“Can’t see the forest for the trees…”
Trainer Jen here.
In her book, The Science of Natural Healing, Dr. Mimi Guarneri talks about her patients’ health like a tree - with the leaves being various forms of disease (heart disease, diabetes, high blood pressure, etc.).
The trunk of the tree is comprised of our genes - our genetic makeup - “the book of life we are given.”
Last, she describes the soil (environment) that the tree is in, and that how we nurture the soil - what we put into our soil (micro & macro nutrients, mental, spiritual, and emotional support, exercise, etc.) - will determine a lot about the health of the tree.
This analogy really struck a chord with me, and got me thinking about how it could be applied to dog behavior (because, let’s be honest, that’s how my brain works…I am ALWAYS thinking about dog behavior on some level or another…).
Playing off of Dr. Guarneri’s Tree Analogy:
If we think of the soil of a tree, this is the dog’s environment: It’s the nutrition, mental and physical enrichment, any training it’s had, and any other information we’ve given it. These are all parts of the “Nurture” part of the equation.
The trunk of the tree is the dog’s genetic makeup - heritable diseases, breed traits, temperament & personality traits, etc. This is the “Nature” part of the equation.
That makes the leaves of the tree - you guessed it - the behaviors we see as a result of the combination of the care of the soil & tree’s health and type of trunk.
Very often, when trainers meet with an owner for the first time, the owner has a long list of behaviors that they want their dog to STOP doing.
These behaviors are the leaves of the tree - but if you had an ailing tree, while the first thing you might notice is the leaves turning brown, you wouldn’t TREAT the leaves…you’d look for issues in the trunk or the soil, or both.
Also very often, when we ask owners what they want the dog to START doing, they give us a blank stare. This tells us they are focused only on the leaves - but haven’t considered the trunk or soil!
Sometimes, we have owners who want their dog to behave in a way that is completely against its nature (wanting a herding breed to behave like a retriever, or a guardian breed to behave like a toy breed). In this case, owners are completely ignoring what type of tree they have (trunk)…expecting their Elm Tree to turn into a Pine Tree and last through the winter with all of its leaves still on the branches!
With the tree analogy, it’s easy to see the whole picture - how the nurturing you provide to the soil (training, nutrition, enrichment, relationship) will work with the trunk (breed, personality, health) to produce certain leaves (behaviors - good or bad!).
So, the next time you look at a behavior in your dog that you’d like to curb, think about the whole picture - the soil (environment, training, etc.), the trunk (your dog’s breed and individual temperament), and then the leaves (behaviors).
Very often, the answer you’re seeking is found not in just focusing on ‘fixing’ the leaves, but instead on using what you know about the tree trunk and nurturing the soil to bring about true, long-term behavior changes that benefit you AND your dog.
