Podcast appearances and mentions of Karen Pryor

In this episode of ABA on Call, Rick Kubina and Doug Kostewicz interview a renowned Norwegian dog trainer about the science of behavior across species. Morten Egtvedt shares his journey from training search-and-rescue dogs as a teenager to helping introduce clicker training throughout Norway alongside Karen Pryor. The discussion explores how core behavioral principles such as timing, reinforcement, fluency, shaping, and criterion adjustment matter far more than any specific training technique. Morten also discusses the differences between reinforcement-based and punishment-based training, the role of motivation in learning, and why behavior analysis provides a practical framework for understanding both dogs and humans. Listeners will hear compelling parallels between animal training, education, sports performance, and everyday human interactions, while gaining insight into how fluency-based instruction creates durable, reliable behavior change. To earn CEUs for listening, click here, log in or sign up, pay the CEU fee, + take the knowledge check to generate your certificate! Don't forget to subscribe and follow and leave us a rating and review. Show Notes:    Binder, C. (1996). Behavioral fluency: Evolution of a new paradigm. The Behavior Analyst, 19(2), 163–197. https://doi.org/10.1007/BF03393163 Pryor, K. (1999). Don't shoot the dog!: The new art of teaching and training (Rev. ed.). Bantam Books. Pryor, K. (2002). Clicker training for dogs. Ringpress Books. Pryor, K., & Chase, S. (2014). Training for variable and innovative behavior. International Journal of Comparative Psychology, 27, 218–225.

This is Part 2 of our conversation with Michele Pouliot. Michele is best known as a dog trainer, but she also has a strong horse background. , Since 1974 Michele has been a professional guide dog instructor with the largest US guide dog school serving the blind. Before entering the guide dog field, she was a professional in the field of horse training, mentoring under Linda Tellington Jones and Wentworth Tellington. Michele retired from Guide Dogs for the Blind after 42 years of service. During her last 16 years, she held the position of Director of Research and Development for programs at Guide Dogs. In that position Michele was responsible for bringing science based Clicker Training to guide dog training and promoting the expansion of Clicker Training internationally within the guide dog field. In her "hobby world", Michele has actively competed in both horse and dog sports since 1970. After successfully competing in dog obedience for 20 years, she moved into the new sport of agility in 1992. In 2006, Michele became fascinated with the sport of canine musical freestyle and began a dog sport journey she continues to love. She has competed in canine musical freestyle with her English Springer spaniel, Cabo, Australian Shepherd, Listo and her young Springer spaniel Deja Vu. Michele thoroughly enjoys this artistic sport that combines the precision of obedience with trick behaviors and challenges her creative side through music and choreography. Michele has won numerous international competitions and Championship Titles. She thoroughly enjoys the ongoing challenges in the sport of canine freestyle and the use of Clicker Training to achieve innovative and entertaining routines. In 2007, Karen Pryor invited Michele to join the faculty of Clicker Expo Conferences. Her presentations are for me always one of the highlights of the Expo. In this episode Michele shares strategies she uses for developing her freestyle routines where she can't click and treat during the performances. Maintaining her dog's enthusiasm for the behaviors she asks for is essential if they are to succeed in competition. So the question is how do you go from clicking and treating every small effort to long sequences in which you can not include a click and treat mid-way through a performance.

We're beginning a conversation with Michele Pouliot. Michele is best known as a dog trainer, but she also has a strong horse background. Beginning in 1974 Michele has been a professional guide dog instructor with the largest US guide dog school serving the blind. Before entering the guide dog field, she was a professional in the field of horse training, mentoring under Linda Tellington Jones and Wentworth Tellington. In 1972, Michele became active in training her first pet Labrador and became fascinated with the comparisons of how dogs and horses learn, stimulating her interest and pursuit in professional dog training. Michele has served as an International Assessor of guide dog school programs for the International Guide Dog Federation. She has completed assessments on guide dog schools in Norway, Austria, Czech Republic, France, Japan, Holland and Great Britain. Michele retired from Guide Dogs for the Blind after 42 years of service. During her last 16 years, she held the position of Director of Research and Development for programs at Guide Dogs for the Blind. In that position she transformed the training program to clicker training. Over her 40+ years of dog training, Michele has been responsible for bringing science based Clicker Training to guide dog training and promoting the expansion of Clicker Training internationally within the guide dog field. In her "hobby world", Michele has actively competed in both horse and dog sports since 1970. After successfully competing in dog obedience for 20 years, she moved into the new sport of agility in 1992. After much fun and success in agility with Labradors, English Springer Spaniels and even Great Danes, Michele took a break from dog sports to focus on her equine hobbies. In 2006, Michele became fascinated with the sport of canine musical freestyle and began a dog sport journey she continues to love. She has competed in canine musical freestyle with her English Springer spaniel, Cabo, Australian Shepherd, Listo and her young Springer spaniel Deja Vu. Michele thoroughly enjoys this artistic sport that combines the precision of obedience with trick behaviors and challenges her creative side through music and choreography. In 5 years in the sport, Michele has won 4 international competitions and attained 5 Championship Titles. In 2008 she received the first scores of double 10's (perfect scores) for Technical and Artistic in one routine in WCFO's Championship division (Perfect Dance Partners). She repeated this accomplishment at the 2009 International competition when all 3 judges awarded double 10's to her freestyle routine. To date Michele and Listo have earned 'double 10' scores a total of twenty-four times. Michele thoroughly enjoys the ongoing challenges in the sport of canine freestyle and the use of Clicker Training to achieve innovative and entertaining routines. In 2007, Karen Pryor invited Michele to join her faculty for Clicker Expo Conferences. At Clicker Expo, Michele presents on the application of clicker techniques for a variety of dog sports, general training, and for the training of guide dogs for the blind. Karen Pryor and Michele collaborated for the development of Michele's online freestyle course which is available from the Karen Pryor Academy. In this episode we begin a conversation that is centered around strategies used in competition where you have to develop long duration programs in which you are not allowed to use treats.

Visit us at shapedbydog.com    Is dog training about to change? In this episode, I'm sharing why a recent conversation about reinforcement-based dog training gave me something I haven't felt in a long time: hope. Looking back at an agility discussion from the mid-1990s, I reflect on how dog training shifts happen, why curiosity creates more clarity than blame or punishment, and why great results are not reserved for "special" trainers. We're talking about reinforcement, intrinsic motivation, meaningful change, and why dogs are always doing the best they can with the information we've given them in the environment we're asking them to work in   In this episode, you'll hear:   • About a conversation that gave me a glimmer of hope for dog training. • Why I've been feeling discouraged about the direction of dog training. • A mid-1990s agility story about weave poles, punishment, and clarity. • My thoughts on hearing "That might work for Susan Garrett, but not for the rest of us." • What I noticed listening to a balanced dog training podcast where my training was discussed. • The subtle shift happening in reinforcement-based dog training conversations. • Why ideas no longer being dismissed is a meaningful sign of change. • Karen Pryor's stages of change and how progress begins. • Why amazing results are possible for everyday dog owners. • Why great dog training is built through clear systems, not "special" trainers. • My reflections on asking myself: "Is it possible that I'm wrong?" as a dog trainer. • Why love in dog training means clarity, fairness, and understanding. • The difference between building understanding and building pressure. • Why clarity creates confidence while pressure creates compliance. • Why dogs are doing the best they can with what they understand. • How to replace blame with curiosity and better questions for our dogs.   Resources:   1. Podcast Episode 313: Are You Learning Or Looping: What To Do When Training Your Dog Stops Being Fun - https://dogsthat.com/podcast/313/ 2. Podcast Episode 146: Balanced Dog Training: Does It Really Exist? - https://dogsthat.com/podcast/146/ 3. Podcast Episode 114: Dog Agility Training: 3 Big Mistakes All Dog Owners Should Avoid - https://dogsthat.com/podcast/114/ 4. Podcast Episode 78: How to Train a Rescue Dog with Behavior Problems - https://dogsthat.com/podcast/78/ 5. Podcast Episode 94: How the Best Professional Dog Trainers Use Reinforcement - https://dogsthat.com/podcast/94/ 6. Watch this Episode of Shaped by Dog on YouTube - https://youtu.be/-YyJwfvyyhM

We recorded this conversation early in April 2026 right after the Clicker Expo. In Part 1 the Clicker Expo served as a launching point for our conversation. We talked about Dr Susan Friedman's presentation on Doing Compassion and my own talk on Thinking Fast, Making Quick Decisions. My program included a discussion of the characteristics we see in skilled trainers. In part 1 I listed some of those characteristics. Among other things skilled trainers able to be flexible as needed. They are able to make adjustments in what they are asking. And they are creative. They are able to find teaching strategies and appropriate training steps that suits their learner's individual needs. For the full list refer back to Part 1. These characteristics are not some special gifts that people are born with. We can think of them as a by-product that emerges as we gain experience training our animal learners. The point of my program is we can be more deliberate, less hit or miss, in the development of these traits. When we jump into this training, of course people are focused on what they will be teaching their horses. That's only natural. But it isn't just the horses who are learning new skills. In the Thinking Fast program, I turned the spotlight onto the handler. What are the lessons the handlers are learning as they introduce their horses to basic targeting and the other core lessons? The structure and focus of these lessons helps to develop advanced training skills. In Part 2 we continued with the discussion of the Thinking Fast presentation. We talked about what advanced training means, especially for handlers, and how do we develop advanced training skills? In Part 3 we begin with another of my Expo Talks, this one is on Training Traps. To introduce that topic I have to first define what I mean by broad and narrow end of the funnel thinking. Defining terms to start out with is important. It means we are all on the same page, talking about the same thing. A good illustration of that is the discussion of starter button and constant on cues. I'm using definitions that for me go back to Karen Pryor's book, “Lads Before the Wind”. In this Episode I also share what happened in the Backstage Pass presentation where I was supposed to work with a dog. Find out how that turned out in this week's episode.

Primitive reflexes are involuntary responses that a newborn is born with to help them survive. These reflexes naturally disappear as your baby's brain matures. In cases of injury, these reflexes can show back up and are a sign of a larger issue.Host Jessica Stewart-Gonzalez sits down with Dr. Karen Pryor, a physical therapist, to cover what parents need to know about primitive reflexes.Host:Jessica Stewart-Gonzalez is the Chief of the Office of Children's Health at the Arizona Department of Health Services. She is married, has two young children, and loves reading (anything except parenting books!) and watching movies and TV.She enjoys spending time with her kids (when they aren't driving her crazy) and celebrating all of their little, and big, accomplishments. Jessica has been in the field of family and child development for over 20 years, focused on normalizing the hard work of parenting and making it easier to ask the hard questions.Links: Strong Families AZHost: Jessica Stewart-Gonzalez Guest: Dr. Karen Pryor List of Primitive Reflexes

Laurie Fass talks about the shift in seasons and how it can create unexpected challenges for our pets. She shares a lighthearted story about being asked to track down a dog's poop hidden among fallen leaves, and reflects on Thanksgiving traditions and this year's National Dog Show, including her thoughts on the winner. Laurie also takes listener questions, offering advice on training a dog to drop a ball on command and addressing a therapy dog's persistent barking. Plus, she highlights the importance of proper training through the book Don't Shoot the Dog! by Karen Pryor, and explains why techniques like consistent reinforcement and ignoring unwanted behaviors can make all the difference.

For over 40 years, dog trainers have been fed a feel-good myth: the "jackpot" reward, championed by Karen Pryor, claims a pile of treats will supercharge your dog's learning. But does it deliver? Did the force-free movement's “kool-aid” mislead trainers for decades?Tune in and discover the truth!

What if the secret to building a powerful brand wasn’t about strategy, hacks, or fitting into a box—but about showing up unapologetically as you? In this episode, I sit down with Bryan Martin (aka Sea Lion Bryan). Bryan isn’t just another social media success story, he’s someone who is fun, genuine, and building a movement simply by being himself. So, get ready to laugh, be inspired, and maybe even rethink the way you show up online - because this conversation with Bryan Martin is one you won’t forget. We’ll be talking about: ➡ [0:00] Introduction: be the expert of you➡ [3:10] The story behind the name➡ [4:38] Dancing through grief and finding joy➡ [7:19] From TikTok to Instagram success➡ [10:14] Do you need to dance to grow online?➡ [14:20] Blending joy and business without being salesy➡ [19:09] Turning social media into a reality show➡ [23:07] Sharing content across platforms➡ [24:42] Playing with trial reels for growth➡ [30:19] Building and training a team➡ [34:48] The grocery store analogy for business growth➡ [36:35] Smart linking & beating the algorithm➡ [39:51] Being the expert of yourself➡ [41:16] Posting by feeling, not rigidity➡ [44:25] When a post gets no engagement➡ [47:28] Authentic connection over automation➡ [52:10] Handling negativity and stereotypes➡ [1:01:33] Bryan’s favourite quote➡ [1:02:01] Bryan’s favourite book(s)➡ [1:05:26] Bryan’s favourite superpower➡ [1:06:17] Bryan’s advice to his past self➡ [1:07:30] Final thoughts and where to find Bryan Resources Recommended Books: ➡ Don’t Shoot the Dog by Karen Pryor: https://bit.ly/3KHz6Ne ➡ The Widow Dancer by Bryan Martin: https://bit.ly/481Xm6x ➡ The Divine Comedy (Inferno/Trilogy) by Dante Alighieri: https://bit.ly/4nPutir ➡ Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs by Judi Barrett: https://bit.ly/4gHZOBz Quotes: ➡ “You could stay in the storm or you could be a break in the clouds” About our guest: Bryan Martin (AKA: SEALIONBRYAN) went from grief to gratitude in a way no one expected. Loss of his father, then an acute terminal loss of his partner 10 months later followed up by a pandemic left Bryan alone and forced to focus on himself and finding a way to make ends meet. Feeling safer financially was the first thing and Bryan joined direct sales with Young Living essential oils to take better care of himself and begin growing a business alongside his full time animal care career. His next moves (dance moves) would prove to be the spark he needed for himself. Dancing each morning in his kitchen to start his day lit a fire back in Bryan and the world began to follow with viral videos, news interviews and winning the Kelly Rippa & Ryan Seacrest dance contest in 2021.Seven years after becoming widowed, Bryan has built a social media following over 2 million with 1.2 million on Facebook alone. Bryan is now married to his husband Devin, his Young Living business has become his full time passion and he has published a book on growing through grief called "The Widowed Dancer" showing us all we can dance through the fire and grow through grief. Connect with Bryan Martin ➡ Bryan Martin’s Campsite bio: https://campsite.bio/sealionbryan ➡ Bryan Martin’s LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/sealionbryan/ ➡ Bryan Martin’s Tiktok: https://www.tiktok.com/@sealionbryan?lang=en ➡ Bryan Martin’s Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Sealionbryan/ ➡ Bryan Martin’s Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/sealionbryan/ ➡ Bryan Martin’s Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@BryanandDevin ➡ Bryan Martin’s Email: Sealionbryan@gmail.com Connect with Direct Selling Accelerator: ➡ Visit our website: https://www.auxano.global/ ➡ Subscribe to Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/c/DirectSellingAccelerator ➡ Follow us on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/auxanomarketing/ ➡ Follow us on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/auxanomarketing/ ➡ Email us at communnity_manager@auxano.global If you have any podcast suggestions or things you’d like to learn about specifically, please send us an email at the address above. And if you liked this episode, please don’t forget to subscribe, tune in, and share this podcast. Are you ready to join the Auxano Family to get live weekly training, support and the latest proven posting strategies to get leads and sales right now - find out more here https://go.auxano.global/welcomeSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

In this heartfelt episode of the Making Ripples podcast, we're joined by Jillian Howlett – Karen Pryor Academy Certified Training Partner and founder of Walk and Train ACT. From her early days growing up surrounded by animals in rural Victoria, to discovering the transformative power of clicker training with her deaf Koolie cross Archie, Jill shares the winding path that led her from a career in education to her current work supporting dogs and their people in Canberra, Australia. Together, we explore: ✅ How Jill's childhood with spirited animals shaped her perspective on learning and connection ✅ The role Archie played in reigniting her lifelong passion for animal welfare and positive reinforcement ✅ The origins of Walk and Train ACT and her unique “walk and train” approach to supporting busy families ✅ The powerful lessons learned from clients like Amanda and her dog Ren, navigating life and training alongside health challenges ✅ Why community, curiosity, and compassion are cornerstones of Jill's practice This episode is a beautiful celebration of persistence, partnership, and the ripple effects that occur when we invest in relationships built on trust and understanding. Jill's journey is an inspiring reminder that it's never too late to follow your passion, keep learning, and create ripples of change that extend far beyond a single household. Links Instagram:  @strudel_and_archie Karen Pryor - find a trainer search Canberra (I'm the only one listed)  jill@walkandtrainact.com actcdc.org.au - Companion Dog Club, Canberra  zddog.com.au - Jess is a key player in the force free community in Canberra

This podcast episode explores the evolution of dog training, highlighting the shift from punitive methods to positive reinforcement techniques. It discusses key figures in the field, the impact of historical events, and the growing understanding of canine behavior. The conversation emphasizes the importance of humane training methods and the future of dog training practices.   Takeaways Dog training has evolved significantly over the past few decades. Many trainers are now using positive, reward-based techniques. The mantra 'from cruelty to kindness' reflects a major shift in training philosophy. Clever Hans's story highlighted the need for empirical study in animal behavior. Pavlov's classical conditioning laid the groundwork for understanding behavior. Thorndyke's law of effect explains how behaviors are reinforced. B.F. Skinner's work advanced the principles of learning in dog training. The rise of humane training methods began after World War II. Karen Pryor's book popularized clicker training and the use of positive reinforcement. Today's training methods are rooted in kindness and compassion.

Eine Stunde nützliche Fun Facts über Katzen! Sie haben sich selbst domestiziert. Sie unterscheiden sich genetisch kaum von der Wildkatze. Sie miauen nur mit Menschen – weil sie merken, dass das bei uns zieht. Katzentrainerin und Creatorin Anika Moritz erklärt ihre Lieblingstiere.Zur Person:

Last week Dominique and I were talking about the Clicker Expo. We shared our impressions of the Expo and then I talked about my presentation on the participating horse. This week we are continuing to explore what changes in the relationship that established when active participation is encouraged. Active participation very much means that it is safe for our animals to say “no”. We begin with a discussion of what a “no” really represents. We consider what it means for our animals to have a lifestyle of choice - an expression that comes from Dr. Susan Friedman. We discuss the use of multiple marker signals, treaties clicks, keep going signals, and treating without clicking. And we celebrate the wonderful clicker expo training community that is part of Karen Pryor's legacy.

Visit us at shapedbydog.com    Recently, dog training advocate Zak George asked me about crossover dog trainers, and framed the question in such a different way that it inspired replying with a podcast episode. When I crossed over from balanced training to reinforcement based training in 1996, many people asked me why and told me it would not work. I'm sharing my start in dog training, pivotal moments, people and dogs that led me to change my approach, what I learned about myself along the way, and the reasons I never went back.    In this episode, you'll hear:   • About my transition to becoming a crossover dog trainer. • The question from Zak George that inspired this episode. • When I decided to leave balanced training behind. • What I learned from my terrier puppy, Shelby. • The book that changed my thinking - Don't Shoot the Dog! by Karen Pryor. • When I first saw true autonomy in dog training and how choice transformed my approach. • About my "Shaping Badly" era. • How learning from Bob and Marian Bailey helped me refine my training with clarity and intention. • The shift to shaping with success. • Why judgment holds trainers back. • That change is possible. • Reasons trainers resist crossing over to a positive reinforcement approach. • A special offer for podcast listeners who want to be coached by me and my team.   Special Discounts to Join or Gift our Online Programs Check out our 300TH Episode & 5th Anniversary Celebration Page - https://dogsthat.com/celebration-central/   Resources:   1. Zak George - https://www.youtube.com/@zakgeorge 2. Podcast Episode 146: Balanced Dog Training: Does It Really Exist? - https://dogsthat.com/podcast/146/ 3. Book: Don't Shoot The Dog! By Karen Pryor - https://shop.clickertraining.com/en-ca/products/dont-shoot-the-dog-karen-pryor?srsltid=AfmBOoqkL4DLKYAPB1xQMDtJGYDwa1AR0r-AdPOhXo5LFMYe2REoECS7&variant=33778264965258 4. Podcast Episode 34: Time Outs for Dogs: Does Your Dog Need One? - https://dogsthat.com/podcast/34/ 5. Bob and Marian Bailey: Behavior by Bailey - http://www.behavior1.com/ 6. Podcast Episode 245: Make Dog Training Easy! Quick Guide To Antecedent Arrangements - https://dogsthat.com/podcast/245/ 7. Podcast Episode 71: Pro Dog Trainer's Secret to Help Your Naughty Dog - https://dogsthat.com/podcast/71/ 8. Podcast Episode 295: Fear Of Criticism? Why Facing The Camera Is The First Step To Becoming A Better Dog Trainer - https://dogsthat.com/podcast/295/ 9. The American Veterinary Society of Animal Behavior - https://avsab.org/ 10. The International Association of Animal Behavior Consultants - https://iaabc.org/ 11. Podcast Episode 297: Why In 2025 We Still Have Dog Trainers Who Believe “Reinforcement Dog Training Doesn't Work” - https://dogsthat.com/podcast/297/ 12. Podcast Episode 290: The Red Flag Of Dominance Based Training: Why It's Hurting Your Dog And What To Do Instead - https://dogsthat.com/podcast/290/ 13. DogsThat YouTube Channel - https://www.youtube.com/@DogsThat 14. DogsThat YouTube Playlists - https://www.youtube.com/@DogsThat/playlists 15. Watch this Episode of Shaped by Dog on YouTube - https://youtu.be/rajGh9u8gkw

In this first episode of a multipart series, Verena and Jesse tackle the thorny and complicated topic of navigating dog training industry as a dog guardian. The first step to hiring the right professional is understanding how dogs learn... and things get a bit nerdy. Go down the rabbit hole with us... and learn to understand your dog - and yourself - a bit better. Our shoutout goes to Reaching the Animal Mind and Don't Shoot the Dog by Karen Pryor. We would appreciate your support for the Reward Your Dog Podcast by liking, rating, reviewing, and sharing. It helps us so much! You can also:Join the RYDP Patreon (no paywalls unless you *want* to subscribe)Buy us a coffeeMore info on Reward Your Dog Training can be found here:WebsiteBlue SkyFacebookInstagram

This is part three of a conversation Dominique and I had at the end of January 2025. Part 1 was a tribute to Karen Pryor. Part 2 was a celebration of Robin's 30th birthday. I don't know his exact birthday so I am celebrating all year long. For me, 30 seems like such an important milestone for a horse to reach. It's like a person reaching their 90th birthday - it's quite an accomplishment, especially if they are still in good health. Robin has played an important role in the development of equine clicker training. In the previous episode I shared some of the many ways in which he showed us what is possible. Thirty years is a long time. When your horses reach their senior years that raises the question of what comes next. That's what we're going to talk about in this episode. Even if you are the one in your twenties and you've just gotten a young horse to start out with, this is something to think about. Horses live a long time. The full arc of their years not only takes us through many changes in our own lives, they help to shape those changes.

Last week we celebrated the life of Karen Pryor. My horses have lived a much better life because of Karen's work. That includes my young horse, Robin. I suppose I should stop referring to him as my young horse because this year he has reached an important milestone. Robin is thirty years old. That's like a person reaching their 90th birthday. It's an achievement that needs to be celebrated which is what I am doing in this episode. I don't know Robin's actual birthday so I will be celebrating his 30th Birthday all year long. Robin has had an enormous impact on equine clicker training. He showed us what is possible. So in this episode I am going to share Robin stories. We'll be talking about trick training, the “pose”, default behaviors and of course, balance, balance and more balance.

Episode 312 Remembering Karen Pryor At the end of January 2025 Dominique and I got together for an afternoon's conversation. This is part 1 of that conversation. I primarily wanted to talk about Karen Pryor. Karen died on January 5 2025. This episode celebrates her life.

HAPPY 250TH EPISODE, TEC TALK! To celebrate this fun landmark, Ari and Chris are joined by four amazing people who've had a huge impact on us and our field: Ken Ramirez (Karen Pryor Clicker Training), Steve Martin (Natural Encounters, Inc.), Susan Friedman (Behavior Works), and Tim Sullivan (Brookfield Zoo Chicago)! Our guests talk about how they all met each other (spoiler alert: everyone was intimidated by everyone), reflect on the impact on their lives of the late Karen Pryor, share some of their current biggest peeves/vendettas/crusades, reveal things they are working on about themselves, and give us suggestions for topics and guests for future episodes. It's an incredible talk with incredible people, and our way of saying thank you to our listeners for supporting the show - here's to the next 250! If you have a shout-out you'd like us to share, a question or a topic you'd like us to discuss, or a suggestion for a guest we should have on the show, let us know at podcast@naturalencounters.com! References from the episode: A Celebration of Life: Karen Pryor The Modern Principles of Shaping by Karen Pryor ⁠Modern Animal Care: A Skinnerian Perspective on Choice and Control⁠ by Christy Alligood and Susan Friedman

The animal and behavior training world lost a true revolutionary recently with the passing of Karen Pryor. Prolific writer, scientist, trainer, lecturer, and business woman with an entertainer's spirit, she changed the exotic and domestic animal training world forever with her ever popular book, Don't Shoot the Dog. She followed up her writing successes with the launch of Clicker Training and legions of trainers, students and fans, workshops, Karen Pryor Academy, and much much more by advancing the use of those mechanical behavioral markers and reward-based operant conditioning across the globe.  Her longtime friend and colleague, Terry Ryan of Legacy Canine, shares her earliest memories of meeting, traveling, learning from, and working with Karen for decades. Animal Care Software 

Karen Pryor was a pioneer in modern positive reinforcement animal training practices. She was a mentor to thousands of trainers, whether they met her in person or just knew of her from her dozens of books, courses, and programs. If you know clicker training, you have Karen to thank. Karen passed away at the age of 92 on January 4, 2025. She will be greatly missed but her legacy will live on with every person who takes on the mantle of caring for animals. I'm honoring Karen today with a discussion of her book On Behavior, a collection of essays and articles from her decades of teaching others the way of positive reinforcement training. Listen to related Zoo-notables: Don't Shoot the Dog and Lads Before the Wind Want a copy of Karen's books? Check out Karen Pryor Academy. Connect with other animal trainers at ClickerExpo (January 24-25 online)

Ari and Chris are back together to talk about everyone's favorite topic in the professional animal care world: dealing with the grief following the loss of an animal in your care. We share some great advice from others, some old attitudes that we think aren't helpful , and some excellent resources to help all of us deal with the worst part of our jobs. Also, stick around for the end, where we share some quick thoughts about the loss of a foundational leader in the animal training field, Karen Pryor, who passed away on January 4, 2025. If you have a shout-out you'd like us to share, a question or a topic you'd like us to discuss, or a suggestion for a guest we should have on the show, let us know at podcast@naturalencounters.com! ---------------------------------------- We're excited to announce the return of our sponsor, Magic Mind! To learn more about how Magic Mind can help you build your "Mental Wealth" and take advantage of a special 45% savings offer, visit https://www.magicmind.com/thetecjan - thanks Magic Mind!

This is Part 1 of our conversation with Lucy Butler. With her fiancé Lucy founded the River Haven Sanctuary in Rhode Island. The sanctuary is home to about fifty animals, pigs, geese, ducks, chickens, goats, donkeys, and three horses. The Sanctuary gives forever homes to animals that were in crisis. Lucy and her fiancé Jeff have plans for developing the sanctuary into an educational center. In Part 1 Lucy introduces us to the Sanctuary's three horses, Pearl, River, and Nieve. Initially, clicker training was used to help the horses settle and to fill in the huge gaps in their basic education. It's been a healing process for them physically as well as emotionally. This sets the stage for the main purpose of our conversation - which is to talk about lateral work. Lucy is in the early stages of introducing her horses to lateral work. The discoveries she's making and the changes she's seeing in her horses are well worth sharing. For me central to all performance work is the horse's balance. The training helps the horse find his optimal balance and use of his body. Whatever your performance goals are for your horse, a central, fundamental focus on balance will help you get there. And it will get you there without compromising your horse. Balance matters for the lifetime of your horse. Lucy has been an active participant in my on-line clinics so I've been watching her horses' training develop over time. All three have reached the point where lateral work is beginning to pop out. In the last coaching session Lucy talked about the exciting changes she's seeing in her horses. The changes in all three horses have been so remarkable, we had to share. Normally when someone is invited to talk about lateral work, it is because they are an expert in this type of training. In Lucy's case it is because this work is so new to her that I wanted her to join us. The changes she's seeing in her horses are very much worth sharing. I always add something at the end of each episode. This week I have included a tribute to Karen Pryor who died on January 4, 2025 at the age of 92. Do please join me in honoring her work.

Pet Grocer is proud to support and shine a spotlight on the incredible work our local rescues do for our community. This month we have the pleasure of featuring podcast interviews with three local rescues an we are excited to help them get their message out.Outrun RescueOutrun, co-founded by Emily Day in 2020, specializes in rehabilitating rescue dogs that face behavioural challenges, particularly those with aggression and anxiety issues. Emily's journey into dog training began after rescuing an aggressive dog named Zip, which inspired her to pursue formal education in applied animal behaviour at the University of Washington. With her extensive experience in the veterinary field and certifications like Karen Pryor and Fear Free, Emily is committed to helping overlooked dogs in shelters get the behavioural support they need to increase their chances of adoption.Location: Lisle, OntarioWebsite: outrunrescue.comTop three things to know about Outrun:Specializes in Behavioural Training: Outrun focuses on helping rescue dogs with behavioural issues, like aggression and anxiety, making them more adoptable through targeted training.Founded by Experienced Trainers: Co-founded by Emily, a certified animal behaviourist, the organization is backed by her extensive experience and certifications in dog training.Volunteer-Driven Effort: Outrun operates with two volunteer trainers, offering positive reinforcement-based training to rescue dogs, aiming to fill a gap often overlooked by shelters.Rescue Needs:More volunteer trainersDonations - Funding for training materials and resourcesSupport for rescue dog behavioural training programsIncreased awareness and collaboration with local sheltersFollow Pet Grocer on FacebookFollow Pet Grocer on InstagramVisit our Website **The content in this podcast is not meant to replace veterinary advice. Always consult your holistic veterinarian prior to using any recommended items or supplements.**

For the 50th episode of the podcast, special guest Ken Ramirez, Karen Pryor Clicker Training breaks down what it means to provide animals with choice and... control. Ken discuss why these terms have often been connected and how to ensure that we are providing both for animals. Ken also speaks to the importance of training in a modern animal setting and how it can be used to help animals get to the "yes" behavior in order to provide control. This episode is filled with practical examples that can provide clarity and help to focus these topics into welfare discussions. Stay tuned in for Ken's "Training Tale" about how he and a rescued dog accidentally ruined a show at the Shedd Aquarium. For questions or suggestions about the podcast email abc@theabma.org and to reach Ken you can follow him on Instagram at ken_ramirez_kptc Let's talk some training and banter about behavior! 3:55 Introduction to Ken Rameriz  12:05 Introduction to choice and... control  13:45 Definition and practical application of Choice  17:10 Definition and practical application of Control  29:15 Giving animals control while still getting to the yes  37:00 Why are these two terms connected  48:21 Practical example of control  52:10 Can an animal have control but not choice?  59:10 How choice and ... control fit into welfare and future advancements  1:05:40 Advice on how to start using training and behavior to give animals choice and... control  1:08:10 "Training Tales" 

This episode Kelli Meyers, ZooTampa at Lowry Park, discusses The 10 Modern Principles of Shaping as created by Karen Pryor and how they have evolved from "The 10 Laws of Shaping". Kelli breaks down each principle and gives advice on how to best implement and think about each of the principles. The 10 principles can be found below in the timestamps for this episode. Stay tuned in for Kelli's "Training Tale" about how she had to get really creative with her body positioning (hint: it included floating in the middle of the habitat) to help teach a sea lion a "clapping" behavior. For questions or suggestions about the podcast email abc@theabma.org and to reach Kelli you can email kelligolota@gmail.com Let's talk some training and banter about behavior! 1:40 Introduction to Kelli Meyers  4:30 Introduction to the 10 modern principles of shaping  6:50 Principle 1: Be prepared before you start  10:35 Principle 2: Ensure success at each step  12:25 Principle 3: Train one criterion at a time 14:10 Principle 4: Relax criteria when something changes 15:40 Principle 5: If one door close, find another  18:55 Principle 6: Keep training sessions continuous  20:20 Principle 7: Go back to “kindergarten” if necessary, take a step back and then move forward 21:45 Principle 8: Keep your attention on your learner  25:50 Principle 9: Stay ahead of your learner  26:45 Principle 10: Quit while you're ahead  33:20 “Training Tales”

What if “bad behaviours” are actually your dog communicating they don't feel safe? If you have experienced challenges with your dog's behaviour, and traditional operant approaches haven't really helped, then this conversation is for you! It's also for you if you're interested in understanding your dog's behaviour from a more emotional and trauma-informed perspective. AND, it's also for you if you want to learn how to be a better advocate for your dog.  I mean, basically, anyone who likes dogs, works with dogs, or lives with dogs needs to listen to what Laura has to say, because when more people are able to have compassion for dogs' trauma and their own traumas, I am convinced the world will become a more loving place. Dr Laura Donaldson is a former university professor-turned certified dog trainer, certified dog behaviour consultant, and Karen Pryor certified training partner whose work really focuses on, in my opinion, creating a paradigm shift around how we frame and approach “undesirable” behaviours in our dogs like reactivity and aggression. Laura has dedicated herself to improving the wellbeing of dogs by getting rid of the notion of the “well-behaved” dog, and instead, focusing on how to support dogs in experiencing deep safety, and emotional resilience, so that they can navigate anything they encounter in the world. In this conversation, Laura and I talk about how asking our dogs the question “what do i need to learn from you to help you feel safe in this context?” can be truly be life-changing for your dog, and for you. We talk about how understanding the impact of trauma on our dogs, and the links between trauma and aggression, can help us to understand and have compassion for our own traumas. We also discuss some techniques that you can use with your own dog to help them release and ground the charge they feel in their bodies from trauma, including Laura's grounding work, and other processes like Emotional Freedom Technique (EFT) and energy work. Laura is launching a new training this January called Transforming Puppies, which she talks a bit about in this conversation you're about to hear. You can find out more about this training, and all of Laura's other trainings on her course platform, which you can find below. For more information about Dr Laura Donaldson and her work, visit her website: https://fourpawsfourdirections.com/ You can find out more and register for her webinars on her course platform: https://laura-s-school-1f3f.thinkific.com/collections This episode is supported by Aspirationery, which, in full transparency, is another project of mine where we create books, notebooks, and stationery to help you become all you aspire to be! If you are looking for a safe space to explore shadow work and your own traumas, our moon magic and shadow work journals and workbooks might be a useful support for you. You can take a peek at them on our Aspirationery instagram account. TIMESTAMPS 00:22 Intro 05:50 Prioritizing your dog's emotional needs through grounding 08:15 The body keeps the score - trauma is stored in the body 11:15 Understanding and redefining “bad” behaviors 19:20 The link between trauma and aggressive behavior in dogs 21:05 Redefining reactivity in dogs: why this label doesn't work 31:00  Building emotional resilience in your dog 33:35 How Laura embarked on this journey 38:38 Why trying to stop the behavior is not a helpful approach 45:25 Practical tips you can do to help your dog with trauma, including EFT and the Triple Heater meridian 50:44 Teaching your dog non-violent social processing as a strategy  56:33 A client example: a dog in Manhattan who was too scared to go outside 1:03:24 Transforming puppies and puppy class: Changing the expectation of dogs being seen and not heard 1:12:05 How Laura's experiences with dogs have helped her address her own trauma

Are you embracing technology or are you frustrated by the rapid changes in the industry and pet care? Whether we like it or not, more and more clients are brining high tech devices into their homes to care for their pets. From smart feeders, to more advanced litter robots, our roll as pet care providers is becoming a lot of tech support. Beth Pasek, owner of Finicky Cat Sitting and Behavior, joins the show to share how to make technology part of your business, and how we still provide immense value to clients, regardless of the devices they bring in. She shares how to use technology to deepen the relationships we have with our clients and to provide even higher quality care to their pets. Main topics Rapid changes Embracing technology Deepening relationships Fear Free visits and technology Main takeaway: Use technology as a tool to deepen your personal relationships with your clients. About our guest: Beth Pasek is the owner of Finicky Cat Sitting and Behavior, LLC in Ohio, USA. In 2020, the organization celebrated 10 years in the pet care industry as a multiyear award-winning pet sitting and animal behavior company for both cats and dogs. She has worked with several rescues as a volunteer cat behavior consultant for special needs diabetic cats in transition and provided a foster home for kittens and critical care cats. She is a supporting member of both the International Association of Animal Behavior Consultants-Cat Division and the International Association of Animal Hospice and Palliative Care. Her ongoing course work includes certification through Karen Pryor's Train Your Cat and she is author of "Understanding Cat Behavior, A Comprehensive Guide to Compassionate Training and Communication" published by Rockbridge Press. Available on Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and Books A Million. Links: Previously on: https://www.petsitterconfessional.com/episodes/132 beth@finicky.us https://amzn.to/46mxOgv https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCrb1J129zUXnioxAOKDEPkA https://finicky.us/blog/f/is-artificial-intelligenceai-right-for-my-cat https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100095633257186 https://finicky.us Buy PSC Merch Give us a call! (636) 364-8260  Follow us on: Instagram, Facebook, Twitter Email us at: feedback@petsitterconfessional.com Full show notes and transcript   Sponsored by: ❤️ Our AMAZING Patreon Supporters   Time to Pet Visit: https://timetopet.com/confessional Code: 50% off first 3 months   Peaceful Pet Music - Calm Music for Pets

Training Without Conflict® Podcast Episode Twenty-Eight: Steve WhiteThe latest TWC podcast features guest Steve White.Steve is a seasoned expert in K9 units from the state of Washington, accredited as a Master Trainer in 1993.He is a key figure at major Police K9 conferences.In addition to his extensive career in police K9 units, Steve is also a prominent figure in the force-free training community. Notably, he was a founding instructor at Karen Pryor's ClickerExpo, frequently presenting at various “Positive Only” events.Our conversation dives deep into various training methodologies, industry trends, and much more. This conversation is close to 4 hours, we had a lot to talk about and I hope you find it interesting too.Ivan Balabanov is a 2-time World Champion dog trainer, Ot Vitosha Malinois breeder, trainer of Premier Protection Dogs and founder of the revolutionary Training Without Conflict® dog training system.For more information about Ivan Balabanov and information on how to train your dog using the Training Without Conflict® system, check out: https://trainingwithoutconflict.comhttps://malinois.comhttps://premierprotectiondogs.com

Ari and Chris are back in their office to finish off their incredibly-surface-level review of The Ten Laws of Shaping from Karen Pryor's Don't Shoot the Dog! In our wrap-up episode for this topic we realize that we don't know who first "shot the dog," we don't remember when we talked about "ending on a good note" (but we're pretty sure we did), and we don't know where our old copies of the book are and exactly how they differ from the one we're using now. Hey, we're being vulnerable, ok?!!? Have an idea, topic, or question you'd like us to discuss on the show? Let us know at podcast@naturalencounters.com!

Chris and Ari return to Karen Pryor's Don't Shoot the Dog! to discuss another batch of guidelines from her "Ten Laws of Shaping"! Solid advice all around, with the added spice of some thoughts on where and when folks might want to consider veering away from them when it's in the best interest of the animal, the session, or the project.  For this second go around, we discuss Laws 4-7:  When introducing a new criterion, temporarily relax the old ones.  Stay ahead of your subject: Plan your shaping program completely so that if the subject makes sudden progress you are aware of what to reinforce next.  Don't change trainers midstream; you can have several trainers per trainee but stick to one shaper per behavior.  If one shaping procedure is not eliciting progress, find another; there are as many ways to get behavior as there are trainers to think them up.  Want to share your thoughts about the Ten Laws of Shaping, or anything else about training, animals, or behavior? Let us know at podcast@naturalencounters.com!  

If you've heard of clicker training but you're not quite sure what it is, this episode is for you. “Clicker training” has become shorthand for positive reinforcement training, and marine mammal behaviorist Karen Pryor is credited with bringing this incredibly effective technique to the dog training world. Here, we talk about Pryor's classic book “Don't Shoot The Dog,” and cover why, how and when to use a clicker.

I love this book! Have a listen and go get the book right away on Amazon! https://amzn.to/3Je9cxm Websites to find a qualified trainer near you: APDT CCPDT IAABC

In this podcast I'll be talking about my thoughts, views and insights of popular books on dog training, dog behavior & even dog nutrition. Check back soon for the first episode where I'll be talking about the book 'Don't Shoot the Dog' by Karen Pryor.

Ari and Chris reconvene in their office to discuss Don't Shoot the Dog's Ten Laws of Shaping! Having not read the book in years, we were interested to look at Karen Pryor's ten suggestions for successful shaping through the filter of our current training practices and understanding of the science of behavior change. Because we can talk forever about this stuff we only get through the first 3, so this is the first episode in a new TEC Talk mini-series - how fun is that? (Also, we're making it clear right now that we own "DRSA" as a training term since we coined it in this episode. You can't have it. So there.) This time we share our thoughts on the following: Raise criteria in increments small enough so that the subject always has a realistic chance for reinforcement. Train one thing at a time; don't try to shape for two criteria simultaneously. Always put the current level of response onto a variable schedule of reinforcement before adding or raisining criteria.  Have thoughts to share about the Ten Laws of Shaping, or anything else you'd like to share? Please do so by emailing us at podcast@naturalencounters.com!

Today's Zoo-notable was a no-brainer as it is Karen Pryor's birthday. It's also appropriate for Mother's Day because I consider Karen the Mother of positive reinforcement training. Don't Shoot the Dog is considered the animal trainer's bible. But it isn't just for training animals, it's about teaching and learning for everyone! There's so much to share, and I can't wait to discuss it with you! Want a copy of Don't Shoot the Dog for yourself (or know someone who needs a copy)? Grab a copy from Karen Pryor Clicker Training, and check out some of the training courses offered at Karen Pryor Academy (I highly recommend courses held at The Ranch!) Related Zoo-notables: Lads Before the Wind by Karen Pryor The Eye of the Trainer by Ken Ramirez Atomic Habits by James Clear- Part One and Part Two As always, stay connected with ZooFit online, so you can eat clean, live green, and TRAIN POSITIVE everyday!

Linda has always felt a strong connection with animals. Her early interest in behavior studies quickly paired with her love of animals to build a career in animal training that has spanned more than 40-years and is still going strong. Linda was in the right place at the right time to attend behavior & training related classes through the Life Learn Program at the Ontario Veterinary Collage, University of Guelph, Canada. She considers herself very fortunate to have attended many in person clinics with Karen Pryor as she was presenting, with Gary Wilks,  in the late 1980's. Over her long career Linda has attended countless clinics, webinars, and workshops. She reads extensively and is always seeking opportunities for further education, knowledge, and growth.  Linda's motto in life is “Only Connect” and continually seeks deeper understanding and abilities in this goal with both people and animals.  When not working Linda attends Master Classes on a diverse range of subjects spanning from rocket science to resilience, to storytelling. She studies music, unrealistically hoping to be a great jazz musician one day, she spends quality time with her dogs, and takes every opportunity to spend time in the wilderness hiking and kayaking. For links check here >>> https://atamember.com/2023/03/02/linda-brodzik/   

Today's Topic: Have you just learned (or are starting to suspect) that your puppy may be going deaf or blind?  Or is your adult dog showing signs that their hearing or sight is becoming more and more impaired?  These are, by nature, difficult waters to navigate, and finding reputable resources to help guide you and your puppy or dog during this time may prove difficult or frustrating, even if you're absolutely dedicated to giving your blind/deaf puppy or dog the best life possible.  That's why we've invited certified professional dog trainer (CPDT-KA), Karen Pryor clicker training partner, and the founder of Down To Earth Dog Lady, LLC., a dog training company specializing in blind, deaf & disabled dogs, Erin Marion, to the pod, to discuss whether deaf and blind dogs can truly live a "normal" life, her thoughts on vibration collars, whether blind dogs have super hearing (or deaf dogs have super sight), what a "sensory garden" is, and so much more!`Guest Bio: Erin Marion is a certified professional dog trainer (CPDT-KA), a Karen Pryor clicker training partner, a Training Partner for the All4Paws Rescue in Malvern, PA & Speak! Rescue and Sanctuary in St. Louis, MO., and the founder of Down To Earth Dog Lady, LLC in Chester Spring, PA. After fostering multiple foster dogs and adopting her own blind and deaf dogs, she is extremely passionate about helping special needs pets and their guardians connect using force-free training methods.Connect With Erin Marion: WebsiteFacebookInstagramTik Tok

Karen Pryor and Fear Free Certified Dog Trainer Corinne Gearhart was a recent guest expert in The Dog Gone Calm Club. She's known as The Doodle Pro, specializing in training, grooming and boarding Doodles. But, her training tips apply to all dogs. In this episode, she educates listeners on recognizing nervous barking and shares force-free ways of managing barking  and helping dogs diminish their fears.  Listen to club members'  barking  challenges  with their dogs at home and Corinne's brilliant and simple answers. More about Corinne here. DOG GONE CALM, Vol. 1 FULL ALBUM ON ALL STREAMING CHANNELS:Click to listen on your favorite streaming appJOIN THE DOG  GONE CALM CLUB WAITLIST (We're opening next week!)MembershipTHEME MUSIC ON THIS EPISODE:Vivaldi Winter Largo from Four Seasons arranged for Left Hand by Lisa Spector HOW TO LEAVE A REVIEW:Gina shows you here YOUR TREAT (PDF with Tips):Using Music to Calm Your Dog's AnxietyCONNECT:Instagram: @My_Zen_Pet   @LisaSpectorPianoFacebook:       My Zen Pet      LisaSpectorPianistPodcast Website: MyZenPet.com/podcastLisa Spector's Website: LisaSpector.comClubhouse: @lisaspectorYouTube: LisaSpector

Episode #73 with Steve White Over 40 years of mostly K9-centered law enforcement career, Steve White is the only person to have served as a handler, trainer, and supervisor for the Seattle Police Canine Unit. Accredited as a Master Trainer in 1993 by the Washington State Police Canine Association, Steve is also a past executive board member of that body. He served as vice president of the Certification Council for Professional Dog Trainers, and is a consultant and instructor for the K9 Academy for Law Enforcement. Steve has instructed at seminars in the U.S., Australia, Belgium, Canada, China, Finland, Japan, Mexico, New Zealand, Spain, and the United Kingdom. He has served as a primary instructor for Karen Pryor's ClickerExpo and the Karen Pryor Academy for Animal Training and Behavior. His articles have appeared in police K-9 and dog training publications in the U.S., Canada, Australia, Finland, and Japan. He specializes in teaching behavior modification, tracking, and scent work through the use of positive reinforcement-based operant conditioning. He provides consultation and training to K-9 units on administrative and legal issues, and has been recognized as an expert witness by Washington and federal courts in Police K-9 and dog behavior matters. Steve now has his business www.proactivek9.com email Steve@proactivek9.com CDTA URBAN TRACKING SEMINAR WITH STEVE WHITE, PROACTIVE K9 OCTOBER 8 & 9, 2022 Show Sponsors: Sci K9 Home of the TADD and NOTA http://www.scik9.com Getxent: Training absorbent tubes for all your odor needs http://www.getxent.com Precision Explosives: Get all your safe and REAL training odors (no permits needed) http://www.pre-exp.com Sheepdog Guardian: All your K9 Legal information and updates. http://www.sheepdogguardian.com Ford K9: All your Detection Dog learning needs at one spot. http://www.fordk9.com 

Join Kassie and me for this episode where we chat with Erin Marion from Down to Earth Dog Lady about blind, deaf and blind/deaf dogs. This conversation is full of some great points on what its like caring for, living with and training disabled dog and, of course, we bust some myths along the way too! Erin says "I have over eleven years of experience working with dogs. I am a certified professional dog trainer (CPDT-KA), and a Karen Pryor clicker training partner. I absolutely love bringing dogs and their guardians together using the power of positive reinforcement-based training. I love all dogs and all aspects of working with dogs. I have worked in many dog-related areas - large vet hospitals, daycare facilities, feed stores, dog training academies and rescues. Throughout the last 10 years, I have gained a wide range of knowledge about dog behavior, health, emotional care, training, and nutrition. In 2018 I fostered my first deaf and blind dog. After learning how to care for a dog with special needs, I knew that it was what I wanted to truly wanted to focus my career on. I currently have fostered multiple deaf and/or blind dogs and have one of my own (Darla). I also have a fully blind rough coat collie." You can find Erin at https://www.instagram.com/downtoearthdoglady To find out more about working with me visit www.rplusdogs.com Remember to subscribe, share and leave a review if you like what you hear! --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/doglogical/message

Jesse Sternberg is a man who unexpectedly began experiencing pain that eventually arose to the level of being completely debilitating for him. Don't stop thinking that this is just another story about suffering and possibly overcoming a problem. You will never guess how Jesse worked through his pain and how it led to a fascinating career as a dog trainer.   Jesse will provide us with some interesting insights about being a leader through his dog training business. He also will show how what he learned helped him in his personal life as well and how the leadership principles he now teaches can assist you as well.     About the Guest: Jesse Sternberg is an author, meditation instructor, and dog trainer. He has been working with animals for more than 30 years.  He lives in Toronto with his two kids and his pup, Jimmy.     About the Host: Michael Hingson is a New York Times best-selling author, international lecturer, and Chief Vision Officer for accessiBe. Michael, blind since birth, survived the 9/11 attacks with the help of his guide dog Roselle. This story is the subject of his best-selling book, Thunder Dog.   Michael gives over 100 presentations around the world each year speaking to influential groups such as Exxon Mobile, AT&T, Federal Express, Scripps College, Rutgers University, Children's Hospital, and the American Red Cross just to name a few. He is an Ambassador for the National Braille Literacy Campaign for the National Federation of the Blind and also serves as Ambassador for the American Humane Association's 2012 Hero Dog Awards.   https://michaelhingson.com https://www.facebook.com/michael.hingson.author.speaker/ https://twitter.com/mhingson https://www.youtube.com/user/mhingson https://www.linkedin.com/in/michaelhingson/   accessiBe Links https://accessibe.com/ https://www.youtube.com/c/accessiBe https://www.linkedin.com/company/accessibe/mycompany/ https://www.facebook.com/accessibe/       Thanks for listening! Thanks so much for listening to our podcast! If you enjoyed this episode and think that others could benefit from listening, please share it using the social media buttons on this page. Do you have some feedback or questions about this episode? Leave a comment in the section below!   Subscribe to the podcast If you would like to get automatic updates of new podcast episodes, you can subscribe to the podcast on Apple Podcasts or Stitcher. You can also subscribe to your favorite podcast app.   Leave us an Apple Podcasts review Ratings and reviews from our listeners are extremely valuable to us and greatly appreciated. They help our podcast rank higher on Apple Podcasts, which exposes our show to more awesome listeners like you. If you have a minute, please leave an honest review on Apple Podcasts.     Transcription Notes UM Intro/Outro  00:00 Access Cast and accessiBe Initiative presents Unstoppable Mindset. The podcast where inclusion, diversity and the unexpected meet. Hi, I'm Michael Hingson, Chief Vision Officer for accessiBe and the author of the number one New York Times bestselling book, Thunder dog, the story of a blind man, his guide dog and the triumph of trust. Thanks for joining me on my podcast as we explore our own blinding fears of inclusion unacceptance and our resistance to change. We will discover the idea that no matter the situation, or the people we encounter, our own fears, and prejudices often are our strongest barriers to moving forward. The unstoppable mindset podcast is sponsored by accessiBe, that's a c c e s s i  capital B e. Visit www.accessibe.com to learn how you can make your website accessible for persons with disabilities. And to help make the internet fully inclusive by the year 2025. Glad you dropped by we're happy to meet you and to have you here with us.     Michael Hingson  01:16  Hi, and welcome to unstoppable mindset. Glad you're here with us wherever you happen to be. If you've listened to a number of these episodes, and have learned my story, you know that I've been working with Guide Dogs for quite a number of years, actually, it will be 58 years in July. And one of the things that I have learned about working with guide dogs is that every time I go to get a new one, what I'm truly learning is only in part, how to work with that dog, what I'm learning are new and advanced and more innovative dog training techniques. And, of course, what that really means is human training techniques, which we're going to get to Jesse Sternberg is our guest today. And he's very much involved in doing a lot of work with dog training, meditation, mindfulness, and you're gonna see how all that comes together, as well as learning his unstoppable story. So Jessie, welcome to unstoppable mindset.   Jesse Sternberg  01:20 Thank you, Michael, what a great introduction.   Michael Hingson  01:47 Wow, there's not a great introduction. It just popped out. Well, so tell me a little about you about your life and in what you where you came from, and all that sort of stuff.   Jesse Sternberg  02:38 Oh, man, okay, let's get the can of worms out of the way. I had a lot of personal things that I've had to work through, just like everybody. But I was fortunate to take lessons from all of them, and not let any of the situations knock me down. for about 10 years, I owned a dog daycare, dog grooming dog training business. And I was already having some spiritual awakening experiences that had me hungry for just figuring out what those things meant. So I was studying spirituality and esoteric stuff and whatever, I could get my hands on mindfulness based material and learning about looking after dogs and also running a business. That was sort of the fertile ground for which all of my knock downs came from. And also the ground where I learned how to connect with up to 3040 50 new different dogs who didn't know me on a daily basis, six, six and a half days a week for a decade and go beyond traditional training techniques. Asking one dog to sit with a with some treats in your pocket is different than needing 48 dogs to be quiet and then you know, put a timeout to some playtime because, you know, you're a one man shop at the moment and you're answering a phone call. So I had a different set of requirements, and that I brought to the idea of training dogs.   Michael Hingson  04:33  Well, tell me about some of the Musa you had a number of knock downs and so on. What do you mean by that?   Jesse Sternberg  04:39 Wow, okay. I would say the first significant thing that happened to me was I had some hip pain after a golf swing one day, and then slowly, slowly over a year I had that pain drip as if it was poisoning To my hip, and down my thigh, I had full blown sciatica and could no longer put my socks on, I could no longer run my business. I couldn't pick up my children. I went into deep depression. My business started tanking, my marriage started tanking, and my mental state tanked to the point where I got suicidal, very depressed, bottom, bottom of the barrel. And so, you know, rallying back to full health, from that, and healing the relationships and, and growing, growing up is a significant thing.   Michael Hingson  05:50 How did you overcome all of the pain and deal with the hip issue?   Jesse Sternberg  05:59 Pain is a really good teacher, Michael. Pain brings you right into the present moment, and it puts in front of you. Something that you can't take your attention off. Now sometimes that's a good skill to have. And sometimes you want to have the skill of pivoting away from that and being able to juggle your balls and function. The other thing that Payne taught me was emotional intelligence, because we're talking about a mind body type of the illness the sciatica thing, and I had to really start to get present with how I was feeling because on a moment to moment basis, something in the environment could stress me out and just shut my hip down. And then the opposite was how do I find healing from this? And of course, love is the answer to everything so. So actually, when I didn't know what I felt like, my heart was black. I didn't know what living without anxiety felt like. That's why I was so into mindfulness. I tried so many things, Michael, doctors physio, Cairo, literally everything. What ended up working was Ayahuasca. Ayahuasca is a shamanic brew. It's like a to plants it's made into a tea can its root, it comes from the Amazon rainforest. And so it's very strong, psychedelic. Hallucinogenic. Basically, what it did was it just revealed to me the root causes of my PTSD. I didn't know what PTSD even was. And it allowed me to get the wisdom from what that PTSD really was about. And it was a big is a big can of worms. And ultimately, it led to me, learning how to open up my heart, learn how to feel more connected to the intelligence that the human organism has, with its emotional moment to moment, indicators. And that's a huge tie in to dog training. And we'll get into that later. I'm sure.   Michael Hingson  08:19 So you, you, you do trace it back to some sort of PTSD, which, which tells me I would think that somewhere as you worked through becoming more aware, you discovered what the causes of the PTSD were.   Jesse Sternberg  08:38 Yeah, yeah. And you know, what's crazy about that, is, science can explain that this is multigenerational. No, I, I'll share an interesting story I'm so I, I immediately went back to being six years old and a very traumatic physical accident, and replayed for me, in my mind, but with a totally different flavor. And I was able to have a much broader perspective of, you know, how my caregivers were reacting in those moments, and I was able to instantly find forgiveness for something I didn't even know that I wasn't allowing forgiveness to. So that was epic. And I also hallucinated that I went way, way, way, way back many, many generations in the bloodline and saw some things there too. And that kind of messed my head up a little bit. Because you know, when you see things, even if, you know, are they real, are they not real and they feel certain way. You can't unsee you can't and feel things and so I went through a little bit of psychosis after drinking this stuff because I I needed some time to make sense of some new things. probation that just seems so bizarre.   Michael Hingson  10:04 But you work through it, and you got rid of the pain. Absolutely. Which is ultimately the bottom line, that is all the other things that the traditional medicine arena couldn't do, you were able to work through, which is, which demonstrates, as many times we hear, even from traditional medicine today that a lot of what occurs is in your, well in your mental psyche to be psyche to be able to address.   Jesse Sternberg  10:41 It is the bottom line and, and that's part of the the drum that I'm beating. And part of the essence of the book here is like, I don't think I'm a unique man, I think I'm undigested pain, emotional pain is something that our species is just discovering is important to deal with. And that we didn't have the information growing up about how important it was, is a skill that needs to be developed. And it's something that can't be seen. So it's not easy to talk about, you know, feeling sad, the roots of the feeling sad how to let sadness flow through. And then also the workings of the mind, which is why is my mind always focusing on the sad or on the pain? Why can't I take my mind off of this? Why can't I be happy? It's all threaded together. And it that's the secret of life, right? When we when we, when we figure this stuff out. What we're left with is a better version of us were calmer or more peaceful, wiser. It's like we have a better sense. The pain taught us when we got through it. What really matters, what really matters in life.   Michael Hingson  12:07 A number of episodes ago, we had the opportunity to talk with Dr. Gabe Roberts, who is a psychologist, a doctor who discusses the concept of holographic memory. And what he describes our minds our memory is really a hologram. Which means that inside the hologram, every single thing that is ever made up, part of our being is stored in some little piece of this hologram. And it's it's a way to describe it. Because if you go back and look at holograms that that are created today, every hologram is actually composed of all sorts of little pieces, all of which basically are the same thing that still make up the bigger hologram. But the doctrine is the template. Yeah. But Dr. Roberts talks about helping people work through their issues of pain and illness, by going back and literally opening the pieces of that hologram and finding out what's stored. And getting to that one thing that needs to be addressed or changed. Because everything that you've ever experienced or has ever been a part of your life is stored and just as vibrant as ever, whether you remember it or not. And so opening and getting into that hologram and getting to the various components of it is extremely important, which is really what you're saying as well.   Jesse Sternberg  13:40 It is it's also an element that I bring into the dog training world because they have their anxieties and neuroses too. And that's usually the result of their bad behaviors. The reason why I'm getting called over to clients, how do I stop my dog from barking, lunging, jumping? Well, you know, your dog's got some fears.   Michael Hingson  14:01 Well, you went through this whole experience of pain and so on how did that lead to, to dog training?   Jesse Sternberg  14:10 You know, they were happening at the same time. You know, my path, my path of acquiring the wisdom and going through the pain. I was the temple that I was quote unquote, was working in and living in at the time was my business. So I was I was functioning, I was functioning through it. Actually cannabis and small amounts helped me open up a little bit and keep moving in a very non recreational way.   Michael Hingson  14:53 Yes, in a number of ways where, where cannabis and CBD oil and other things medically do help. So anyway, Go ahead.   Jesse Sternberg  15:02 Yeah, so actually I was learning who I really was, is what was happening while this was going on and who I am is very sensitive empath is I've always liked being alone with lots of dogs I liked, I liked being able to feel what they were feeling. And I liked being able to get a big group of them into a tranquil state. There was something about that communal vibration that was just so therapeutic is well, people who have dogs, no dogs are therapeutic. Obviously, it's not, it's their presence, right? They have a presence is a presence of benevolence, of joy, of love. These are flavors of love, by the way, and earlier I said Love is the answer to everything. And love is like a higher law, learning about it, what it really is, what its vibration feels like what his vibration does to ourselves, getting connected to that vibration, and what that allows you to do go into the hologram and reprogram and these things happen organically with the frequency of love flowing through you. It's called Heart coherence going into a state of heart coherence. And I like to say in the book, what I'm what I'm basically saying is, you have no idea what happens to your dog, when you go into heart coherence. And Vaser. Some experiments that I was accidentally running was I would get into these very elevated, meditative, highly lucid conscious states, while looking after these large packs, animals and what I started to see was okay, dog training is really just about communicating. The more effective I can get at communicating with the dogs, the faster I train them, obviously, I'm in the business of train them as fast as possible, but according to some like, and the fastest way is to connect with them at their own level. And in order to connect with them at their own level, you do it from a place of peacefulness, with mindfulness, with the wisdom of how their body language system works with the wisdom of how they frame reality for themselves, which is from a pack, mammal based reality was a non language, non verbal, non manmade language constructs, very much natural element construct. So there's an element of self growth that has to happen because you have to strip away so much conditioning to get into this kind of state to connect with your dog at the level that I'm talking about. But it's not difficult to do, there's a path to do it. They have signals that they make their signals that are good, and their signals that are bad. They are never not paying attention. They are highly present. So you know, adjusting to their way of being is really what mindfulness is, though the same lessons.   Michael Hingson  18:18 Interests, you bring up a really good point, and I'll go back to guide dog training. I believe that. As I said earlier, the most important thing that I learned when beginning to work and continuing to work with guide dogs is the most important thing is learning how to be a dog trainer and using your terminology. That really means that I'm learning how to become aware of my partner, my teammate, my guide dog, I'm learning how to communicate with them and to work with them. And as I described to people, my job is to be the pack leader. And to be the coach to the cheerleader, the teacher, the the Confessio, the person that they communicate with,   Jesse Sternberg  19:19 there were a lot of hats, you got to wear all the hats.   Michael Hingson  19:23 You got to wear all the hats and wear them with poise. I've seen so many people who use guide dogs who with the slightest little bit of unexpected interaction or unexpected things that that go on while they're working become very stressed. And that of course, gets passed right to the dog.   Jesse Sternberg  19:50 Interesting to just to color that in. It's just imagine being the dog and you know a series of moments. Your, your coach, your teammate, your, you know, your buddy who's in charge is calm. Well, that means everything's kosher. And all of a sudden, they get strict big spike with stress. Well, that's alerting, right. That's really alerting and unnecessary. It scans scary. And so now who's the one triggering that actual behavior?   Michael Hingson  20:26 Interesting, right? Right. It's not the dog.   Jesse Sternberg  20:29 It's not the dog. And I want to just so that the guests get back to the hats, right? Knowing which hat to wear. And when isn't a reflection of self? Yeah.   Michael Hingson  20:44 Well, or which hats or number of hats to wear, because I think that in reality, I have to wear a number of hats all the time, it's an awesome responsibility.   Jesse Sternberg  20:56 It is. And when you go ahead, actually, that's meeting them at their level, right. And that's the fastest way to make a leader the fastest way, I think a leader can make a connection, and earn respect, and earn influence in a non dominating way. And like a Yo, this is just aligning, it's good attraction is to meet at their level, not to make them meet at your level, it's true for every relationship, if you can meet that any relationship at their level. And then there's the least amount of resistance and communication from there.   Michael Hingson  21:40 You, you may want to get them to work at it, whoever at a different level. But you still have to begin by knowing where they are understanding where they are. And that's also in part what is called establishing a rapport, but you can't do it unless you truly understand and are aware of   Jesse Sternberg  22:03 exactly. yourself, you have to get there first, and then off. So with dogs, you know, with healing dogs, behaviors or feelings, you have to come in with that mindset. First, that's the beginning. Because a feeling of fear, if I'm feeling scared, I'm wanting calm reassurance from my leader. That's gonna fix it, from wanting encouragement, give me the courage.   Michael Hingson  22:34 But I can reverse that. And also say, as the leader, I may very well from time to time, be looking to my colleague, my partner, to see how they're behaving, because that will tell me things. And I think that is not just true of Guide Dogs. But my my story around that. First and foremost is, of course, what happened on September 11, because when I had a colleague in the office, who was saying there's fire smoke above us, we got to get out of here right now. I was well aware, even then, that dogs senses are so heightened that if there were something that was an immediate crisis, I'm going to be able to sense that in the dog.   Jesse Sternberg  23:22 Yes, well, and you really aren't.   Michael Hingson  23:26 And the fact is that, what happened? Well, so there was fire and smoke. I wasn't smelling it. But I also knew that I worked 24 hours a day with someone who would probably detect that stuff before me. And I knew her reactions to different things so that if something changed, I would sense it from her first. Well, I didn't sense it. And that told me a lot of how to behave. So it does go both ways. But that only comes when you establish a true real two way, trust. Zack, recognize that there are times that your partner also must take the lead.   Jesse Sternberg  24:14 Exactly. Being a leader doesn't mean you're always leading. It means you're attuned. Actually, the best leaders are so you don't even know they're there.   Michael Hingson  24:25 Yeah, they're so soft. If you're truly being a good leader, then as I tell every sales person I've ever hired, my job isn't to be your boss and tell you what to do. My job is to add value to what you do. And if you can't find ways to do that, and if you decide you're not going to be successful, then you won't be able to work here but the smart people always recognize that there were ways that I could add value because my experience rinses were totally different than theirs. And there were ways to combine our experiences to greatly enhance what we do. And then, for me to add in the fact that I'm working with a dog that gives me information, that I don't care what anyone says you won't get from eyesight all day long, is important, too. So I think that there is a real key advantage to having that kind of a relationship that you're discussing and describing.   Jesse Sternberg  25:35 Yeah, agreed. And actually, you know, this is not new. Okay? This is the way this is what dogs gave humanity. This was technology for us.   Michael Hingson  25:44 Sure.   Jesse Sternberg  25:46 And when you think about that train of thought, you take that just back a little bit more, but the dog is capable of doing and how they want to be on your team and what they want to be stimulated and challenged to do. We're not even taking them out of kindergarten. No wonder you know that they're not fulfilled.   Michael Hingson  26:10 I've maintained for years, that, in reality, I am I am able to communicate with, with my dogs, and learn so much from them, I submit that I've learned a lot more about team building, and trust, from working now with a guide dogs. And they've changed my behavior. Because of that. I've learned more than I ever learned from all the management theory books, and all of the other kinds of things that people write about how to live better lives and be better team builders, and so on, because working with the dog puts it into practice.   Jesse Sternberg  26:57 Right? And if they clearly show you when you're not a good leader,   Michael Hingson  27:05 yeah, they really do. It's just part of their nature.   Jesse Sternberg  27:09 And they clearly reinforce when you are a good leader, you   Michael Hingson  27:12 are a good leader. Yeah, absolutely. And the fact is that they do want you to be their leader. I believe, when people say that dogs love unconditionally, I believe that, yes, unless, unless they unless they're taught in some horrible way not to brag, in which case, they go into their shell. But I believe that dogs love unconditionally, but I don't think that they trust unconditionally, but they're open to trust unconditionally, unless somebody destroys that. So being open to trust is really the first part of it. And that's what they bring to humans and humans should learn that concept of being open to trust, a lot more than love to talk about   Jesse Sternberg  27:57 this, let's take this thread somewhere. Because trust is so important. Here's what and and it's the not trusting your dog vibe, operates below consciousness. Okay, so let me give you an example. You're walking your dog. So when you see someone's walking their dog, and they are sensing their dog is going to react in a couple of seconds in the future, because maybe they see the squirrel that their dog hasn't seen yet. Or maybe they see somebody or a scooter or a skateboarder coming by, okay, so what do they do in that moment, when they don't really recognize that they're not trusting their dog, they feel stress. And then when they feel that stress, they act in a way where they're going to manage that stress, okay? And so they'll wrap the coil the leash up tighter on their hand, or they'll change direction, or now they've got a feeling that is stressful, that they're emitting. And now they've got an action that they're using to communicate. And all of this is happening unconsciously. They're not thinking about doing this. They're not the same as, but the dog is taking these as conscious communications. Often what they're saying is, okay, I'm scared about what's approaching us. Well, what, what would you expect a good teammate to do? You offer a little protection, which is obviously bad behavior. And so how do you untrain that thing or how do you grow in that thing? The question is, how do you earn How do you create trust? How do you test trust in the relationship? How do you practice giving opportunities for the pet to show you you can trust them, and when those and when you can figure out how to do that and when you can let them rise to the occasion. That's training your dog.   Michael Hingson  30:03 So let's go back to your example of you're walking along, and you see a squirrel and you think the dog doesn't see it yet. What do you do? You, you, first of all need to trust the dog. Okay, you may very well know that your dog wants to chase that squirrel. But until the dog chases the squirrel, or starts to chase the squirrel, you got nothing to talk about, you have nothing to talk about. Now, when the dog starts to chase the squirrel, you got a conversation you have to have, then you can deal with it. But even before then, so you see the squirrel first, you can start talking to your dog, and you can say, you know, you're doing a great job, what a good dog. And try to keep the the dog's attention on you. And it may very well help or or lessen the reaction. But you should be doing that anyway. So if   Jesse Sternberg  31:00 you can, if you can do that, in a calm way, I know when you're where the dog is going to stay focused on you. And you can do that to get past the distraction. That's a band aid solution. You're managing it, and it's effective. And it works, right if you want the conversation to be Hey, buddy. Anytime you see a squirrel, I want you to just be close to me as if it's no big deal. I just want it to be, yeah, it's just us. We're chillin, I don't want you to tag me. And I don't want you to think that I have to, you know, do this whole thing rigmarole I want, then what you have to do is you have to, so that's the conversation when I say you have to know what the boundary is, in your mind, you have to know what is very clear boundaries, I just painted that picture. And then you have to spend some time and some energy and some calmness around that around the excitable item and rewire that programming. Because what you're really saying is, hey, hey, Doc, I know you can handle this strong impulse. Okay, let's get you there. Good   Michael Hingson  32:05 job. You can't do anything until there's something to do something about. And so you've got to wait for the dog to react. And by the way, you might well be surprised because you think the dogs gonna go after the squirrel zactly. But you may have the relationship with the dog such that the dog won't go after the squirrel.   Jesse Sternberg  32:31 Exactly. And what's cool about what you're talking about is self growth. Right? I just, I just got a strong thought it's it's stressful thought. How do I cope with it? How do I manage with it there, what you're saying is, be patient. Alright, see how let's see what's actually happening in the moment. Let's see how it actually plays out.   Michael Hingson  32:52 Now, I have been working with all of my guide dogs. Dogs are are bred at the schools, and are really taught well not to deal with distractions. But even so I can tell when the dog notes something. So let's say I'm to do the easy example. I'm walking with someone using my guide dog. And they they they say there's a squirrel coming up. I'm going to be alert to see what my dog does. Exactly. And when my dog doesn't go after that squirrel, I know the dog's got a look. And I can tell that the dog looks because the dog, you can feel it turn its head you can feel it. And so the dog looks goes and goes on. I will stop and praise and reward the dog for not being distracted. Which brings our relationship closer. But I'll do that. Once we get past the distraction, but that's okay. It's all about recognizing, yeah, I know what you're talking about dog. I know what you were you were looking at. But you did a great job. You didn't do it. You didn't go after   Jesse Sternberg  34:11 that squirrel. Yeah, good example.   Michael Hingson  34:15 And you got to you've got to have that level of trust, which is why dog training today with most people is really about training the person and not the dog.   Jesse Sternberg  34:28 Yes, yes. Well, because a calm dog doesn't need to be trained. A dog that's a dog that just stays in calmness. And you've, I'm sure everyone has seen these. They just follow you around calmly. And they have wisdom those pets. Those pets have a lot more wisdom about how the human world operates. That's why they're able to stay calm. So in other words, those dogs have higher consciousness and their owners gave it to them. Just state that you're in when you're walking your dog is very cool, because you're describing levels of connection to your dog without seeing your dog. And that's an advantage. Because your body language has much more mammal based leadership. You You never see an animal a mammal in nature staring at the other mammals. Usually when that and we do that to our dogs, in a in nature, the angle of making eye contact. The reason you never see it as it's almost unwritten, it's forbidden. I call it the forbidden angle. Making eye contact and holding eye contact generates contrast, strong contrast in the nervous system. It feels uncomfortable. Have you ever had? Can you ever sense that? Can you sense when someone's staring at you?   Michael Hingson  36:02 Yeah, sometimes I can sense when they're staring at me now making eye contact is a different story. But staring Yeah.   Jesse Sternberg  36:10 Okay, but when people are walking their dog, they're staring at their dog. When people are not trusting their dog, they shift into body language with it, which is staring at the dog. And so actually what they're doing is your current using the body language of the mammals by accident, and they are generating stress. Now, here's a little secret, a mindfulness Secret. Secret Sauce, say it that way. Sounds cheesy, but strong feelings equals need to act them out. at an unconscious level, very, very heightened energy, heightened feelings. You know, you're going up a roller coaster, that's a strong feeling. People are screaming, people are waving their hands. So when you're using that, anytime there's a strong feeling in the dog, they're going to act it out. And acting it out is always going to be bad. It's always going to be barking, whining, scratching, jumping, it's always one of those major ones. Okay, so that's not a calm dog. So the answer is get the dog calm. The biggest secret to getting the dog calm is understand how their language works. And understand when you're making them stress when you want them to be calm. And you're doing it by accident. That's a huge way of meeting them at their at their level. And it gives results faster than anything I've ever tried.   Michael Hingson  37:36 Most of the time, I still submit when they're not calm. It's true that you are part of the root cause of that. And so your behavior needs to change. And you need to communicate with this person who's looking to you in such a way that you can deal with creating the calmness again,   Jesse Sternberg  38:00 agree on that. And I'm also going to say the way that you communicate, do it with an action. Do it communicate with a well timed calm action and no need to flavor it in with your with your language. Right because that language is probably not going to be is not going to soothe them the way you think it is. It's actually a self soothing technique I find as too much flavor in the airwaves.   Michael Hingson  38:28 And maybe and maybe not it's really soothing even to you but right, it's how we get conditioned. Now I will say that our cat stares at our dog a lot. But   Jesse Sternberg  38:40 on purpose, okay, there's a power play happening when   Michael Hingson  38:43 there's a power play happening. That's absolutely right. And that's okay because he stares back at her and just ignores her. So she knows so she thinks she has the power. It's okay. Yeah. Yeah, they get along really well together though. It's, it's it's fine. They don't even steal each other's food much. So it's good. Yeah. Much. I would never want a dog and I've seen some dogs that are just absolute cat haters, and I don't know what what happened in their lives to make that happen or whatever. But I would never want a dog that can't get along with other creatures in the house.   Jesse Sternberg  39:29 Yeah, yeah, that's it's too intense.   Michael Hingson  39:32 Yeah. And sometimes it's very difficult to break into to deal with it. But still, I would never want that. At one time, we had a cat, a dog and a desert tortoise living with us and we had to take them all to the vet to be boarded for an afternoon because we were going to be doing some spraying and some Walking around the yard or having some spring done,   Jesse Sternberg  40:02 you turn the cat, the dog and the tortoise to the vet for the day. All   Michael Hingson  40:06 three. Yeah. And the dog and the tortoise. We unfortunately never got a picture of this, the vet regretted not having a camera, but the cat was in one cage. And the dog in the tortoise, we're in the other. The tortoise walked around the cage a little bit, came back over and got prone. The dog walked around the cage a little bit and then got prone, putting his paw over the tortoise, and last lap that way for about three hours. I love it. I love. So when we encourage that kind of relationship, and it works really well. We've been very happy with that. But the reality is, it's more our training that needs to happen, then what happens with the dog, or any training? And yeah, there are, there are things that you, you train a dog to do you train a dog to do specific things that you want the dog to do, but you train different commands, but again, how you train makes a big difference, the schools have become much more active in using clicker training. And I'm a fan of them too. Yeah, clickers are great, because it's a, it's an absolute instantaneous demarcation of what you did, right? You don't use it to point out a negative behavior, it's, you did it right click, and then you do a food reward. And it is so incredible, as to how much it is improved by dog training to do with that   Jesse Sternberg  41:40 way. But you know, as as as a lifetime dog trainer, and as a balance dog trainer, Mindfulness Based dog trainer, I view my profession as like, I'm an artist, you know. And the clicker is just a, a new, awesome tool, and learning how to use it in all of its creative ways. Very high potential, rehabbing fear base dogs, very high potential giving confidence as Mark has, you can mark those moments. But, you know, I just want people to appreciate it's a modality of communication, you it's not the it's not exactly meeting the dog at their level. It's not communicating to them moment to moment to moment with your body language. But when they're about to get conditioned out of being neurotic, or scared or anxious, then it becomes an awesome tool. Or we are reinforcing Poppy behaviors. Awesome tool, new training behaviors. Yes.   Michael Hingson  42:54 Right. And and that's probably the most powerful way it's used at the schools is reinforcing behavior.   Jesse Sternberg  43:01 And it's also difficult to use, I have to say, Michael, it's difficult you fumble with it. You have to have it ready. You have to have the treats, right? You have to really plan ahead for it.   Michael Hingson  43:12 Oh, absolutely. And the trainers keep the clickers in their hands. Even when we start working with the dogs, the trainers are the team leaders that the dogs are most used to. So for example, when I first started my first walk with Alamo, my current guide dog was a black lab. We were walking down the street, we got to a corner. The dog stopped appropriately. But even then, instantly, the trainer clicked. Yeah. And I gave the dog a food reward. And what we asked for time was to translate that to I carried the clicker and clicked just to reinforce the behavior, even though it was very clear that the dog knew   Jesse Sternberg  44:00 what yeah, great feedback. You're doing great.   Michael Hingson  44:03 You're doing great. And I recognize you're doing great. I want you to know it. We actually taught the dog to stop at a muzzle kind of a driveway. It was it was almost like an alleyway between two buildings. But there was no curb to really tell you it was coming. But between the trainer and I and clicking, we taught the dog to stop at that alleyway. And I submit that if we went back up to Gresham, Oregon today, he would still stop there. Of course, because behavior was so ingrained and clickers can do that. And if people want to learn about clicking behavior, they really should go study it. Karen Pryor was the one who brought it back to dogs. It actually started with dogs BEFORE HORSES and then they started using it with horses and it kind of fell away from dogs and then it came back and what around 2000 or so when has become a much better tool with dogs as well. And it just makes perfect sense to do. But clicking is a wonderful tool, but it is a tool and it's a it's a positive tool. It should not be used in a negative way. By but I find even today if I haven't been out for months, I can click the clicker and the dog's head will pop up. Yeah,   Jesse Sternberg  45:27 yeah. Yeah. So when you anytime you have a lot of power, you got to be responsible with that. It's a responsibility. Yeah, you can't. You can't misfire. No, you lose. You lose. What what happens when you misfires you lose trust.   Michael Hingson  45:44 So trust and you lose credibility.   Jesse Sternberg  45:46 You lose respect, you lose respect, which is one thing. I remember thinking, but I didn't get a chance to say is, yeah, dogs, you said this talks about the dogs love you. Yeah, you know what, you know, I thought, respect deserved.   Michael Hingson  46:02 Respect is absolutely earned. And people need to understand that most pet owners just have no real clue about integrating their pet into their family and making them a true family member and making them a true family member. It doesn't mean you let them just jump up on the bed or all those other sorts of things. It's a relationship issue.   Jesse Sternberg  46:26 Yeah, yeah. And they're just gonna reflect where you are, personally, you know, and just how you how you approach self love and your own boundaries, and you know, your own relationships with people, your dog is going to mimic that. And the reason why they mimic that is because they're never not watching your emotional frequencies. So when when you come home, from work, and no one's home, the dogs home and the dogs will be watching you Be who you really are watching how you behave, when you're talking on the phone, when the pizza guy comes everything. And when your dog then goes into life and is in being social in social aspect, either either new people or new dogs or new environments. If they're feeling free, if their frequency of their feelings matches up yours, when you're home alone, in those moments, they're gonna behave the same way. Yep. So you know, if you've got a hot temper, your dogs gonna have a hot temper. If your wedding, whatever it is, they match that. And what's cool is, when your dog's doing that you usually don't like how their dogs behaving, it will give you clues on how to heal it. That's just going to fix things in your life to without even thinking about without even trying it. My fourth, but you're talking about it. I mean,   Michael Hingson  47:53 I know what you're saying. My fourth guide dog Lynnie was one of the most empathetic creatures I ever knew we would go to parties. And our pastor of our church was a good friend of Lynnie, my fourth guide dog and observed her at various places. And she said one day when we would when people would come and visit us, or we would go somewhere and they said you can let her go loose and won't wouldn't do it unless they, they allowed it. I knew she'd be well behaved. But our pastor said, she always goes to the person who needs her the most first, because they're the most in pain. And then she goes around the room to see other people. And of course, she wasn't talking about physical pain.   Jesse Sternberg  48:38 Only the pain a pastor would know right after Congress and the pastor would know.   Michael Hingson  48:43 Yeah. As we observe as we observe Lynnae, that's exactly what we saw. And she would go over the   Jesse Sternberg  48:52 truth. She's a true healer, a true. True vessel of light.   Michael Hingson  48:57 An old soul. Yeah. Lovely. So tell me is people keep talking about the alpha dog and the Alpha creature in a team? And yeah, tell me about that concept of what you think of that.   Jesse Sternberg  49:12 I intentionally write about this quality called that I call peaceful out. And I say intentionally because I actually alpha is a trigger word for our present times, mainly because it's associated with toxic dominance, toxic masculinity. So I wanted to bring healing to that. Now, the idea of this peaceful alpha is that the way a dog the way you behave, if you behave in a certain way from your dog's perspective, as the calm leader, as the calm watcher, as being in The same level of attunement with the dogs feelings like you are when you're walking past a squirrel, knowing how to interact and bring it emotional peace, providing for it in a way that challenges and stimulates and grows them expands their consciousness, well, they end up giving you a certain kind of respect, they end up, give it they end up, you earn it, they end up showing you different quality behaviors. When I go to client's homes, even years after training the dog as a puppy, the dog gets up from their side and it comes to my side and it lays down by my side. I don't even talk to it. I haven't even looked at it yet. And I haven't even really touched it yet. So the dogs have a sense of presence, and a way of relating to presence and so peaceful alpha is a state of consciousness. It's there's a lot of wisdom, a lot of calmness, a lot of Swift acting, and a lot of recognition of you know, your dog's feelings. What could spike your dog's feelings? And, well, well, grooved boundaries, non challenged boundaries, fair, fair boundaries, no need to get excited at the door. No need to get excited, you know, by the squirrels. Mostly just the ability of keeping the dog calm.   Michael Hingson  51:50 The plan? Go ahead.   Jesse Sternberg  51:52 Well, yeah, I think I think you're gonna guess it say, No, go ahead. The point is, is that you're providing a richer quality of inner life for them and outer life for them. And that's why they respect you. And you can't do that, who's the one that's doing that, that's the leader. That's the position of the alpha. And that's what they're looking for in that. So I'm trying to say, Guys, you can get that all the power. You can get it through wisdom and love and self restraint and self discipline and emotional intelligence, and presence.   Michael Hingson  52:31 It goes back to the alpha position, doesn't need to be the boss position. It's not about bossing, it's not about dominating in exactly a way that is intimidating. It's all about spirit. And that's true. Yes, it's as true in the human human interaction as with the human dog interaction. And it's exactly   Jesse Sternberg  53:01 because of humans. If you behave this way. Humans gravitate to you. Because your word has wisdom in it doesn't let them down. You, you end up giving them what they already know they need, it's just a little bit of a boost, and there's no ego, you're not trying to get something in return for it. It's because you want to do it. And so this notion of being a peaceful alpha is like, you know, I just wanted to find a cheeky, clever way to take humanity on a journey of bettering themselves. And, you know, I worked with what I had with what I do my tool was I knew dogs. And so that was my mission and writing my book.   Michael Hingson  53:49 Well, we've been talking about dogs can you use the same behavior with other animals like cats and so on?   Jesse Sternberg  53:55 Actually, Michael any mammal, because if you understand the language, you understand that their body language is coming from emotions, and most of their so anything a calming sick, Google calming signals, Turid Rubis talks about calming signals for a long time now. That's the essence of the body language. But I also talked about that confrontational angle. All of the body language is around de escalating emotions. And so you're sitting at the poker table and somebody gets a good hand. They get excited. Yeah, they're acting out impulses, but those are calming signals, mammals happen. So you know, it's just about getting attuned to the fidgety the subtle, the, the inner workings of your own self. How do you behave? Do you bite your fingernails when you get anxious, you have an expression of your energy. So learning about how you move your body through space and mastering that in a way so like you're playing the angles with your dogs is going to show up, when you walk into a room full of people, you're gonna walk into a room full of people with a different posture with a different, more broadband consciousness, your eyes are going to pick up when other people are getting stressed around you. And if you're empathetic, if you're calm, you can bring a little attention to that. And that does wonders. So that becomes reinforcing. So this is just a skill at becoming a better human being.   Michael Hingson  55:33 But here's the real question. Does it work with training politicians? Just just tonight, check that out. It doesn't work against you go? No, it's it's a real challenge   Jesse Sternberg  55:50 for Iowa. If we could get politicians to drink Ayahuasca, Michael, that's totally   Michael Hingson  55:55 they would get a an interesting experience, wouldn't they? Tell me about your book?   Jesse Sternberg  56:03 Okay, my book is called enlightened dog training, how to become the peaceful Alpha your dog needs and respects. The first few chapters are examples of how the body language works with the dogs and what they're saying and how they're saying, and there's diagrams and there's pictures. And it also shows how humans accidentally tap into this. The rest of the book is really interesting, because each chapter is a unique case study of a human with their dog with the dogs problems with the humans characteristics, their neuroses, their anxieties, and these are all common, these are all common with every pet owner. And so the case study has a solution to it. And the solution is a mindfulness based solution that incorporates the dogs feelings, and some advanced but simple dog training techniques. And people the idea is that people read it and they go, Oh, my God, that makes so much sense. I see that. And I see how it works on my dog, and I see how I can grow from that. And then there's a, you know, at the end of each chapter, there's also a training tips, summary, bullet points, what exactly to do in these types of problems. And then there's a meditation, how to get yourself into that kind of calm state when such and such is happening. And just, you know, like a consciousness expanding, wrap up of each chapter. So that's the essence of how my book works.   Michael Hingson  57:32 So you, one of the things that people will ask is, but my dogs always afraid of thunder, you can fix that too.   Jesse Sternberg  57:41 Yeah, because we're just talking about fixing the relationship of fear. Yeah. There's actually every example is either example of working with a fear or working with an excitement. And that's what's cool is it doesn't start with that it starts with the behaviors, right? Why does my dog because, you know, let's go to Thunder, why does my dog run around hide under the howl and hide under the bed? When there's a thunderstorm? Well, lying down on the belly is what I described as the fourth stage of the fourth stage in the posture of surrendering maximizing the surface area on the earth. That's grounding. That's calm. That's wise. That's wisdom. When was last time you did that, when you were scared? What would happen if you did it? Okay, interesting. So there's a hint there, if your dog trusts you, and if the environment is safe, if you can get your dog to go into a lie down, and if you can get them to stay there, you can actually watch them restrain themselves from leaving. And you can watch them breathe, because they'll have you know, they'll have a rapid breath working, and you can time it. You can encourage them, give them courage, while they're breathing that out, while they're facing their fear. They're confronting it. And then what's left is experiential wisdom on their part. Wow, I got through that. Wow, you helped me get through that. Wow. Thank you. I appreciate you. And as you end up, you know, as you learned how to do that with your dog. You need patience. You need connection, you need calmness, but boys and rewarding the rewards from that never stop copying. Nope.   Michael Hingson  59:36 It all goes back to trust.   Jesse Sternberg  59:40 Exactly. And trust just so people will get this like trust is an expanding asset. It doesn't just you don't just flip it on and that's what you got. It never ends. It can do it.   Michael Hingson  59:54 And it's an ongoing process to evolve it and improve it and enhance it.   Jesse Sternberg  1:00:00 It's an expression of love, it's a virtue of love and love can keep expanding.   Michael Hingson  1:00:07 Well, this has been a lot of fun. And I've enjoyed it very much. But I want you to tell people how they can get your book and learn more about what you do and maybe reach out to you and, and engage in conversations,   Jesse Sternberg  1:00:24 all of those things they can do directly from my website, which is peaceful alpha.com. And you know, the book, it tells you where to get the book from there. But you know, if you just want the book, you can get it from Amazon or Books a Million, or it's a published book by intern press, which is owned by Simon and Schuster. So any bookstore can just order it for you.   Michael Hingson  1:00:52 Well, Jesse, this has been absolutely enjoyable. And I am really grateful that You have given us so much of your time and your insights and I hope people will reach out to you and I hope that everyone listening will take to heart what you have told us about learning to establish better relationships with our dogs and our pets and each other for that matter.   Jesse Sternberg  1:01:22 I really appreciate being on your show, Michael Time flew for me and I had a great time and really great energy and then just enjoyed our conversation. So thank you for having me and, and for your interest in in helping me share my story.   Michael Hingson  1:01:43 Well, thanks for for being here. And for all of you. Peaceful alpha.com is Jesse's website. Go there. And please check it out. I want to tell you I very much appreciate you being here today and listening to us. Talk. I think it's been fun. I hope you do believe the same and that you learn from it. Reach out if you have any comments or would like to make any suggestions about this or any of our episodes or have thoughts of people who you think ought to become guests on our podcast, you can contact me through email at Michaelhi M I C H A E L H I at accessiBE at A C C E S S I B E.com. Or go to www dot Michael hingson.com M I C H A E L H I N G S O N.com/podcast. And wherever you're listening to this, please give us a five star rating. We appreciate it. Your ratings are invaluable to us. So thank you very much again, and we hope that she'll be back next time for another episode of unstoppable mindset. Jesse again. Thank you, Michael.   UM Intro/Outro  1:03:01 You have been listening to the Unstoppable Mindset podcast. Thanks for dropping by. I hope that you'll join us again next week, and in future weeks for upcoming episodes. To subscribe to our podcast and to learn about upcoming episodes, please visit www dot Michael hingson.com slash podcast. Michael Hingson is spelled m i c h a e l h i n g s o n. While you're on the site., please use the form there to recommend people who we ought to interview in upcoming editions of the show. And also, we ask you and urge you to invite your friends to join us in the future. If you know of any one or any organization needing a speaker for an event, please email me at speaker at Michael hingson.com. I appreciate it very much. To learn more about the concept of blinded by fear, please visit www dot Michael hingson.com forward slash blinded by fear and while you're there, feel free to pick up a copy of my free eBook entitled blinded by fear. The unstoppable mindset podcast is provided by access cast an initiative of accessiBe and is sponsored by accessiBe. Please visit www.accessibe.com. accessiBe is spelled a c c e s s i b e. There you can learn all about how you can make your website inclusive for all persons with disabilities and how you can help make the internet fully inclusive by 2025. Thanks again for listening. Please come back and visit us again next week.

National Zookeeper Week is here! On this special episode of Zoo-notable, I sit down with Ken Ramirez, animal trainer extraordinaire, Vice President of Karen Pryor Clicker Training, and author of The Eye of the Trainer. We discuss training animal trainers, meeting people (and animals) where they are, how punishment works and doesn't work, and not jumping to conclusions, among many other topics covered in The Eye of the Trainer. From the book description on Karen Pryor Clicker Training site: "In The Eye of the Trainer, Ken Ramirez brings to life the power of positive reinforcement training to build trust and transform lives. Ken is one of the most creative, cogent, and effective animal trainers in the world. His positive reinforcement training principles and practices are studied, replicated, and applied in settings as diverse as conservation efforts with elephants on the African plains, canine search and rescue in Texas, oil-disaster recovery for sea turtles in the Gulf of Mexico, butterfly training in England, and animal shelters in Chicago. In this inspiring, heartwarming, and hopeful series of essays chronicling his 40+ years of global exploration and observation, Ken shares not only the intriguing personalities of the animals that shaped his life, but how their unique challenges influenced his training choices, philosophy, and worldview. A must-read for anyone who lives with, studies, or works with animals, Ken's training wisdom, principled guidance, and practical advice call us to see the world through his eyes. Ken's world is one where great training transforms the shy animal into the confident one, the aggressive into the calm, and the mistrustful into the trustful—and even the unsupportive boss into an ally. See the world better. See it differently. See it through The Eye of the Trainer." Want more goodness from Ken and Karen Pryor? Join Ken on The Ranch to take your training skills to the next level, get certified, or join hundreds of other positive reinforcement trainers at the Karen Pryor ClickerExpo. Learn more at ClickerTraining.com Grab a copy of The Eye of the Trainer online, or at your local bookstore. And ask your library to get a copy for distribution. Want more ZooFit and Zoo-notable goodness? Join the ZooFit Pride on Patreon and get access to bonus material, excerpts from my new book, and opportunities to connect with me and other ZooFitters. And join me all week long on our blog at ZooFit.net for National Zookeeper Week celebratory blog posts. --- This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app

Kathy Sdao, MA, ACAAB is an applied animal behaviorist. She's been a full-time animal trainer for thirty-five years, first with marine mammals and now with dogs. At the University of Hawaii, she earned a master's degree as part of a research team which trained dolphins to understand sign-language. She then worked for the United States Navy training dolphins for open-ocean military tasks. Kathy also worked as a marine-mammal trainer at Point Defiance Zoo & Aquarium in Tacoma Washington. After leaving the zoo world, she co-created Tacoma's first dog-daycare. Kathy launched Bright Spot Dog Training in 1998. Services include consulting with families about their challenging dogs and mentoring professional trainers who want to maximize the power of positive-reinforcement training. Kathy is proud to be an original faculty member for Karen Pryor's ClickerExpos; she's taught at forty-one of these popular conferences. Kathy has lectured at venues across the United States, Canada and Europe, and in Australia, Israel, Japan and Mexico. In 2012, she published her first book, “Plenty in Life Is Free: Reflections on Dogs, Training and Finding Grace”. “Plenty In Life Is Free” Kathy Reading "Plenty In Life Is Free" “LIMA beings” If you want to work with me, Susan Light, you can find me at: www.doggydojopodcast.com The music was written by Mac Light, you can find him at: www.maclightsongwriter.com If you like the show, please Subscribe, Rate, Review, and Share to help others find the show! I'll see you in two weeks with a brand new episode of the Doggy Dojo!

Karen Pryor turns ninety on May 14th! Annie is celebrating today and... plotting continued celebrations on this podcast in the coming year. If you're a Karen Pryor fan, join the celebration! If you're not, you'll enjoy learning why she is so worthy of it. In this episode, Annie interviews BF Skinner Foundation president Dr. Julie Vargas, about the importance of this incredible scientist, writer and entrepreneur who, over the last thirty years, has done more than probably anyone else alive to help show people how we can use operant conditioning and secondary reinforcers to train dogs with rewards: aka, clicker training. When her husband bought Sea Life Park in the 1960s, Pryor was tasked with training the dolphins to perform. She got her hands on a paper written by students who were working in BF Skinner's Harvard lab, and it outlined the basics of operant conditioning and how to use a secondary reinforcer, like a whistle, to pinpoint the moment a desired behavior occurred. It further described how to then use successive approximations to shape the behavior using reinforcement. She took what she had learned about dolphins and wrote a book about about using positive reinforcement in everyday life: Don't Shoot The Dog!, then started doing seminars on how to use a clicker with dogs in the 1990s. In the 2000s, she started running Clicker Expo, a conference which brings the worlds best positive-reinforcement trainers together several times a year, and began training dog trainers through her Karen Pryor Academy. Follow us on Instagram, @schoolforthedogs, where we are giving away her book Reaching The Animal Mind and a signed clicker this weekend. Learn more about Dr. Vargas: https://www.juliesvargas.com/ Learn more about Karen Pryor: https://karenwpryor.com/biography/ Learn more about the BF Skinner Foundation: http://bfskinner.org Books: Don't Shoot The Dog! https://www.amazon.com/Dont-Shoot-Dog-Teaching-Training/dp/1860542387 Reaching The Animal Mind https://www.amazon.com/Reaching-Animal-Mind-Clicker-Training/dp/0743297776 --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/dogs/message Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/dogs/support

Welcome to The Veterinary Roundtable! In this episode, the ladies discuss how they'd spend one million dollars, a case of a German Shepherd eating a toy giraffe, answer training questions from Heidi Gossard-King, and more!Do you have a question for The Veterinary Roundtable? Ask us on any social media platform or email harrison@all-starvet.com!Episodes of The Veterinary Roundtable are on all podcast services along with Facebook and YouTube!TIMESTAMPSIntroductions: 0:04:41Icebreakers: 0:06:34Case Collections: 0:14:30Listener Questions: 0:28:47

Learn all about animal acting with Dawn Wolfe, an Animal Talent Agent and Wrangler for almost thirty years. Dawn runs her own talent agency, PAWSITIVELY FAMOUS, a national Animal Modeling and Talent Management firm. It all began when Dawn was a little girl and fell in love with the scrappy dog known as Benji. Benji was one of the most popular animals ever in the history of cinema. Learn all about Benji, aka. Higgins the dog, and fascinating, hilarious, behind-the-scenes stories of animal actors and their handlers seeking fame, glory, and belly laughs. Want to follow up on our sources or watch any of the videos we mention? Go to ThisAnimalLife.com and click on Show Notes.  Interested in KLIMB tables and other Blue-9 products? Click here to learn more and apply our promo code, ANIMAL2020 to get free shipping and $20 off. References: lgonquin, the Story of a Great Dog, by Dion Henderson, Western Publishing Company, 1953.  Benji--The Full Movie, 1974, EncourageTV, YouTube, October 2020. The Big Book of Tricks for the Best Dog Ever, by Chris Perondi and Larry Kay, Workman Publishing, 2019. Beverly Hillbillies, Wikipedia. Captain (Arthur) Haggerty, Master Dog Trainer, Wikipedia. Clicker Training for Cats, Karen Pryor, Sunshine Books, 2001. Cooper, Diana C., “Higgins--from Shelter Dog to Beloved Benji,” Famous Dogs in History, July 2017. Dawn Wolfe Social Media Dawn Wolfe Instagram Pawsitively Famous, Dawn Wolfe's animal talent agency's website Pawsitively Famous Facebook Page Do More With Your Dog Dog Trick Titles and Stunt Dog Titles Do More With Your Dog Animal Actors Academie Internationale First Born, starring Elisabeth Shue and Dawn Wolfe's dog, Nikki, 2007. “Frank Inn: Animal Trainer,” full 4-hour interview, interviewed by Michael Rosen, Television Academy Foundation, The Interviews, August 8, 2001 “Frank Inn on the dog who worked on Petticoat Junction and starred in Benji,” Foundation Interviews,  “Higgins the Dog ~ Star of Benji, Petticoat Junction, Beverly Hillbillies, Lassie, Mooch,” The Humpy Awards, Miss Hope wins the humping competition, YouTube, June 2012. Hope in the “Westminster Commercial” for Treasure Island Resort & Casinos, YouTube. London, Jack, Call of the Wild/White Fang, Ann Arbor Media, 2006. “Maverick the Surfer Cat,” Cat People, YouTube, Netflix Futures, July 2021. Pawsitively Famous YouTube Channel Petticoat Junction, Wikipedia. Petticoat Junction, “Betty-Jo's Dog,” Season 2, Episode 1, YouTube March 2017. Prose, Eileen, “Remember Benji? Meet the movie dog and his trainer. See his tricks!,” YouTube, June 2017. Sasha, My Friend, by Barbara Corcoran, Atheneum, 1973.  Stanley Steemer, “Toby's New Trick,” The Loomis Agency, YouTube. TV Guide, “The Benji Issue,” December 2-8 1978. Where the Red Fern Grows, by Wilson Rawls, Yearling, 2000.  

In this most graphic episode thus far, actress/comedian/pop culture curator Chris Farah sits down with Sasha and Steven to caress her memories of STEALING BEAUTY, a 1996 coming-of-age-sexual-awakening-slash-mystery movie starring Liv Tyler, Joseph Fiennes, Jeremy Irons and Rachel Weisz. What disease does the character of Alex have? Can you find out who's your biological dad by reading a vague poem about him? Most importantly, is that Liv Tyler's vadge? Listen to find out. Plus, everyone tells stories: Chris about losing her virginity, Sasha about being aroused as a teenager by a 1984 miniseries THE LAST DAYS OF POMPEII, and Steven about almost being molested while watching the film "Blue is The Warmest Color." Finally, Sasha and Steven recommend a board game "Sherlock Holmes: Consulting Detective" and a classic dog-training book "Don't Shoot The Dog" by Karen Pryor. Email us at shutuppod@gmail.com Twitter/Instagram: @shutupiloveit1 Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/shutupiloveit1/

In this most graphic episode thus far, actress/comedian/pop culture curator Chris Farah sits down with Sasha and Steven to caress her memories of STEALING BEAUTY, a 1996 coming-of-age-sexual-awakening-slash-mystery movie starring Liv Tyler, Joseph Fiennes, Jeremy Irons and Rachel Weisz. What disease does the character of Alex have? Can you find out who's your biological dad by reading a vague poem about him? Most importantly, is that Liv Tyler's vadge? Listen to find out. Plus, everyone tells stories: Chris about losing her virginity, Sasha about being aroused as a teenager by a 1984 miniseries THE LAST DAYS OF POMPEII, and Steven about almost being molested while watching the film "Blue is The Warmest Color." Finally, Sasha and Steven recommend a board game "Sherlock Holmes: Consulting Detective" and a classic dog-training book "Don't Shoot The Dog" by Karen Pryor. Email us at shutuppod@gmail.com Twitter/Instagram: @shutupiloveit1 Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/shutupiloveit1/

Summary: Over her 40 years of dog training, Michele Pouliot has presented scores of seminars and has been responsible for bringing science-based clicker training to guide dog training around the world. In her "hobby world," she has actively competed in both horse and dog sports since 1970. In dog sports alone that includes A.K.C. dog obedience, attaining three OTCHes, agility, tracking, and then, starting in 2006, the sport of canine musical freestyle. A short time later, in 2007, Karen Pryor invited Michele to join her faculty for Clicker Expo conferences, where Michele presents on the application of clicker training techniques for a variety of dog sports, general training, and for the training of guide dogs for the blind. Karen Pryor and Michele collaborated for the development of Michele's online freestyle course, which is available from the Karen Pryor Academy. Links www.michelepouliot.com Next Episode:  To be released 5/11/2018, featuring Amy Cook, talking about thresholds and managing reactivity while you work on changing how your dog actually feels. TRANSCRIPTION: Melissa Breau: This is Melissa Breau and you're listening to the Fenzi Dog Sports Podcast brought to you by the Fenzi Dog Sports Academy, an online school dedicated to providing high-quality instruction for competitive dog sports using only the most current and progressive training methods. Today we'll be talking to Michele Pouliot. Over her 40 years of dog training, Michele has presented scores of seminars and has been responsible for bringing science-based clicker training to guide dog training around the world. In her "hobby world," she has actively competed in both horse and dog sports since 1970. In dog sports alone that includes A.K.C. dog obedience, attaining three OTCHes, agility, tracking, and then, starting in 2006, the sport of canine musical freestyle. A short time later, in 2007, Karen Pryor invited Michele to join her faculty for Clicker Expo conferences, where Michele presents on the application of clicker training techniques for a variety of dog sports, general training, and for the training of guide dogs for the blind. Karen Pryor and Michele collaborated for the development of Michele's online freestyle course, which is available from the Karen Pryor Academy. I'm incredibly thrilled to have her here today! Hi Michele! Welcome to the podcast! Michele Pouliot: Hi Melissa, and thank you for having me. It's a pleasure to be here, and I want to thank Fenzi Dog Sports for having me here. Melissa Breau: Absolutely. So thrilled to talk to you. To get us started out, do you want to just share a little bit about your own dogs and what you're working on? Michele Pouliot: My current dogs are two. One is my English Springer Spaniel Déjà Vu, who is 8-and-a-half years old now, and I have a 4-and-a-half-year-old Australian Shepherd, Saki. They are both continually working on coming up with new ideas for tricks. It's what canine freestyle pushes you to do is always trying to come up with new moves and new behaviors to make your next routine interesting. So other than that, they're having fun just being dogs, running around the property. Melissa Breau: I know that you got started training horses. Do you mind sharing a little bit about how you originally got into training, and what led you then from horses to dogs? Just a little bit on your background? Michele Pouliot: Sure. We're going to go way back now. Straight out of high school, I really wanted to have a career in horses. I'm an Air Force brat, so my father, our family, moved all over the world as I was growing up, and in high school we landed on an Air Force base in Louisiana. My entire life I'd wanted a dog, couldn't have a dog, my mother was not a dog person and used the excuse of us moving so much as to why we couldn't have one. And I also wanted a horse. My father had always promised me that if we ever got to an Air Force base that had a stable, that I could have a horse. Well, we did, when we were stationed in the Philippines when I was in junior high school. I just fell in love with working with my horse, and I thought, This is what I want to do for the rest of my life. My father was very supportive when we came back to the States and ended up in Louisiana. In high school I got another horse, and he went ahead and allowed me to skip college and use the money to go to the Pacific Coast Equestrian Research Farm, which was run by Linda Tellington and her husband at that time, Wentworth Tellington, very well-known equestrian professionals. My whole goal was to be a professional horse trainer and instructor. After spending a year there with Linda and Went, I got my first job, which was running a new equestrian program in Fargo, North Dakota. What happened there was I was giving riding lessons to a woman who was a dog trainer. I got my first dog as soon as I got there, so I had a yellow Labrador. As soon as I got away from home on my own, I got my first dog. So I had this dog, loved it, didn't know what I was doing. But one of the gals I taught riding to was a dog trainer locally, and I look back on that experience realizing how lucky I was that the person I ran into about training dogs was such a good dog trainer. She was a traditional trainer, of course, back in those times, but she was a really good traditional trainer. So she taught me, in exchange for riding lessons, all about how to work with this young Labrador puppy that I had and make it a nice, mannerly pet. I was intrigued with how easy it was to train the dog versus the horses, so it got me interested more in training the dog versus just training it for being a nice pet. That is how I slowly started shifting my focus for my profession towards dogs, yet I always kept horses, so I haven't ever been without a horse since then. I just slowly, when I left North Dakota after my first winter — that was a sign that I never wanted to stay in North Dakota for another winter — but when I came back to the West Coast, I just decided, You know what, I really like this dog thing, so let me start that. And that's how I ended up going into dogs. Melissa Breau: That's really quite interesting, and I know you started to touch on a little bit there the similarities and differences in training the species, that dogs were a little easier. Do you mind sharing a little more about what you learned, compare and contrast a little bit for us? Michele Pouliot: Sure. Of course, when you're thinking that we're talking back in 1970 -'71, there was no positive training that was known of, so everything was traditional. We were training horses in traditional techniques, training dogs in traditional techniques, and when you're training traditionally, the gap between training a dog and a horse was huge, because what you had with this dog was a species that really wants to please in general. So not only are they maybe more domesticated than a horse, but they surely love to work with people. That was what stuck out so much to me. Whereas horses, being traditionally trained, it isn't like they're all excited to go out and work with you. It was good traditional training, they weren't afraid, but they certainly weren't the way horses can be nowadays when they are positively trained. So I think my first realization in that frame of reference, when you think of the times of training at that point in time, was just how much easier the dog was to train because they were so much more like, “What can I do for you?” The horse took so much longer to train because you didn't seem to have that automatic impulse from a horse you're working with to say, “What can I do to please you?” That was the big difference then. There's still a big difference, so even though my horses are clicker trained, as my dogs are, you're dealing with a big animal, so the difference in your safety is a big one. Even though we're not talking about an aggressive horse, it's still a big animal. If you think about dogs that will mug people and get in their bait pouches and jump up and want rewards, well, imagine a 1200-pound horse doing that to you. You have to be much more thoughtful about every step of the training process with a horse to make sure that you're not inadvertently creating an excitement or an energy in your positive training that can actually be dangerous for a human on the ground. Whereas with dogs, we don't really think about it that much as far as something that's going to be dangerous. If I teach a dog to leg kick and he happens to clock my leg, yeah, that's not great, but it's not life-threatening. Melissa Breau: Right. You talked a little bit about the fact that back then everything was traditional training, that approach. What led you to become a positive trainer and to clicker training? Michele Pouliot: When I got into dogs, first I kind of got my foot in the door with that first dog I had. Once I had him trained, I heard something about AKC and obedience, and I entered him in local obedience trials, and for some reason I was winning. People would meet me outside of the ring and say, “Ooh, do you give lessons?” and I felt weird because I didn't think I knew anything yet. But I started giving lessons and I was really enjoying that aspect. I ended up working at a kennel, figuring, You know, Michele, you've really got to learn more about dogs. So I took this entry-level position at a kennel in Long Beach, California. I was cleaning kennels and all that, but in the afternoon I would be giving some training lessons to the public, which was a great experience for me. But I wasn't there very long before I read an article about guide dogs and training dogs for blind people. Remember, there's no Internet back then. This is a magazine, and in the magazine was this article, and in the end were addresses of three guide dog schools in the country. The article was fascinating to me, and all I could think of is, Oh my god, what an amazing combination: the love of training dogs, and I'm also helping people. This is what I want to do. It just hit me like a thunderbolt that I had to do this work. We're in 1973 now, and I write all three schools. One of the schools never responded. Another one, I still have the letter framed on my wall today. The letter reads, “I'm sorry, but women are not emotionally or physically capable of training guide dogs.” Melissa Breau: Oh dear! Michele Pouliot: Understand that in 1973, that was not an affrontive letter. My reaction, as this naïve young woman, was, Oh, I didn't know that, in my head. Whereas ten years later, my hackles would have gone up reading something like that. Anyway, I got a letter from Guide Dogs for the Blind that invited me to fill out an application. I filled out the application, sent it in, and they had me come for an interview. Everything was great, I got the job, I was so excited. I found out later, when I arrived, I was the only woman besides one other woman who had just started working six months prior. It was not an easy place for a woman to step into, because there was a belief system that women can't do this. It's way too rigorous physically, and emotionally it's very difficult. So this woman and myself were like the pioneers of trying to get our feet in the door for proving ourselves that we could do it. When I first got my job at Guide Dogs, which was really my first serious, in my head, dog training assignment, I also was always focused on trying to do so good that I was paving the way for other women to come and do this work. That was the first goal. A part of that —which you're probably wondering, Is she ever going to get to answer my question? — a part of that is that I knew that I could do better what they were doing. I was so surprised when I showed up and realized that I was a darn good dog trainer when I was watching some of the techniques that I saw being used. What I saw was some very harsh traditional training. Very harsh. And I just knew I could do better than that. So, from the day I arrived, I started putting this subtle pressure from demonstrating that you don't really have to do it that way. My focus was always to be the best trainer I could be, the kindest, the gentlest, even though I was totally understanding of traditional training and that's what you do, there was no other option. But because that was my background in the 1970s, when I started hearing in the 1990s about this new, modern training, I was fascinated. Through those twenty years, before I heard about positive training, I had helped the program get better, better, better, and I mean in the early 1990s, our school was doing really good traditional training. I was so happy that the program had come so far that no dogs were being treated really unfairly. Even though it was traditional, it was good traditional training. I always have this flavor in my heart of, How can I be kind and gentle and still get the job done? Even when you're a good traditional trainer, you might be focusing on that, but you also inherited the belief that using a lot of punishment to teach is OK. It's a belief system that you are born into. So as I started opening my mind to looking at this new positive training thing I was seeing, I was so excited that, oh my gosh, there's other possibilities, and that's really what led me to start looking at videos and going to seminars and going to conferences and trying to figure out how this fits into my world, especially how does it fit into guide dog work. Melissa Breau: So, I'd love to hear a little bit more about some of what you did with the guide dog program, if you don't mind. I know that you spent a large chunk of your career focused there. How did that evolve? Can you share a little more? Michele Pouliot: Sure. I retired two years ago with forty-two years, so I've been doing it a long time. When I chose to introduce positive reinforcement training to my school, my guide dog school, my intent at that time was just, can we even make this better, kinder, gentler, and overall more positive for everybody, including the trainer. Because it was a very physical type of training when you're doing traditional training, too, so we had injuries. We had people coming in and being injured. By the way, by this time the staff was majority of women, so over the twenty years a lot changed. The men were in the minority, and I'm not really saying I even know why that is, because it's kind of true in the guide dog industry and in the cane mobility industry — meaning instructors who teach blind people how to travel with canes — it's interesting how through the last several decades the majority are women. I think it has to do with being nurturers and wanting to help is why we have more people in there now that are women versus men. Anyway, back to guide dogs. When I first brought the idea to my supervisor, my supervisor had a lot of faith in me. I had already done a lot for the program and had everyone training so much better than they used to train, so I had a good relationship with my supervisor, but he looked at me like I was crazy. Now, you have to understand that in the guide dog world, guide dogs have been trained since World War I. That's when it started. The techniques used for guide dog training were from World War I, meaning war dogs. How do you train a dog to be a war dog? And you know those dogs were hardy, hardy, tough, courageous dogs. So all the guide dog work that started was with very heavy-duty traditional training, and the thought process was you have to be tough to make the dog reliable. No matter how weird that sounds today in the positive training world, it's a reality for when it started. It was such a unique idea that somebody had in World War I to do this, and they were doing it successfully. So imagine if you say, “Can we train a guide dog to help a blind person get around safely and keep them from being injured?” and it worked, what does that do for your ego? It pushes it up there pretty big. So when you join a guide dog school and you are in awe of what they do, I was in awe of what they did. It's like, oh my god, this is like miracles. Those dogs are saving people's lives. So when somebody tells you that you can't use food when you train guide dogs, and the reason is the handler's blind and there's food all over the environment, everywhere you go, there's food, because of that, you believe it. I believed it. I was totally brainwashed. And I brainwashed so many of my blind clients over the years, like we all did, because we didn't want them hand-feeding their dogs. It was about food only comes in their food pan two times a day when they get fed. So the first thing that we had to tackle, we were the first school in the world that tackled this whole belief system, which was, believe me, very deeply entrenched worldwide that you can't use food in training guide dogs. There are still some outliers now that are holding to that, and their programs probably won't change until there's a few individuals that retire or leave the program, just because they're so entrenched in the belief system, and I understand that because I was there too. Thank God I had an open enough mind to say, “Maybe there's a way.” So the first task at hand was to show that we could teach the dogs, with food, how to not take food in the environment, and how to avoid offered food in the environment. If you picture that you've got this handsome, cute little dog out in harness and you're blind, how many people do you think a day come up and say, “Oh, he's so pretty. Can I give him this cookie? I have a little piece of meat.” You have all sorts of people doing that and not even asking. Guide dogs actually are offered food a lot. And imagine how many restaurants that you would go sit in, and your dog goes under the table, and guess what they find under the table that somebody previously dropped on the floor. There's food all over the place. So we thought — ha ha — we were doing this great job of teaching food avoidance through correction. The dog, of course, if they went for food, would be corrected. The comical part about that is although the response we trained looked really good at the end of guide dog training, because that means the professional was handling the dog, and the professional has sight, so the professional can do what? Time a correction. They can see what the dog's about to do. Well, hand the dog over to a blind client, and guess how long it takes a guide dog who's been trained that way to figure out that the blind person isn't responding at all when they head toward some food. We had ourselves brainwashed that we were doing a good job. The really cool thing about coming up with “How do we teach them with food to leave food?” was incredibly rewarding for us to go, “Oh my gosh, we just blew that belief system out of water.” The dogs are so much better now than they ever were with environmental food. And it's because they're choosing. It's their choice. They're not being threatened. They know that, If I leave this food alone and if I refuse this food from this person offering it, I know at some point in the near future I'm going to get a reward too. That was the huge hurdle to get over because of how entrenched that belief system is in the world. From that point on it was saying, OK, let's look at this clicker training thing, and look at all the skills we teach, and what can we teach with clicker training? I'm really glad my school took it really slow. At the time I felt like I was dragging them forward — “Please, let's do more, let's do more” — but the reality is traditional trainers have to learn these skills, it's totally new skills. So for us to just overnight decide we were going to change would not have been a good idea. We took it really slow. I look back at 2006, when all of our instructors were using clicker training, and it's comical to me to think that we thought we were so advanced, because it's come so far. Things that we transfer over to clicker training, it was clicker training, but now it's been improved to where it's really good clicker training. So it was a very long haul. The good news was that when we made this change, we had a couple schools that had heard through the grapevine that we were doing this who asked if we could help them out. Management made a decision then that really changed the course of the entire industry, because the industry could be very protective over what they did and their information, not necessarily willing to share “secrets.” Our management at that time decided that we're going to share this. We're not going to keep it quiet. And so at that time, around 2007, they started sending me out on the road to any school that wanted help. That is what kind of started the road to changing the industry, because the word started spreading. And then we started presenting at the International Guide Dog Conference, which happens every two years. That was like an international community, and presenting and showing video of all that we're doing, showing them data on success rates that skyrocketed higher than ever historically from the day we started clicker training. There was so much information that our school made available to the guide dog industry besides us actually personally helping. I mean, it's just wonderful. Let me give you an idea. There's about a hundred-plus guide dog schools in the world that belong to this International Guide Dog Federation. In 2006, there were three guide dog schools out of that group that were using positive reinforcement. Now it's over sixty-five. That's a big deal in ten years. It's a really cool thing to see it happening, and it's a really cool thing that I get to still do. I'm a consultant. I just got back from South Africa in February, helping a South African school, and it's just wonderful to see the excitement, because most of the staff are younger people now. There are always still some staff that are more senior, and traditional trainers who are learning new skills, but everyone has gotten to the point where they realize this is really a better way to go. So it's rare for me to run into people now that haven't realized, because we proved it. Basically our school proved it. Melissa Breau: That's fantastic. That's got to be such a good feeling to know that you've had such a huge impact on that field, and to really be able to look at the numbers and see how much change you've really created. Michele Pouliot: It is. It's an extremely satisfying time in my life to go ahead and retire. Melissa Breau:  Fair enough. Michele Pouliot: It was about five or six years ago now I was considering retiring, and I just had a funny feeling that I needed to give it a few more years to make sure that my program that I was leaving was really set to still move forward and not slide back if they didn't have me bugging the heck out of them all the time, for instance. Melissa Breau: Right. It's fantastic you've created this change, but I know there are still some fields that are, for lack of a better word, struggling to make the switch, or fields where traditional methods are still the norm. Do you have any advice for people who are maybe positive trainers in those situations, or positive trainers who are surrounded by others who aren't, when they're trying to maybe create change or inspire change in others? Michele Pouliot:  Over the past ten years — I guess more than that now, actually — I feel like I've done this so many times with so many different people and organizations, at least in the guide dog and service dog industry, I've been involved with so many now that I've learned the hard way what not to do. Even when somebody acts like they're open-minded and ready to listen, you have to be very careful that you respect them and avoid criticizing then, because the tendency in positive reinforcement trainers is to look down on traditional trainers as if they're being mean or even abusive or harsh or whatever. So when they're talking at a traditional trainer, they have that attitude of, “You need to change because da-da-da-da-da.” Well, the reality is traditional trainers love their dogs, too, and if you think they're doing it because they want to be meaner than they need to, that's not so. They inherited that. That's what they learned. I never thought I was being mean or harsh or too rough. I was a good traditional trainer and I used techniques that worked. My dogs were happy, they worked happy, they weren't cowering. But when I look back now, of course I realize, wow, there's so much of a better way to do this, and the animal is so much more joyous in its work. But people approach, if you want to call it the other side of the fence, they approach that with criticism, even if it's not direct criticism. You need to give a person respect for what they've done, what they've accomplished, and not in any way punish them. The comical part, to me, is if you're truly a positive reinforcement trainer, then why are you punishing these people? Are you going to punish them long enough that you think they're going to change? You should know that punishment isn't very effective. It only works with threat, so are you going to threaten them? No. The way you get them to change is reinforce them for their efforts, support them when they're having trouble, and sometimes that means you have to ignore something that's still happening and just go, “That will come in time. Leave it alone.” Right now, give them something you can actually help them with, because that reinforces them. When you solve a problem for someone or some organization with positive reinforcement and it's a problem they continue to have, you are now God. Now it's like, “Wow, we were never able to solve that with traditional training, and they just solved it.” That's all about reinforcement, so it's no different than applying positive reinforcement to animal training. It's how do I get this animal, which happens to be human, I have to want and get them inspired and motivated, don't I? I have to have something they want. So I have to give them the feeling of reinforcement, and usually that comes in the shape of showing them how it works. Don't just tell them. Show them. There are a lot of people in the horse barns, for instance, that are certainly surrounded by traditional horse trainers, and they're the one person in their barn that wants to do clicker training with their horse, so they day in and day out feel like they are one against a hundred. The best thing they can do is just smile and say, “Thank you. That's really cool that you're doing that, but I want to do it this way. I'm really enjoying this. This is really fun.” And then, on the side, you're showing them, from them noticing, that it really works. There's no sense in having a war, because the war never gets you anywhere. I've been at those wars. I've been the positive reinforcement and the traditional trainer wars. It doesn't work. It just makes the traditional trainers dig their trenches deeper because you're making them feel they have to defend themselves. The last thing you want to do is make a traditional trainer feel like they have to defend themselves. You have to get them curious so that they're really interested in how that works. The good news is in the guide dog world it's been proven now. We were on new ground when we did it, and when we did it, we didn't have anything telling us it's going to work, so we were just hoping we'd get the same quality of response at the end of training, and what wowed us was how much better all the responses were. We were just hoping that going to this new positive thing would be kinder-gentler and we'd still get what we had. We never, never imagined we would get better and better responses than historically the school had ever had. Melissa Breau: That's fantastic. I know there are a lot of people out there who are in that exact position, and they're surrounded by so many trainers who are doing things other ways. They feel like they're fighting that battle, so I think that's really useful for folks to hear. What about for those folks that are out there, maybe they're on the edge, or maybe they're in the process of crossing over, I think anyone who has done that knows it's not easy. Do you have any advice for those folks? Michele Pouliot: The best advice I can give for someone who wants to cross over, they're in the process, is realize that learning never goes away. I think in the traditional training world you get to a point — and I say this not just from my experience, but being around so many traditional trainers for so many years in the '70s and '80s — you get to a point where you think you've learned everything. It's a little phenomenon. It's like, I'm there, I've got it, I've done my thing, and now I just keep practicing it. As a positive reinforcement trainer I quickly realized that I didn't know anything about training. It was like, wow, I might be good at actually doing some certain things with animals, but I had never even thought about how the science would affect everything that I'm doing. So realizing that it doesn't end. When I first joined the faculty of Clicker Expo, Karen Pryor's faculty, I was totally intimidated by being on the faculty. It's like, Oh my god, all these people, they are so much better than me. And then I started getting more comfortable after a few years, but every time I went, I realized I still feel like a novice. Every single time I go to an Expo, I'm learning something else from a faculty member, or two or three of them, that I went, wow, I never even looked at it that way. That has not ended, so I realized it's an open book. It's an open end that never stops. And if you do stop and you say, “I've learned enough, this is all I need to know,” that's sad to me because there's so much more available to you, even within your own little world and how you're using it, because it's constantly got the ability to give you more information and make you even better and better at training both the animal and the student, the person. Melissa Breau: Even if you've learned, say, everything that was out up to a year ago, when you really talk to some of the leading trainers out there, there are always new ideas that they're trying and they're testing and they're playing with, and then going out there and sharing. Michele Pouliot: Exactly, exactly. Even through things like this, a podcast. You're listening to a podcast and you go, “Oh, well, that's interesting. I never quite heard that before.” Or you hear it said a different way, and even if all that gives you is ooh, when I teach that next time, I have another way to say that that might make more sense to that individual person who I'm having trouble getting that concept across to. Melissa Breau: Absolutely. I know that that, for me, was a big, big thing when I was teaching pet dog people was that I'd often sit in the class, or listen to somebody talk, and you just come away with, “Oh, well, that was a really great analogy. That was a really good way of phrasing that,” that you can reuse or turn around. Michele Pouliot: For sure, for sure. And to me, I really always look at myself as when I'm working with somebody, an individual and their animal, I'm never really teaching the animal. I'm teaching them. So it's my job to be able to be a hugely successful communicator and adjust on the fly when it's not working, because obviously the way I'm explaining it is not working, so I've got to find another way. Melissa Breau: I know that I mentioned in the intro you've done competitive obedience and agility, and that today you mostly compete in musical freestyle. For those who maybe aren't super-familiar with the sport, can you share a little bit about what it is and how it's judged? Michele Pouliot: Most everybody has at some point in the Winter Olympics watched the ice-skating. If you look at that event, the Olympic ice skating, and the short program, long program — years ago they also had the figures that they don't do anymore because it wasn't very interesting to watch — but it's very similar in that you have a piece of music, and what you're doing is you and your dog are performing certain behaviors and you're interpreting the music. So freestyle, in its own right, is meaning anything you want to do. Anything goes, so it gives you the open ability to choose a lot of interesting things to do. Most organizations that you can compete under, and there's about four or five organizations worldwide, do have some limit in freestyle for safety. In other words, the one limit can be as long as it looks safe for human and dog. Other than that, there really isn't a limit, other than don't do something in really bad taste, for instance. But if you look at the Olympic ice-skating, in that they are judged both technical and artistic, it's the same thing. In most organizations you have two basic element types you're being judged on, which is the technical aspect of the performance, including the precision, including how things flowed, and then you have the artistic, which is the creative part, how unique was this, how emotional was it, was it funny, was it dramatic, was it just really amazingly entertaining. If you look at it with that ice skating analogy, I think you'll realize, yeah, that's an easy to understand sport. It is still a bit of a subjective sport, meaning you could have the exact same performance in front of two different judges and they may judge it a little differently. But that's not really any different than if you get in a high level of competitive obedience. You're looking at who's going to win the classes a half-point ahead of the other, and that could be a subjective judgment between judges, so one judge saw it as a perfect sit and one judge saw it as a half-point-off sit. So no matter what, the subjectivity comes into most sports, agility being one that probably not. The dog either does the … but you still have some judgments about did he make the contact point, did he miss it, so it is a subjective sport. The cool thing about the sport is everyone going in the ring is doing something different, so you're not watching the same routine, like an obedience routine or the agility course. You're not seeing the same thing again and again. Every single person that goes in the ring is doing something different, even if you — by horrors — happen to have the same music as somebody else, which has happened to me. It happened to me. But they're still totally different routines because you have a different person and a different dog interpreting it. So it's very cool that it's your own creation. I have tons of video of my dogs doing competitive obedience at way back Games Nationals, really cool stuff, and agility runs. Do I ever pull that footage out and watch it? Not really. But do I pull out my old freestyle routines and watch those? I do. It's more like you created art yourself, you and your dog together created this thing, and nobody else has done that thing. It's something that you did, and when you are in freestyle long enough that you're losing dogs, obviously they die, I mean, that was the first time that hit me was when I was watching my Springer Spaniel Cabo's performance to Phantom of the Opera at a seminar. Somebody wanted to see it, and I showed it for the first time after he had passed, and I mean I got really emotional because it wasn't just seeing him on the screen as much as all that we put into that routine to make it an entertaining routine. The cool thing to me about freestyle, which is why I got so excited about it when I discovered it, is everything keeps changing. It isn't that you get to this high level and then you're doing the same skills and maintaining those same skills. You're always trying to do something new, inventive, because of the piece of music you've picked. It brings out the creativity and it really pushes you as a dog trainer. So it's been wonderful for me because it keeps pushing me to what is the next thing I'm going to clicker train — not necessarily that I'm going to use it in the next routine, but maybe the routine after that. So it really does help me, personally, get inspired and motivated to train, because my goal is to come up with some sort of performance that is entertaining to the audience. I just love that. Melissa Breau: You obviously bring it to the sport. You're very passionate about it. Is there anything, in your opinion, in particular that has led to your success? Michele Pouliot: I think for anyone's success, you have to say you're obviously doing good training. Again, it's motivating to me to keep pushing myself to become a better and better trainer for that reason, because it's going to come out in the performance. Creativity is something that I think I probably was born with, because I always had a wild imagination, and my brother is a very creative person too. I actually don't know how to teach people creativity, but you can get a lot of great ideas from just watching Broadway plays, movies, shows, you can get some great ideas for what might make a very cool routine. I would have to say that I entered this sport at a point in my career when I'd only been clicker training on my own with my own animals for maybe four or five years when I got into freestyle. But I had already learned the power of it for teaching really great behaviors, entertaining-type behaviors, so that really inspired me to, like, what else can I do? When you envision something in a routine that might seem a little up there — meaning, well, maybe I shouldn't really expect that I can make it look that great by teaching a dog to do something like that — and then you actually do it, that's really rewarding for yourself as a trainer, but rewarding in that you were able to show the audience something. It also is a really good ambassador for clicker training, because when you see a good freestyle performance, the one thing you know is there are behaviors you just watch that you know you couldn't train any other way except with clicker training because it wouldn't work. There's no way you could teach that traditional. It just wouldn't happen. Melissa Breau: I know we're getting close to the end here, and there are three questions I always ask at the end of my first interview with someone. The first one is what's the dog-related accomplishment that you're proudest of — and I feel like you probably have some good ones. Michele Pouliot: I kind of feel like I have two different worlds that I've been in. One is a very serious type of work with the guide dog world and the other is my hobby in the sports. I have to say that being able to look back on my career with the guide dog industry, knowing that I've made a big change, now I am one of the catalysts that's really helped to move that whole industry forward, certainly is something I'm extremely proud of and makes me feel really content that I left that career, officially left the career, when everything was really moving along. That would be the guide dog side. The dog-related side would probably be just individual great performances I've had with my wonderful canine partners. When you said it, I probably had to think of my first Aussie in freestyle, Listo, who passed in 2014. But we've had some incredible performances. I don't know if I can pick one out. But one thing that he did do that no other dog has done is he — I know I should say “he and I together,” but I think of him as such an amazing dog performer. He was like an actor. He was so good at this that I felt like he was carrying me through some of the performances. He not only scored perfect scores from judges once, he did it twenty-four times. It is incredible, and a few of those were at international competitions where there was a judging panel of three judges, and all three judges gave him perfect scores. And I realize gave us perfect scores. But I would have to say that probably is one of the highlights of my hobby career. Just a couple of weekends ago, my young Aussie, we debuted a brand-new routine, and it's a very cool routine. I'm very, very proud of this routine. In fact, we dedicated it to Listo. It's a very cool routine, and he did it so well for his first time. I was totally blown away with how well he did, and he got a perfect score. Melissa Breau: That's awesome. Michele Pouliot: For my young boy to get a perfect score was a really cool thing. So there I gave you the serious side of dog training and the fun side. Melissa Breau: Congrats on the new perfect score. That's awesome. Michele Pouliot: Thank you. Melissa Breau: The second question on my list is about training advice, and I wanted to ask what the best piece of training advice you've ever heard is. Michele Pouliot: Oh, so many to choose from. I am going to reach down deep to the first one I ever remember hearing that changed my life, and that was Linda Tellington. In 1970, I was having trouble working with a horse. She stopped me, and she walked over and very quietly said, “Listen to him.” And ever since then, I listen so hard to my learners, and that includes horses, dogs, people that I'm teaching. It's listening, paying attention to what's happening, because they're giving you so much information that so many people ignore. So I think that would be the first one, because it has affected me, it's so much a part of who I am when I train is really noticing what's happening quickly, not waiting until we get five minutes into it to go, “Oh, I guess that's not working.” Then the other one would be Dr. Phil's mantra, “How's that working for you?” Melissa Breau: I like that. Michele Pouliot: I say that at seminars all the time. I say it to myself. It's like somebody comes up with all these questions, “Why is he doing that? Well, I've been doing it this way.” And I go, “Well, how's that working for you?” It's a great mantra, so I find myself going back to that. It actually is usually quite appropriate for most situations to ask yourself that, or to ask someone else, so I'll just stick with those two for now. Melissa Breau: Absolutely, and it relates back to the first one. If you're not listening and you ask yourself, “How's that working for you?” it's going to remind you... My last question here: Who is somebody else in the training world that you look up to? Michele Pouliot: That would probably be Ken Ramirez and Kathy Sdao, both. They have been my lights in the distance when I started this guide dog movement to change to positive reinforcement training. Both of them … without them, I don't know if I could have made it happen, because they again were so supportive of what we were doing, and yet knowing a lot of what we were doing they did not like at that time. They were able to put blinders on and ignore some of what they were looking at, and focus on the stuff we were getting better at, knowing that when more time went, we'd be ready for the next step to improve. And then, on a personal note, when I joined the faculty, just to have them be so wonderfully friendly and open and warm, and so interested in the way I think about training and what I do. They've just always been really dear to me. Melissa Breau: That's awesome. Thank you so much for coming on, Michele! This has been great. Michele Pouliot: You're welcome, and I thank you for having me. I enjoyed every bit of it. Melissa Breau: And thanks to our listeners for tuning in! We'll be back next week, this time with Amy Cook to talk about the true meaning of a threshold and how to manage your activity while you work on changing your dog's feelings about the thing. Credits: Today's show is brought to you by the Fenzi Dog Sports Academy. Special thanks to Denise Fenzi for supporting this podcast. Music provided royalty-free by BenSound.com; the track featured here is called “Buddy.” Audio editing provided by Chris Lang.