After 30 years as a professional dog trainer, I've learned a lot of things.

But today I'm going to share with you the most important thing that I've learned.

And this one thing actually is a domino that makes

dog training far less frustrating and far easier for the dog to be successful. Hi, I'm Susan

Garrett. Welcome to the 100th episode of Shape by Dog. And first, I'd like to acknowledge the phenomenal team that I have

that helps me put out these episodes each and every week. They're just amazing. They make my life

crazy, easy, and they support every kind of goofy idea I have to bring dog training to everybody in the world. So, a big round

for everybody on the Shape by Dog team. My first episode of Shape by Dog, I really wasn't

100% sure the direction of the podcast, but I did know I wanted to share life lessons that made

dog training easy, that helped people to see how dog

training was related to things like parenting and teaching or coaching or being the leader of a

team. And I know we got a little bit of pushback because people were saying, well, are you

saying that we should be training our children like dogs?

And I want to make it clear, children and members of a team that you're coaching or people in a

class that you're teaching or people who work for you that you might be leading.

They are all learners. And that's how we're united. And that's how there's a commonality from one

to the other to the other. And for me, having the congruency and seeking to constantly be

congruent in all areas of my life makes life a lot easier for me. I've mentioned many times in the

podcast that I look at dog training as a conversation between friends, that

our dogs give us feedback by the actions that they take, by what I talked about episode

number four, the temp, their body language. They respond and they give us feedback on what

we have given them. So, how good are we as educators? Our dogs' behavior

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