So I’m a seafood nut.
Love it. Shrimp, lobster, clams, oysters, fish, you name it.
My good friend, Craig, decided to visit from the Western part of of Massachusetts and he loves seafood as much as I do. Being the gracious host that I am, I made him an authentic Southeastern MA clam boil.
I’m sitting there watching him eat the clams when I noticed that he just ripped them out of the shell and popped them into his mouth.
Clams, also known as steamers, need to be shucked. There is a little membrane that needs to be peeled off before eating. I guess if you really wanted to you could eat the membrane, but it is crunchy and tastes like wet dirt.
I said: “Whoa, what are you doing? You need to peel that sucker off before eating it,” and then showed him how it was done.
One small, little change and he was no longer eating dirt and the clams tasted much better.
Funny how one little change can make a HUGE difference.
This also happens with training your dog to walk on leash. I was once helping this guy train his dog to walk on leash where one small change made a big difference.
This guy was wrapped tight, nice guy but he was wound up. I spent the first 30 minutes working with him showing him what to do. I then spent the next ten minutes watching him yank and jerk his dog around.
I asked him to relax a little which made him worse. He became even more tense and started yanking on the leash harder. I finally took the leash and asked him to walk around the park for a few minutes.
He came back about ten minutes later and apologized. He told me he had an awful day at work and was calmed down now.
Once he was relaxed, he got much better results from his dog.
This is good to remember. The first step in dog training is checking your own emotions and seeing if you’re ready to train your dog. I know there are many days when I need to step back and regroup.
This one little change may make all the difference when training your dog to walk on leash.
Speaking of making big changes with leash walking, have you checked out any of our classes yet?
You can by going here NOW:
Best,
Eric