Forget everything you’ve been told about psychology being some clinical tool just used to train a pet. Psychology isn’t about your dog; it’s about you.
We live in a world that loves to look at behavior as a simple transaction—something objective to be rewarded or punished. But staring at a behavior objectively without looking at the history behind it takes zero psychology. And here’s the kicker: objectivity doesn’t drive behavior. Subjectivity does.
All that “subjective” stuff is what makes you, you. Every single past experience, every event, and every environmental pressure you’ve ever faced created the person standing in front of the mirror today. That requires actual psychology. Psychology isn’t here to give you a manual for your dog; it explains the subjective creature that you are.
The problem is, people don’t understand the self anymore. We flat-out refuse to accept the basic animal that we actually are. We are total slaves to cause and effect, just like every other creature on the planet. Yet, with staggering hypocrisy, we shove our made-up, comforting beliefs about “free will” down our dogs’ throats, expecting them to magically transcend biology while we bumble through our own deterministic lives.
Here is the hard truth: if you cannot understand the animal that you are, you have zero chance of understanding your dog.
If you really want to figure out your dog, stop looking for quick-fix obedience tricks. Go take a long, hard look in the mirror at the reflection of the animal staring back at you. Until you accept and understand that animal, you will never understand the mirror that your dog is holding up to you.