I’ve tried EVERYTHING to tame my dog's prey drive
I’ve been working on an upgrade to my website. Not an exciting “Wow – look at my amazing new website” upgrade. Oh no. This has been an invisible upgrade to a newer version of the framework so that it will continue to work well behind the scenes.
Anyway – it’s been hard going. It has taken way longer than I thought it would. It has included at least two days where I reached the stage of I.T. development that I call:
I’ve tried EVERYTHING – this is IMPOSSIBLE
Now, I’ve been doing this stuff for a really long time and have worked through that stage many, many times. I know that what I need is a break. That’s what I did each time. I took a break, did something else and then when I went back to it, I’d had a new idea. I kept working and in the end, my website upgrade was finished successfully.
Dog training is also an activity where it is easy to reach the I’ve tried EVERYTHING – this is IMPOSSIBLE stage.
Things are a little more complex with dogs because they are not at all like computers. Computers have no feelings at all. Computer programmers have two choices. They either learn how to experience feeling like they’ve hit an impossible problem – and then work through that stage OR they find a new career.
With dogs, it is not uncommon for the the I’ve tried EVERYTHING – this is IMPOSSIBLE stage to become a major blocker. It is the reason for some dogs being rehomed, it is the reason for some people just sucking it up and learning to live with their dog’s difficult behaviour and it is often the reason that aversive experiences are introduced into training.
Here’s the thing, though. There is always something new you can do. It might be that you need to be persistent with whatever training you are doing. If you are working with a trainer you like and are using training methods that you are comfortable with and you are seeing some progress – then more time might be all that you need.
It might be that what you need is to find a new approach or a new idea to just tweak what you’re doing a little. These days, that is so easy to do. You can do it without even leaving your house. So many dog trainers work online these days and you can get truly high quality learning – and support – without much effort at all.
I always recommend learning from more than one expert. Everything complex I’ve managed to learn has come from more than one expert. So don’t feel stuck because you and your trainer have run out of ideas, reach out to somebody new and find some fresh ideas. If you want to know if I can help, email me on tracey@bestdoglearningandstuff.co.uk and let me know where you’re stuck.
I promise that you would die of old age long before you’d tried EVERYTHING when it comes to training dogs.
