The Driven Dog

28/12/2025

Words become powerful because they shape the actions we take.

When the language changes,
the approach changes,
and the outcome changes.

This series isn’t about right or wrong.
It’s about using words that guide people toward better preparation, not just good intentions.

Better preparation builds better coping,
better regulation,
and better adult dogs.

The dog you live with later
is shaped by how you understood the job early on.

25/12/2025

🤍𝗣𝗮𝘆 𝗜𝘁 𝗙𝗼𝗿𝘄𝗮𝗿𝗱 𝗚𝗶𝘃𝗲𝗮𝘄𝗮𝘆 🤍

In honour of a much-loved dog who was tragically lost in an unexpected way just before Christmas, one of our clients has kindly chosen to pay it forward by gifting support to another dog and owner who truly need it.

We are offering one 𝗕𝗲𝗵𝗮𝘃𝗶𝗼𝘂𝗿𝗮𝗹 𝗔𝘀𝘀𝗲𝘀𝘀𝗺𝗲𝗻𝘁 with The Driven Dog team, valued at $274, for up to 2 hours.

A 𝗕𝗲𝗵𝗮𝘃𝗶𝗼𝘂𝗿𝗮𝗹 𝗔𝘀𝘀𝗲𝘀𝘀𝗺𝗲𝗻𝘁 is a comprehensive, in-depth session where we assess your dog’s behaviour, emotional state, environment, history, and current challenges. This allows us to identify the why behind the behaviour and provide clear, practical guidance tailored specifically to you and your dog.

𝗛𝗼𝘄 𝘁𝗼 𝗲𝗻𝘁𝗲𝗿:

👍🏻 Like this post

🏷 Tag a friend (or multiple friends) who would genuinely benefit and briefly explain why

🔁 Share this post

All 3 must apply and will count as 🅾🅽🅴 entry.

🗓 The winner will be drawn one week from today.
Conditions

• The assessment must be conducted at our HQ in Ramarama

• The winner must be able to travel to us

• The assessment must be used within 3 weeks of booking

This giveaway is about support, compassion, and community. Thank you for helping us honour a very special dog by giving another one the chance for understanding and clarity 🤍

T & C apply.

20/12/2025

Check us out! We have had a refresh of our website 😊

Originally born in West Sussex, UK, I moved with my family to the beautiful island of Jersey in the Channel Islands at the age of four. My passion for animals began early, having been raised on a farm with eight siblings and every kind of animal you could imagine. Horses and dogs were a constant

19/12/2025

As I close the door on work for 2025, I want to take a moment to speak from a place of genuine gratitude.

To every single person who has entrusted me with their dog this year, whether through one to one coaching, day train, or board and train, thank you. Trusting someone with your dog is never a small thing. It is personal, emotional, and often comes at a vulnerable point in your journey. I never take that lightly, and I remain deeply humbled by the faith so many of you have placed in me.

This year has exposed me to an incredible range of dogs, owners, challenges, and professionals, and each one has shaped me in some way. I have learned just as much from the dogs in my care as I have from the people behind them. Every case, every conversation, every moment of progress or frustration has added another layer to how I see this work and the responsibility that comes with it.

2025 has been a year of real self growth for me. It has forced me to reflect, and get very clear on what truly matters. The standards I hold myself to, the direction I want this business to head, and the kind of work I want to keep showing up for. That clarity has been grounding, and it has shaped the way I approach my training, my clients, and myself.

Our focus on board and train this year has been a huge part of that evolution, and seeing the long term change, resilience, and confidence in both dogs and owners has been incredibly rewarding. It has reaffirmed why I do this work and the importance of doing it thoughtfully, ethically, and with the individual dog in mind.

I feel incredibly grateful for where I am right now, not just in business, but as a trainer and as a person. Thank you for trusting me, for challenging me, for learning alongside me, and for joining me on this journey.

I will now be taking a well earned break and will be out of office for around a month. During this time, there will be limited coaching availability with the wonderful Louise. If you would like to continue your coaching or enquire about a spot while I am away, please feel free to DM me and we will do our best to help where we can.

Wishing you a very Happy Christmas and a Healthy New Year. See you in 2026 🥂

16/12/2025

An official introduction is long overdue!

Meet Voss.

Voss has recently joined our world, and we feel incredibly fortunate to have been entrusted with him. He has been selected as my next sport dog. While he won’t be used within our training programs or working directly within the training facility, you may occasionally see him around in a controlled capacity as part of his own individual development.

He represents the next chapter of our journey, one that is deeply rooted in thoughtful development, clear structure, and respect for genetics and purpose. Voss is here to grow, to learn, and to be prepared carefully and intentionally for the sport path ahead.

We’re already documenting his development and progress, and this will be added to our Visual Learning Hub in the new year, giving clients and handlers a transparent look at how we develop a dog from the ground up, without shortcuts and without guesswork.

We’re incredibly excited about where this journey will take us and grateful for the opportunity to do it properly, with patience, clarity, and purpose.

Welcome to The Driven Dog, Voss.

14/12/2025

Meet Rupert, this guy's deserves his own post.

Current board + train.

Hes certainly not for the faint hearted.

These kind of dogs are often miss diagnosed.

High intensity doesn’t always mean dysregulation. Sometimes it means the dog is exactly where it wants to be.

This Fox Terrier isn’t stressed, anxious, or overwhelmed. He’s doing what feels good, makes sense, and aligns perfectly with his genetics. He doesn’t show classic recovery signals because his job was never designed to include hesitation or negotiation.

Terriers were bred to commit, persist, and repeat. That’s not emotional fragility or poor regulation. That’s genetic clarity.

When we mislabel reinforced behaviour as stress, we apply the wrong solutions and miss the opportunity to communicate clearly. Not every dog needs calming. Some need precision, purpose, and criteria that actually mean something to them.

Behaviour doesn’t change through guesswork.
It changes through understanding.

13/12/2025

Raising two puppies from the same litter is one of those topics that carries a lot of noise online. You’ll hear the warnings about “sibling syndrome,” and yes, those issues can be very real-conflict, possession over resources, dogs becoming overly dependent on each other, and struggling to cope in the world without their littermate beside them. But what often gets missed in these conversations is the nuance. Many people bring home two puppies with the best intentions in the world. They want companionship for the dogs, they want them to grow up together, and sometimes they’re simply not advised properly by a breeder donwdone enough research about what raising littermates actually involves. None of that comes from a place of negligence. It comes from best intentions, more often than not.

And here’s the part that goes against the typical narrative, many sibling pairs do run absolutely fine together. In fact, a lot of the modern case studies and behavioural data show that the majority of sibling homes don’t develop the catastrophic issues we so often hear about. The difference tends to sit in the structure, clarity, and human involvement that happens from day one, not in the fact that the puppies were born on the same day.

I’m living this right now. I’ve just brought home my new puppy, 'Voss' and her sister is staying with us temporarily until my friend takes her after Christmas. Two high-drive working-line pups in the same home is something you’d expect to create chaos, but the process has been surprisingly smooth, simply because the foundation is intentional. I don’t micromanage every second of their interactions, they’re allowed to communicate, to negotiate space, to practise their social repertoire in a natural way. But at the same time, I make sure they don’t spend their whole world orbiting each other. They spend individual time with me, they train separately, they have separate experiences, and they build their own confidence without relying on their sibling to do all the emotional heavy lifting.

That balance, allowing communication while still creating independent relationships with the humans in the home is often what gets missed when people talk about

04/12/2025

Ever find yourself thinking why your dog consistently repeats certain behaviours?

Maybe it looks like excitement, maybe it has become a habit or maybe it feels a bit stubborn at times. But a huge part of why this happens comes down to what is going on inside their body. Their biology is constantly shaping how they respond, what they find rewarding and what they automatically repeat.

Dogs repeat behaviours because their biology is telling them to.
And there are three key systems that sit at the centre of this:

Dopamine which creates anticipation and motivation
Cortisol which drives stress responses and survival instincts
Prediction error which builds patterns and habits based on what “works” for the dog

When these systems are understood, your dog’s behaviour becomes clearer, more predictable and much easier to influence. Behaviour doesn’t change by chance.

It changes when the brain begins to process information differently, form new associations and create new pathways that support the behaviour you are teaching.

02/12/2025

𝗧𝗵𝗲 𝗗𝗿𝗶𝘃𝗲𝗻 𝗗𝗼𝗴

If you’ve been with me for a while, you’ll know this change has been a long time coming and it reflects not just my business, but who I am as a trainer today.

When I first started out, nearly a decade ago. I genuinely thought I’d be a purely reward-based trainer. That was the lens I viewed dog training through at the time. It made sense to me then, and it was all I really knew. But as I grew, worked with more dogs, learned from different mentors, and stepped deeper into the complex behaviour, working-line breeds, drive work, and dog sport, everything began to shift. I realised there was more to behaviour, more to communication, and more to fulfilment than simply ignoring the “bad,” reinforcing the “good,” and managing everything tightly.

And the moment I started questioning things asking how to get a dog from A to B, how to create genuine clarity, how to support genetics instead of fighting them, that’s when the pushback hit. Not in the beginning, but later on, when I became curious and open to learning beyond one ideology.

Being in that vulnerable stage of learning and then targeted by the very people promoting “positivity” was an eye-opener. It cemented something for me: I wasn’t going to change my name to appease anyone. I kept Positive Paws deliberately, not to claim “purely positive” methods, but because I genuinely believe positivity has its place in all good training. A positive outlook, a positive relationship, positive experiences… those things matter alongside structure, consequences, drive fulfilment, and everything else.

𝗧𝗵𝗲 𝗗𝗿𝗶𝘃𝗲𝗻 𝗗𝗼𝗴 is simply where I am now. It feels aligned with my craft, my values, and the dogs and owners I’m passionate about working with. It represents my evolution, not away from positivity, but into a more complete, grounded, balanced understanding of what dogs actually need.

Thank you to everyone who’s been part of this journey with me, trusted me, grown with me, and challenged me. I’m excited for this next chapter, and everything that comes with it.

For those concerned, everything, including the logo will stays the same, just the name change.

28/11/2025

STATE SHAPING vs SKILL TEACHING

There’s a layer in dog training most people skip, not intentionally, but because they’ve never been taught it.

Everyone looks at the skill.

Heel. Sit. Recall. Stay.

But the real story is the state the dog is in.

A dog can absolutely “know” something, yet be unable to access it when their nervous system is sitting in the wrong place.

Over-aroused, stressed, flat, frantic, conflicted… those states shut down clarity.

When we shape state, we teach the dog how to:

• regulate themselves

• stabilise before acting

• transition cleanly through arousal

• find neutral again

• work with the right intensity

• respond under pressure

Once the state is right, the behaviour becomes clean, consistent, and fair.

This is the part owners rarely get shown.

And it’s the part that changes everything.

24/11/2025

❤️❤️❤️

Davina at Positive Paws:- this lady is absolutely amazing — a true dog whisperer, animal psychology and even more so, a human trainer! I quickly learned that when the human is trained… oh my Lordy, the results speak for themselves. With the right tools and guidance, the pup isn’t hard to train at all.
Positive Paws gave our family the confidence, clarity, and a whole new understanding of our pup. The transformation has been incredible. Highly recommend if you have a pup or older dog how a few sessions with Davina can speed up and change behaviours. ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️