01/18/2025
1/ Decide that you are going to, without reservation or guilt, lead your dog; holding them to a far higher standard of behavior. Also decide that when that standard is breached you will, without reservation or guilt, hold them accountable and share valuable consequences which change behavior. (This will not destroy your relationship, on the contrary, it will rebuild it in a far more healthy fashion.)
2/ Ensure your dog is dragging a leash or longline connected to a prong collar (while supervised) so you’re able to train as needed and correct any infractions as they come up — and not play the catch me if you can game.
3/ Make peace with the “Indoors is for calm/chill behavior and outdoors is for play/craziness.” approach, and stick with it. This alone will change your life.
4/ Crate train your dog. Your dog should sleep in the crate at night, be crated when you’re not home, and spend some downtime crated during the day as well to prevent any separation anxiety and allow them to totally turn off and reset. Ensure your dog enters and exists the crate on your command and does so calmly — this is CRITICAL!
5/ Correct any whining, barking, digging, destruction while in the crate firmly and ensure it stops. (E-Collar is best, but bonking the crate, or sq**rt bottle, or opening the crate door and slamming it can often work.)
6/ Teach basic prong collar obedience: sit, down, place, recall, heel. This is far easier than you think. (My YT “The Good Dog Training” has all the videos for free.)
7/ You have to master the walk. You can’t transform your relationship if one of the biggest components is unhealthy. Watch my training videos closely. All the info is there.
8/ Control all freedom. YOU decide where your dog should be. Free roaming is not allowed at this point — your dog should be in command at all times except for sleeping, potty breaks, and specific play times. (This isn’t forever.)
9/ You control access to all resources — this means toys, food, people. Do not allow free access to anything valuable.
10/ This is a no furniture period. This means no couch or bed. Remember the dog is supposed to be in command if out of the crate and in the house during this period. (This also isn’t forever.)
11/ Correct any whining, barking, or assorted nonsense from place or down — these commands should be calm and chilled. Also correct any overly aroused, hyped-up, chaotic behavior (mindset) in general. You can use leash and prong, or a bonker for this. (And of course e-collar if you’re using one.)
12/ Ensure your dog waits for permission to go through any high value threshold. Correct with leash and prong firmly for non-compliance.
13/ Treat small infractions like large ones. And share larger consequences for smaller infractions for the most relationship/attitude mileage. This one ( #13) is probably the least understood on this list, and probably the most transformative. Work on it!!
14/ Treat pushy, bratty, impulse control-free moments not as “An excited dog” but as pushy, bratty, impulse control-free dog who has no respect for you. Address accordingly, if you want a respectful dog.
15/ Realize that every addressing and every allowance is a conversation that tells your dog who you are and who they are. These moments will define the healthiness or dysfunction of your relationship dynamics. Most folks will struggle and slide with how consistently they enforce the rules and how firmly. Don’t make this common mistake.
16/ Keep play and affection moderate and lowkey — for now. Play hard to get, and let your dog’s polite, respectful behavior earn them more of the good, soft, sweet stuff from you. (This isn’t forever.)
17/ Ensure your dog is getting sufficient physical exercise in the form of structured walks and structured playtime. But be very careful to not fall into the “A tired dog is a good dog” trap.” A tired dog is simply that — tired, for the moment. It’s easy to accidentally build an athlete who requires more and more exercise to be momentarily tired. Instead make sure your dog is getting the physical AND the mental exercise by way of duration place and down. It’s easy to miss the transformative value of conditioning calming work (like long duration place and down) for the more obvious and conventional physical exercise — but you will be missing a huge part of the success puzzle if you do so. Dogs should be able to be calm without having just run a marathon — and yes, this goes for even high drive dogs.
If you’re consistent with the above you will absolutely begin to transform your relationship. It won’t happen overnight, but contained in the prescription above are the ingredients which smart dog trainers use to transform dogs in training day after day. And for those looking for even more success, after you’ve mastered the prong collar obedience, I’d highly recommend you move to e-collar work. There’s no rush, but this final transition will enable you to hit on and off-leash goals you likely can only dream of.
PS, there’s a lot of stuff here. Don’t brush over it or breeze through it. The degree of depth and commitment to this list will determine your outcome. All of this can be accomplished in 2-3 months if you work hard. Imagine having a different dog and different relationship 3 months from now. And then imagine how much more fun, freedom, and inclusion that will create for you and your dog. Lastly, remember that the firmness of this outline is a means to an end. It’s meant to create a hard reset/overhaul for those truly struggling. If you’re not struggling, or if things are only mildly problematic, see what you can pick and choose from here to improve your situation as needed.
PPS, I haven’t focused on the value of affection or play nearly as much as I have the “other stuff” — meaning the rules, structure, and accountability side of things. There’s a good reason — it’s exceptionally rare that when owners are struggling that it’s due to a lack of play or affection. These things are almost always in surplus, whilst the stuff I shared above — aka the hard stuff — is almost always in terribly short supply. 🙂
Providing owners with simple balanced training solutions for all their dog behavioral needs. 
