완벽한 것보다 끝내는 것이 낫다 #1

to share the lessons of those mentors in this podcast. And a lot of those lessons came to me, um, while training dogs. And when I talk about that, that circle, that everything is, seems to be related and it comes around to us again. If you look at the way that, that we, if you're in my tribe, you have made a, uh, a conscious choice on how you train your dogs. And basically the way I look at it, there's four ways we can train a dog. Number one is training with hope. Meaning I get a new puppy. Yeah. He's destroying the furniture. Yeah. He's peeing on the carpet. Yeah. He's digging in the garden. Yeah. He pulls on a leash. I hope he'll outgrow that. And we actually have a rescue dog, um, tater salad, half bulldog, um, half terrier cross that his owner hoped for that, but three destroyed couches and a bunch of other personal items destroyed. Uh, at 14 months, he was, um, he was given up and we adopted him and he's an amazing dog because we don't rely on hope. So, hope is number one. I think that's probably the number one, uh, training of choice. People just hope and wait for the dog to outgrow things. Number two is blame and punishment. And there's various degrees of blame and punishment. It could just be the big sigh or hands on your hips. What did you do? You might say to your dog, but you're blaming him. He did something. You don't like it. He should know better. Like, aren't you, you know, I, you know, they should be pre-programmed to know that this isn't the way things are done. Um, and it could also escalate from there. So, training with a, uh, a, a collar that might correct the dog with a chain, or you might, some people might use electric collars or electric fencing. Some people just yell or throw things that it is the dog's, um, responsibility to figure this stuff out. I put in a little bit of training. I put in all the training you should need, and now you need to figure it out. So, blame, blame, and judgment could be the foundation of it. And some people, um, you know, they, they'll, they'll use words to, to like balance trainer. Like I've put in a lot of food and rewards to train him and now he knows he needs to know better. So, he needs to be, he needs to have a correction. That is a consideration. Third way to train is with food lures. But if food lures are, are continuously used, they're just bribes. And if the dog's not hungry, um, and there's a, a myriad of reasons why I don't believe food luring is going to create the dog of your dreams. It definitely works for a lot of dogs. There's too many accomplished dogs out there that have

been trained just with food lures for me to say it doesn't work. Sure it works, but it, it, it not works a lot as well. It not works for a lot of dogs. So, the fourth choice and the choice that I use is science-based. It's a choice that works with everybody, with every dog because it is science and it is using shaping behavior to get a response you're looking for and reinforce it with something the dog loves. So, four ways of training your dogs, hope, blame, and shame, uh, food lure, bribery, or science-based shaping. And so, the, the one you pick, I believe, and this is a huge epiphany I had, is that we can become the person we're meant to be in life by training a dog, but it depends on how we train that dog. So, stick with me for a second. Let me walk through this. Let's say you're an extreme blame and train or blame and shame, uh, punish person. So, the puppy comes into your house, you, ah, no. And you maybe give them a little smack under the chin when they nip, um, that you, you know, you, you teach the kids when you say sit, you give them a cookie, but if they don't sit, you push down and pull up on their collar. So, these are lessons that we're teaching our children. We look for what the dog's doing wrong and we tell them, Hey, sucker, you're wrong. I'm disappointed. You're bad. If that's the way you train your dog, you are feeding your subconscious mind with way of going in life. Ah, Susan, it's just a dog. It's a dog that's sent to us to share lessons. And if you open yourself up to that possibility, your life will change. Because let's flip this around. And the way that we train dogs, scientifically proven through shaping, it has a few, um, accepted facts. So, I don't know if you can read on my blackboard. It, it says that, um, all dogs are doing the absolute best they can with the education you've given them in the environment you ask them to perform. That is a core belief that I have. And anytime my dog does anything wrong, I look at, is it the education or is it the environment that I've asked them to do, to perform it? And some of you are saying, Oh, no, no, no, no, Susan, my dog's a rescue dog. So, he's had some baggage that doesn't apply. The behavior of your rescue dog today is a reflection of your adopting this philosophy. If you buy into this philosophy wholeheartedly, you're going to look at the environment and the education. Now, I'm not saying that there isn't a, a, uh, a challenge with different dogs because of who they are, the personality of who they are. Um, you know,

dogs are like people. We all have different personalities that make it easier for us to do some, some things and more difficult to do others. And dogs have a definite personality that is a, you know, formed from their genetic makeup, formed from the start, the breeder, ideally the breeder, um, gave them, formed from the socializations that, that they got early on as puppies, but they have this personality. Uh, for example, um, I have, uh, I came from a very large family. I came from, I was born into a very large family of, uh, I'm the, the seventh child. I have, I have eight brothers and sisters. My old, next oldest sister is seven years older and she was super shy as a kid. I was never really shy as a kid. Um, I remember one of my earliest memories. I was five years old and my mom and dad were having some company in and my mom kind of brought us into the living room. I just remember my mother, my sister and I standing at the threshold to the living room. And one of the people in the, in the living room asked my sister a question. She was 12. She instantly dropped her eyes and went in behind my mom and didn't say anything. And then I kind of burst out from behind and said, uh, it's okay. She's shy, but you can ask me. Which of course made the room erupt in laughter, which of course reinforced the extrovert that was developing in me. Those kinds of experiences took what was naturally there and fed and led them to come out to be me. It's somebody who I feel super comfortable standing in front of a group of 10,000 people talking either about dog training or business. I love, I'm driven to help people. And that need to help people is reinforced when I can share what I know in front of a lot of people, right? My sister's a super awesome person and her, her, her, her strength and, and who she was has allowed her to do things that wouldn't, I wouldn't be allowed to do. I, I, I wouldn't be good at because we're, we're made differently. Our dogs are exactly the same. Some dogs are super confident and outgoing. And you can look at that, you know, there's a yin and a yang. That dog is independent. He is, you know, he's a free thinker. He blows you off or he's confident. And how can I use that to my best ability? So, yes, I'm going to say that, that there is a, uh, uh, uh, who that dog is. And you have to accept who that dog is as your starting point. Love them unconditionally say, this is who you are. And now it's up to me and the education I can give you and the environment that I put you in, that's going to make a difference. I'll give you another example.

You get a puppy, puppy, eight week old puppy, you bring it into the house and you let it have the whole house because you love dogs and you're not going to be one of those people who restrict the dog and put them in a box, crate, kennel. Now we're going to talk about that in upcoming episodes and how box crates, kennels actually can be super good and how you're actually being kind of cruel to your dog when you don't use one. That's another story. But let's say you get this puppy and you give them the freedom to, you know, to, you love them. So you, my house, you know, me castle, your castle, you can, you can do whatever you want in this house, you know, and you take them outside and you give them praise and rewards when they piddle in the grass where they're supposed to. But crap, Susan, here we are a month in and my dog's still piddling places. He actually piddles on my, my sweatshirt. I think it's dominance. Or it could be that you have linoleum in your kitchen and you threw your, or your bedroom and you threw the, the sweatshirt on the floor and it actually creates a better purchase for the dog. So she, her legs don't slide when she tries to piddle and hey, I like this. This is reinforcing for me to piddle on. Why did that happen? Because you're started with a dog who didn't have a lot of bladder control because puppies don't naturally have bladder control. And then you put them into an environment where they had a lot of choices. More of them were poor choices than good to piddle where they wanted. And you didn't give them a thorough education to let them know where you wanted that to happen. So that's where accepting this as one of your core beliefs in life is going to not only help your dog be a brilliant, but it's also going to improve your relationship. Because let's get back to the thought that, um, we become the person we're meant to be when we train a dog. Because if you're a person who buys into the science that I have that says the dog is a product of the education environment, then when my dog does something wrong, I'm going to say, wow, what can I do to help you be more successful? How can I educate you more to love what you're doing and to want to do more with me? When you do that, you're a person who's basing everything you do with that dog in kindness. You are looking at how you can bring more joy to that dog through training and, and, and, and manipulating the environment that they're, that they're currently in. Do you think that makes you a better or worse parent, spouse, if you run a team like me, team leader,

friend, sibling? If you're somebody who is starting to program your brain when you train your dog to never blame, but, and not judge, but rather look to improve through education and environmental manipulation and acceptance of who that dog is. Do you think that will help you in everyday life? That's how I believe we become the person we're meant to be by training a dog. I'm not saying I am the, a person who, who is perfect, but remember, as I said at the beginning, done is better than perfect. You need to start somewhere. So, we're, we're all flawed humans. We accept that, but we want to improve that in order to improve that. We need to have structure to educate ourself. So, the structure is when I, you know, have a big, deep sigh because somebody on my team disappointed me, I recognize that did not help them to have the confidence to move forward and be better next time. So, put it out there. Start today. Look at how you can improve what you've got. And that's where this podcast is going to come in. I'm going to share with you the lessons I've learned, the flaws that I have that has allowed me to be open to new lessons. This podcast, sure, it's going to be about some dog behavior. It's also going to be about mindset and how our beliefs create the kind of outcome that we have. Now you, if you've listened so far, then, thank you. You may be thinking, well, Susan, you're a competitor. Is this going to be about dog agility? There might be some dog agility episodes. Absolutely. But my success as a world champion in dog agility, it all starts by having a focus of creating the most amazing family pets possible. For two reasons. Number one, I know when my dogs, when I create these from puppies or when they're rescue dogs from older dogs to have this drive in them to want to work with me, to want to do amazing things. It makes it easier to train things like agility down the road. Number two, my dogs are family pets for many, many, many more years and more moments in my life than they're ever going to be agility dogs. When I put the focus first into creating great family pets, what I do for that dog is I give them a life of freedom. When I focus on them coming when they're called, doing what I ask, when I ask, they get more freedom. They get more time off leash because I know they're going to make the right choice. They're going to want to make the right choice. They're not coerced. They're not blamed. They're not punished. They are, they want to make the right choice. That's the way we train.

So, if, if you buy into this, not only are you creating a better life for your dog because you're creating a life with more freedom, but you're also, the full circle is you're creating a life where you become a better person. And that's what this podcast is meant to be. I would love to get your feedback. I would love for you to ask me questions. Um, my, um, um, I'm, I plan on having experts that I'm going to be interviewing. I, uh, the, everything I present is going to be based in a foundation of science. There will be some woo out there. Um, which, which, you know, some people, um, mindset is a bit woo, things that aren't as tangible, but they still have great scientific evidence, um, to, to support them. I'm going to talk about things like nutrition or exercise or all the things that impact the quality of life that our dogs can have and all the things that impact our life in return. So, that is what, um, Shaped by Dog is going to be about. I hope you subscribe so that you can get, uh, every update that I put out on, on the podcast. And, uh, I'm looking forward to a, a long and creative, uh, process with this podcast. This is the first, the first of many done is better than perfect. You're going to see a different format as time goes on, because I'm going to learn from the feedback I get from all of you. I'm going to learn from the experiences of putting out a podcast. I'm going to learn to, uh, to, uh, adjust it. So, today we've talked about how it doesn't matter if, um, it's something new you want to train your dog or a trick you want to train your dog, something new you want to try. Yes, you've got to plan, but you've got to take action as well. You've got to be brave to step and be uncomfortable because done is better than perfect. You can improve upon it, but you can't improve upon something that you won't be willing to try to put it out there to the world. So, I would, uh, ask you to go and train your dog, try something new, video what you're doing, and that's how you're going to be able to look at what you're doing and improve upon what you've got. That's it today. I'm, uh, super grateful for everybody in this community, for everybody encouraging me to, to take this first step. I look forward to getting your feedback and, um, we'll see you in the next episode of Shaped by Dog.