Instead, at which point I could notice the attention surplus disorder of those wondrous purple Kosmos flowers adorning my route. What scents can Paddy Paddywhack make of them?

Or I can curio around those cul de sacs. After all, it isn’t just main roads that contain scary traffic. Oftentimes, a conscientious reversing suburbanite can express anxiety creep more of a Paddy Challenge than haring white van man (now, there is a example of route boredom).

Or I might rearrange those random bits of ‘street furniture’ (wa-hay, I have always wanted to use that phrase!!) to give Paddy Paddywhack a good injection of cognition coaching.

Anyways, I could go on and on with these examples. Needles to say, there is always also backwardness, forwardness, crabness, upsidaisyness, and insideoutedness. Or we could just go all Elliott Nessness and bust up the joint. (As long as it doesn’t end up all Paddy Wagoned!).

Boredom, what was that again?

According to the existentialist Martin Heidegger (another Smarty Marty), it is “drifting here and there in the abysses of our existence like a muffling fog, removes all things and men and oneself along with it into a remarkable indifference. This boredom reveals being as a whole."

For there it is: boredom is the tan(gent) on the skin of your humanity, which you were born to peel, like sunburn.

Question: what is the opposite of boredom?

Answer: It is ‘flow’. Athletes call it “in the zone”. I call it “DogZense”.

Positive Psychologist Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi felt those with an ‘autotelic personality’

(enjoying something for its own innate pleasure, as opposed to the external benefits such as fame, money, power, or comfort) have the traits of internal drive, curiosity, persistence, and low self-centeredness, which are ideal for obtaining flow. In other words, he was talking about children and puppies! (Minus the low self-centeredness).

Therefore, to become a great Dog Trainer, you need boredom to guide you to your inner puppy.

Myself? I inhabit at least 3 of these traits on a doggedly basis.

This makes me a semi-autoletic. Why am I stubbed? I aint saying!

Second Question: what comes under ‘borers’ in the Yellow Pages?

Keep Boring and Kindest Regards,

Tails and Trails

Providing professional care for pets