4/24/2011 - good or bad, like or dislike. . .

The decision to enroll Grr in puppy training was not as easy to make as one might think.  Obviously, he could benefit from some discipline and guidance in his life, some help in replenishing his dwindling courage, but I couldn't help but think of the dogs my parents have had and how neither of them went to training.  Why should ours, then?

Of course, given the opportunity, Elliot, their rambunctious lab, would eat the veneer off the cabinets if it remotely tasted like anything.  Or, as was the case last fall, an entire bag of hot Cheetos and a box of peppermint bark.  My sister can probably testify to how vital training could have been after repeated cleanings of Elliot's brown-and-orange, ultra-pungent regurgitant.

So maybe Grr does need training, (and Elliot too, for that matter), but as most things go with him, the training is costly.  Our session with the trainer, in all, subtracted another $600 from our emergency/vacation/fun stuff fund and essentially pushed the expenses of owning Grr into the thousands (plural)--thousands that we could have spent on a nice suite on the main Waikiki strip, a new TV, a little pied-à-terre for a week in Paris, two tickets for a flight to Thailand, a bender in Vegas, a weekend in Portland, just an amazing dinner downtown, even.

But obviously, I try not to dwell on these things too much.

The trainer stayed with us for over three hours, testing Grr's limits, stressing him out with his loud and foreign presence, all while breaking down for us what he believes to be the basic foundation of communicating with animals: know your subject.

He believes that dogs, while highly intelligent, also exist in a world of simplistic polarity: good or bad, like or dislike, and nothing in between.  Communicating with them, then, needs to mirror this thought process.  Where I had been saying, "Hey!  Grr, you better cut that out!  Do not take one more step!  Grr, no!  Bad!  Drop it!  Why do you hate me so???" now becomes a very simple, "No!" to stop the offending behavior, "Sit!" to reshift his focus, and an enthusiastic, "Goooooood boy!" to praise and affirm what I do want from him.

Grr does not need nuance, does not need inference.  Just two commands, two opposite ideas: positive, and negative.  Just, "No!" and "Goooooood boy!"

I've always considered myself to be a good communicator.  I was, after all, a psychology major with a focus on social psych, volunteered as a peer counselor in college, and even took a "Crucial Conversations" training at work that specialized in tackling sensitive subjects.  And all of those skills I acquired have worked pretty well with people, all of whom are complicated and nuanced and interpolative.  With people, the basic tenet of the 'know your subject' philosophy seems obvious--I would never talk to my boss in the same way I talk to my friends, or in the same way I talk to my mom.  So why, then, have I been treating Grr as if he was a person, insisting on communicating with him in the same way I do with Sam and expecting Grr to respond in kind?

I reached this epiphany late in the session.  Was it worth $600?  Well, I think I'll just have to find a way to convince myself, hopefully with a successfully trained pup as Exhibit A.