It was time to teach Mert how to enter the present moment so that she can use the Trust Technique
and help Charlie to quiet his mind down at the right time.
And your attention is on spot, it's not on him because if you looked at him, you would start
thinking about him feeling, him reacting. So your attention is just on the spot.
He's aware of you and because he's aware of you and your mind's quiet, his will start
coming down so every now and then you can look at him. You know, he's quite relaxed now
and then you find your spot again. That's it and really focus on what you can see, hear and touch.
Ok, look at him. Just awareness of wherever he is. Now, I usually look at things as thinking
levels so I go from one to ten and I would say that ten is panicked, that's usually down to about
eight. Seven is pretty highly strung. Six is very aware, five is okay, four is relaxed. Three, they're
usually lying down, two, they're eyes are closing and opening, which is what his has been doing.
One their eyes are closed and what I would call zero is where you would see the body starting to
twitch. They go into a healing state. He's in level, sort of one at the moment. His eyes are closed,
you're going to stay nice and present and it won't be long before he starts,
there we go, he's starting to twitch. So already he's gone into that zero healing state.
Isn't that amazing? So can he stay like this while I go upstairs and do all my chores? Well, this is
what we're going to lead to. So I can say straight away how close he is to your feelings
and I know that if you're present with him, you're not going to be having the thoughts.
It's the thoughts that he's reacting against, you see his reaction and you react with him
and between the two of you, you create a lot of anxiety. He's just been mirroring but
look he's already gone into that sleep and you've been here for no more than two minutes.
We went back to the kitchen table. This time to make the present moment stronger. I know I'm going
to need to help Mert as much as possible with this situation so we needed to go a little bit deeper.
And I think you've got an amazing dog there, he's fantastic. He came into your life at
that time and now we're in a situation where- Only because we've bugged them if you know what I mean
like and then it happened and then it's like, oh no, now what. But he was all pretty game to come in,
he's a little angel that's coming to help you. Doesn't feel like that right now! It will do. You've
now got to work with him where it's actually gonna work for both of you. Our next step
is stage two. Stage two is very simple. Charlie, sit. What I'm doing is I'm sitting Charlie and
if he moves I'm going to ask him to go back to the same place. Charlie, Charlie sit.
Now, it doesn't matter, I don't mind to have to do this a hundred times.
Charlie, sit. There are a few rules here. You're always asking. Charlie, Charlie, Charlie, sit.
Charlie, Charlie, sit.
So it's very gentle and it's very persistent because what will happen is that after all this
excitement, that's why he can't listen because he has excitement, showing it very clearly to me now,
after the excitement, he'll just crash but I have to be peaceful because I'm getting present,
patient and very persistent. Charlie, Charlie, sit.
Sit, Charlie.
Charlie, sit.
And this shows so much about his character for me and that's what I've got to help him through so
like I've been helping you through this, now I've got to help him. Can he sit in a peaceful feeling?
Not really so I need to help him to do that.
In situations where the mind of the animal is so busy and isn't really listening, when Charlie has
his attention to me, he's getting too excited so I put him on the lead and it just helps me to have
a little bit more of a connection with him so that I'm clearer about what it is that I need him to do.
You can see that as soon as I put the lead on, it did allow this still moment to happen
and for Charlie to stay in a sit position whereby he will be able to feel me.
Good lad so here's the yawning and there's him gone. Okay so often what will happen is
they have to yawn out their feeling first so there's a quick yawn. And what about sometimes
there's this constant licking? That's because there's a lot of stress and there's biting and nibbling.
That's completely opposite to this. So now I've got him in a position where I've just
asked him to sit, you will do it with the lead first and you know, there's an extra connection
between me and him. Then you can drop the lead. Now, if you notice when I move away, he'll be looking
at me everywhere. Oh! As soon as he gets up, Charlie, sit.
I get present to show him how to feel
and there he is, look. So he tried to get excited, I've just asked him to sit again, I've got
present again. I'm going to drop the lead and I'm going to go further away. His attention
will be with me now because I've asked him to be in that feeling. As soon as he moves, Charlie, sit.
And I'm going to repeat this so I'm saying to him,
what I'm doing is I'm very clearly communicating that
when I ask him to sit in this feeling, he needs to stay there. I'm not asking him to stay, I'm saying,
I'm doing it with feeling.
So now we create what I call an invisible lead. His attention is with me,
I've asked him to stay there in a very good feeling, I've said, you know, stay there, chill.
So then I can carry on and do whatever I need to do. Now, if I need to reinforce that, I'll just keep
doing it, he will stay there. It doesn't matter if it's 10 times or if it's 100 times, he will do it
and this is the start of how you guys are going to create distance so I go back to
him and I say Charlie, you sit with this feeling. Don't say out loud, I start with putting myself
into a meditative state, he now knows that I've asked him to stay there peacefully
and he's done beautiful. Now, if I had to keep going for another 50 minutes I would
but I don't, if I was to get anxious at all or frustrated, it wouldn't work because I'd
be asking him to sit with a frustrated feeling and if you notice, it's much easier on the lead.
Even though I've dropped the lead now but it was much easier on the lead and he had
to whine a little bit before he went down, he had to let go of his stuff to be with me.
For him to match my feeling and I'm pretty chilled, that's the dog reflection of how I feel at the
moment. Now, when I've asked him to sit and I've got present and then I move away, I can be me.
I can do whatever I need to do but as soon as he gets up, I'll go over to him, get him present,
I sit him, get present until I see that he's relaxed then I move away so I can be myself again. I can
go and do, you know, the washing up or this and that and actively thinking so even with your
little one around, you'll be able to do this with a bit of practice. Okay. It means that yeah, he's
not used to being peaceful because look he can hardly keep his consciousness. He's going
into a healing state already but all I've done is asked him to be peaceful so we've created this
lovely feeling. You know, this is, now he's more awake, but he already went down into a healing mode
but look how much he's listening now - but of course with a listening animal, comes great
responsibility because what are they listening to? So that's where your present moment is going
to be so important. Now, if that means that at the beginning you've got him sitting there
and you're doing stuff in the kitchen, already you're teaching him about separation anxiety.
Right. Because you're saying you can be in your own space peacefully rather than in my pocket
and suddenly he starts turning into a chilled dog. That's a relaxed dog.