How do you project calm energy ? All behaviour and training advice tells you a dog can read your body language and pick up on how you feel so its important to stay calm, relaxed, not to tense up etc. I was reading something the other day which said to project calm energy. Ok but how ? Is it as simple as taking a deep breath and staying relaxed ? It seems like there should be more to it then that. There's advice on dog body language how to read it and what it means but I can't find anything on using human body language to help calm and train. My dogs being the nervous over excitable creatures they are would benefit from some projected calm energy but I'm not sure I'm very good at it or maybe not doing it right.
I could do with some help at this as well . My Pilates instructor is always mentioning my tensed shoulders and this was also commented on at dog training, it seems no matter how hard I try my shoulders always end up around my ears . And I can see Ripple reacting to any tense body language. Calm energy would be really great.
PMR is good for learning this. Progressive Muscle Relaxation. I use it as a calming method when I have to fly. You can look it up (Google is your friend ), but it basically involves you tensing every large muscle group in your body (one at a time, in sequence), holding it really hard for several seconds, then suddenly releasing it. Not only it is great for calming you (I think a large part of this is that the counting almost puts you into a meditative state), but more importantly, in my mind, it trains you to feel when your muscles are tense, so you can relax them - something that I certainly struggle with, holding tension in parts of my body. Once you've done it for a while, it's pretty easy to close your eyes and do a mental check of all the muscles to check that they're loose
On one if the many courses I attended in my working life we were encouraged to think of a place/time when we were feeling very relaxed - a really good holiday for instance. Visualise that time while breathing slow and steady. The visualisation with practice becomes easier and easier and can quickly be called upon to help you calm/de-stress in situations. You need somewhere quiet and comfortable to start working on it but I found it really good and easy to switch into.
I wish techniques like that helped me, Rosemary. It sounds so simple! I don't have a visual mind at all, though - when I close my eyes, I don't see pictures at all. I find it quite alien that people can conjure up pictures in their heads. It must be awesome being able to see what you want whenever you want!
Need to read up on this PMR but sounds good. I'm starting to visualise my happy place as I type Rosemary. We are just off for a walk and from my dogs behaviour over the last couple of days it would appear every bitch in a three mile radius is in season and walked down our lane !!! I am calm, I am calm.
Here's some more information on PMR: http://www.anxietybc.com/sites/default/files/MuscleRelaxation.pdf
Shows how different brains work cos I can't do the muscle group relaxation Caused me a few problems trying to do the relax in Pilates but just went to my "happy place" instead
Basically then if I'm calm the dogs will pick this up and become calm ? I just have to stay calm when they are going loopy. Oh if only it was that easy I'm sure my dogs pick up tension a lot easier than they pick up calm.
People say that having a dog is a great way to introduce calm into your life. Hah! I've never been more anxious!! Always worrying about my boy.
