에피소드 11: 에이미 쿡 인터뷰

And I think the crime was that it was not quite winter. It wasn't winter. It was summer. And the ground was, used to be marshy and now was dry and cracked. And I think she just tweaked the toe, just running, just not even running a lot, just running kind of a normal amount. And it didn't look injured at all. And so it took so long to, you know, it was like, oh, rest it for three weeks. It'll be fine. And then it was, oh, that wasn't long enough. Rest it for eight weeks and it'll be fine. And then specialists come in and they say, you're going to take four months and it'll be fine. And then finally to the agility, fancy agility surgeon. And he said, yeah, I think we should. I think we should do some surgery on her toe. It's not healing. So from that point, it would, I know it was six weeks of splint and six weeks of bandage. And now it's going to be 12 weeks of rehab. But, you know, it was quite a shock to the system to be, she's my main partner, my main, you know, my main dog. I didn't have the puppy. She was the only dog I had at the time that happened. So our training life took a turn for a bit, but it's, we're almost there. We're almost there. The end is in sight. End is in sight. Very happy about that. So you mentioned the puppy. Where did the puppy come from? Caper. She was my unplanned pregnancy. As my friend likes to say. She was, oh God, she was, you know, she was, you know, a friend sent me a picture. I'm like, oh my God, she's so cute. It's a classic story. Like, I just need a little pocket dog. I just need a little, you know, Marge Pets is going to be out for a while. I don't need, you know, my next sport dog will come in 2018. I thought to myself, and I just need a little, you know, dog to tide me over. I'll get a little, I'll get a little pocket dog. I'll have a little fun companion for a bit. And Marge kind of likes that. So that'll be really fun. And then I get this, uh, this little sort of try on as a foster dog. And first thing she does from the day, week one is she's bringing me toys. She's pushing me. She's, why are we not doing more? I'm not a pocket dog. Put me down. Why are you picking me up? I don't want this. Here's a toy. Can you tug this? She was so active. It's like I did Dr. Svortico. Holy puppy. It was crazy. And I was like, oh, well, that's not who I thought you were, but I can roll with that. Okay. All right. That's fun. She's a fun little dog. She's really fun to train. And she, she came with focus out of the box. I've barely trained focus in her and she doesn't take her eyes off me. It's crazy. It's really fun. It's a real contrast to Marzipan. She's so cute.

Um, it's a real contrast to Marzipan because I'm used to the Sighthound way and she's all Terrier, all Terrier. And I'm learning a lot from that, from, um, working with that psychology, you know, different. One of the things about your intro that, uh, I don't think I'd known before I started doing some research for the podcast is that you'd been to a chicken camp, especially four times. So I really want to hear more about that. Just like what your impressions were, what your thoughts were about it. What was it like? Yeah. Amazing. Amazing. Um, I went to chicken camp. We, we, uh, uh, like a, a friend of mine and I went together and, and, um, you know, I'm really glad to see that Bob is still here and with us, but, and, and doing chicken camps. But at that time, I think it was, it was right after his wife had died and they were doing the camps together and he wasn't sure how much he was really going to continue. And it was like, God, I've been putting this off way too long. We have to go. We have to go. So I actually did, I think two in one summer and then two the next summer, if I'm not mistaken, I kind of crammed them in because I really wanted to take advantage of, of, um, learning from Bob. There's really nobody like him. And then at the time I was very, very into clicker training. I mean, you know, of course still am, but I was much more so than, um, learning it, learning it a lot on the internet, a lot from books, a lot from just every source I could find. And I wanted to go to somebody who was so close to the, I guess I could say origins of it, if that's fair to say. Um, and, and as much as I could. And honestly, it was absolutely life-changing to learn, um, both from him and to train an animal that does not meet you halfway, that does not help at all with the learning process isn't trying to work with you at all. And I, you know, I think if you can train a dog, that's, that's, that's one thing, but it doesn't guarantee you can train another animal. But if you can train a bunch of other animals, you can probably train a dog because, because they, they make it so much easier on you and the other animals kind of don't, at least that's my impression. Um, and so it was, it was wonderful. And he's such a good teacher. He knows exactly how to lay just the right amount in front of you. Um, there was one time where a chicken was, was pecking me like crazy and I was really afraid of her. And he actually shaped us both, um, without telling me that that's what was happening. So I got the experience of just quietly being, you know, compassionately and respectfully shaped.

It was just a beautiful experience. I love chicken camp so much. And it changed the way I train. Fundamental. Absolutely. For anybody out there who might not be familiar with the concept, do you want to just briefly kind of explain the idea? Sure. So, um, what you do is you're, maybe you're a dog trainer, maybe you're a bird or exotic animal trainer. I went to camp with a few of those, or even psychology professor, if you want to learn how to apply, um, the techniques of operant conditioning in a, in a very controlled environment, you can go to chicken camp. You pay money to, um, to, to spend a week with Bob and two chickens and a partner and a room full of people in the same boat, um, doing the little exercises that he lays out for you and they get increasingly complex. And, you know, all, all you have, and you, you first start with how do I click and how do I, how do I feed this animal in a way that is correct? Cause how do you feed a chicken? Well, they pack, you can't hand them with your hand, a piece of feed, right? So you go through all the mechanics of how to feed a chicken and, or how to train a chicken, um, clicker train. And then he gives you these little tasks. And so it's, you know, here are some discs, have your chicken peck only the red one and not the yellow or blue one. And you're like, ah, piece of cake, I can do that. And yeah, famous last words, right? Sure enough, one errant click somewhere because you're late because dogs can kind of handle you being a little bit late, right? And still progress. Uh, one errant late click for a chicken and the chicken goes, oh, all right, got it. And starts doing that thing that you click over and over and over again. You're like, no, no, I didn't, I didn't wait. I just, could you not, I didn't mean that. No, one click could get you a hundred clicks in the wrong direction to get out. Uh, and you really learn to be accurate because you can't, you can't afford to make certain kinds of mistakes. Um, and the chicken will get full. So every, you know, every click and every, every food they eat is care is measured. You have to really, really be careful and be very, very good. And you make all sorts of sloppy mistakes and you pay for them really harshly. Your chicken does not do anything you thought you were teaching. You're all over the place. Um, you're like, you know, you find yourself, um, maybe turning to things you, you know, otherwise do with your dogs that maybe you don't realize you do like, oh, come on, just could you just, and then you're like, wait, I can't do that to a chicken. Do I do that to my dog? I shouldn't do that to my dog either.

Huh? Um, it, it pared you down to the, to the, to the pieces of the technology that actually work. And, and, and the chicken forces you to get better because she's not going to cover a single mistake that you make ever. That's it. Click once wrong and little boy, you're going to be there all day. I definitely think chicken camps on my someday list. It's on my bucket list. So I would love to do. Absolutely. Don't run, run, don't walk for sure. I wanted to ask you too, about the early days of FDSA, because I believe, um, I think you actually told me that you were one of the first teachers that Denise brought on at Fenty Dog Sports Academy. So I was really curious to get some of your impressions on how you think it's changed and, uh, kind of what happened when she initially approached you. Oh boy. You know, it was standing in the right place at the right time. I swear. Um, you know, she had, you know, taught online elsewhere and decided to, to do this endeavor. And I was just, um, I'm pretty sure I was just finishing grad school and saying, well, guess I'm going back to job training. Uh, I'm sure I had in store. I'll just revamp or ramp up my business again. I'm fine. Um, and I can remember a standard freezer and your garage and I can't exactly remember how it came up, but, but she thought, well, you know, could you, you know, we can have a behavior arm. Could you teach what you teach? Could you teach a class and what you do? And boy, I, I felt, I mean, my answer was both yes and no. Like the answer is no. Cause like I've never done that, but the answer is yes, because well, it's gotta be possible. Right. I mean, sure. I'll certainly try it. I really wanted to, to do something like that. But for a second there, I was like really behavior, behavior though. I mean, behavior, like it's complicated. People are all over the place. Dogs are behaving all over the place. It's a lot to call. How will I do this online? Um, but I had faith. She really had vision early on for how this was going to go. And, um, we, we brainstormed. I was really excited about it. She actually came up with the, with the title of the class. She's like, let's call it that. I'm like, sure. Um, it was exciting. It was exciting times. And I was really just like, well, I'm happy to run a class and see what I can do for people. And if it's something I don't feel is resulting in, um, improvements that are reasonable for, for the dogs I'm helping, that it's, that it's not right. Then, then online is more suited to skill-based stuff and not so much the concepts or the complicated behaviors.

And I shouldn't have been, I shouldn't have been afraid because it's been amazing. It's been amazing. Um, I, I gotta say, I think that my, my online students, oh, well, I wrote a blog post about this because I was just so moved by this. I mean, the, my online students, you know, um, get to their goals faster than in-person students do. And there's, there's something very intoxicating about that. Like to get somebody closer to their resolution in such a shorter amount of time, you know, I was like, well, then I want everybody online. Everybody get online, everybody quick, you know? Um, and it's, it's amazing how much contact I have with somebody who takes an online class. They can talk to me every day, whereas no in-person client does that or can afford to. I mean, really, it's not, you know, that, that's the reason. And I get every day, almost contact with people trying to, to apply the lessons, run into problems and ask again. And I get to fine tune it so much. It's like living with people, which is what I always want to do. When I get a new client, I'm always thinking, God, I could just, I could move in. I could just move in. Uh, you and I together, we could, we could fix your situation and I could help you, but you get an hour a week. It's not enough, you know? Um, and, and boy, being online with people is amazing. And, um, and the community that Denise has been able to build through Facebook and, and all of that. Um, I don't know. I just, I think about it all the time. I think about how, how much access we have to changing. I mean, I know it's, it's, it's lofty. I just don't have any other way to say it. Changing the world. You know, it, it's the ripple effect. You have to put it out there and say, this is the way I think we should be doing this. And let me help you with it. Let me help you with it. And, um, and the changes I've seen just in these short few years have been really, really inspiring. I'm so grateful to be a part of it. So the, my understanding is the very first class that you started offering right out of the gate with Denise was the boogeyman course, right? It was, it was. And I, that's all I ran for a long time. Do you want to just explain briefly to listeners kind of what the course is and a little bit about, um, the methodology that you use? Yeah. So the course is dealing with the boogeyman and it's designed for, um, fearful, stressed, uh, reactive dogs, dogs that are overwhelmed with what's going on for them, what they're afraid of.

Um, and the, the, the really getting to the root of the problem and really trying to get to the source, get right to the bottom of the problem rather than, uh, just kind of manage it, which is what we end up doing a lot of times. You know, we find a way to get to about a stasis and we, we kind of coast along there. And, um, but, but stress is a hard thing to experience. Um, everybody listening, right. Why wouldn't we all not want to have the stress we have in our lives? Every one of us wants to have a less stressed life pretty much. Um, cause it's hard. And I feel that I feel that for dogs, it's hard for them to live, um, in our world when they're so stressed. And so this class is, is designed to help with that at a root level. And what I do is I use, um, social connection and social play to help get them in a, in a state where they can process their triggers a lot better. And, um, I reduce the use of food. I reduce the use of toys sometimes to zero, but, you know, not always to all the way to zero, uh, to, to, to help them. And it didn't start out like it started out. The first iteration of the class is not like this, the current iteration that's running right now. It has evolved a lot over time. Um, as, as I watched things, as I watched students get, have more success with even more play, I just started emphasizing more and more play. It was a part of the program before, but it wasn't, it wasn't, um, as emphasized as it is now, but I've seen, I've seen the wonders of, of what it can do. And so now it's really the bulk of what the, the approach is. So you take the class, you're going to play, play, play, play, and then you're going to play some more and then your dog is going to get better. That's what you're doing. I know like when you and I talk about it, usually you call it kind of the play way is like the name of the methodology, even though the course is the boogeyman course. So I was curious if you wanted to sum kind of what the play way is up in a short blurb. I mean, you, you talked about it a little bit, but if there's anything kind of you want to add there. Yeah. The, the, the play way is specifically using social play and social connection. So not tug, not fetch, not that kind of thing, but being goofy and silly and making your dog laugh and having a fun time with your dog. And taking that play and using it to directly solve problems that they have with fear. So it's dog centric. It's about the dog, him or herself coming to a new understanding of the thing that they don't currently understand.

So if they're afraid of, you know, strangers, it's because they have a misunderstanding of what the strangers are about. Cause none of the strangers really mean to hurt them. And I think they don't have enough information. Now it's hard to get dogs to get new information about things that are scary to them because they're scared of them. And you can't look at it openly and you can't, you can't deal with it as well. Like I can't deal with spiders. You put one on me and I'm done. I can't deal with that. So you want to reframe that. It's not going to work until you get me distance and get me in a calm state. And I really found that play puts them in this completely different emotional space and allows for our therapeutic attempts to really take root. And I realized none of that is brief. I think it still gives people a good idea, right? Of what the methodology is and kind of what you're endorsing here. I mean, I think that it's very different probably than what most people are used to hearing about dealing with fear and dealing with dogs with sensitivities, which is so often food-based. It's different from everything I'd ever done. I mean, I've been doing this a long time and it's a complete departure for me. It's not at all like what I've done most of the time in helping dogs. So where did it come from? Where did the idea? Yeah. Kind of a, you know, it's an instant, it's an evolving idea. I should first say, right? I'm not finished. I mean, I want to keep investigating all of this and, and, and putting all the little pieces together. And right now I'm at a place where I put some pieces together and it's hanging together and helping. And that's really exciting. And, you know, it was a sort of this big evolution of influences. I first got together with Denise because I'd known her before kind of just from our local training circles, but she and I both got puppies at the same time. And they both turned out to have very similar sorts of views on the world and challenges in training. And it, you know, made us get together kind of more often, you know, once a week we would talk about it and, and shoot the breeze about these different things. And I started training, I started watching her train in person more, which I hadn't really done a lot of previous. And the amount of social interaction and the way she was working with her dogs was, was sort of reminding me of how, or reminding me of how I had been feeling lately that a lot of clicker training was feeling remote. To me, at least at the time, it was feeling like you, you, you, well, very chicken camp.

I'll tell you maybe a little bit about that later, but where you observe your animal a lot. And so you're watching and you're holding your clicker and you're kind of being still and letting your animal think. And it's, it makes, or maybe it was just me. I was making learning a little more sterile than I needed it to be. And she had so much more play and relationship in it. And through watching her do that and training with her and exploring that with my own dogs, I started to just some, some things that were clicking in my head. And then I'm also friends with Grisha Stewart. And when she was creating that, which is the behavior adjustment training, she was really exploring how dog centric training could be. Like how much can I let the dog do for him or herself without intruding so much and let the process happen more naturally. And that was inspiring to me because we were tending not to do that. We were tending to make a lot of associations. Here's a cookie. I'm making an association for you. I'll be there in your process with you. And that was percolating a bit too about how to, I mean, really, dog, all of us should know how to, how to deal with our fears if we're given the right environment to do so. You know, it's, an animal should know how to, how to calm him or herself. An animal should know how to become less afraid to investigate something that's frightening. It just isn't available if the stimulus is too high. If you're too afraid, you can't do it. But all of us have that kind of wisdom in us. We all know how to make something better. And so with that percolating, and then, and then there was this, I sort of had this undercurrent of a bit of dissatisfaction with the way rehab was going with the basic tools that I had. I mean, it worked, but I don't know. There was, I felt like there was something more. And when I was in grad school, I got a chance to actually read a whole bunch more literature than I had been able to read as a, as a non-student. Although I was studying Skinner and studying Pavlov and using science to train dogs, for sure, science-based all the way. Now I had big libraries behind me and a whole bunch of, you know, information and people I could ask. And I realized, you know, when we're dealing with human fears, we don't really do it like we do with dogs. We don't really classically condition them in that same way. You know, and, and, and more importantly, when children have fears, we don't classically condition them. Or maybe someone does, but I was seeing that a lot of therapy has to do with play and has to do with relaxing and talking things through.

And I thought, how can I do this with dogs? I can't talk things through with dogs. So all these pieces were kind of just in the air for me. And as each influence kind of came in, I started to think, well, okay, I like what this distance is doing, but the dogs are on their own. And for our sport dogs, we need them to be turning to us and be more interactive and wanting to do things with us. How can I put myself in this picture with them, with their dog-centric work, without impeding it, without taking it over, without going back to trying to click or make associations with classical conditioning? How can I blend them? And I started to just experiment and see what, what dogs needed. And, um, it kind of all came together and it took a few passes through Boogeyman for me to, to see just how I wanted to impart it to people. And I honestly, that's not even true because I keep tweaking it. I tweak it every time, figuring out how to explain it better and more. But that's where it came from. It's partly human psychology, human therapy, and partly the great distances that, that, that Grisha was experimenting with and letting a dog solve her own problems. And then the great relationship building stuff that, that Denise is just amazing at. And, and reading when you are being too much for your dog and when you're not giving them enough agency to come at you. You know, she, she's just so good at that. And I, I drink everything. Every time I get to see her do anything like that, I drink it up and think, how can this apply to dogs in trouble? How can I use this? You know, it's very inspiring. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I have to say, having had the chance to watch Denise train a couple of times now, I feel exactly the same way. When, when you see somebody who's really incredible at what they do and you just get a chance to watch, it's just, I mean, it's fascinating. I'm looking forward to camp again this year so much because last year I, you know, you get to, to watch, I mean, all the instructors at DSA are just so incredible. And to be able to spend a couple of days doing nothing but watch these incredible trainers do what they're best at. I mean, it's really a neat experience. So it really is. I change every time, you know, and, and, um, you know, I'd have my lesson with Denise and then I would sit there and watch her do whoever came after me just to kind of watch what she'd say. I'd go, how come what she's doing here isn't what I have access to in the pet world? You know, I came from, I did pet dog training all of this time.

My whole career, my whole life, pet dog training and behaviors in pet dogs, aggression, fear, stress, all of that stuff. Not really sports, sport. I got into late and I just did for myself. And, and it's a whole different world for, you know, pet dog trainers don't have access where it's, it's almost two non-overlapping circles. It isn't quite true, but it felt that way. And when I was watching, I watch a lot of, a lot of shade is one of those people too. I watch her and I go, how come that wasn't something I could have learned when I was learning how to train dogs? That part is missing from, from the pet dog trainer education. And I wish we were a lot more, I wish there was more overlap than there is. I hope that's in our future. That makes both of us. So we got a little bit away from kind of what we were talking about originally, but that's okay. I think, I think the conversation went good places, but, but I want to kind of bring us back for a second to the boogeyman course. We talked through that a little bit, but you also now teach the management for reactives dogs class. So I wanted to give you a chance to tell us a little bit about how that course is different and what that course covers and kind of why you felt the need to add a second course. Yeah, that course is different. I teach that as an, as an adjunct, they're kind of a package, but I mean, you can jump in at either point. They're not sequential. Um, because when you, when you live with a dog, who's got some troubles, um, it's great that you can put aside time for therapy and those therapeutic moments are really impactful. They really make a difference. And that's all great. It takes time to do it though. And in the meantime, you still have to potty your dog. And in the meantime, you still have to, you know, get your house guests in, right? And in the meantime, you know, you still have to drive somewhere and life goes on. And, you know, you can't stay under threshold. I have a completely, I have a way more conservative definition of threshold than most people do. Um, so staying under it, it gets even harder if you're going with my definition of threshold. Um, and so, you know, that doesn't solve everybody's problem. It's great. You can go through boogeyman, but you can't potty your dog, right? So a management class is for the times when your dog is going to be over threshold, maybe not massively. So maybe not full on into the biggest display ever, but worried, actually triggered by being scared, seeing somebody, you know, outside or seeing a strange dog.

And, and it's, it covers all of the strategies to get you through daily life. How do you get a positive leash walk going? How do you, what do you do when your dog barks at a window and someone's walking by the house? You know, how, you know, how do you get these, get your dog outside without rehearsing the worst behaviors of their stress and their fear and their anxieties? Um, and, and, and, you know, you don't, I don't want anyone to worsen anything. Management is what you put in place first. You just say, how can I make sure nothing gets worse than it currently is? How can I relieve the pressure as best I can keep everything as positive as possible? What skills do I need to do that? And once that's in place, you're like, all right, now let me set aside some time for therapy to get at the root of this. So management is how you can get on through your leash walks without, um, getting your leash all tangled, how to feed in a way that keeps the dog's nose right on that cookie magnetically. And I'm continually surprised that that's, uh, hard for us all. Cause we were, we're trained to keep the cookie off. It's not a lure we're supposed to reward after. Um, and so a lot of little details that way. And the two together get, get you through, uh, kind of the problems that you're having with your dog. I also teach a learning theory class, but it hasn't been on the, on the schedule for a bit, but I think that one's coming back too. So I do have three classes that I. Well, that's exciting. Do you want to briefly tell us what that kind of. Yeah. I'm thinking of revamping that one. I do a learning theory class. That's a bit of the basics to catch up, make sure we're all on the same page with operant and class, classical conditioning and what it, how it works and what it's for. But I've been doing this for a long, long time. And there's a lot of interesting practicalities when using those models. There's a lot of overlap between the two models. There's a lot of times when you're not sure which one to use. And, and so I wrote this class to be a practical introduction for people who'd been trying this stuff. Like I'm trying to use operant conditioning, but this is a common thing I run into. And I, I looked for all the, all the common pitfalls, all the holes, all the, should I do this or that? Because I've heard if I do that, it's going to make this happen. And I'm like, aha, glad you asked. I'm going to write a whole lecture on it. So it's, it's sort of very practical, very nitty gritty, very, what a dog trainer actually needs to know.

Like you really don't need to know all the schedules of reinforcement. All of you out there, if you studied all these, the conditioning models, you've also studied schedules of reinforcement, but you don't really use them in real life. Right? So I paired this down to the stuff you actually do every day of your life. And then we talk for fun about things like, can dogs feel jealous or, you know, can dogs tell time? Can they, you know, can they, can they estimate things? And what, what kind of a life does a dog lead inside their brains? We foray into that for fun. But I'm, I'm currently revamping it a little bit. You can't dangle those two questions out there without giving us at least a brief answer. So can dogs feel jealous? Can they tell time? Well, that's what we discuss, right? You know, if you lay out the evidence for jealousy, I think it doesn't pass. I think what they feel, and I'm, you know, this is a guess. I'm not saying I have a fact, right? I think they feel a precursor to jealousy. I think they feel the thing that is like, oh, I want that. No, why does, I want, you know, a very basic version of feeling upset and wanting. That if it had more self-awareness, we would be comfortable calling jealousy. Because jealousy has this sense of, you know, you know, she shouldn't have that. And I wish I had the thing she had. It's got more layers to it. But just because it doesn't have the outer layers doesn't mean it doesn't have the core. So it's my, it's my guess, knowing what emotions they do have, what emotions they don't have. They don't seem to have secondary. They do seem to have primary emotions. They probably don't have well-developed jealousy. But everything's continuum. And, you know, having a basic version of jealousy, it becomes a semantic argument. Like maybe we would just call that jealousy then. Why can't we just say that's what jealousy is in dogs and say they have it? You know, so we toss that around a lot. It's a class for talkers and thinkers and tweakers and people who like to debate back and forth about, you know, definitions. It's that kind of geeky class. That sounds excellent. Because it's like me. Hey, it sounds pretty good to me. I'll have to take it next time it comes around. And so now that we've talked a little bit about that, I mean, looking at a puppy who doesn't necessarily have a fear issue, or you mentioned you just, you know, you did get caper fairly recently. How do you kind of try to raise that puppy in a way or lay groundwork for that puppy in a way that really allows them to become a healthy adult dog so you don't see some of those issues crop up?

Yeah, it's been fun. You know, every puppy is this, you know, this adventure gift, right? I mean, you know, part of why her name is Caper, because we're on a caper, we're on an adventure together. You can think you have one thing when you meet your dog or when you get to know a dog and have something entirely else at any point. And, you know, as Denise would say, you train the dog in front of you today, right? So I think, great, I've started with a brand new puppy. She's, you know, not really a blank slate because we know nobody's really a blank slate, but she hasn't had anything really happen to her. But, you know, really, she's a dog that was found stray on the streets of Fremont and picked up and, you know, put into a shelter and into a rescue. And she certainly has a history. And so what's been really fun is using the sensitive tools I have now that I didn't have before, or, you know, that you're always a better trainer this year than you were last year, right? Hopefully. I hope. Please. Please, God. I feel like she's the Fensi puppy in a way, because Marzipan kind of wasn't. I mean, she was, but this one, I don't know, this one feels like she really is. So I take her out and I think, who do I have today? Who are you today? How do you feel today? I get to keep asking her how she feels. And I feel like I can hear more clearly what her answer is than I have ever felt before with other dogs. It's really exciting. She has her issues. We went through a season, a heat cycle, and then a false pregnancy. And maybe from that, or maybe a kind of fear period, I don't know, where she was all of a sudden some other kind of puppy. And I thought, whoa, okay, I don't have the puppy I had a minute ago. What do I have now? And that's, you know, it's been just a, at times, a not so fun challenge, but mostly a fun challenge while I figure out what her needs really are. And she's completely different. I mean, maybe everybody says this. I'm going to go back and see if you ask this of everybody or what people say now. But thinking of my last four dogs, not a stitch of similarity in any of them to each other. You know, you're like, I'm going to get a dog who's going to be like this, and we're going to do that. And you get the dog, and you're like, oh, hi, nice to meet you. Who are you? What do you bring? She's enormous fun. And I'm taking a lot of time with her. I don't care. I know a lot of people will just, you know, there's this pressure in puppyhood to get all this, get a bunch of skills in, because they're just so malleable, and you can start all this stuff, and they love to learn, and all that's true.

But I also know that I can teach an older dog, any dog, those kinds of things. And the time in immaturity, the time when they're growing up is the time to actually smell the flowers, you know, to chase the actual butterflies, to let them take in the world without so much interference from my input and from training. We go out and we exist together. We see the world. And I resist the urge to try to take advantage of every second and train all the fun stuff. And it feels more holistic, and it feels more like we're bonded in a way that it just feels richer, because I'm spending so much time listening and, you know, asking her how she feels and what she'd like to do. And she's just an N of one, we like to say. It's not like I can say, and that leads you to the best dogs in the world, because I don't know her. But I feel like when she does, you know, then say, yeah, I can work. I'm ready to work. The quality of the connection that we have is much, much better after I've let her. And I directly learned that from the stuff that Denise was investigating with Brito. I mean, it's really, I'm just so grateful she got a little dog before I did. So I want to ask you what the dog-related accomplishment that you're proudest of is. Oh, my. Well, right now that would be Marce Pan, who I guess we didn't, you know, I didn't talk too much about. But I have a theme. I have a theme in my life where sometimes I get a dog and I think, yeah, I can just make her into that. I can do that. I'm a good trainer. I know what I'm doing. I can just solve that problem. No problem. And then I realized that I'm on crack and don't know what I'm doing at all and get in way over my head. I got a dog long ago named Hannah who was very, very fearful. And I didn't estimate correctly how difficult that was going to be. And it was really, really, really, really hard. But I got into it going, ah, just a few weeks of cookies. I'll be fine. And so when I get my Whippet Marce Pan, I had intended to get my sport, my main sport dog. I'm getting my dog and I'm going to do all this fun stuff when I get a Whippet. And she's not purpose-bred. And she was five months old. And, you know, she didn't really work, didn't enjoy it. And I thought, that's a lot. You know, like I'm a trainer. I'll just train her to like that stuff. You know, and then it was harder than I thought it was. And, of course, therefore then a gift, right? It led me to people like Denise. It led me to people like Shade. It led me to understand that I don't know anything about drive building and need to actually, you know, learn from people who do.

But we got, you know, she's in master's level agility and she does very, very well. And she's fast and she's connected and she's focused. And she didn't start out that way. And it was really hard, mostly because I didn't know. I was applying the tools I had and they weren't right. And so I'm really, really proud that together we were able to find the key to her lock, if you can say that. And that I was able to change enough because I had to do all that work. I had to do all the heavy lifting. It's not on the dog, right? It's not on the dog to change. You have to be who the dog needs. I had to change the way I presented myself. She didn't like a lot of the things I was like. A lot of things I was doing were not the things for her. And through the help of Sandy Rogers and through a bunch of people, we found it. We found a way to motivate her, found a way to make her love this. And I got a non-working bread off-breed to find a way to love and look forward to and perform well in agility. And I'm just really proud of that. And I'm proud of her for sticking with me through my many, many late friend crosses. Thank you very much. I'm really proud of her. And I'm really proud of the teamwork we have. That sounds like it's totally a good thing to be proud of. I mean, it's just like you guys worked really, really hard to develop it. And she's come a long way. So that's awesome. Yeah, I'm thankful for it. I mean, it's lessons to me, right? I mean, I'm grateful that I've been able to grow in this direction because she was not, you know, she was a really easy dog. I might not have the skills I had, right? So that's the upside to all those things. I'm just very grateful. Potentially my favorite question every single episode. And since we've had somebody quote you on the podcast, not to add any extra pressure, but what is the best piece of training advice that you've ever heard? Well, you know, my advice. That's my, no, I'm kidding. That piece that I made up, that's the best advice ever. That's the, you know, no, everybody else got two. So I'm taking two. So I'm just saying that there's two. One that really, really made a difference and has really impacted me, always stuck with me. It was from Bob Bailey. And he said, observe your animal, observe your learner. And, you know, maybe that doesn't sound so deep at first. You know, of course you watch your learner and you'll learn what you need to know. Um, but it solved so many little problems and so many, um, so many things that get in the way of your training are because you're not seeing who's actually right there in front of you.

And, and the short example is that I had to teach, you have to teach a chicken to peck, not just the circle. That's like a, like a construction paper circle and, uh, not just the circle, but the dead center of it. And that's really harder than it sounds because they move very quickly and the speed it takes for you to see the chicken and then depress your thumb onto the clicker. It's by the time the sound is made, the chicken is on its way back up from pecking. So you need to click, like plan to click and start the clicking when the chicken is on its way down. Um, and so it took many lessons. I'm, I'm concatenating it for this reason for you, but, but Bob had to give me little pieces over time, but it was, I had to know what she, what her head and her beak angle and what she looked like when she was going to be pecking the center and decide before she got there that that was going to be a successful tech and then click that one. And instead I was looking at the pack. I was looking at where the pack landed and trying to click the correct ones. And instead you click on the trajectory toward, and if you don't know what your animal looks like, if you don't observe her really closely, you can't tell which pack is going to be the one. And therefore your click will be late. And therefore you'll never train the chicken. It doesn't, doesn't happen. Your dogs can be late. It's all right. But the chickens know. Um, and you know, and teaching a, I was teaching a dog to tug open a fridge and I kept, I had to call him cause I kept not getting it right. I couldn't see what my problem was. I was clicking when she was tugging and I, it just wasn't getting more tugging out of it. And he asked me, what is, what does her neck look like when she's about to make the best tug, about to make the strongest contraction? I'm like, I wasn't looking at her neck. Like, what were you looking at? The tug in her mouth? Well, you're looking at the clench of her, you know, quads as she, you know, settled into really getting a good tug in, click that. And, you know, in the matter of an evening, she was tugging really hard and pulling the fridge open. You really have to look at who you have and not see what you want to see and not click or, or reinforce, um, end products, but reinforce process because it's the process you're trying to often get when you're training. So that one stuck in maybe a much more accurate and better trainer. And then my second, um, is, is Denise in the sense of, um, I don't know if she boils it down, but in the way of attitude before precision, I'm sorry. Yeah.

Attitude before precision where, you know, you feed cookies for attitude. If that, if that behavior was incorrect, you give a cookie anyway. Um, and I think a lot of times we as trainers get caught up in, I reinforce the right ones and I make sure not to reinforce the ones I don't want. And that's very, you know, ingrained in us. Don't, don't, don't click or don't, don't reinforce the incorrect behavior. And she was doing it. She does it all the time. It's like, that isn't correct. But my dog tried, you know, cookies for attitude. And when I first was aware she was doing that, it made me a little nervous. Like, how are you going to, you're going to get all this bad behavior in the mix. How, how is this going to work? You know, but it works beautifully. It works beautifully. It keeps your dog in the game. Um, she, she really helped me see that, you know, cookies for trying is not, it's not bad. How to, how to handle a mistake is to reward it because you're done tried and was with you. And you can just craft it that most of the, of the cookies are for the right thing. Don't worry so much. It's not, you know, your learner has an emotional life and that's way, way, way more important than anything else. And, um, she's very, she, she codified it down into, you know, attitude over precision. It really, um, centered me in my training a lot. Those two things feel like they have a lot in common just in terms of kind of looking at the bigger picture of things, you know? Right, right. Like don't, yeah, exactly. It's very, it's very bigger picture. And, and I think clicker training and just for me, I shouldn't speak for anyone else can get me a little too focused on minutia. Um, and for, and, and make me forget the rest. So those were, were good for, for me to, to learn and to incorporate at this stage of my training. I certainly don't think you're alone in that. I mean, clicker training, it's all about splitting. And sometimes when you're splitting it, it's hard to, to also think, to hold both ideas in your mind at the same time. Right. Right. It's kind of like, wait, I'm splitting, but should I lump it? No, it's not lumping. It's splitting and wait, mixed metaphors. Um, forest. I'm splitting in the forest. Wait. Something like that. Right. Someone listening can suggest something much more elegant than that. Cause I've never been known for an elegant metaphor. I'll tell you that. So, so for this last one, somebody else in the dog world that you look up to, and I'm going to push you not to name Denise. And she's gotten named lots. No, you can't do that. I know because I talked about her way too much.

I didn't plan to talk about her constantly. I'm sure you have one or two that I haven't, that I'm not super familiar with. I can tell. I mean, I stand on the shoulders of giants, right? I, everybody who's come before me is an influence on me. And, and I, you know, everyone has taken their, their turn. I had a troubled dog years ago that I brought to everybody. Like instead of doing some tea touch with her, I brought her to Linda Tellington Jones, you know, like I, I sought everybody I could find to help and to teach me. And I absolutely stand on their shoulders, all of them. I, I credit myself with nothing and them with everything except my own mistakes. And however that phrase really goes. What I admire most in a trainer I can look up to now is independent thinking. People will say there's nothing new in training. You know, it's, it's all, it's all been done before. It's just how we're repackaging it or retaking about it differently. I don't think so anymore. I think, I think there are, there have been just as few people, at least, you know, on my radar that are willing to challenge something that's supposed to be the way it's done. And try it on dogs and not say, well, that's in the wrong codger. That's supposed to do this. That's going to make a dog do X. Can't do that. Because I was that. I mean, that's how we all start when we, when we're learning, we acquire the wealth and wisdom of other people who say, don't do it this way and please do it that way. And so you do. And, and we can get, we can get a little lost in that sometimes. And so I gravitate toward the independent thinker who isn't about, I do it this way because this is the way we do it. I like people who say, I don't know what would happen if I just gave a cookie and he was wrong. Let's find out. I mean, yeah, of course it's going to make it, make him, you know, a little confused, but I can fix that. I'm not worried about it. That kind of confidence of I'm an independent thinker and I don't do just what people do because it's what they do. I'm not terribly like that. So I really look up to it. I think Denise does that. Grisha also does that. And Donna Duford, I don't know if you remember her, also taught me that same way. And, and she, she was one of the kind of early old school clicker trainers from the East Coast. There was a kind of a East Coast, West Coast rivalry going on in the clicker training where early on, and at least I'm led to understand, and I was a few years later than this.

Or I'll just say that there are people who replaced their methods and people that call themselves crossover trainers who replaced things they did piecemeal one at a time. You know, I don't think this one works, so I'm going to do this instead. Oh, this works better. Oh, this is really great. And then there are people who, because they hear about a new system, throw out everything they did before and try to put in the new fancy positive system that they're learning. And I think, I think when people have the courage to just say, I'm just going to try this little piece and see how it goes. And they put it in their system and go, I think I like this. This is pretty good. I'm going to investigate some other stuff. I'm going to try something new. I think from there comes the innovation. And at least in my world, in the people who've been around me to influence me, there haven't been a ton of people doing that. So when I see that, that really stands out to me. I fully admire it. I think Grisha did that when she just said, I'm just going to see what happens when we do this. I think Denise does that all the time. She's not beholden to the world of the monolith of training that says, this is how you do it. She's like, let's find out. And I, you know, I look up to anybody who can think independently, try stuff on their own and just kind of stand their ground with what it is. I don't think you're giving yourself enough credit. I think that that's exactly what you've done with the Playway is take a look and do something totally different. It's really what I'm trying to do. It's what I'm trying to do. I don't know that I bravely strike out so well, but I'm trying to because I, you know, we have to see things new ways. Or we have to explore. If there's some other way people do it in some other tradition, don't be afraid. You know, if you're good enough at what you do, if you're sensitive enough with your learner, if you really are sure that you're not going to cause harm, it's okay. You know, it's okay to give a cookie for the wrong behavior, right, to use that again because you're not causing any harm. So try and see what you get. And that's, I think, where innovation will be found. And I think we get a little stuck. We're a little ruddy a little bit in some positive training circles and some pet training circles. And I think it's time to see what else, not to throw out things, but to enrich them with new experiences and new things from other thinkers. And that's where I'm, I don't know if I'm headed there, but that's what I think about a lot. So thank you for that. But I don't accept it.

I reject the compliment and insert some self-deprecation of my own. You can't get me. I refuse. Well, I'm going to tell you that I can get it anyway, and you can choose to accept it or not. But it was sincerely given. Thank you so much. Thank you for coming on, and thanks to all of our listeners for tuning in. We will be back in two weeks with Julie Flannery to talk about Rally Free. And if you haven't already, please subscribe to the podcast. You can do that on iTunes or the podcast app of your choice. And you'll have the next episode of our podcast automatically downloaded to your phone as soon as it becomes available. Today's show is brought to you by the Fenzie Dog Sports Academy. Special thanks to Denise Fenzie for supporting this podcast. Music provided royalty-free by bensound.com. The track featured here is called Buddy. Audio editing provided by Chris Lang. And transcription written by CLK Transcription Services. Thanks again for tuning in, and happy training!