Emotional Regulation: The Missing Piece in Dog Training

Ever wondered why your perfectly planned training techniques sometimes fall flat, despite your best efforts? The missing piece might not be in your training toolkit at all. It could be your emotional state.

Max Seifert, certified dog behavior consultant and creator of the Connection Over Control approach, takes us deep into the fascinating world of emotional regulation in dog training. While traditional approaches focus heavily on operant conditioning and behavior modification, Max reveals how our nervous systems directly impact our dogs' ability to learn and respond. Drawing from attachment theory, affective neuroscience, and his own extensive case experience, Max demonstrates why the emotional connection between handler and dog often determines training success.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:02):
In this episode I chat with Max Seifert about one
of the most overlooked yetpowerful elements in dog
training, which is emotionalregulation.
We explore how both dogs andhumans experience dysregulation,
what it means to co-regulatewith our animals, and how
emotional awareness can reshapeour relationships and training

(00:23):
outcomes.
Max shares his personal journeyand offers practical strategies
for building safety, trust andresilience in both ends of the
leash, especially when workingthrough reactive or challenging
behavior.
Max is a certified dog behaviorconsultant, certified
professional dog trainer,certified behavior adjustment
training instructor and an AKCCanine Good Citizen evaluator.

(00:46):
He is the creator of thethree-step connection over
control approach and brings aunique blend of science, empathy
and experience to his helpworking with dogs with
behavioral challenges.
From his early roots in horsetraining and therapy dogs to his
current work in behaviorrehabilitation, max is committed
to fostering deep, meaningfulbonds between dogs and their

(01:09):
people.
And before we jump into today'sepisode, a quick heads up If
you're looking to learn moreabout helping dogs with
aggression issues, head on overto AggressiveDogcom, because
we've got something for everyone.
For pet pros, there's theAggression and Dogs Master
Course, which is the mostcomprehensive course available
on aggression anywhere in theworld, packed with experts,

(01:30):
insights and CEUs For dogguardians.
Check out Real Life Solutions,a practical course for everyday
challenges like leash reactivity, dog-to-dog aggression and
dog-to-human aggression, and ifyou want full access to expert
webinars, live mentor sessionsand exclusive discounts, the
Ultimate Access membership isjust $29.95 a month.

(01:51):
You'll also find info on the2025 Aggression and Dogs
Conference happening inCharlotte this September.
That's all at aggressivedogcom.
Check it out after the showdogcom.
Check it out after the show.
Hey, everyone, Welcome back tothe Biting Into the Dog.
This week we are talking aboutemotional regulation, which may

(02:13):
not be a term that many of youare familiar with, but I have
Max Seifert here, who has beenreally focusing on this topic
lately, especially in the workhe does with dogs.
So welcome to the show, Max.
Hey, thank you for having me.
I'm really excited to be here.
Yes, I'm really happy to bejumping into this conversation
because I think it's one that isnot talked about enough in the
dog world.

(02:33):
So you are here to explain someof this to us.
So let's define it for theaudience first, and then we'll
get into why you want to focuson this.

Speaker 2 (02:42):
Yeah.
So emotional regulation is lessof a state and more of a action
or a practice that you have ofreturning to baseline.
I like to put it in the contextof nervous system regulation.
So not just are you happy orare you sad, but are you really
worked up or are you calm.
The goal is generally to becoming down to a baseline where

(03:03):
you're aware of things, not shutdown, but you're calm about
them, you're able to process,you're able to think instead of
go straight to react.

Speaker 1 (03:11):
Good definition, very straightforward and easy to
understand that part.
So let's maybe think of acouple examples for both dogs
and people, because I thinksomebody just hearing that would
be like oh, I felt that waybefore, but what about like,
what does it look like in dogsand people?

Speaker 2 (03:28):
So in dogs I think it's a little bit harder to
define because we can't quiteask them.
You know, hey, what emotionsare you feeling right now?
But we can measure biologicaldata or we can look at certain
behaviors.
I like to look at how stiff arethey.
Do I see the stiffnessdecreasing if they're around a
trigger?
Am I seeing them disengage froma trigger and re-engage with
the world around them withinmaybe three to five seconds?
And of course that varies onthe dog and the situation.

(03:50):
But I want to see them noticingsomething and not going up the
ladder of excitement.
They're not going to stiffness,they're not going to growling
or barking, they're coming backdown.
Maybe they're going to go sniffsomething, even little
disengagements where they maybelook to the side or they look to
the handler.
And then, as far as people, Ithink there's probably a lot
more examples there.
Meditation is something thatpeople often do for emotional

(04:12):
regulation.
I think most therapies areprobably in some way developed
around emotional regulation.
But if we were to go furtherinto it, saying that you pick
apart a thought so you notice,you have a feeling, you notice
it comes from a thought,something makes you feel really
offended and then you go.
Well, why did that happen?
And then you realize that youknow, maybe that says more about
your beliefs on the subjectthan it does the situation.

(04:32):
You can pick those beliefsapart and then kind of let that
settle and sit with it.
That's probably broader thanyou wanted, but that's.
I think those are some examplesin terms of dogs and humans.

Speaker 1 (04:43):
Yes, and of course, the opposite is the
dysregulation which we'll getinto.
Yes, but tell us your storyabout this, like why did you get
into focusing on thisparticular aspect in the work
you do so much?

Speaker 2 (04:53):
Yeah.
So I got into this.
I'd been doing behavior casesfor a while, I'd been working
with dogs for a while and then Igot my own kind of behavior
case.
Her name is Gertrude.
She, the shelter, is like, oh,like, she's totally fine, nope,
comes home, tries to kill thecats, tries to attack her other
dog really bad separation andconfinement anxiety.
And I was sort of like, oh myGod, and I had, you know, the

(05:15):
technical skills to do it.
Right, I was already workingthose cases but I very quickly
realized I did not have theemotional bandwidth.
And then I realized like, ifsomebody who has the skills and
the background and supports thatI have and I'm struggling with
it, what the heck are my clientsdoing?
What are other people's clientsdoing?
And that led me down the lineof, well, how do we make
training sustainable?
And then more work in that.

(05:35):
And then I'm finishing a degreein psychology and those two
things I sort of put togetherand went the training part.
There's always a lot of greatinformation on, but how do we
help support the people inparticular?
From what I my own experiencesand talking with other
professionals, I think there's awealth of information around
training really fantasticinformation, but not as much

(05:56):
about how to make that doablefor people.
And to me the best way to makeit doable was to teach emotional
regulation skills to clientsfor certain.
And then there are alsotraining methods that kind of
promote that for the dog too.

Speaker 1 (06:08):
So what do you see in some of your clients when you
feel they're experiencingdysregulation, so they're
starting to.
You know they're experiencingsomething that you're
recognizing and then you helpthem through that process.
But maybe we can use someexamples to you know the client
that's out and about and theirdog has pulled them off their
feet and their dog's barking andlunging and they're just.
You know, both the dog and theperson are having a hard time.

(06:31):
So we could talk about the dogalso, of course, but we do that
a lot on the show, but let'sfocus on the client side and
what you might see where you'resaying all right, we need to
take a moment here.

Speaker 2 (06:40):
Yeah.
So that's sort of like in thatsituation where it's like
everything's out of control atthat point.
That's I almost feel likethat's besides the point, cause
it's like, well, all we can dois damage control at this point.
But once everybody's safe and Ido this sometimes for dogs too
but like having people pause anddo a body scan or just doing
like one of my favorites isasking people where their
attention is drawn to, you wantto be careful that you're not,

(07:03):
you know, making it a judgmentor anything, just literally like
hey, like where do you feeldrawn to right now?
What do you feel like you needto do?
Because that brings everybodyinto their body.
They sort of go oh, it's nolonger about the five things in
my brain, where are my eyes onright now, like that sort of
helps to ground them, and that'sa very easy grounding technique
for people who maybe don't feelcomfortable going into their
body yet.
Sometimes the five senses thingcan be too much or just feel

(07:26):
scary if you're not ready toconnect with your body.
But you know, just pointing outwhere the eyes are Prior to
that, like when I'm talking withsomebody in the house, or
things where it's not quite asescalated as that.
I might see sped up speech.
I might see a lot of likenervous energy type stuff, like
tapping their fingers or youknow their feet or whatever.
And to be clear, none of thatis like a bad thing.

(07:50):
Dysregulation is not a dirtyword, it's just okay, like
that's something we can payattention to.
If that's helping you cope,that's fantastic.
But it tells me that there'ssomething that needs to be coped
with and so maybe we managethat differently, maybe what
you're doing is totally fine,but it's kind of the same thing
I think we do in dogs.
It's kind of the same thing Ithink we do in dogs, where we
sort of note it.
We don't maybe do anythinginitially, but you want to watch
the distant antecedents, if youwill, the kind of precursor
signs.

Speaker 1 (08:10):
So yeah, I was just going to mention that it's very
similar to like what we'd see indogs before they go, you know,
way over threshold, as we wouldsay, a dog is doing when they're
barking and lunging.
So we see the subtle signs liplicks, you know, yawning some
stress signals, same thing forpeople.
And do you kind of find thatit's difficult to know when to

(08:32):
take a step back and steer themor talk to them about how
they're feeling?
At certain times maybe they'reshowing those.
You know I'm using air quoteshere.
Stress signals are the samething we'd see in dogs but we're
seeing in the human, like thetapping, the figures.
They're breathing a little moreheavy, they seem a little bit
more tense in their musculature.
Do you find that it's difficultto know when to do that?

(08:53):
Because maybe somebody is likethat a lot right During the
whole consult.

Speaker 2 (08:57):
Yeah, it's a good question.
I think it mostly comes down tohow comfortable they feel with
you and how you feel with them.
I only do in-home training,which I think helps, so people
already have kind of a familiarrelationship with me and I work
with them over long periods oftime.
So it doesn't feel at least inmost of the relationships I have
with clients it doesn't feellike overstepping to say hey,
like I'm noticing this about you.

(09:18):
I think they also see me do itwith the dogs, so it's, it feels
like less foreign that way,cause I have, like I'll just
point things out I'm like, oh, Inoticed this is happening and
so it's less jarring than likecoming out of nowhere and saying
that to them.
But you do want to time itcarefully.
But I think that also comes tonot having judgment about it.
Like I'm very careful not totry and say in a tone that's

(09:41):
like oh, you know, you need tostop that.
I just say oh.
In a tone that's like, oh, youknow you need to stop that.
I just say oh, like I'mnoticing that.
You know, you seem a little bitI don't want to say the word
agitated.
I try not to say stuff likethat, but you know, I'm noticing
that your breathing is comingup a little bit.
Is this something that'sstressing you out and asking it
genuinely, curiously and openly?
I don't want to shut downwhatever's happening.
I just want to ask them whatthey're thinking about it and
what they're feeling.

Speaker 1 (10:02):
Do you tie in the same language so like, let's say
, you're first helping themunderstand their dog and you see
, let's just say rapidrespiration on the dog and you
use keywords like you know.
I think your dog might beexperiencing a little stress
right now.
Do you use those same phrasesand words with the client so
they can feel connected withtheir dog, or is that work

(10:23):
against you sometimes?

Speaker 2 (10:25):
Oh, that's a good question.
I think it depends.
Again, most of the people Iwork with are pretty familiar,
so they don't mind it, but Ifeel like if I had clients who
really saw a divide betweenthemselves and their dogs, I
might have to be careful aboutnot phrasing things that way,
because that could come off asoffensive or judgmental.

Speaker 1 (10:40):
Yeah, yeah, I think it depends on what phrase we're
using.
Right, especially angry, wemight say, oh, their, you know,
pile erection is occurring, oryou know we see the muzzle

(11:06):
lifting or things like.

Speaker 2 (11:07):
We point out physical signs rather than assigning a
state or a moral value to those.

Speaker 1 (11:11):
Yeah, yeah, that's a good call.
So big part of this is theclient's going to feel a lot of
empathy from you when you startrecognizing how they're feeling,
cause they're probably alreadysaying well, this guy Max, he
really started to understand mydog because he's pointing out
and recognizing when my dog'suncomfortable.
I imagine it takes a littletime to build that trust in the
relationship with the clientwhere they're gonna be like you

(11:33):
can't go in there at the firstminute and be like you look
stressed.
You have to build that trustand a little bit of rapport or
relationship.
So do you find that happens ata certain stage or do you have
like little tips for that as yougo along?
Is it like the first fewminutes or is like after the
first consult or what's youraverage?

Speaker 2 (11:50):
Hmm, another good question.
I'm not sure I've tracked itthat closely.
If I were to think on it I'dsay maybe not until the second
or third session or so.
But it's not.
It's not so much intentional asit is.
I spend the first few sessionsreally kind of focusing on the
dog, because I have to startwhere people are comfortable and
I can't start with like, ohalso, I'm gonna do human therapy
because a I'm not qualified tobe, that's not what they thought
they were getting.
But starting with the dog side.

(12:10):
And then I might start tonotice there are little blocks
and like what the human is doing, like I might notice, okay, the
dog gets really excited whenyou come home and I think the
way that you're responding to itis maybe amplifying that.
So I start with modifying thehuman's behavior in a way that
isn't that doesn't feel as closeas emotional regulation, that
doesn't feel as personal.
And when they're sort of usedto me saying like here's
something you could change aboutyour behavior in a

(12:33):
nonjudgmental sort of you know,open, helpful way, once I have
that, it's a lot easier for meto say like, oh, like, I noticed
that this situation isstressful for you for X, y, z
whatever.
So this situation is stressfulfor you, for xyz, whatever.

Speaker 1 (12:45):
So, yeah, yeah, makes sense.
Now let's get into some of thescience of this, because I think
sometimes people hear thisthey're like oh, that's you know
what are you talking about.
They you know.
They feel like it's like likewoo right so yeah yeah, you get
that sometimes, I think,especially in the dog training
industry, and people that do alot of behavior consulting are
recognizing that, the sciencebehind this, and then bringing
it into the discussion much more, which is great.
Yeah, so there was a paper thatcame out last year looking at
behavior consulting, arerecognizing the science behind
this and bringing it into thediscussion much more, which is

(13:06):
great.
So there was a paper that cameout last year looking at how
much the person or caretakerimpacts the dog's behavior, and
not just through training andall the other environmental
factors, but through just theirown behavior, their own emotions
.
Yeah, talk us through whatyou've seen lately and some of
the developments from thescience side of things.

Speaker 2 (13:24):
Yeah, so okay, so there's a couple of research
papers that I think have beenkind of relevant to this and I
will say a lot of this is builtoff of um effect regulation
theory, which is pretty muchentirely in humans.
But I'm using what we knowabout co-regulation in humans
and then what we know about dogsunderstanding emotional state
and sort of combining the two.
But there was one I'm going toprobably butcher this name

(13:44):
Natalia Albuquerque et al, thatdogs can infer implicit
information from human emotionalexpressions.
That was in Animal Cognition in2021.
And essentially, theyunderstand what effect looks
like.
And when I say effect I meanlike, not necessarily the
emotional state, because wecan't quite constitute that dogs
understand what emotions are,at least in humans.
But we can say that theyunderstand facial expressions

(14:05):
and that they understand youknow what a raised voice or a
happy voice or whatever means.
But anyways, they understandwhat that effect looks like on
human features and they can usethat to decide who is safe to
approach.
So this was an experiment done.
Both groups were allowed toapproach the human after to,
like, get food, but the dogswatched one human be angry.
The experimental group did thecontrol group just watched a

(14:26):
neutral human and then they weregiven the choice to go get food
from either of those people,unless dogs would approach the
human who had been angry, eventhough the dog had not been in
the room when the human wasangry.
They just watched the human beangry.
Same human was in the room whenthey went to approach the food.
They didn't want to go to thatperson for food.
Very often there's also one fromthis I'm totally going to

(14:46):
butcher Brower J it's calledDogs Distinguish Authentic Human
Emotions Without beingEmpathetic, and that was also an
animal cognition.
So essentially they perceiveemotional differences in the
human emotion and they'll behavedifferently depending on that.
This was.
They were like training a dogto do some agility stuff and
interestingly, the dogs gazed upand jumped less often and were

(15:06):
less compliant with even the sitcommand when they were learning
a task from a sad owner.
So this isn't even about angerat this point.
This is just about like effectand like how they, how they feel
about it.
And then there was one measuringheart rate variability.
Again, we can't go to dogs andbe like, hey, what were you
feeling about this?
Because we just don't have thelanguage for that, but a lot of
times dysregulation is measuredin heart rate variability.

(15:28):
So this one is that thecharacteristics of dog owner and
the relationship, those allmodify the dog owner dyads.
So like when I say dyads I'mreferring to kind of like a
caretaking relationship or justa relationship between.
You know, usually inco-regulation theory we say this
between like human andcaretaker or like child and
caretaker.
That would be a dyad For us.

(15:48):
We're just going to call it dogowner dyads.
Anyways, the dog's heart ratevariability was predicted by
essentially the humans, thehuman's expression, the
relationship duration, all ofthis different stuff.
Conversely, for us our heartrate was the only predicting one
, for that was the dog's overallheart rate.
So that shows it more that dogsinfluence us versus us

(16:09):
influencing them.
But I think that's still kindof powerful data to have in
terms of what we're looking atfor co-regulation, that at least
it goes at least one way,potentially two.
It's just that for us affectingdog heart rates there's more
factors than just us.
There's just the emotional sideand then the ownership duration
.

Speaker 1 (16:28):
Yeah, I'm going to touch on co-regulation in just a
moment, but yeah, I was just.
I just had Chirag Patel on anepisode I recorded this week.
I think it'll you guys who arelistening in now.
It probably would have alreadycome out the episode, but we
were talking about HRV, ourheart rate variability and the
devices we wear, the whoopdevices.
We both noticed we're like oh,we're in the same thing.
It just tracks heart rates,heart rate variability.

(16:49):
Resting heart rate tracks yoursleep and all that stuff, and
we're like wouldn't it be socool if they had one of those
for dogs and then they can trackthe heart rate variability like
all the time?
And the app tells you how'syour dog feeling today.

Speaker 2 (16:59):
That would be cool, yeah.

Speaker 1 (17:00):
You know, should you go exercise, should you?
Did your dog have a bad day?
Because it tells me when I hada like you know, if I go out
with my friends the night beforeand I've had a few drinks or
something like that, then myheart rate availability is super
low, it's off like way off, andit tells you like you better
take it a little bit yesterdaybecause you haven't recovered
right it tells you your recovery.

(17:21):
So and sometimes you can be inthe red zone, like, oh, that's
for.
Like the times I'm like flyingto europe and super jet lagged
and maybe had a drink on theplane to help myself sleep, and
like now my thing's likescreaming at me, like, yeah,
don't even leave your bed today,you know.
But but yeah, I think thatimagine for for pet guardians,
like if they could know howtheir dog's feeling without
necessarily having to look somuch at body language in that

(17:43):
moment.
It's tracking data all day, allnight really 24-7.

Speaker 2 (17:47):
So, yeah, that and I think for you know, in terms of
research, just having proof,because we don't have a good way
to prove.
Otherwise we have, you know,colloquial stuff.
We're able to say like oh yeah,like this seems to work, but we
want proof.
Yeah, exactly, and oh yeah,like this seems to work, but we
want proof.

Speaker 1 (18:00):
Yeah, exactly, and it's.
I mean, think about the datathey can gather.
I mean people would have to optinto that, but you know, like
the whoop, you can opt into themgetting your data.
And now you have this hugesample size, right?
So if they did the same thingfor dogs.
They could get this huge samplesize of like what is it like
the dog's life and what are theyup to, can also track

(18:23):
activities in there, so workoutsin there, how much caffeine I
had, like all that stuff thatyou can put in there.
And it's just a great way, Ithink, for science to say dogs
need this or that right or needmore of this or that.
So okay, so co-regulation canyou just define that really
quickly for those that might notbe familiar with that term?

Speaker 2 (18:36):
Yeah, so it's essentially where the dyads that
I was talking about.
So, relationship betweenyourself and your dog, at least
in this context, that one of youcan regulate the other's
emotional state.
Now, usually in this contextwe're talking about the human
regulating the dog, because, inthis case, because the dog's
reactive or experiencingbehavior issues.
We do know that it works theother way.
I mean, that's why we havetherapy dogs, but in this

(18:59):
context it's really just aboutus being calm enough to match
our dog's state and then bringthem back to regulation In that
regard.

Speaker 1 (19:08):
How much do you see in your cases that being an
issue?
So take out all the typicalthings that we normally would
focus on, like somebodypunishing their dog, or the
overt stuff or the environmentimpacting the dog's behavior.
So in a black box right and youhave the animal and the dog and
the person.
I should say you know how muchare you seeing it?

(19:29):
Like if you're saying, okay,it's simply just what this
person is experiencing that isimpacting the dog's behavior
greatly or even to some extentwhere you need to address it.

Speaker 2 (19:39):
Honestly, I'd say that you could take that out to
saying all of it.
Really, even when we talk about, like somebody choosing to
punish the dog or something likethat, people make that decision
informed on a lot of things,but a lot of it is due to them
wanting to feel control over thesituation.
Or you know, oh, I have to fixthis because my landlord is
going to kick me out if I don'tLike.
It's a decision but it'sinformed by the emotional stress

(20:00):
.
I feel like that still comesdown to the emotional regulation
side of it as far as just theyou know, the owner being
stressed and then picking up onit.
I do think that happens a lot.
And I think it happens becauseI don't think there's any one
way to remove the emotional sideof it from what people actually
do, because that's it driveseverything, even if we're not
aware it does.
It drives everything even ifwe're not aware it does.

(20:23):
The book Effect RegulationTheory has some really
interesting stuff on this wherethey talk about kind of the
split between the right brain orthe intrinsic and the left
brain and the explicit and howyou know we may think we're
choosing something, but we'rechoosing it based on whatever
the right brain is sort offeeling and sending us Like we
think about gut feelings, butthose are still based on the
experiences we've had and theemotions and stuff that we're

(20:43):
feeling, which doesn't meanwe're doomed to repeat it.
It just means we have to settime aside to train ourselves to
do differently.

Speaker 1 (20:49):
Yeah, can you give us a maybe case example where
you've seen that?
And what you had to do tocommunicate the importance of
recognizing that no-transcript,great.

Speaker 2 (21:24):
But part of what we had to focus on for her was just
getting herself to a pointwhere she wasn't panicked about
even going outside, so like wedid all the other stuff.
And then we would say, okay,you know, maybe we're not ready
for a full body scan, but if youcan, like, shrug your shoulders
when you go outside, like as acue.
We essentially do a behaviorchain where the dog sits and
waits for the door Before yourelease them, you shrug your
shoulders and then you both walkout together.

(21:46):
And that led to like a quickchecking in with her body, like
when somebody's stressed they'renot going to be able to do a
full blown.
You know, head to toe, let'stake a breath, let's feel
everything, but they're probablycapable of just a little
shoulder shrug or maybe noticingwhere their eyes are, although
that's honestly kind of hardcompared to a shoulder shrug.
And over time what we started tosee is that she became calm

(22:06):
enough to do something, becausewe were making good progress.
And then what she told me islike I just froze, you know,
like she knew what to do, sheknew exactly what to do, but she
would just freeze, and sohaving that sort of brought us
out of that rut.
We were in, where we were likewell, this isn't a training
issue.
At this point, this has to comedown to you feeling like you're
able to do the action that youneed to do.

Speaker 1 (22:25):
So the things that you're talking about, we're
focusing on helping the client.
It's going to be helpful anyway.
So even if it wasn't impactingthe dog's behavior, it's still
the ethical, proper thing to dois recognizing when our clients
are uncomfortable or need sometime and helping them through
that as best we can with theagain, the credentials or
information we have.
So the dogs that are impacted bytheir human's emotions, so the

(22:50):
dysregulation is happeningbecause of the human.
How do you track when you'relooking at data Again, we use
that word a lot here but data orlike how do you know when it's
actually changing the dog'sbehavior because you've adjusted
how that human's feeling socause it could be a lot of other
factors of course we know, buthow do you recognize?
All right, this is helping thedog too, because now you're
feeling better in theseenvironments.
Do you have any like things youlook for?

Speaker 2 (23:13):
Yeah.
So admittedly I tend to onlyreally drill down on emotional
stuff, like I did in that case,if we're sort of at a crossroads
and it's not because I don't doit otherwise, it's because I
sort of sprinkle it in along theway in other cases.
But there are times, like inthat case, where we have to
really just focus on that,because everything else was kind
of dealt with.
It was just that piece.
So I guess that's part of it issaying like well, if nothing

(23:33):
else worked, then this did.
But the other piece I see isthat a lot of times and this is
not like me putting down patterngames or anything I think
they're super, super useful.
But a lot of times I can tellwhen a dog is looking for, like
specifically, just thereinforcement, like they're like
oh, this is the game, how do wedo this?
Versus looking to their humanfor support.
And usually what I'm seeingthere is that, like in a pattern

(23:54):
game, there's usually a prettyclear start and stop, like they
see a trigger and then they'rerewarded for it or, you know,
there's steps in between,there's a pretty clear framework
to it versus when I'm seeing itsort of develop more naturally
alongside the emotionalregulation.
The dogs seem to look a littlebit more open.
They seem maybe a little bitless frustrated, a little bit
less expectant, a little bitmore okay, what are we doing now
?
How are we doing this?

(24:14):
Like, you can almost see themsort of sigh and look to their
owner and be like, okay, whatnow?
Or they'll look to their ownerfor input.
I think giving choice is reallyimportant there too, which is
another like facet of this,where you, you know, give them
options to say what they need tosay, like if you're going to
cross a road or something, youwait for them to say like, okay,
do I want to go right or left,kind of by where they're looking
?
Not that that's safe orpossible every time, but when it

(24:36):
is things like that.

Speaker 1 (24:43):
You know, we're talking about how the dog's
behavior and their emotionsmight be impacted by the human
not always, but might be.
But we're not talkingnecessarily about the observable
behaviors of the human.
Yet We'll get there.
But like, let's say, it'ssomething we mentioned, the
dog's recognizing the facialexpressions, and so we could
break it down in ABC contingencyright, say, okay, client, does
this particular face is the, youknow, the antecedent that a

(25:04):
particular outcome happens?
So the dog might be justresponding to that.
But you know, we know that it'smuch deeper than that.
So we could look at it that way.
But then you also have theconnection side, you know.
So, you, we talk about therelationship between the client,
the dog, the connection, thebond, and of course that
influences behavior too.
So how much do you focus onsaying, okay, we're missing a

(25:26):
connection here, there's abroken bond, a broken
relationship, or it's becausethere's a great relationship
there but the client's feelinganxious or nervous?
in this situation, experiencingstress, dysregulation.
Now I hope that makes sense,because I'm sort of really
diving deep here into my ownbrain.
But, thinking again and whatyou would do once you start

(25:47):
recognizing, be like oh, thisrelationship's great or this
relationship's terrible becausethe client's afraid of their dog
or something like that, but thedog's still recognizing.
You know the emotions of theclient.
It's really impacting theirbehavior.
So you know you need to fix therelationship too.
How much do you get into thataspect?

Speaker 2 (26:03):
I think on one hand I'm going back to the answer
that it's never really thatseparable, because I think a lot
of the you know bad I say inair quotes relationships that I
see are effective dysregulationon one or both sides.
So, like the dog's reactive,you can call that dysregulation
and that's going to cause somestress and that might cause, you
know, the client being afraidof the dog, for example.

(26:23):
But as far as, like, if I'munderstanding the question
correctly, the relationship,they're both kind of
co-regulating Okay, but thehuman is still going into kind
of an anxious state.

Speaker 1 (26:31):
Is that the framework ?
Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 2 (26:33):
Okay, yeah, I think I mean honestly, I don't think
I've ever had that happen,specifically because I don't.
The relationship may be greaton the surface level, Like you
know, their needs are met, likethey enjoy time out together,
but and this is my owndefinition but I think that if a
relationship is going to begood, it has to be built on co
-regulation as well, or it hasto have the capacity for it.

(26:53):
Not that you have to beco-regulating all the time,
that's kind of exhausting but inthe sense of you both trust
each other enough to to look toeach other for things.
So it is a very broad way ofsaying that I don't.
I don't know that they're everfully separable.
I don't know that.
I've run into that specifically.

Speaker 1 (27:08):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (27:08):
I will say that when people are really afraid, then
or you know where things arelike so severely off the rails.
The first thing we're startingwith, anyways, is management to
get them to feel safe enough.
Like, safety is a huge part ofco-regulation.
You can't, you can't get thereif you don't feel safe and, more
than that, even if you knowyou're safe, you can't get there
until your body feels safe.
So it's like a there's noseparating them.
I don't think.

Speaker 1 (27:28):
Yes.
So those two words, you know,safety and trust are the
foundation of what we need to do, especially in aggression cases
that we're working right.
So, yeah, yeah, I love wherethis is going.
I think we should talk aboutthe dog side in just a moment,
but we're going to take a quickbreak to hear a word from our
sponsors and we'll be right back.
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All right, we're back here withMax Seifert and we've been
talking about emotionalregulation, dysregulation, as

(29:20):
well as the client side ofthings.
Now let's focus a little bit onthe dog side, because I think
that'll also help the trainersand behavior pros that are
listening right now kind ofthinking about the human side
when they're talking about thedog.
So a lot of us know aboutthings we can do to help dogs,
right, so we look at getting thedog out of the environment,
good management distance.
You know all the things that wedo to help the dog first feel

(29:47):
safe.
Talk us through some of thethings we do after we notice the
dog's still in a high state ofstress or arousal.
Or you know we're seeing thesigns, the body language and
behaviors, because that's how weobserve these changes in dogs.
But you know, talk us throughwhen you're starting to see that
and you see a pattern of thator you see that the dog's
struggling, resiliency issues,that kind of thing.
What do you like to do withdogs, especially thinking
through what you've learned onthe human side.

Speaker 2 (30:08):
Yeah, I like to take it out of context.
So if I know that they'restruggling, I like to call it
emotional fitness.
But I think resiliency is afitting term too in terms of
their ability to bounce backfrom things.
I take it out of context.
So animal-centered education,free work, can be a really good
choice to improve resiliency,because you're introducing novel
stuff, hopefully at a lowthreshold, but you're
introducing a bunch of noveltextures, sounds, objects for

(30:32):
them to navigate on their own,which tends to improve
confidence.
And then low-level stressorslike that.
You expose them.
They deal with it well.
Great.
We're building confidence Ontothe side where we're maybe
seeing specifically over arousal, like we're seeing.
You know this doesn't just gofor reactivity, but like excited
dogs do where they're like allthe time, all the time, like
young sporting breeds or stufflike that.

(30:52):
I really like to do relaxationtype protocols, so things like
not always care in overalls.
I think it's fantastic, but Ithink it's a little bit better
for desensitization than it isfor truly teaching them to be
calm, at least in dogs that aresmart enough to understand that
there's a game.
Some of them get really good atknowing like, oh, you take four
steps away and then I get atreat and then they're in this
anticipatory and they physicallylook calm but they're not

(31:13):
mentally settled, like they'remaybe laying down, but you can
see that they're getting readyto get up pretty quickly, the
frustrations building.
So I like Karen overalls alittle bit more for kind of
handling that and then, oncethey have that sort of down pat,
or you can do like a take abreath protocol or even doing
like T touch, like that sort ofthing where we're doing these
sort of calming exercises, maybepairing it with like a lavender

(31:34):
scented mat or somethinggetting them a little bit
excited.
So you know, play fetch for alittle bit, nothing super
intense, but getting them alittle bit excited.
Cueing the calm, you know,making sure they're entirely
calm.
That's very important.
You don't want to let themleave this exercise before
they're like, fully calm, almostto the point of, you know,
being ready to go to sleep.
And then pairing that.
You know, maybe day two you'regoing to do a little bit more

(31:54):
excitement and then calm themdown.
If they can come up and downthat ladder of arousal, that's
great, and then you might do acouple of reps.
You want to be really, reallycareful because they need to be
coming back down to baseline.
I cannot stress that enough.
This doesn't work if you don'tdo that.
But really essentiallypracticing the rehearsal of high
arousal to low arousal andgetting that fluent before we go
.
Put that back in context.

Speaker 1 (32:15):
Interesting.
So you're in some senses wherewhen we talk about arousal right
, we're helping the dog regulatethat or get that cognitive
decision-making process honed inat high levels of arousal,
which we know that at too highlevels of arousal those
cognitive processes can beimpaired.
So it's interesting that you'relooking at it in that aspect.

(32:35):
Do you find, if we're nottalking about arousal, other
exercises like you mentioned,nose work or dog sniffing?
In the beginning of the episode.

Speaker 2 (32:43):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (32:43):
So other activities do you find those can be helpful
in moments where you'rerecognizing signs that the dog
was dysregulated and then yousay, okay, we need to take a
break or we need to take a stepback because I can see some
things going on here.
What activities do you do inthose like posts over threshold
moments?

Speaker 2 (33:01):
Yeah, just doing a treat scatter can be a good one
if you have the space for it.
I do like doing up-down games.
Like I said, I don't knockpattern games, I use them, so I
think that can be a good one.
Some dogs do better withstructure, some do worse with it
.
Kind of just depends on the dog.
So if it's a dog who reallywants structure, doing more of
an up-down thing, if it's a dogwho's sort of like you know, I
really want to do this on my own, like livestock guardian types,

(33:23):
you know dogs that are likethat, letting them, where it's
safe, pick what they want to do.
So if they want to go sniffsomething, okay, cool, we'll go
sniff something, kind ofwatching what benefits them best
.

Speaker 1 (33:34):
Real quick for the audience that may not be
familiar with up-down.
Can you just yeah?

Speaker 2 (33:38):
So after a trigger, you might initially cue the dog
to look at you, but that's theonly time you'll do it.
You mark when the dog looks atyou.
You drop a treat down at yourfeet, you just rinse and repeat
that.
Some dogs are going to bereally fluent about looking back
, and that's.
I also use it as a datagathering exercise, like if
they're really good at lookingback to me I'm like of time or

(34:00):
if they're, you know, maybegetting the treat, and then they
pick up a scent and they reallywant to go run with it, then
maybe that tells me okay, thisis no longer beneficial for you.
You would benefit more fromdoing XYZ thing.
I hope that's helpful.
Yeah, perfect.

Speaker 1 (34:12):
Perfect.
So let's think about a casescenario here, because I think
it'll be helpful to put it intopractice in a sense.
I'll throw a little challengingcase scenario.
Let's say you have a clientthat's very much in the mindset
of sit down, stay come walknicely like that, like
everything's training andeverything's sort of operant in
their mind in terms of how weget a behavior change in a dog.

(34:34):
So like a dog that's showingaggression or on leash, should
be walking nicely next to me orheel position, sit, stay, that
kind of mindset of training.
And they have, let's say, likeme when I was younger, very
little EQ.
So the emotional intelligencerecognizing when either an
animal or another human ishaving a hard time is very

(34:56):
difficult for them to see.
So where do you start in that,especially when you see that
there's a significant issue youhave to address it, be like
listen, you guys are having ahard time here.
It's not about teaching you todo a dog to sit or you to hold
the leash properly.
It is about you feeling safer,feeling better here.
And then you start talkingabout that.
They're like ah, you know, likewhat are you talking about?

(35:17):
Like I want to, how to sit,where's the treat or where's the
whatever training method theymight be using.
But like, how do you get intothat conversation with them?

Speaker 2 (35:23):
Yeah.
So, especially if they comefrom that obedience background,
sometimes it can be worthwhilepointing out like okay, well,
you're using that right nowbecause you know how to use it
and it didn't work.

(36:00):
no-transcript can say okay, well, you know, maybe it doesn't
work because you know, maybethis dog is whatever, who knows,
we don't have that caseinformation right now, but they
have this as the background andso then we're able to say you
know, that might've worked onthose dogs, but this is why it

(36:22):
might not work as well for thisdog.
And then moving into what Iknow from it, which is that
let's say it's frustration basedor whatever, if we know the dog
is frustrated, putting more andmore and more control on it is
not necessarily going to makethem less frustrated.
It will help them think aboutit, but it will not help them to
process the emotions.
A lot of times I like to sayit's like giving your kid math
homework and what they reallyneed is like a timeout to go

(36:43):
calm down.
Like, yeah, the math homeworkwill keep them busy, it'll keep
them from getting into trouble,but it won't deal with the fact
that their head is on fire rightnow.
Like that, that's a separatething.
So phrasing it as sort of likeit's a distraction versus
dealing with the real thing.
And then is there a specificmoment where you're thinking
like, like in real life, or isthis just like a kind of
theoretical how you would handleit Like a theoretical case?

Speaker 1 (37:05):
Yeah, yeah, Kind of just yeah.

Speaker 2 (37:07):
Because I was trying to think like well, if we're
talking like, let's say, we'rein a behavior modification
session and this happens like inthe middle of something like
that's that I could give a moreconcrete example on, but I was
curious if that was where youwere going with it or if it was
not going that way.

Speaker 1 (37:19):
Yeah Well, it could happen Like, let's say, it did
happen during a session.
You know and you find out likewhoa, this really we really need
to address this, because I canteach you all the fancy tricks
of the world you know and teachyou the mechanics and how to
reinforce and all that.
But if you don't address therecognition, I guess helping the
client recognize that yeah.

Speaker 2 (37:37):
Yeah, I think what I said already sort of covers it.
And then phrasing is like well,if you want to try something
new cause you know why not we'rehere, starting with like like,
especially people like that Ilike to start them on sort of
pattern game type stuff likeengage, disengage, Cause it's
very easy to grasp and it sortof fits in there.
Yeah, they're sort of opera andunderstanding of behaviors.
So that doesn't feel.
That's like dipping the toes inthe water versus if I were to

(37:58):
just throw them straight into.
We're going to do behavioradjustment training.
Now they're going to be like no, what is that?
We're not doing that becausethey don't feel comfortable
enough with that concept ofregulation.
So I can start to sprinkle inlike, oh, you see, like now when
the dog looks deeper territory,but we're doing it at a pace

(38:19):
that they're comfortable with interms of like handling things
like that where it's kind of abig conflict, holding to both
yes, you need to have empathyand ask why, and then also
holding to your own, like youhired me as a professional.
This is the background on whyand, as best you can, trying not
to sound.
You know, setting a boundarydoesn't have to be conflict.
It just has to be.
Here's what I'm doing.
If you don't want to do it,that's fine, but I'm here, so we

(38:41):
might as well.

Speaker 1 (38:42):
I think much boils down to the client's
understanding why you'd betelling them to do something
Like.
What's the point of you tellingme this?
I think that's really helpfuland on that note, I kind of
would love to hear your opinionon.
You know, in the dog trainingindustry we're talking about
things like connection-basedapproaches right.
And it's becoming more talkedabout, which is great because
it's looking at a different lensof how we can help dogs and

(39:05):
their people.
You know, we've seen a shift,and maybe you're too young to
even I don't think you were evenborn yet when we started
talking about some of this, butyeah, I mean, we saw obviously
the history of dog training, thedog training industry was very
heavy punishment-based to startwith, compulsion-based, and then

(39:26):
we started to see things likepositive reinforcement come into
the picture with Karen Pryor,gene Donaldson and so many
others talking aboutreinforcement training.
And then again it got veryheavily operant-based.
So people were like, oh, it'sSkinner, the ABCs operant based.
So people were like art,skinner, the abcs observable
behaviors stop labeling thingsright.
So we saw a significant shifttowards that.
Oh yeah, I think good things.
And you know a large part ofthe industry is still focusing

(39:49):
on that.
You know the four quadrants andtalk that's when we have
discussions about behavior.
We look at that.
But then, with connection-basedapproaches, it's really looking
at a whole different lens whenyou think about it.
I mean, of course we're notjust throwing operant
conditioning out with the baby,as they say.
But you have a lot of differentsciences involved, like
effective neuroscience we couldtalk about that but do you find

(40:11):
that there's pushback on that,because it's always difficult
for some new concept to comeinto the industry and you get
pushed back like no, how do youreally know what a dog's feeling
?
Or how do you really know if ahuman's just right, like you get
questions from the approachesof very operant or you know
observable behaviors orbehaviorism right.

(40:32):
So any thoughts on that andmaybe even conversations you've
had on social media or elsewhere, yeah, I initially thought you
were going to ask about clients.

Speaker 2 (40:40):
But yes, too, with other professionals.
Some of them are my closefriends and so it's pretty easy
for us to just say like, oh,like, let's talk about it more
and we'll, we'll figure it out.
And I've learned things fromthem where I was like, oh yeah,
you know what?
That's a good point, I hadn'tconsidered that.
But then when there's moreconflict, it's tricky, like
because they have very goodreason to, to really be firmly
rooted in the operant approachbecause it does work.
I'm not going to sit here andsay it doesn't, like I said I

(41:02):
absolutely use those.
They're very, very good.
I think a lot of the pushbackcomes from, you know, based on
conversations I've had, thinkingit'll take too long, or
thinking the clients won'tunderstand, or thinking that,
sure, it's effective.
But you know, the operanttraining is still going to be
doing the heavy lifting, whichmight also be true, but I think,
remaining as open as we can toconversations, which is, it's

(41:24):
very Broadway, saying it youknow, be open to words.
These current times, I thinkyeah, yeah, but challenge, yeah,
but I mean, yeah, legitimatelyit kind of is.
And I see that a lot Certaingroups on Facebook where I'm
just like that is I don't knowthat I would have approached it
that way.
There's like a lot of thethings that I take issue with
mostly are where there's shamearound it, where it's like oh,

(41:46):
if you're not doing this, thenyou are assigned moral value of
like bad or you know whatever.
And that really frustrates mebecause it's like, well, people
make the actions that they knowhow to make and that doesn't
make their actions right.
And that doesn't not say it'san excuse, but like we can't sit
here and say that you knowyou're bad or whatever, because
that's not going to help.
If you really want to help thedogs, then why don't we help

(42:06):
with helping people figure outwhy they made that choice in the
first place?
Yeah, getting a little bit onthe soapbox, but yeah, yeah, no,
I completely agree.

Speaker 1 (42:15):
It's hard for people sometimes, especially on social
media, to look at other methodsor approaches, or when we're so
firmly rooted in our beliefsystems and what we're doing,
what has worked for us andthings like that, totally
understandable.
You know we're all goingthrough those journeys and our
own training, development right,and what we do for behavior
change.
So yeah, so you know Imentioned effective neuroscience

(42:40):
.
Do other sciences or lensesinform?
Connection-based and thingslike we've been talking about.

Speaker 2 (42:43):
Yeah, for me personally I have really liked
effect regulation theory, whichcomes a little bit out of like.
If you've ever heard the bookthe Body Keeps the Score, daniel
Hill, alan Shore and Bessel vander Kolk, they sort of they
started to have this theory oflike okay, trauma stuff can't
just be handled with dialectalbehavior therapy and cognitive

(43:03):
behavior therapy.
There is something that we'remissing.
Alan Shore and Daniel sort oftook that to the side and said
let's look at like attachmenttheory essentially, and that's
where clinical regulation oreffect regulation theory sort of
comes out.
But the somatic stuff, or maybeyou've heard of like polyvagal
therapy or like bottom-up ortop-down approaches, that sort
of came from the scienceshifting and saying like well,
we can't deny trauma victimsthat these things happened, so

(43:26):
we can't just say that thosefears aren't founded because
they are.
But what can we do to help themfeel safe anyways?
So that's part of it.
And then going into kind of thecounseling side too.
Going into kind of thecounseling side too Personally,
even though I'm not religiouslyBuddhist, I think also the
concept of metta, which is likeloving, kindness type meditation
, where you purposely seek outloving all of the things that
are difficult in yourself and inothers, because the thing is

(43:48):
that if you can't do it yourself, you can have a really hard
time doing it for others.
But that's sort of all loving,all understanding, and that's
not to say again that we'reexcusing things, but that you
can sit with it and say, likethis is uncomfortable.
I can understand why it'suncomfortable and I can still
choose to see the good in thesituation or I can still choose
to have empathy for you even ifI don't agree with whatever it

(44:11):
is.

Speaker 1 (44:12):
Yeah, I'm digesting everything you're saying in a
good way.
Yes, and can we back up toattachment theory?
Yes, if you could just quicklyexplain what that?
Is and why it's important.

Speaker 2 (44:24):
Yeah, so in the lens of co-regulation theory,
attachment theory is essentiallythis idea that different types
of attachment you may have heardlike insecure, secure.
There are three different typesof insecure.
There is avoidant, hyperfixatedand disorganized.
So avoidant is the ones thatare purposely not seeking
anything out because they don'tget anything good from it.

(44:44):
The hyperfocus, or thehyperfixated, I should say, is
generally what we think of asanxious attachment.
So it's the like you know youdon't want to be apart from
whatever attachment figure youhave, Like that's where you get
your security from.
And then there is disorganized,which is that safety cannot be
found on either side and soyou're sort of bouncing between
them.
It's basically the idea thatdifferent attachment styles lend

(45:06):
to different outcomes in theadult.
So whether that is differentmental disorders, whether that
is job outcomes, salary outcomes, whatever.
But there's a reallyinteresting study.
It was called the StrangeSituation because I want to say
it was Mary Strange who came upwith it.
But they put these kids withdifferent attachment styles in
with a stranger and theymeasured how long it took them

(45:26):
to come back down to regulationand how open they were to
exploring once their caregiverleft the room.
And it was just them and thestranger and that was really
telling as far as what they didand how quickly they would
regulate, and that was sort ofwhere they started to organize
attachment styles from.

Speaker 1 (45:41):
And how does that play into dogs?
So between the human and thedog.

Speaker 2 (45:46):
Yeah.
So this is going out on a limbbecause we do not have this sort
of scientific evidence withdogs and I will absolutely
acknowledge that I don't thinkwe can draw one-to-one with you
know this dog is avoidant orinsecure or whatever.
But I do think we can say, youknow, this dog is more likely to
solve issues on their own.
This dog is really likedependent on their owner to fix
things for them and neither ofthose might be functional.
I mean livestock guardian dogfixing problems on their own is

(46:08):
functional.
Sure, until it comes to, youknow, maybe biting people who
come in the house because theythink that's their job.
Like there's different levelsof function there.
But in terms of seeing it likeI just use the attachment theory
as a base to say like okay,that's sort of how we understand
co-regulation theory is in thelens of attachment theories.
That's kind of why it has to bethere.
I think to going a little bitdeeper and perhaps above my pay

(46:29):
grades.
Like you know, you're not atherapist, you can't go out and
just maybe you are if you'relistening to this, I don't know,
but you can't go out here andjust overstep it.
But if you know, I'm noticingmy client maybe has like really
wants to fix things before theylet the dog practice it on their
own.
Maybe that's indicative of likeanxious attachment style type
stuff.
And there are certain things youcan use as far as like again,

(46:50):
be careful not to overstep thebounds but like drawing
attention to it, not by saying,oh, I think you're anxiously
attached, but like, hey, Inoticed you really want to.
You know, step in here to fixthis.
Some people you will haveenough of a relationship with
where you can maybe ask themwhere that comes from, like if
it comes from like, oh, theyfeel like they need to control
it because the situation doesn'tfeel safe.
Sometimes people just sayingthat and getting into the why
and saying it out loud tosomebody they trust is enough

(47:10):
for them to kind of let go of it.
For other people it's somethingthey'll be working on that
we're not really qualified tohelp them with.
But being the safe space thatthey can express those things to
, it sounds so unrelated becauseit's like well, this is the
client's issue and yeah, sure,but if it affects the dog and we
can help them, then you know.

Speaker 1 (47:26):
Absolutely.
I think it's so important forus to recognize when there's a
variable in the case that'sreally impacting the dog's
behavior beyond what we cantypically control ourselves as
trainers or put suggestions inthat are more straightforward,
like use a baby gate here ordon't let your dog that close to
that thing.
Those are what we typicallythink of.
But what if, you know again,the client's having such a

(47:49):
profound impact on the case?
And it's a tricky area because,similar to meds, for instance,
or medical issues, right, we seea dog that's their gate is off
and we as trainers with anobservant eye can say, okay,
there's probably a case thatneeds to go to the vet.
Or we recognize the dog'shaving a tough time in a city
environment.
So we suspect behavior medsmight be an option for that dog.

(48:10):
As trainers and consultants wecan't say you know, go get your
dog on Prozac 40 milligrams, youknow that kind of that would be
way overstepping our bounds.
Prozac 40 milligrams, you knowthat kind of that would be way
overstepping our bounds.
And similarly we have to becareful how we talk to our
clients and using diagnosticlanguage or making suggestions
in any particular way.
That's stepping over that line.
What do you suggest for thetrainers and consultants?

(48:30):
Listening in now to, first ofall, resources, like it's not
always something that we thinkabout.
We think about veterinarians,we have our resources, we know
vets and vet behaviors, but thehuman side we often don't know
where to start.
Like you know a lot of thingslike well, I don't know where to
get help for this or to suggestthe client, or even if I can
suggest for the client to toseek help or explore further.

(48:51):
So what are your thoughts there?

Speaker 2 (48:53):
I like to suggest books because I think that
suggesting you know therapistsor things like that like sure
great, except you know they takethe client's insurance, they
get along like that's too muchinformation I don't know and
that, frankly, I don't want toknow.
But the books, as far as, likethe body keeps the score, can be
really useful if they're nerds,like they really really like
deep, difficult to digest texts.
The clinical effect regulationtheory handbook, which is a lot

(49:17):
of what I studied and got a lotof this from.
Stuff like that or even justlooking at like sometimes this
is less of a resource and moreof an exercise, but like body
scan type exercises or thingslike that.
If they like journaling,sometimes doing this is a little
bit cliche and I'm going toacknowledge that as I say it.
But shadow work type stuff, Idon't know that I agree with the
name of it, but the idea islike you are supposed to go

(49:38):
through these prompts tounderstand what drove you to do
certain things or how you feelsafe, and I think the name is a
little bit cliche, but I dothink it has value in terms of
like well, I can't guide youthrough this, but here is a.
You know, some prompts or aworkbook or something that might
help you to guide yourselfthrough some of this, and maybe
at the end of that they decidethat they want to go seek out
stuff on their own.
What?

Speaker 1 (49:59):
does that kind of look like?
Shadow work, if you can kind ofdive a little bit more into
that.
It sounds interesting.

Speaker 2 (50:03):
It really is.
Just I feel like this is so mygeneration.
So I apologize if it soundslike absolutely weird to the
rest of you, but it'sessentially down to literally
like there's some prompts that Iput together for my clients
that are like where do you feelthe most safe with your dog?
Or when you were growing up,what was your relationship with
your family dog like, if you hadone?
What did you understand aboutdiscipline when you were growing

(50:25):
up?
What does you know?
If your family dog misbehaved,what happened immediately
following?
Because I think a lot of ushave stories where, like you
know, the dog barked too loudand dad got really angry and ran
after them and that, as scaryas it was for the dog, was also
certainly scary for the smallchildren in the house who maybe
experienced that behavior beforeto them and are now realizing
like, oh, this is, you know,applied here.

(50:45):
So it's stuff we don't think isrelated.
But if you go back and we'relooking at like emotional
regulation and kind of thattrauma side of it, that, oh well
, of course that's going tospark our dysregulation because
we see this happen in the dogand even though we're now adults
, we're remembering, or ourbodies may be remembering this
feeling of fear.

Speaker 1 (51:03):
So it's kind of designed to get their thought
process, in the sense of you'reasking questions as cues to get
them thinking about certainthings.
Yeah, that's a good way ofputting it Interesting,
interesting, so fascinating, andI can see how it could be such
a useful tool without accusingor pointing fingers, avoiding
the hurtful comments that can beelicited if we say the wrong

(51:24):
thing.
So I think that I imagine thatrequires some practice too.
Want to ask you this face toface.

Speaker 2 (51:29):
It's not something I want to do, at least not if I'm
not really close with them.
But most of my clients like Idon't know that I'd feel
comfortable doing that and Idon't know that they would.
But being able to say like, hey, here's some things that you
know other clients have foundhelpful, that I even found
helpful, maybe you'll get someuse out of it.

Speaker 1 (51:52):
Yeah, message for the audience.
Here you know, after ourwonderful conversation.
What would it be?
What would you love to have outin the world?

Speaker 2 (52:00):
As cliche as this is, I would just say empathy.
You cannot get anywhere, I think, with any of this if you do not
have empathy.
And I'm not saying empathy islike a as a feeling, so much as
it is a practice, which is thatyou look for the good or you
look for why somebody did that,even if you don't agree with it.
And I say that because I know somany of us got into this field
for the dogs.

(52:20):
We love dogs, right, but thehumans are part of it.
There's no going away about anyof that.
So when we want to help them,being able to not look away from
the things they do that maybemake us uncomfortable, like if
you see, you know, if you'revery force-free and you see
somebody using, you know, aprong collar, we might initially

(52:42):
want to rush to judge orsomething like that, and you may
still have that feeling.
That feeling may not go away,but you can modify what you do
with it.
And that, I think, becomesreally important, because if you
come at it with conflict,they're going to feel conflicted
too.
And now we're not movingtowards fixing anything, we're
just getting stuck in our youknow, you're right, I'm wrong
type stuff, yeah, or theopposite.

Speaker 1 (52:56):
I should say yeah, yeah, well said, well said.
Max, where can people find youif they want to learn more about
you?

Speaker 2 (53:02):
Yeah, so I have Rosie's Tail Training, which I'm
sure there will be a link to,but it's spelled tail like dog
tail.
I offer in-person services inmost of the DMV area so I'm
based in Frederick, but DC,northern Virginia, those areas
and then online or virtualservices through both.
The community that I have whereI post kind of dog training
videos, do some.
Actually it's a whole workbookI take people through.

(53:24):
That kind of goes through thisprocess as well as actual
behavior modification and haslike weekly Q and A's.
That's called Connection OverControl.
I'm sure there'll be a link tothat too.
But those are probably the twobest places to find me.
And then you can always followme on Facebook too.

Speaker 1 (53:37):
All right, fantastic, and I will be sure to include
all those links in the shownotes.
Max, thank you so much.
This has been wonderful and I'mlooking forward to seeing you
again in the future.

Speaker 2 (53:47):
Thank you have a great day.

Speaker 1 (53:49):
I really appreciated the chance to sit down with Max
and explore the emotional sideof dog training, which is
something we often overlook inthe rush to fix behavior.
Max's compassionate, thoughtfulapproach is a great reminder
that emotional safety andconnection are at the heart of
meaningful change for both dogsand their people.

(54:11):
His insights on co-regulation,resilience and human-dog
dynamics offer valuable toolsfor anyone navigating complex
behavior issues.
And if you're ready to godeeper into understanding and
helping dogs with aggression,visit AggressiveDogcom.
Whether you're a professionalor a dedicated dog guardian,
you'll find everything from theAggression in Dogs Master Course

(54:34):
, which is the mostcomprehensive program of its
kind, to expert-led webinars,informative articles and the
Aggression and Dogs Conferencehappening from September 26th
through 28th 2025 in Charlotte,north Carolina, with both
in-person and virtual options.
And don't forget to check outour Help for Dogs with
Aggression bonus episodes, whichare solo shows where I walk you

(54:57):
through real world strategiesfor issues like resource
guarding, fear-based aggression,territorial behavior and more.
Just hit, subscribe or head tothe show notes for more info.
Thanks for listening in and, asalways, stay well, my friends.
Bye.