Inside a Dog's Mind: Love and Fear, Part 6

Continued...

Now, this takes us to our next step: it’s established that our pooch has us well-trained by keeping our emotions in check and has us paying attention to him like a child who constantly craves all their parents' attention. It’s time to go forward and teach Pooch how to work. 

Having been around working dogs since I was eight years old, I must say I’ve seen it all.  There are lots of dog training experts floating around online that swear by treating your dog like an underling in a wolf pack as the way to train. 

In this scenario, you become the Alpha in the pack, but little do these experts know that in real wolves, it is the females who are always dominant.

Interestingly, this holds true for most dog breeds, especially with malamutes.  I’ve seen a 70lb malamute girl take a 120lb male to the ground and hold him there until he fully submitted to her. 

This kind of dominant behavior isn’t from the results of fighting, but a beady-eyed glare and snarl from the girl that makes any male shudder and flee from fright.

Either way, we are not dogs or wolves, so please don’t listen to those who tell us to bite a dog’s ear, grab its throat, or roll it on its back, mimicking wolf behaviors.

And, believe it or not, I couldn’t believe it until I saw it, nor had I imagined anyone could do this: please do not pee on your dog! Sure, dogs pee on each other, but we are not dogs.

Dogs naturally look up to us in adoration, love, and respect. However, this behavior is reciprocal, and we must return it; otherwise, we will have a bunch of wild dogs peeing on us.

As mentioned earlier, love, compassion, and patience are our three ingredients that we must emit in our demeanor, and certainly not dominance.  Our dogs want to please us because of the love they feel from us, not out of fear. 

Through love, they put forth all they got to please us; through fear, they only do what they can get away with without being punished. The first method results in dogs that exhibit longevity and a cheerful, warrior-like demeanor with strength beyond comprehension; the other results in mediocre hardiness and an unfortunate early retirement.