People Training

I've been asked to help Project POOCH (www.pooch.org) in a new way. My new mission is to help three of the youth develop their skills in training other trainers. This means helping them figure out how to get their own knowledge and skills into the hands of other youth in a way that is meaningful and effective for the new trainers and the dogs in their care.

This is a BIG task! Dogs are easy to train. People are much, much trickier! Teaching humans to teach humans is daunting. Luckily, it's a subject I'm passionate about and very excited to continue to discuss with the guys at Mac Laren Youth Corrrectional Facility.

Last Thursday we discussed some of the issues they've been having as trainer mentors. Much of what they face is similar to what I deal with in my own clients. As I've looked over my notes and thought about how we'll move forward, I've been giving a lot of thought to why it's so much easier to work with dogs than people.

While there are many reasons, the one I want to mention today is defensiveness. The defensiveness of humans gets in the way of both teaching and learning. The definition I'm referring to is this:

"excessively concerned with guarding against the real or imagined threat of criticism, injury to one's ego, or exposure of one's shortcomings"

For all the talk about canine hierarchy and their concern with status, you'd think we'd more easily recognize that it is we, the humans, who are overly attached to our own perceived status. It's this kind of defensiveness that globs up communication, blocks information and separates great minds.

So, your training assignment for today? Think of one human you have had difficulty communicating with, or someone whose opinion raises your hackles, and check to see if those feelings are actually connected to a personal desire to defend yourself from criticism, a hurt ego or exposure to your own shortcomings.

Think about what might happen if you stopped.