A dog gains awareness of its “self” from an awareness of its body. It gains an awareness of its body by being acted on by external forces, such as gravity. This awareness is framed by a bilaterally symmetrical anatomy configured around a physical center-of-gravity. A dog’s sense of its self begins with a subliminal beam of attention on its physical center-of-gravity in response to external forces. This construct integrates the animal mind with a sense of its surroundings. The surroundings become the substrate of the self and this is the basis of motive. The construct of the self is directly reflected in body language.
Ran across this blogger talking as “Mindful Leadershp” and this post relating to the dog’s body seemed interesting. Voice4dogs.blogspot.com/2013/02can-manipulation-of-body-and.html He recognizes that positive/negative reinforcement and simple manipulation of a dog’s body surface is not too meaningful. Just wondering If you had any insights or comments.
Quickly scanned the article. On the whole seems very good and in fact crystallizes to some degree what I’m trying to say. This is why the core exercises (pushing/biting/barking/suppling) are so vital. Every dog wants to feel good. Feeling good involves genuine emotion. These core exercises are the mechanics of feeling good. Through exercising the core, the dog is learning that it is in control of what’s happening by feeling good, eventually it no longer has to react in its typical way because that doesn’t feel as good as a genuine good feeling. Since feelings are social by their nature, feeling good always computes for sociability. Feeling good changes the way the dog perceives, what values it picks out from its surroundings. The transformation becomes genuine. But first a dog has to feel what feeling good feels like, before he can choose to feel good rather than “feeling” hectic/nervous/aggressive as a way of being in control and thereby safe.
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