So I've almost finished reading Cesar Millan's first book, Cesar's Way. It's not about training a dog to do things as much as it's about a whole mindset and philosophy for raising a happy, balanced dog. Cesar believes that we mess up dogs by making them fulfill our needs - for love, affection, cuddling, etc. His mantra is "Exercise, Discipline, Affection" - the attention you give dogs should take the form of exercise 50% of the time, followed by discipline 25% of the time, and affection 25% of the time, in that order.
That's really, really difficult to do when you have an adorable puppy in front of you and all you want to do is give affection, affection, affection.
I'll let you know how it goes. Olive is spending her first night alone in her crate this evening. I gave her a warm rice/flax pillow with a timer under it to simulate her mom's heartbeat. She cried and cried for what seemed like about an hour and a half, but it turned out to be five minutes.
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