Leash Work

We all have cabin fever. Either it's been too cold to be outside because of the windchill, snowy, rainy. Quite frankly, when there is sun or gray days with temperatures in the mid-20s, I lack the motivation to bundle up and get out there.

This is not good.

It is not good for them. They are bored. Bored dogs whine and chew and bark, three activities on the rise in this house. It is not good for me. I'm spiritually stagnant, unconnected.

I throw the ball around for Ollie in the back yard. It is cold, really cold. I'm going to need gloves. Ollie and Marshall get excited and start wrestling. This is a good time for me to get ready. Gloves, earmuffs, scarf, walking shoes, yoga pants, tank top, long-sleeved t-shirt, and winter jacket. Ollie and Marshall sprint to the house and bolt through the dog door the minute they hear the leashes. They know they have to sit to have their leashes put on and Ollie plants his hindquarters on the ground. Poor Marshall's tail is so excited that he can't sit properly, so he slouches in a sloppy puppy-sit. I'll take it.

Leashes clipped and door locked, and we are ready to go. I give them the cue 'let's go' to tell them they are released from their sit. We walk down our street and cross the main road into the neighborhood with the park and plowed streets. This is when it all goes down hill.

Marshall is the poster pup for perfect leash behavior. Part of that is because he hates pressure around his neck. Ollie is too excited and his long legs make him walk fast. I imagine walking next to me for him is like me walking next to someone with a cane or walker. You understand why the other person needs more time, but your steps become unnaturally shortened to keep in step with them.

No walking meditation today. It's leash work time.

I started out with the right things.

Let the dog burn off excitement energy. This is especially important if the dog has been home alone all day and you've just gotten in for the evening. They are glad to see you.

I was able to get Ollie in the right 'following rules' mindset by doing a few drills with him. Sit for leashes, lay down and wait to go outside, sit and wait while I shut the door.

Ollie was just too excited for this walk. This means reinforcing the rules, the biggest of which is You Follow Me.

When training this, I use two methods: Crazy Lady and Treat In Hand

Training the Crazy Lady way means turning on your heel the second your dog starts to get a head of you. This doesn't mean wait until the dog is pulling and whip around, jerking the leash and yanking on the dog's neck. The purpose of this is to not let the dog think it knows where you are going and to always defer to you for directions.

Training with the Treat In Hand method is basically as simple as it sounds. Walk with a loose lead holding kibble in your hand. The dog will walk next to you, sniffing your hand. Treat him occasionally, saying 'good dog' or other verbal praise (keep it consistent). Do this for short walks at first, then slowly lengthen the walks and the time in between alternating praise and treats.

The important thing is to stay calm and patient. If you feel angry at any time, pack it in. Yanking, pulling, whipping, jerking, is not only painful to your dog, but also hurtful to your relationship. Punishment, if not timed correctly, becomes arbitrary and unpredictable to a dog. You look less like a mentor and more like a dictator.

Walking Meditation Tips (and tip-tips)

As I re-read yesterday's post, I heard Marshall's little prance across the kitchen floor. Marshall's tip-tip toes reminded me that others might need some tips on how to pull off this whole 'walking meditation thing' with a dog. (It also reminded me how much I need to trim Marshall's nails.)

A lot of people confuse meditation or presence with the stereotypical sit-on-the-floor-all-pretzel-like-and-say-ohm-till-you're-zoned-out characters on TV shows. There is nothing zoned-out about mindful walking or walking meditation, especially with a furry friend. It is a little more complicated than just walking by yourself in a secluded setting. You have to be aware of cars, crossing streets, the message you are sending down the leash, communicating turns or commands if you have certain rules about other dogs, distractions, pedestrians, or cars. (Ollie has to sit on the shoulder for cars coming from behind him. He used to be so afraid of things he couldn't see, he'd run without thinking -- a very dangerous habit that had to be corrected.)

There are so many great websites on walking meditation, but here are a few of my tips:

• The key is to be kind to yourself. Wear comfortable clothing, drink water before you go, don't worry about how far you are going to walk. This is not training for a 20K charity walk. It is training for being mindful and aware. Listen to your body. If in the spring and summer you are too hot or feel winded, dizzy, or otherwise woozy while walking, sit down for a minute or stand and lean against a tree or building in the shade. If on a cold day you find your hands and feet are losing feeling, maybe it is time to go inside and warm up.

• You aren't going to be able to connect with your breathing if your dog is over-excited and pulling you everywhere. You're going to be fighting him the whole way. Let your dog run around outside before you go, throw a ball, tire him out a little. Let him have a good drink of water. Dogs really don't need sweaters and coats until it is well below 30 degrees. Unless the dog is small and has fur with no undercoat (Italian Greyhound, Min-Pins, etc) or is almost naked (Chinese Crested, Chihuahuas, groomed Poodles, etc.) they probably don't need any people clothes on a walk. If your pooch does need outerwear, check periodically to make sure there is no rubbing or chafing.

• When just out walking your dog, practice good leash habits. It doesn't really matter if the dog is in front of you a little or behind you. What matters is there is no leash-pulling.

• When you and your pooch start off, begin walking a little faster than normal. The increased heart rate forces your body to start breathing correctly and really accepting your breath. You may naturally begin breathing in your nose and out your mouth. Plus, a little feel-good endorphins never hurt anyone, right?

• After about four or five minutes, slow down a bit and let your breath fall into a natural rhythm. Don't expend the energy trying to force yourself to breathe in or out on a certain step, just notice when you do breathe. Lengthen your stride to fit the rhythm of your breath.

• This is about the time where one of two things will happen with your walking partner. Either he will sense your changing mental state and join you in it, falling into step beside you, or he will feel you starting to relax and take it as an opportunity for free-for-all leash time. If you experience the second response, you and pooch need more leash time and more training walks. (Tomorrow's post)

• Soft-focus your eyes, relaxing the muscles in your face, forehead, and around your eyes. Be aware of your step, hear your breath. As thoughts or feelings surface, don't try to ignore them, rather acknowledge them and let them go as if they were the trees or houses you are passing. To help you remember to praise your dog for good leash behavior, choose an object ahead of you. Do not focus on that object, just use it as a guide. When you pass it, give soft and calm verbal praise.

• Smile at people you pass. Smiling is important. "Sometimes the source of your smile is joy. Your smile can also be the source of your joy." --Thich Nhat Hahn

Walking Meditation II

Note: This is a revised post, originally posted 7.19.2009

It is another partly cloudy day. The last one I expect to see this week. I could base my prediction on the local weatherman's forecast of lower than normal temperatures and thunderstorms. Instead, I look at the trees for conformation. The breeze grows stronger throughout the day and the silver undersides of the leaves are exposed. The silver maple sparkles for a moment. This is how I know tomorrow will bring rain.

We are walking, Marshall and I. He is a good walker. His toenails tap the pavement as he bounces next to me. I call his happy walk "tip-tip-tip". His head is up, his whippy tail reminds me of the Wacky-Waving-Inflatable-Flailing-Arm-Tube-Man outside the local Chevy dealership.

Marshall is a happy puppy. I'm realizing as I write this that he only has a few short months until he is no longer a puppy. He will be two in November. People always think he is much younger and mistake him for a sixteen-week old Rottweiler. The truth is we don't know what he is, a Heinz 57 mutt that most closely resembles a German Pinscher, the dogs that are the ancestors of Doberman Pinschers, Schnauzers, and Affenpinschers.

His prance has been passed down from three hundred years of working dogs. Marshall walks with pride. He has a job and he does it well. I am currently working with him to be a service dog. My service dog.

I am one of the thousands of people with an invisible disability. People with Epilepsy, Autism, Diabetes, Alzheimer's, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, and other serious psychiatric disorders fall into this category. Marshall is being trained in medical alert and response, certain tasks to help me in my daily life, as well as all of his public access standards. I may have periods of recovery where I may not fit the definition of disabled and meet the requirements to bring Marshall with me. I actually hope for those times. We continue training regardless of what the future brings, trying to stay in "the now".

He is off-duty right now and enjoying the scents coming to him in the pre-rain breeze. We stand for a moment in the shade of an oak tree, close our eyes and smell. Someone is burning leaves and yard waste and from far away someone is grilling. The scent of sun-ripened blackberries down the path beckons me. I start to walk ahead, but Marshall is not moving. He has firmly planted himself next to the tree.

When I move closer, he nudges my knee. It is one of his gentle alerts. I take my pulse and realize I do, in fact, need to sit down and continue the deep breathing we were doing before. The tightness in my chest builds then subsides and I breathe through it. A few minutes later, I feel a tug on the leash. Marshall is standing on the path with his happy wagging tail. He tap-dances at me to tell me it's time to get going and I'm ok again. It is time to finish our walk, side-by-side.

I am reminded at this point of a quote by Thich Nhat Hanh's "Faith as a Living Thing".

Faith is nourished by understanding. The practice of looking deeply helps you understand better. As you understand better, your faith grows.

My faith has been fed today. And I think Marshall's has, too.

Walking Meditation Beginnings

Note: This is a revised post from 7.8.2009. It appeared as part of the collection of blog entries on mindfulness and meditation.

This week I walked with Gus. He is a Silky Terrier who stays with us most of the time. His owner, Heather, is a friend who was staying at our house for a while. She works long hours and spends most of her days off helping her family. We get the benefit of having him when he is not with her.

Gus was a former puppy mill puppy. Through his puppyhood and early adolescence he was kept in an 8'x8' pen with four to five other litters. Surrounded by so many dogs, he never learned how to develop the social skills or bonding needed for mental and physical development. His only human interaction was being kicked out of the way when someone cleaned his cage or decided to change the water and food.

When the ASPCA had enough evidence to close the mill, he was taken to a rescue on the border of Ohio and Southern Michigan. I found him through a search on PetFinder.com. My friend was looking for a Yorkshire or Silky terrier but also wanted to adopt rather than go through a breeder. His picture showed a scraggly dog with matted hair, looking up hopefully at the camera.

I spoke to the foster mom. She gave me a little bit of his background and told me that he's a little fearful of strangers. I've worked with socializing shy and fearful dogs before, so that didn't seem like much of a challenge. Heather and I drove out to meet Gus at his foster home in late December.

I knew immediately he would be a difficult rehabilitation. While all the other foster dogs ran to meet us at the door, Gus only peeked out from around the corner. It took almost an hour for him to let me pet him without shaking. Heather had decided it was love at first site. "He's going to need a lot of work. I can help, but it's going to be a long road. It's not too late to change your mind," I told her as we walked back to the car. She nodded sincerely but could hardly contain her smile as she said, "I know."

By the time we got him to my house, Gus was exhuasted. He fell asleep on the floor by the couch after meeting Ollie and Marshall. I tried to brush his fur to no avail. I knew we were going to have to cut it. Poor little Gus slept the whole time while I clipped and Heather thought of names, eventually settling on Gus-Gus after the mouse from Disney's Cinderella. A friend who does grooming cleaned up my hack-job Army haircut just before his appointment with our family vet.

His vet records said he was about eight months old. Our vet immediately showed us Gus was over a year old, perhaps older. "See the tartar build up here and here?" Dr. K said, pointing to the tar-like brown and black covering the top half of his molars and incisors. "Most of that is from not getting regular cleaning and chew toys. In my opinion, that level of build up wouldn't be able to accumulate in less than 18 months, maybe two years." Dr. K looked at the little shivering waif and you could see her imagining his life. "You struck gold, buddy. This is a really good family. You're gonna get your teeth brushed."

As I watched him over the next few weeks, I became fairly certain he was closer to two years old.

Two years. No human contact. No positive play or dog interaction.

Sheesh.

He was certain every sudden movement was to be feared. He had no understanding of how to relate to my dogs. He hoarded toys and socks in the corner of his crate or under Heather's bed. He guarded his food. He cowered and lowered his head every time someone tried to pick him up or pet him. We would joke that he 'hated how much he loved' belly rubs because he would be so happy being pet, but the minute you loosened your grip or moved he would run away. And when it came time to put on a leash he fought ferociously and would nip and yelp.

It's been six months since he first came home and hours of classical and operative conditioning. Now he enjoys snuggling and will fall asleep in my arms. In May he learned how to entertain himself and play by himself with a tennis ball. He is becoming more consistent with 'come', 'wait', and 'sit' but that's about it. We've had quite a few rough days. A lot of days he feels like a chore and some days I threaten to give him to a traveling circus. We have so much more work to do together and so much more training ahead of us.

Walking with Gus this past week strangers would comment, "What a cute dog!" and "What a happy puppy!" as they passed. I looked down at Gus prancing beside me, bright eyed with a 'smile' on his face. I realized I am seeing what other people see: a happy terrier enjoying his daily walk along the lake.

My walking message for mindfulness I learned today:

Take the time to realize small achievements toward your goals. Reward small progresses and use this awareness to see that others are working on their stuff too.

Walking Meditation

Walking is a pretty spiritual thing for me. It is a time to be aware of my body and my surroundings. I am fortunate to live in an area where there are boardwalks and bike paths that go around lakes and into wooded areas. The air is sweet and cool on spring and early summer days and the lake is fairly still. Swans and ducks and the occasional egret or heron enjoy the marsh by the boardwalk. Bullfrogs and turtles and leopard frogs rest on fallen branches.

The colder it gets, the more difficult it is to be motivated to walk. The neighborhood roads are usually plowed, though. And even when it is blustery and cold, the dogs always enjoy our walks. The snow and ice right now cover the naked branches and sparkle in the sun. Children ice skate on the lake. It truly is a beautiful place to live when I take the time to notice it.

I very rarely bring my iPod along when I walk by myself or with the dogs. I feel it breaks the connection down the leash as well as the time to listen to my body. I use walking as a meditation frequently since I don't seem to be doing well lately with sitting still and feeling present. When we walk, the dogs and I get a chance to see and smell small changes around us and within.

Many of my favorite quotes on mindfulness are by Thich Nhat Hahn, a Vietnamese Buddhist monk exiled in France. Rather than explain what I think of these quotes, I will simply include them and let you come to your own conclusions thinking on them.

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People usually consider walking on water or in thin air a miracle. But I think the real miracle is not to walk either on water or in thin air, but to walk on earth. Every day we are engaged in a miracle which we don't even recognize: a blue sky, white clouds, green leaves, the black, curious eyes of a child -- our own two eyes. All is a miracle.

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Walk and touch peace every moment.

Walk and touch happiness every moment.

Each step brings a fresh breeze.

Each step makes a flower bloom.

Kiss the Earth with your feet.

Bring the Earth your love and happiness.

The Earth will be safe

when we feel safe in ourselves.

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Be aware of the contact between your feet and the Earth. Walk as if you are kissing the Earth with your feet. We have caused a lot of damage to the Earth. Now it is time for us to take good care of her. We bring our peace and calm to the surface of the Earth and share the lesson of love. We walk in that spirit.

Mu.

Prompted by an article shared by a friend, I thought I would spend this week on the history of our domestication of common pets and how it has historically affected our treatment of animals.

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In my spiritual studies back in college, I came across a Zen Buddhist koan that has stuck with me since. A koan is a question or parable whose answer cannot be reached through rational thinking, logic, or arguing. The answer is more of a meditation that one has to interpret intuitively.

A monk asked his Chinese Zen master: `Master, does a dog have Buddha-nature?'

The master answered: `Mu.' (or Wu-- the Japanese symbol for null or nothing)

I thought about this koan for days, walking to and from class. This one word, Mu, meaning "nothing" or "null set" in a literal translation, but in the meaning of the Buddhist koan, meaning the question itself is moot. There is no discontinuation of nothingness, there is no end to existence. In that one word, "mu" conveys that subjectivity and objectivity become one. The moment you ask the question, you lose your own Buddha-nature, your own innate ability to access the entirety of your mind and body and awakeness. It matters and it matters not.

I was instantly reminded of this koan when a friend brought a recent article by Marc Bekoff from Psychology Today to my attention. Bekoff is a Professor Emeritus of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at the University of Colorado, Boulder and in his article, he asks the question, "Are nonhuman animals more moral than human animals?"

For those of us who share our lives with animals, it isn't that surprising that Bekoff comes up with a the (almost) answer of yes. He goes on to explain that predatory behavior is not immoral, merely survival and the circle of life. He discusses the rarity of predators killing more than what is needed for the meal of an individual or pack. He explains how disputes over territory pales in comparison to human war and conquest. And while there are a few cases of violent 'scapegoating' or 'picking on' a weak member of the group, there is also evidence of empathy and compassion within and between species.

I related this article and my personal experiences to the Buddhist koan. I struggle constantly with the idea that we share the same space, resources, and energy with all animals (even mosquitoes) and all animals are equal life and all life has equal value. This koan makes our observations and clinical assessment or argument of the value of those observations like those in the article are moot. Thinking too much gets in our way of being present to experience the wonder that is sharing a life with an animal.

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And before the Wise Ones appeared,


Forty million years of ducks in the mud.

Blowing out a candle
ten thousand miles away


Cutting up a duck for dinner.

A dog barks at nothing,
a thousand ducks twitch--


winds of winter.

Has a duck the Buddha-Nature?


"Sssshhh!
Stop quacking like a duck."

- Michael P. Garofalo

Smell and connection

This whole week has been devoted to The Skunk Incident of 2009. Primarily my focus has been on coping with the smell of skunk musk and how it affected my relationship with Ollie and Marshall. I also had to cope with how it affected my home. I was obsessive about getting that smell out of my house, not just because the smell was offensive to my nose, but because it was disrupting my spiritual focus.

Scent is very powerful. Some studies have shown that scent is one of the strongest sense connected with our memories. Certain smells can evoke emotions, positive or negative, and activate physiological responses.

I am very connected to scents. I am particular about what scents I have on me in terms of perfumes, lotions, or shower gel. I have very strong opinions about how my bedroom should smell (warm sandalwood, vanilla, sweet tabacco, and earth), my laundry room (Bath and Body Works Fresh Linen), and my kitchen soap is always, always lemon.

I even go so far as to adjust my plug-in air freshener scents in cycles. Post-holiday winter is black currant, spring is lavender, early summer has some kind of lime, citrus, or lemon verbena. The early-harvest August through holiday season bring apples and cinnamon, pumpkin, orange and clove, and fir and balsam.

These scents are not just for ambience. Scent, being so strongly attached to memory, is also attached to actions. The changing of scents are a cycle that generates thoughts and behaviors that help me connect with the season. I associate the fresh scent of lavender with activities that freshen my life and home: cleaning, organizing, letting go of hibernating hurts and grudges. Citrus smells make me feel juicy and full of energy, active and ready to take in sun and connect with earth. Apples and cinnamon make me long sleeves, long walks, and long fireside discussions over cider. The smells of the holidays encourage me to breathe deeply and focus on the warm feelings from connecting with those I love instead of associating the season with frenetic urgency, irritation, or stress.

I find that when I am having a hard time connecting spiritually, scents of wood and leather help me find roots. When I having a particularly difficult time with forgiveness of myself, others, or the world in general, lighting my citrus and sage candle during meditation or thoughtful reading helps me release the anger blocking me from healing my hurt and also helps release whatever ties that bound me to that anger.

Maybe this is why TSI of 2009 brought about so much change for me, so much reflection. I had to restore my house, my furry four paws, and myself to their own true scent to feel that connection as strongly.

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True nature is always elusive,


Only the heart of no-heart
can grasp-it.


Up in the mountain,
the burning jade stays brilliant.


And in the roaring furnace,
lotus blossoms keep their fragrance.

- Ngo An, Korea, (circa 1090)