The impact of your thinking on your dogs behaviour and health
Scotty Valadao
Scotty Valadao
Many years ago, I became a Louise L Hay Practitioner, although I had no idea as to why I felt absolutely compelled to do this, as I knew my path in life was to work primarily with animals.
According to many experts and indeed, from what I learnt myself in the Louise L Hay Practitioner courses, our brains seem to have a natural tendency to favour negative thoughts over positive thoughts. Psychologists refer to this as negativity bias, and it causes people to focus on one bad thing instead of the amount of good things that may be part of their lives. I have supplied some links at the bottom you may find of interest.
It’s good to know this, however, how on earth does this relate to our animals? Think about what your subconscious mind may be saying, or what you may be saying out loud – ‘Fido will never get this right’ ; ‘oh no, I just know that Fluffy is going to try and attack that dog coming towards us’ and so on – do you see how we can, inadvertently, set ourselves and our pets up for failure without even realizing it?
Now we all know that our dogs and cats pick up on our emotions (and even our thoughts and any pictures we may see in our mind’s eye), and when we think in a negative fashion, whether sub conscious or not, we are increasing our own stress levels. Our stress levels can impact on our animals, and in the case of a dog that may be reactive to other dogs when out for a walk, what we are inadvertently doing, is to increase the likelihood of a reactive reaction from your dog, without realising it – we get stressed, we are seeing a negative outcome in our minds, plus we often hold on tighter to the lead, and our body language becomes stressed – of course a dog would pick up on this and react. While I was still doing hands-on behaviour, a lot of my clients were dogs with aggressive behaviour. In additions to modifications that were brought in, one of the very first things I looked at was could the owner control the dog - very often not! I would then bring in humane tools such as collar and harness on two points of contact, or in the case of an extremely strong, or aggressive dogs, I would try a Head Halter and collar. Of course these were not just stuck on - the dog was desensitized in the correct manner to learn to enjoy this type of equipment, and the owner was schooled in use of same. It never ceased to amaze me, that once the owner realized they could easily contain the dog and prevent it dashing towards other dogs, the dog, on average, immediately became less reactive - why - a major component of fear had been removed from the owner, and of course, stress travels down the lead, and the sub conscious thoughts disappear!
If we look at a situation whereby a dog is suffering from separation anxiety, perhaps consider what a person’s thoughts may be when they are about to go out the door – ‘oh no, I just know he is going to try to destroy something/bark/whine’ and that is before we have even left the home! Then, during the day, we often worry about our dog, and our stress levels increase accordingly. Now imagine if we get caught in traffic coming home, can you now imagine how much stress is being caused?
What about the dog that has a medical condition – the same thing applies – we focus on the negative and may continually say that my dog has xxx, instead of bringing in some positive affirmations. Are the positive affirmations going to change the condition – no – but it will reduce both your and your dogs stress levels, which alone, is conductive to healing taking place.
I am not saying that saying that positive thinking alone will change the behaviour or any health conditions – we also need to do what is necessary by way of vet assistance, behaviour modification, energy balancing and communication and any other modalities you may consider. What is crucial, is discovering what the root cause/s of the behaviour or condition is – why is the animal acting in that specific manner, and what is the animal getting out of performing the behaviour. An animal engages in a behaviour simply because it works, and the more it works, the more likely the animal is to repeat the unacceptable behaviour – remember to the dog it is absolutely normal behaviour!
Now, changing negative thoughts to positive ones, are not as easy as it seems. The negative thoughts are already imbedded in our heads, and if I told you that your dog would not be reactive to any other dogs just by thinking this, or seeing that picture in your minds eye, and saying ‘my dog is no longer reactive’, you would simply not believe me.
In a situation such as above, I would suggest you use a sentence such as ‘every way, in every day, he is getting better and better’, and if the negative thought surfaces, immediately repeat this new affirmation. Saying it once is not going to help either, positive thinking is something that takes time to become the norm, and as they say practice makes perfect! Gary Player used to say, “the more I practice the luckier I become”, and this applies to changing both your thoughts about an unacceptable behaviour and a health concern. It will take time to change, but is a very powerful tool to have, and you will be amazed at the difference it can make.
Well, you have no idea how glad I was in retrospect that I became qualified as a Louise L Hay Facilitator – the knowledge helped me to clear my own ‘stuff’, and more importantly, it was a tool that I was to use in just about every behaviour consult to help my clients overcome the problem they were having with their dogs, and is still a tool I use in communication and energy work.
Suggested Reading:
Negative Bias - https://www.verywellmind.com/negative-bias-4589618
Neuroscience behind words - https://brm.institute/neuroscience-behind-words/
E-Book – Words can change your brain by Dr. Andrew Newberg
https://www.amazon.com/Words-Can-Change-Your-Brain-ebook/dp/B0074VTHMA
According to many experts and indeed, from what I learnt myself in the Louise L Hay Practitioner courses, our brains seem to have a natural tendency to favour negative thoughts over positive thoughts. Psychologists refer to this as negativity bias, and it causes people to focus on one bad thing instead of the amount of good things that may be part of their lives. I have supplied some links at the bottom you may find of interest.
It’s good to know this, however, how on earth does this relate to our animals? Think about what your subconscious mind may be saying, or what you may be saying out loud – ‘Fido will never get this right’ ; ‘oh no, I just know that Fluffy is going to try and attack that dog coming towards us’ and so on – do you see how we can, inadvertently, set ourselves and our pets up for failure without even realizing it?
Now we all know that our dogs and cats pick up on our emotions (and even our thoughts and any pictures we may see in our mind’s eye), and when we think in a negative fashion, whether sub conscious or not, we are increasing our own stress levels. Our stress levels can impact on our animals, and in the case of a dog that may be reactive to other dogs when out for a walk, what we are inadvertently doing, is to increase the likelihood of a reactive reaction from your dog, without realising it – we get stressed, we are seeing a negative outcome in our minds, plus we often hold on tighter to the lead, and our body language becomes stressed – of course a dog would pick up on this and react. While I was still doing hands-on behaviour, a lot of my clients were dogs with aggressive behaviour. In additions to modifications that were brought in, one of the very first things I looked at was could the owner control the dog - very often not! I would then bring in humane tools such as collar and harness on two points of contact, or in the case of an extremely strong, or aggressive dogs, I would try a Head Halter and collar. Of course these were not just stuck on - the dog was desensitized in the correct manner to learn to enjoy this type of equipment, and the owner was schooled in use of same. It never ceased to amaze me, that once the owner realized they could easily contain the dog and prevent it dashing towards other dogs, the dog, on average, immediately became less reactive - why - a major component of fear had been removed from the owner, and of course, stress travels down the lead, and the sub conscious thoughts disappear!
If we look at a situation whereby a dog is suffering from separation anxiety, perhaps consider what a person’s thoughts may be when they are about to go out the door – ‘oh no, I just know he is going to try to destroy something/bark/whine’ and that is before we have even left the home! Then, during the day, we often worry about our dog, and our stress levels increase accordingly. Now imagine if we get caught in traffic coming home, can you now imagine how much stress is being caused?
What about the dog that has a medical condition – the same thing applies – we focus on the negative and may continually say that my dog has xxx, instead of bringing in some positive affirmations. Are the positive affirmations going to change the condition – no – but it will reduce both your and your dogs stress levels, which alone, is conductive to healing taking place.
I am not saying that saying that positive thinking alone will change the behaviour or any health conditions – we also need to do what is necessary by way of vet assistance, behaviour modification, energy balancing and communication and any other modalities you may consider. What is crucial, is discovering what the root cause/s of the behaviour or condition is – why is the animal acting in that specific manner, and what is the animal getting out of performing the behaviour. An animal engages in a behaviour simply because it works, and the more it works, the more likely the animal is to repeat the unacceptable behaviour – remember to the dog it is absolutely normal behaviour!
Now, changing negative thoughts to positive ones, are not as easy as it seems. The negative thoughts are already imbedded in our heads, and if I told you that your dog would not be reactive to any other dogs just by thinking this, or seeing that picture in your minds eye, and saying ‘my dog is no longer reactive’, you would simply not believe me.
In a situation such as above, I would suggest you use a sentence such as ‘every way, in every day, he is getting better and better’, and if the negative thought surfaces, immediately repeat this new affirmation. Saying it once is not going to help either, positive thinking is something that takes time to become the norm, and as they say practice makes perfect! Gary Player used to say, “the more I practice the luckier I become”, and this applies to changing both your thoughts about an unacceptable behaviour and a health concern. It will take time to change, but is a very powerful tool to have, and you will be amazed at the difference it can make.
Well, you have no idea how glad I was in retrospect that I became qualified as a Louise L Hay Facilitator – the knowledge helped me to clear my own ‘stuff’, and more importantly, it was a tool that I was to use in just about every behaviour consult to help my clients overcome the problem they were having with their dogs, and is still a tool I use in communication and energy work.
Suggested Reading:
Negative Bias - https://www.verywellmind.com/negative-bias-4589618
Neuroscience behind words - https://brm.institute/neuroscience-behind-words/
E-Book – Words can change your brain by Dr. Andrew Newberg
https://www.amazon.com/Words-Can-Change-Your-Brain-ebook/dp/B0074VTHMA
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