523: From Touch to Trust: Building Better Dog Relationships with Garrett Stevens
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What are the silent ways dogs communicate with us? In this episode, Garrett Stevens, owner of Stevens Family Kennels and Dog Language Center, dives into the four pillars of dog language: touch, space, movement, and energy. He emphasizes the importance of non-verbal communication in understanding and managing canine behavior. Garrett also shares practical tips for conducting behavioral assessments and creating a balanced, calm environment for dogs. Ultimately, he reminds us that between a stimulus and a response, there is a space where meaningful change can happen.
Main topics:
Dog language pillars
Touch and space
Energy and movement
Non-verbal communication
Behavioral assessment cues
Main takeaway: Between a stimulus and a response, there is a space.
About our guest: Garrett Stevens is husband, father of four, and an author, speaker, and chronicler of dog language. Founder of Stevens Family Kennels and Dog Language Center, Garrett and the Stevens family have been professionally helping dogs and teaching people for almost two decades. Garrett’s groundbreaking books on dog behavior, language and calm, natural training help clients and readers across the world understand the pitfalls of mainstream dog training and boarding practices while simultaneously guiding the open-minded reader into Nature’s ways and how all socially-skilled dogs communicate, interact and behave. Clients and other professionals in the industry are often shocked to find that there is little to no need for food treats and no need for harsh handling either when using the Garrett Stevens Method of natural dog training!
Link:
Previously on Episode 254: https://www.petsitterconfessional.com/episodes/254
Website: www.stevensfamilykennels.com
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Episode 435: https://www.petsitterconfessional.com/episodes/435
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A VERY ROUGH TRANSCRIPT OF THE EPISODE
Provided by otter.ai
SUMMARY KEYWORDS
dog, people, energy, good, client, call, garrett, pet, space, kennel, touch, calm, gift, day, human, canine, pillars, training, language, sniff
SPEAKERS
Garrett S., Collin,
Collin 00:00
Music. Welcome to pet sitter confessional today. We're brought to you by timed pet and pet perennials. Today, we are super excited to have Garrett Stevens back on the show. He is previously with us on episode 254 so it's been a hot minute, and we want to dive into some more of topics. But Garrett, super excited to have you back on the show today, talking about cues from dogs, more about body language and things we need to be watching out for. But for those who aren't familiar with you or your work or haven't listened to that episode yet, can you please tell us a little bit more about who you are and all that you
Garrett S. 00:35
do? Yes. Thank you, Collin, for that kind intro, and thanks for having me back on. You guys do great work. My wife, Amalia, and I own Steven's family kennels and dog language center in Puyallup, Washington. And I've also been a professional dog trainer for, well, actually this, this summer, fall, going on 20 years now. So that's been a fun journey most times,
Collin 01:05
Oh, I bet. And in the 20 years in the dog training world, I'm sure there's been a lot of things that have have changed as well.
Garrett S. 01:12
Yes, yeah. And for me personally, when I was in the beginning, you know, phases or the first few years, it was very much based on, you know, what I what I call leave typical training, or mainstream training, where here's a sit, here's a down, here's a, you know, the work and the obedience, and I did shoots and all this kind of stuff. And we my, my first dogs were boxers, and they did amazing tricks and carried in the groceries and jumped through literal hoops and all that kind of stuff, which was fun and good, but then I started to get a little bit away from that which is a better fit for me, when I started going much more into the deeper behavioral problems and issues and finding that sometimes the tricks and even the work that most people think the dogs need for modern families and house dogs, they might not need as much of that work as they do relaxation and calmness and fitting in and adaptation and dog language kind of skills and with other dogs and with people.
Collin 02:18
Yeah, it's a reminder that just because your dog can sit doesn't mean it's trained, right? Because we're talking Yeah, kind of sounds like what you're talking about here is, is there's a much broader world here, a much more holistic approach that we're trying to understand, yeah,
Garrett S. 02:33
especially because, you know when we just think of when, I guess, whatever, normal people, not a dog, crazy like me, when they think of training, and even a lot of people, I think, in the pet industry, think of training, they instantly imagine, you know, whatever, the German Shepherd doing this rigid kind of obedience. But if we look at most families, they have house dogs, and they the requirements there are different from, say, the canine handler on active duty going to Ukraine or Iraq, and they need rigid obedience right away. But we, even though we want our house dogs to obey, and they do, we want them to be family members and to hang out and to be really much more relaxed than I think a lot of I think a lot of people don't realize how relaxed and wonderful some dogs can be, especially if they get a working breed. They think like they automatically are almost pigeon holed towards going that way.
Collin 03:37
And they Yeah, and then they start going down the road of, okay, well now, how do I make this dog fit my life? Or, how do I make my life fit this dog? And sometimes that means they, they started off on the wrong track, on the wrong foot, a better understanding of, like, no what, what actually is, is possible with this
Garrett S. 03:54
right? Because even if you look at any canine, wild or domestic, the parents and the uncles and aunts that are hanging around the pack the group, they have very much some requirements on proper energy so that fights don't break out. Proper energy so that, you know, they the young are up and coming. They grow super fast, and they have to be prepared for life, especially in the wild, of course, but domestication is kind of a catch. 22 for a lot of our dogs, because and a lot of the owners because they get food, shelter, water. 24/7 so they can basically, they can grow up quick, just like all canines do, but they can remain foolish with their energy distribution. Let's put it that way.
Collin 04:41
Yeah, I know. I just, I've had those interactions with dogs where the only way I can describe that is where you kind of get that feeling of, oh, this is kind of intense right now. Or like, this is this dog is kind of like, the energy levels on this dog aren't, aren't, aren't appropriate for this situation. That's right.
Garrett S. 04:59
That's. Right? And even if we're talking a just a hyper young, friendly pup that's mauling almost grandma at the front door at Thanksgiving or or you're talking about a serious behavioral issue where the dog is putting bites on people or bites on other dogs because it's out of control, it's always a matter of going back to the heart of the energy and the dog language, in my opinion, well, so
Collin 05:25
I know a very practical component of this is as dog walkers, as pet sitters, people who, you know, who do boarding, that kind of thing. A lot of us require a meet and greet, a new client meeting, and a lot of us are starting to use some more language along the lines of, oh, we're doing a behavioral assessment or doing a consultation to make sure that this dog is a good fit. What are some things that maybe we should be looking for during that initial assessment, or things that you see that go go missed and shouldn't be
Garrett S. 05:55
Yeah, that's a great question, and we do that too. At Stevens family kennels, we have an overnight, 24 hour boarding requirement before you know, say, you know, because we'll get the call. My German shepherd's never boarded anywhere. He's He's a bit reactive. And we got a three week trip coming up in two days. We're like, well, and believe it or not, sometimes we take those, of course, because I we do work with some very powerful and very interesting case by cases, you know. But to get back to what you're saying, Yeah, we definitely want to look for the dog language and and one of the main issues I always see and in my upcoming third book here. It's about the, what I call the four pillars of dog language. There's two different chapters in this book based on touch, because touch is one of the, what I call the first pillar of dog language, because they're born, they're born like little Helen Kellers, right? They're born blind and deaf. So how important is touch? And then touch is also the first of the five senses. And often we we might, as professionals, will look at dogs and we'll read, you know, industry things on the olfac system of a dog. We know they're amazing sniffers and smellers and tasters with the gustatory system the mouth and the smelling of the nose and but we sometimes are missing some of the subtle manipulations of the dog touch, and that can be a very friendly but hyper guy, and for some people, it's, again, it's a case by case basis for the human. And what we are doing as professionals, we might think that this hyper young dog is is okay, but it might be going too far. And then we have to consider the age of the animal too at the time, because whatever is underlying behaviorally comes out stronger as sexual maturity for a lot of dogs, which is around a year and a half to two. So if there is a whether the dog is being friendly but constantly pushing into your space, for example, the nervous dog is always might try to push in and lick you and hide its butt in your feet or near your legs. These are things we can the good news is, these are things we can adjust by simply going hands on in the in the right way. And that, I think, is that I know, is lacking in the training industry because of diverting to a treat or something where we don't actually physically handle the dogs in a smooth and loving and sometimes firm, but sometimes gentle, but some, you know, there's a whole Gam gamut of of wonderful things that like, like you see with a mother dog and her pups. So I don't know, I'm going off kind of but to reel it back in, yeah, so, like, so if a dog's jumping on me, some of the mainstream advice is, oh, turn your back because you're not acknowledging it. And while that might be true for three months and under there are plenty of dogs on the planet that will, if you just turn your back on them, they'll increase it over the months to jumping more and even possibly humping, and then, who knows, nipping your arms and whatever else like, they can take it to the next steps. We have to, kind of, as professionals, be aware of where the trajectory is going through touch and space. Which is space? Is this what I call the second pillar? So the four pillars of dog language, touch, space, movement and energy. And if we think more about that, I think we're going to get a much more in depth view right away, in depth analysis right away on what what the dog is like, and what the dog is doing,
Collin 09:46
especially in that context of you said, touch, space, movement and energy, walking into a room, and I get, you know, that's on us to go, Okay, I've entered a room. How is this dog immediately reacting to me? Right? What? What are they moving closer? Are they moving further away? How, how, you know, how quickly are they doing both of those things? So maybe walk through some of the relationships between these or, or are these kind of just distinct, as you have them, pillars? Or are there, you know, connections between them?
Garrett S. 10:14
Yeah, well, I call them pillars because if I say, say, I'll use two examples, say we got the hyper young pup that's friendly and just coming bombastically into my space, jumping all over my legs and licking and mouthing and nipping like which is all normal. I will still kind of try to keep a barrier in the beginning of, you know, eight, nine inches from my legs, so that this dog, and that means that requires me to bend over and kind of not push it, but handle the dog, so it backs up a little. Now, if you do push a dog, of course, or a pup, they're going to spring right back. So so I like to step forward into the space, which is what you'll see if you watch videos of any more calm but assertive and relaxed parent dog, they will take the pup space, but to get so again, there's a pillar, but to get to energy which we want the dog to calm down. Again, we might guide or influence touch, then take the space. Then as the dog calms and slows its movement, another pillar. Then we give that, we see proper energy starting to occur. So then we give back that instant spatial freedom again, and it's freedom to fail for the young puppy, the puppy gonna fail forward, like they often do, and like I did when I was a young pup myself, right? We're gonna make mistakes, and it's okay to make mistakes, but we want to fail forward and get the understanding of that, that proper space, and say, Listen, when you're around me up, you can't be throwing these, this level of energy at me. So to control the energy, you have to slow the movement a little bit. I have to take the space, if necessary, and then I can touch the dog smoothly. The dog relaxes them, and I give back the space, and the movement can go back, but not at the same level, just like when you see the referee call a foul in basketball, the guy maybe elbowed down in the paint. He elbowed the guy, he bumped the guy. You can go back to bumping a little, but you can't elbow so he took it down a notch energy wise,
Collin 12:17
showing that dog, what the expectations are for this kind of interaction and the touch of, yeah, is it a nice, smooth, gentle, calm touch, or are we, you know, going crazy, you know, around their head nears and getting them, you know, basically giving lots of touch, lots of stimulation. And what I'm hearing from that Garrett, is that's, that's kind of giving that dog permission to give that back to us in return.
Garrett S. 12:43
That's right. And I don't know if a lot of people know that dogs may look, I think of it like in a humorous way. At the end of the day, if they're looking at the canine scoreboard, they might say, Listen, you called me three times. I came one of them, and then maybe I you didn't know it, but I kind of bounced into your space and out touched you like 50 times during this whole day. And therefore, at the end of the day, I'm kind of a bit more in charge. You know, they can, they can take this view, and again, not to make it only about hierarchy or any of this kind of stuff, but they do test, of course, we know they'll they'll try. They're brilliant social creatures, and they do, you know, just like my own children, I have four, I love them. They love me. I might want them to go to bed at a certain time, especially when the younger they are, right? And we kind of set bedtime, and they want to try to manipulate control of bedtime. It's the same thing in the world of touch, space and movement with a dog. So it's very interesting. Well,
Collin 13:47
we hear that a lot from pet owners, right? What do they say? Say, oh, that my dog doesn't act like this around my spouse or my significant other or man, my mom, the dog knows not to do that with them, because they aren't smart enough to learn. This person allows that this person doesn't, this person's Okay, and the only way they know that is if they test people right in those initial meetings. And we can get frustrated sometimes, if we go, Oh my gosh, this dog is just going crazy. But if we understand that, okay, no, I have to show where the limits are here and actually have an interaction with this dog of what is appropriate, that that that's part of that conversation,
Garrett S. 14:26
exactly. And that's what, that's what we tell all our clients, is saying you have to be the referee of energy. So in the referee. Here's the cool thing, though. This is to me, this is very encouraging, because in a lot of training, the idea is that you have to be the coach, and the coaches will go back to basketball example for humans, the coach, Hey, come on. Set the pick. Set the pick. Get down there. You gotta he's very concerned and energized about his five players on the court. But with the referee, He's smooth. He's just trotting up and down. He's waiting say, Okay, there's a boundary. He said. Out of bounds, they blow the whistle. Everything stops for two seconds. All right. Ball back in play resumes freedom. Freedom resumes so but yeah, setting the tone relationally is hugely important. And sometimes it's funny, because over the years, of course, sometimes if I just take the leash, the dog just acts totally different. I didn't do anything, but just they they know and they sense. They're very sensitive, of course, with those super senses, like I like to call them, and oftentimes we overlook those two with dogs, because no other animal is as the it's like the most familiar animal with humanity. So sometimes we'll say, Oh, well, I watched a program on sharks, and look amazing sensitivity. If you turn the shark upside down, it goes into what's called a tonic state. And this is incredible, because they have such super senses. I say, Yeah, we all do every, every, even the humans. We all have our gifts and our superpower too, right? Still finding those and using those, but, but the dog, the familiarity and breed rudeness, and that's where we have to call out those boundary lines.
Collin 16:04
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Collin 16:26
looking for new pet sitting software, give time to pet a try. Listeners of our show will save 50% off your first three months by visiting time to pet.com/professional I'd like for you to talk a little bit more about the release aspect of this, because I think a lot of times we focus on the either, you know, the the correction or the the implementation of a different energy. But you've mentioned a few times now of the importance of then giving that space back or giving that energy back. Why is that aspect so critical to this process?
Garrett S. 16:56
Yeah, that's, that's a great question. That's awesome. And I think that's a fine art that has to be developed in us as people, because mom dogs has it instinctually. In most cases, there's always exceptions, right? Some you can talk to someone and they're like the breeder would say, Oh, this mom abandoned the puppies, right? That's terrible instincts. But for the most times, I try to uplift the parent dogs, but the art of fading away, and some philosophy their training will say, Oh, we never correct. We just reward what's good. And that's, that's a fine philosophy. However, in my opinion, you can see dogs correcting one another, right? So how? For me, it became a how to calm the situation. And I think in dog language, if we were actually speaking dog language, the word correct is almost interchangeable with the word claim or calm. So the mom dog, the uncle, the aunt, my example, dogs might calm a dog by taking the space real quick and then, and I have it on video and stuff, they will start to turn their face away calmly and when they get the results. So first you have to identify what result you're looking for, which is lesser energy and smoother movement. It doesn't have to be frozen. That's another, I think, interesting thing with a lot of training is they, they can inadvertently, accidentally train frozen explosion syndrome, where one example for that, real quick, just to go up, is you got your young puppy. You want to train it well and raise it right and take good care of it so you teach it to wait, wait, wait before the food, or stay before the food right. You put the food down. Now, some dogs are very hungry, and they will. You might be accidentally pumping up their energy while they're frozen there, and in the dog's mind, they're saying, One Mississippi, oh, I'm doing this today, but I can't wait to devour that food. Two minutes to be you're pumping me up more. I'm going up higher. Three Mississippi. And the result of this, over time can actually lend itself to more resource guarding. And that's something interesting to me, because they don't know they're they think they're doing solid training, but they might be adding too much energy the frozen explosion syndrome, which will grow resource guarding. This is just one example of like, you're kind of discovering this stuff over the years, but, um, the art of fading. Like to get back to it. So when my dogs, or myself in a training session or in our kennel, when we're boarding dogs, even when we're boarding dogs, we're kind of famous for for having it very quiet. I have lots of videos showing 20 something, 30 something dogs in attendance, and they're not barking when I walk in with a loose dog in the kennel, kennel, 4000 square feet. So this is kind of rare, right? And people say, how you once, well, get these comments. That's amazing. How what I used to work in the industry, how did you Why are they all quiet? And I said, well, because we don't like a lot of barking, but, but we go, we go up, I go up to the fencing, right? Because. They're in there, in their six foot enclosure, and then they have 20 feet outdoors, whatever. But I'll go up and just kind of look a little unpleasant, but I just kind of put this energy out, and I use my center line, the line running down the center of my body, and I kind of go towards like, hey, hey, you know, slow down. And for most dogs, believe it or not, if you have that wonderful intention, and you can be very serious, firm, but fair, I like to say. And then when they as soon as they do it the key you're talking about, as soon as they lower a little bit, or they quiet a little bit, or they start to respond a little bit, you cannot be a tyrant and sit there. You have to then soften the face, soften the arms, soften the hands, soften the body language and start to turn away. A lot of this communication is based in proper physics and geometry. So the fading though is wonderful because it relates to real freedom within the relationship. And I like to say this when people ask me about training or behavior. I tell them, you don't have I don't have to tell my dogs to sit or down or stay or come or any of that stuff. They're just free with me. They know. They know and I they don't have to be like a lot of trainers. You'll see them put their shepherd, for example, because there's lots of German shepherds out there, Belgian Shepherd, whatever. It's very popular. They'll put them on some down stay or some plats. You know, it's German for place, and it's rigid. And again, that's fine, I think, if you're doing tricks or if you're doing some canine handling. But for most house dog owners, imagine if they just knew what to do and like, like a human, like another human in your house, and you didn't have to, like, when someone comes to visit us, I don't have to usually tell my kids exactly where to go and how to stay and be you be frozen on that couch, or any of things like this. But people do it with their dog all the time, and they think it's very proper. And I'm not saying it can't be, but you have to consider, what would the natural way be? For me, it would be the dog sniffs them. They bark a couple times, of course, before they come in, let people know if there's a bad guy. Hey, this dog's there, whatever. But they sniff them. We open. I take the space a little bit back in, the dogs up. Then Grandma comes in. We'll use her again for Thanksgiving, or whatever. She's coming in, they sniff little pad for two seconds, and it's over. It's over. It's literally that small and that's smooth, and that's, I think, what a lot of people are looking for, but may not have,
Collin 22:24
right? Well, because that traditional of we're going to sit and wait and stay sure that explosion may be proper, if we are trying to, I don't know, take down an attacker at any instant. You know, at any second, yes, and we just have to be ready for action at all times. But if we're trying to leave, live in a more cohesive, kind of, more organic environment, in that family setting, where we don't need that. That's not required there. I love how you said, too, Garrett, of like, they know humanity so well. They know humans. They've, they've been with us for a moment or two, right? They understand our body language, and that is part of that communication. Of you know, I know, if I'm at a dinner table and my dad, right, raises an eyebrow, and he makes a certain face, I know we're about to be in trouble, right? We need to go, Okay, we're gonna, we're gonna move on. And then he lowers and he changes his his facial expressions to show, okay, we're on the right track here. We know. We all know that. We don't. We didn't have to get that. Wasn't a rigid tool set that we have to go through, but it's that showing of okay, if I'm going to change my energy level to show what I want here, in order for them to know when they've done the right action, I have to back off. Because if I just keep ramping it up and maintaining that, they're not going to know what to do. That's right. That's right.
Garrett S. 23:37
And same thing, they won't know what to do if you don't address it, right? So you need both. There's always this wonderful balance in nature, right? And that's kind of what I think of the four pillars of touch, space, movement, energy, because it's primal, it's instinctual, it's natural. And for me, if I think of those things, it's like a very, very efficient way to get to what we want and what the dog wants. Because the dog, of course, just like us, we want some rules and boundaries. If you don't have it, you have chaos. Now, if you overdo the rules, you might get rebellion, right? So those are like, kind of the two things, chaos or rebellion are the results of if it's not balanced properly and if it's not done smoothly, like the dogs do.
Collin 24:22
Well, it also gives them a chance to actually do the thing that you're wanting. Allows them to start operating on maybe a more independent level, so it does act as more organic with one another, so that they're not having to always look at you to say, Is this okay? Is this okay? Is this okay? Is that okay? Right? Yes,
Garrett S. 24:40
that's exactly it. And for most training, everyone is taught that we have to teach them to watch us. But we tell our clients, listen, they're furry. Sherlock Holmes. They are observing everything at lightning quick speed. They know what's happening. So instead. Of that. What does the mom dog do? Or the older, smooth example dog, they actually turn their head away and walk away, and that might prick a little instinct in a good way, so the pups start following, right? So instead of me having to get all hyper and be like, hey, come Come here. He'll heal, or Foose or whatever, not that we don't do it sometimes we do. Of course, obedience is good, but it's secondary to the stuff I'm kind of talking about, this primal behavioral language skills. The mom dog turns away, takes away eye contact, and that also said, calm down. It says, Follow me. It says, everything's fine, because I'm not giving you a lot of attention right now. So it means relaxation. And I love that that's what we kind of talk to our clients, a lot about relaxation for both parties, because that's what the pack wants in nature. Well, you
Collin 25:51
mentioned it a couple times here, too. Of you know, we again with the typical idea of of training and what that is and what we're looking for. We typically think of the sit stay commands, we'd say verbal things that we're talking about, but you also are talking about a lot of this non verbal cues. So you mentioned, you know, turning your head away, averting your eyes. What are other things, other ways that we may be unintentionally communicating with dogs?
Garrett S. 26:19
Yeah, very, very good. Well, one like we just mentioned a little bit is the eye contact. And of course, we love dogs. We love the look of dogs. We love the look of our personal dogs. That's one reason we get them. But we, I can almost, if I was, we were betting, right? I'm sure I'd win the bet if, if we took a video, this would be an interesting study on how often the mom is looking at the pups versus how often we look at our dogs. And I'm sure the human far, far, far exceeds the look, because we also appreciate, possibly more, I don't know, I'm not a dog, more of the esthetic beauty, but in nature, I think they appreciate more the living in the moment and the energy, the beauty of energy, and the beauty of these movements and things like this. But anyway, yeah, I think we look too much at dogs, and this is a huge problem if you have a nervous dog or an anxious dog, or an aggressive dog, a reactive dog, or any kind of dog that, or just a new puppy. The puppy could say, Hey, you guys are looking at me constantly. I maybe I'm in charge. Am I in charge? I don't know. I guess I'm in charge. So it's very interesting that the mom and dad dog, the uncles, the aunts, the smooth, balanced dogs, you can say whatever you want to label it. They are choosy about their eye contact. That's one right away. That's a big one. I
Collin 27:47
mean, you can definitely get some some responses that you don't want, right too, from that eye contact. And sometimes we may be going, Well, I'm really looking at something about this dog. I've done this in meet and greets too, where it's like, well, what is this thing? What's the dog moving, and I'm really watching it intently. Unknowingly, this dog is getting more and more nervous. It's getting more and more anxious. It's starting to, you know, kind of panic while I'm staring just because I'm watching its language. Wow. It's getting really nervous because I'm staring at it, right? And if I just looked away for a minute, it could de escalate that situation.
Garrett S. 28:20
And that's the key. You know, we teach our clients there's a three second rule. A three say it has nothing to do with dropping your sandwich on the floor, right? Three second rule based on we also teach them staring is swearing in dog language. So if the if a dog is looking for more than three seconds. It doesn't mean it's going to turn into Cujo or anything, but it does mean the most skilled linguists among dogs will blink or turn their head or lower the head to sniff and move in to sniff, or turn sideways or just walk away or go pee on something or whatever, whatever it's going to be, they won't keep a direct line more than 334, seconds, usually, unless they are now, now there's exceptions, right with on leash, and you're walking down the long road or the straight sidewalk, and someone else is coming, they're going to try to keep that line, but that's where if you want to disperse the energy, which you usually should to help them be, because we're the refs of energy, refers energy. We want to interrupt that line a little with a zigzag or a slight turn, or a light pat on the head, near the eyeballs, or all sorts of wonderful things to smoothly interrupt. But yeah, if you're going into a house to evaluate even just you look at the dog for one two seconds, you glance away, back at the owner, you look back at the dog, and you angle your body at a 45 instead of a zero point where it's direct. One question I always ask clients too is, does energy leap up when you're. Watching the weigh ins and the face off at the UFC or or with boxers, does energy leap up when those guys get in their face and they're face to face at the zero point? Yes, it does. And then, of course, Dana White, or whoever, puts his arm in between, thinking that's going to do anything but, but the energy, the energy leaps up at the zero point. And even we can feel it. If we've been at a restaurant or a bar and you feel someone looking at you for very long. Do I know that guy? Who is it? What is it this guy causing trouble? What's his problem? You know you we start to and if we can sense it as humans, with our wonderful spoken language and all the words and wonderful William Shakespeare's throughout all human time. Dogs who have a wonderful language as well, but don't need as many letters, so it's a faster language, can sense it within seconds moments, and they
Collin 30:51
also sense when we're getting anxious too, in those moments. And so it's also a reminder of I've got to really check myself before I even go into that situation, right? If? Because, if I, if I bring in that anxiety of the red light that I just hit or the person who cut me off, or that I'm running 10 minutes late, if I bring that energy in and then I'm, I shouldn't be, I guess I shouldn't be, you know, surprised when that dog or cat even is giving that back to me.
Garrett S. 31:19
Yeah, exactly, because many of them don't have a lot of them don't have that mature skill in the world of their own self control and energy. And that's what we're looking for. Of course, as a father, that's what I want for my four kids. I want my that for myself, right? Self control, especially nowadays, it's hard. There's there's entertainment hitness, there's advertisements, there's food stuff, there's self control is very valuable throughout all of history, and it is. It's necessary in dogs. Now, of course, in the wild canine, you just get killed by nature if you lack self control, right, right? So nature will kick your butt until you learn it, and it might be a lethal butt kicking, but for us, we want to always check ourselves before walking in, relax and of course, unlike what I'm doing now, which is a lot of talking when I'm with a the more nervous, anxious, reactive, aggressive, whatever a case I'm dealing with, the more quiet I get now, not quiet and too still, but quiet and smooth with the movement. Because I want to show like you were saying you don't. You want to show yourself to be in control and relax, but you also want to, of course, have to hope the dog starts mirroring that,
Collin 32:39
yeah, and that that movement too is also important when we're, you know, when we're meeting these dogs or just interacting with them. Because, especially for us, when we do timed visits, it can be really tempting to rush through that visit, because we've got to hit our 30 minutes or our hour long visit, or however we're there, which means that we tend to be moving faster, more rapidly, more erratically in that home and space. Because we're just trying to get something done. I'm just trying to pick up the bowl and run over to the sink to scrub it out and then put it back down and go over and scoop out the litter, like that's what I'm doing. But what the dog is seeing is this erratic, fast moving, unpredictable movement of somebody, yeah,
Garrett S. 33:20
and he's in, some dogs would say, well, now do I nip at your feet? Right? You're in the house of the blue healer or whatever, and, and for that, I say, Hey, listen, I turn around and I actually start to with, with those kind of things, just to address this one issue, if they if it's not a real serious bite. Case, you can turn whip around and almost like I mirror the dog back on itself a little bit with my two hands, almost like I have mouths. Now, I don't even touch the dog, usually, in this case, but I'm almost like chuckling and hurting and cutting it off spatially a little bit saying, just to say, Listen, don't come after my feet. I'm claiming my space. I'm claiming you. So in a way, you you, you do want to go and claim the environment smooth as possible, and that way, if you do raise the energy some or start moving a little quicker, the dog already knows. Oh yeah, I have to. We have to start that relationship with respect, and then we can grow trust. But a lot of times we have to be careful, because some people will try to bribe their way in, or go with trust only, and the dog is saying, Yeah, I'll eat this tree for you. I'll receive a pet or two, but I do not respect you. And that's where the being really skilled or learning to be more skilled with the touch, space, movement, energy can come into play. Now, how do those
Collin 34:46
four pillars align with the five senses of the dogs that you that you mentioned earlier?
Garrett S. 34:53
Yeah, yeah. So the five senses right, touch, smell, taste, vision and hearing are interesting, because. Dogs, as we know, are born blind and deaf. So those are what I call the secondary senses. The primary senses of touch, smell and taste are what we want to kind of look at deeper. Because if you go into a house and the dog did not sniff, touch you and notice there is a touch, right? It's not just a sniff, usually. Now the worst cases, of course, are the most difficult. Let's say that they might sniff from a far away while they're cringing in the corner, in the crate or whatever, behind a couch or under a couch or something. But we ideally want to see the sniff touch, because to me, that's similar to the evolution of the human handshake, where the two guys would come up, well met, and they grab the forearm of the wrist or whatever they do, they shake the hands, and they say, even if we have weapons, we're not going to spear each other to death. So it but it's a way to start a relationship through touch. And dogs, of course, start their life through touch, with the mom and with each other, and then it just spreads. So there's always going to be a touch or a non touch. And if it's a fearful case, they'll try to slip the touch, like Muhammad Ali, get away from the touch. And those guys, you might have to, like lasso, kind of get the get the slip lead over the neck, and then gently but firmly, give a little tug, and then go loose. Tug and go loose, tug. It always going loose. Always going back to relaxation. Well, you're kind of dragging them across the floor gently as possible, but still getting the job done. That's the tricky part of what a lot of us do. But it is worse, made worse through our talking, usually, in most cases, that's one thing for sure, because if I'm a nervous dog, and I'm in those states of mind, and you talk to me, even friendly, I might take the nervousness as praise. In many cases, once in a while, you'll get an exception. There's always exceptions. Once while you say and the dog comes forward and WAGs a little bit, and it's getting better through a little bit of friendly talking in a relaxed way, but usually it is. The Talking can get us into trouble instead of just using the touch, the space, the movement and the energy. And I for people, I always ask that, Will you calm her when you're quiet? Are you calmer when you're blabbing all the time? And we know the answer, right? We're calmer when we're breathing and quiet and smooth, you know, smooth with it.
Collin 37:17
And that's a that's a battle against our primary way of communication, isn't it, of, of going well, I've got to talk, because that's how I communicate, right? But recognizing there are so many other senses that we have to engage and that if we aren't, there's going to be a lot of stuff that's got that it's basically going to be a dropped call, right? Because we're we think we're sending one thing that's right, but we're actually saying something else.
Garrett S. 37:40
So, yeah, going back to that nervous or terrified, anxious dog, I've got him on the leash now, right? I slip the slipped lead over now, I bring him over to my left leg, and I don't do anything, but I put his nose if I can, within an inch or two, and then I'm hoping that the rest nature kind of does the rest right? We I'm trying to get his nose to do the sniff, touch as gentle as possible, while still getting the job done. And usually at that point, and I had a client yesterday, this dog was terrified, used to peeing everywhere, and it was a rescue, right? For the people. So we don't know the whole history, but I always tell people, and this is a good one to spread, let it go, let the past go. Of course, live in the moment. He the dog was using habits he felt worked from the past so, but we were in the present, saying that's not working anymore. So, so it's a good challenge, just like all of us need a challenge once in a while for personal growth, and there's no growth inside the comfort zone all that stuff, right? But, but I got his nose closer, so he he did do the sniff touch, and then they were amazed, because he didn't leave when I backed off. So I'll always take a little and give a little, take a little and give a little, then give a little, take a little and give a little. This way you're being kind of a, I guess, a gentleman or a lady in in dog language,
Collin 39:08
going, going, was that okay? Was that okay? Was that? It's basically this ask of going, Okay, if we do this, how does that? How does, how does the dog respond? Ooh, doesn't look like they like that. Okay, I'm going to back off. We're going to engage in a different way. Oh, we're going to engage because otherwise, because what you're kind of cutting around each one of those little things. So we don't know the dog's history. We don't know their past experiences. In a lot of cases, even the owners might not. So we're cutting in and going, this is part of my assessment of getting to know who you are,
Garrett S. 39:40
yes, especially in the beginning, right in the beginning, I want to be super calm, um, somewhat authoritative in it, as far as in a that sounds, that sounds weird, it sounds negative, as I came out of my mouth there. I'm not that way in a dog way, which is just like, I'll just take up space. Nice and in a gentle way, but I'm taking up because, to me, right, there are alpha dogs, but they're called parents. Those are the parent dogs by default. They're just in charge because the young ones are tiny and they don't know what they're doing, and they're so they're following the leaders. The same with my chickens in our chicken yard, right? And it's the same in our household, if me and my wife really want to go out to eat somewhere, we often don't let the six year old say, Well, no, we're not doing that. We're doing this right. That would be a little bit out of order, according to nature's ways. So anyway, we were calm, but we're fair, very fair, but we're also, like you said, we want to explore the touching and the spacing, and then we want to, if I see a weakness, if you really it depends whether what you're doing, what, what line of work right in the pet, if you're just bitten with them, you might not need to push it as much as I have to. I have to then push a little bit and prod a little bit. If I see like, if we have a client, of course, that says that you can't touch the dogs, but then, of course, I have to touch the dogs. But right so, but it's even that is done smooth with what I call touch and goes, which are one to two seconds, and I'm out before the dog even notices. And that's key, because if the dog notices and then says something like, get off me in dog, then I can contribute to making the dog worse, but if the dog doesn't even notice, it's like, nice, done very smoothly. Then soon I'm up to three and four seconds. Then soon I'm up to five and 6778, seconds, and the soon the dog doesn't care. The dog is turning wonderfully behaved.
Collin 41:39
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Garrett S. 43:36
Yeah, exactly, exactly. And it's, it's, to me, it's been fun discovering over the many years that they can change quicker than most people believe they can. I want to encourage everyone, if anyone, listen to this, to to give yourself freedom to grow into it and give the dog freedom to change. Because one thing we can definitely do with these these creatures, is maim them by keeping them the victim, right? We don't want to do that. We want to know, hey, listen, I call it Teddy Roosevelt in the thanks, but bully and we're going to charge forward. And, hey, we're running up the hill together, and we're we're having gusto a little bit. And even with the worst cases, they need a little bit of that. Especially the worst case, they need a little bit of that pushing, a little like tuning the guitar string without the proper pressure. There's no good tuning and but if we, if we put too much pressure, we break this, this thinking string, right? But if we have no pressure, there's no music either. So we need that finding the right tuning for each dog or each family or each household that you go into is, to me, that's part of the fun that keeps me motivated over the years, right? And then I go, you know, sometimes we'll work the doorway so I'm in the house, the dogs try to attack me or bark or do whatever the heck that we're working on at the front door. And then I say, Okay, let's do the whole thing again. And I. Go out, pretend goodbye, I shake my keys and leave. I'm outside for a minute, and when I'm out there, I'm saying, this is an awesome job, man, this is like, this is so cool we get to work with we're helping families. We're helping people every day and with their furry family members and all that. And a lot of times they don't even know that the level of help we can do, which is really cool. So anyway, just to encourage our fellow dog people and Cat people out there and pet people, you know, it doesn't matter if you're working with iguana, you know, you're doing a good job. Keep going
Collin 45:34
for the for the smell part. Garrett, do you ever use any sort of calming sprays or fragrances or to try and avoid anything
Garrett S. 45:43
that's interesting. You say that because in the in the end of my second book, so long, separation anxiety, I do mention a single drop of lavender oil, because once in a while, of course, that can, and that's a great one. On the fourth of July, especially, right? Or New Year's some places they light off the fireworks and all that. But as far as extraneous stuff, personally, I don't go too far into a lot of that, because, again, I want to be as as simple and gentle and direct and honest as possible, like a lot of the dogs are, while still, you know, using the some of the modern stuff, which is cool, but, yeah, they're definitely a drop of lavender oil. Can do some, I don't know, maybe I should develop a little cologne or perfume or so, right? We can go into business on that together. Why do you smell like hemp?
Collin 46:42
I asked it because I know it's a big concern that a lot of us have, going from house to house to house to house to house, picking up a lot of smells throughout the day and but also, you know, from what you're saying, Garrett too, of going well, it also has to be practical. It has to be workable. It has to anything you do has to be repeatable and sustainable. And that's where we fall down a lot of times. We may go all we've been all the way over in one direction for one kind of client, or for one kind of instance, but we aren't able to do that the next time because they don't have barriers that have a weird way of getting inside the house, or they've got, you know, XYZ going on. There's a lot of stuff outside of our control. So really focusing on, what do I have control over? How can I repeatedly show up as myself? Because that consistency is also huge in this entire process of if I show up, it's hard to build a relationship if I show up one day speaking Klingon, and then the next day show up speaking Mandarin and the next day show up speaking Spanish, like nobody's going to know what's going on. So we have to have that consistency of, oh, you know, Garrett's here, oh, Collins here. I know what to expect from
Garrett S. 47:45
them. Yeah. And I think that's where for me, that's why I broke it down in those four pillars. Because I'm like, if I'm aware of touch, who's touching, who, how and when, how is the touch transpiring? Is this a good touch, or is he pushing it into rudeness? Oh, did he slip my touch? That means I got to work on some touch. And goes. And then the space, is this dog circling non stop? It would would mother dog allow that? Or is that dog whirling himself up into becoming obsessive? We need to interrupt that a little bit, and that can look like you're just playing defensive basketball. You go over, stop them for two seconds, then you turn and give freedom again, but yeah, keeping it consistent, and that's awesome. And being just I love working with dogs too, because, of course, they're going to tell you exactly how they're feeling they and it's up to us to read it, and as we read it and feel it and see it and sometimes smell it right, if you got some nervous one with the anal glands. That's nasty, as we know, the oily, kind of crappy smell, but, but that's an extra service you charge there, of course, because you said, Hey, listen, I expressed the anal glands for you so that, no, I'm just kidding.
Collin 48:56
Yeah, I some people, but you know that, well, that's we have to remember that this is also in the context of talking with another human, right? The owner, right? The fur parent, going, Yeah, at the end day, like, I have to talk to them about what's going on. So when you're having these conversations, scare with people's pets, when you're doing this assessment, or when you're working on them through a training program, or they're doing boarding with you. How do you talk to them? What kind of language do you use? Because I know things come up and you do a lot in the world of, you know, reactivity, you know, defensiveness, anxiousness, what? How do you make sure that you're using those in an appropriate manner, so that the client understands at the end of the day, what's happening?
Garrett S. 49:38
Right? Well, I for me, for my personality, I kind of go back and forth. I can get him with something real serious and throw some stupid joke in some dad joke, but, but answer more directly, yeah, we have to be honest. That's a huge thing, especially in industry. I we get some clients that have been burned before by some. Other places, and I don't like that, of course, so we're always trying to be right up front and very honest with everyone. If we say, for example, have a dog that might not be the best fit for our kennel, and we try our darndest first, we call him and say, Hey, can we get these dogs? Your dog on the treadmill, because he's starting to bite the fencing and freak out too much, or he's barking too much, or whatever, even after we've gone in a few times and kind of tried to calm him down and spatially and everything, um, and usually that will help, but if that still doesn't help, and we think the dog might injure himself, the dog is freaking out or, you know, then of course, we have to have a more serious conversation. And for us, we say, with the with the kennel, like it might not be the best fit for us, with me and your dog, or for us and your dog. You know, we're sorry about this, but, and I don't know if some people have others that they can recommend, that might be a good thing to do, but that's kind of how that goes with the with the kennel, and we're saying, Listen, let's try again. Maybe, usually we have a few things, a few a little bit of protocol where we'll try again, but for shorter, little bit shorter stage, kind of get your dog used to a little bit or half the kennel dogs are not training clients. Half are right. So then, of course, we can suggest training, but through our calm training. But yeah, if we're talking defensive, use the word defensive, a little bit skittish, and say we definitely need something, maybe some some trainer or behaviors, to come in and start desensitizing the over sensitivity, some a little bit of exposure therapy with a reactive dog. Of course, we have a reactive dog package of eight private sessions or whatever, but, or we have board and train options and all. But even with a board and train options, I'm always warning everyone, results can fade over time because the relational side of things. And I say you have to be wary if you're going to put your dog with anyone when you're not there. So you have to really care for the things anyway. Yeah, the conversation must be fairly direct, and people aren't going to always enjoy hearing that. And over the years, of course, you might get someone that blows up extra or whatever. That's where we think again, this is such a great job. What an easy thing we can do that's always just for your positive thinking and
Collin 52:29
go exercise yourself after that. Got to post it. Post It note on your desk. You actually like this job, right? You wanted to do this. You said Yes, right? But that's, that's a good, good point, Garrett, of just the being honest with people at the end of the day, we might not always be able to use the right words or remember the exact phrase or whatever, but coming at it from a position of honesty and of a genuine nature to help and make sure that they're getting the best help possible, and that takes us being honest with ourselves too, of like, you know, I went into a meet and greet the other day, and this dog was was definitely using space and touch in a very high energy amount where we couldn't dissipate it, no matter what we did or how, how I moved in this environment, this dog was Not allowing that. It was really starting to then herd me into a corner, and it was like, Look, you need to leave in two days. And we're this is not in a good place right now. This, this is not a good position for us to be in, and is not going to set your dog up or us up for success with where we are now. Now, if you want to work on this when you get back from this trip, we'd love to do that, set up some more trial days and some more short term things, but you calling us today and leaving in two days to go, be gone for seven, right? Going on for a whole week that nobody's going to be happy with the end results of that, and just letting them know this is beyond what we're comfortable with.
Garrett S. 53:56
Yeah, exactly, exactly, yeah, you and if we don't, I mean, if we don't have the boundaries with the humans, then, you know, it's not going to go well either, right? We talked a lot about boundaries with the dogs, the boundaries of touch and space and movement energy, but, yeah, exactly. We have to have the boundaries with the humans, otherwise they can become worse than the animals.
Collin 54:17
Well, we've got to work with them, like if this is a long term relationship that we're trying to build here. There are, I mean, we need to be their partner. They need to be an ally in this entire process of working with the dog and setting them first up for success. And if we're fighting them on things, if we can't be honest with them, yeah, that nothing's going to progress
Garrett S. 54:35
Exactly. Yeah, yeah. That's so good. Yeah, yeah. It's funny, yeah, oh. I mean, of course, you know, doing this for two decades, you're gonna always, there's always gonna be, once in a while, a problem client or something, right, that that's gonna come up, especially to more that you can help and serve over the years. And we were at, you know, we've had times where we got. Me and another trainer going, or my apprentice trainer going, and so we're doing double sessions out front, and then people are picking up and dropping off the kennels, so it can get crazy. We we're licensed, actually, to 100 dogs in the kennel, but we refuse to go over 30. And even that usually is, is, you know, we try to max out at 25 because even though we have a great team, I'm not downing you guys, we have a great team in and we definitely train them up in the way they should do the stuff and and the dogs are, you know, have great clients it, you know, for so many basically, I guess I'm putting it this way, there's only so much energy allowed in any environment, whether that's I liken that to okay, this much weight in the elevator or this many people allowed in this Banqueting Hall for fire code or whatever it is. So we also have to be aware of our own personal energy, because some of us can take on more than others, and there's nothing I'm not saying that's a good or a bad thing. I'm just saying it is what it is. We again. We all have different skills, and that way we can kind of maybe engineer some of those boundaries according to our strengths and weaknesses.
Collin 56:13
And knowing I have agency to stop at any moment and reset, right? I've worked with a lot of our employees, of going, if you're in a home, and think if things start to spiral out of your control, yeah, you can step into the garage for a little bit and reset yourself before re engaging with that. Then that's actually what you need to remove yourself from that. If that, if you're not okay with how things are going, stop trying to engage and take a moment to collect yourself and reassess the situation before continuing. And that that having that self awareness to go there's you said, there's too much energy in this room right now, and I'm contributing to that because I'm frantically trying to move around and get vacuuming and pick up the mess and also get the doors closed. I need to really check myself right now, because I'm not helping. I'm not helping the situation. The problem is
Garrett S. 57:06
me, yeah, and remember, they're the animals are looking to feed off the energy, like, what? What are they gonna mirror? So we have to be we have to become skilled. And, like you said, taking those breaks. It is a good quote. I think it's by Viktor Frankl, between stimulus and response. There is a space I love that. I love that quote. So I keep that and use that mentally for me and emotionally. And the beautiful thing with dogs, of course, is you'll see that too. We want to encourage the reactive dog or the aggressive dog or the anxious dog or fearful dog to find that space. Then they can yawn it off, then they can stretch it off, then they can perform a calming signal. Then they can do the big shake off, and then start sniffing again or blinking their eyes, or whatever the calming signal is. But they we have to get to that little space sometimes, and it's a wonderful, uh, safe place to be, which is good, Garrett, I
Collin 58:08
really appreciate you taking time out of your day to talk with us and encourage us to to find that space, not just in our own lives, but in the dog's lives, and giving them permission to do that, and working with them at the senses And those pillars that you've talked about, I know there's a whole lot more here, right? And there's so many different scenarios and things that we could go down. But for people who are interested in picking your brain on things or following along or looking forward to that book that you've got coming out, how best can people do that? Yeah, yeah.
Garrett S. 58:38
Well, we have G stevensdogtrainer.com it's Stevens with a V. That's a one website. We also have Stevens family kennels.com and then Stevens family kennels is on Instagram as well. That's where I think we first connected. And yeah, thank you so much for having me on. It's always a pleasure.
Collin 58:57
Yeah, absolutely. And Gary, I'll have those links in the show notes, so we can click right to those and people can get connected. And yeah, Garrett, absolutely pleasure. Thank you so much for coming on the show today.
Garrett S. 59:09
Thanks a lot. Collin,
Collin 59:10
since my conversation with Garrett, I haven't stopped thinking about the quote where he said, between a stimulus and a response, there is a space, there is, and there's what we do in that space that can make all the difference. There's what we can do, there's what we don't do, there's what we ought to do, and it's all in understanding the dog that we are working with, that we are, that is before us, and the goals that we have for that visit. It's also important in running our business, in that between the stimulus, between when we receive something and when we need to act, there is a gap, and we can process. We can take a breath. We can choose a different way of respond. Thing. So whether we're working with a dog or a client or a business decision, embrace that space and allow yourself to make the most of it. We want to thank today's sponsors time to pet and pet perennials for making today's show possible, and we really want to thank you for listening. We hope you have a wonderful rest of your week, and we'll be back again soon. You.
