Ep. #23- Robert Cabral

Golden Nugget of Wisdom from Robert

Audio Clip Found @ 59:37

The thing that I can't stop thinking about after my interview with Robert Cabral is his view on Dog training being an artform. If someone were asked to name different types of artforms on family fued, I'd be willing to bet some major bucks that nobody would say dog training, and if they did, a big loud X would likely appear. But after talking with Robert, I may now be the one who would. An artform is defined as "any activity regarded as a medium of imaginative or creative self-expression" and dog training fits right in when you think of it that way. Teaching an animal to do something YOU want it to do, is absolutely self-expression.

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With anything creative, there tends to be a huge learning curve. And during this process, there's an inner voice that worries that you may not be "doing it right." I didn't realize until my conversation with Robert that this voice was stopping me from making as much progress as I could. And looking at dog training as an artform, rather than a science as Robert does, has helped me gain access to a certain confidence and creativity that I didn't know was possible while training my dog. I just try things now, rather than worry that it's not "how you should do it." And I think this logic applies to way more in life than just dog training.

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True artists, true creatives are those that learn to shut out the voices of "what others may think" and align with their inner truth. They get out of their own way. They do what they feel like doing. There is no right or wrong in art, there's only a gap between how close you can get to pure honesty in what YOU FEEL is right. And as soon as you make a decisions based on what other's may think... that's when that gap widens.

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So, in short, if you want to let your dog on the bed, let your dog on the bed. Nothing in Dog training is "wrong," it's a constant experiment, it's an artform.