< Back
What have you learned from dogs?
I learn daily from dogs how to be a better person.
Every dog has so many positive traits that only the very best humans possess. Dogs do not discriminate. They are incapable of meanness, prejudice, or cruelty. In a person, these would be the attributes of the perfect friend.
Dogs are our helpers and healers. Some of them help and heal as guide dogs or therapy dogs but all dogs have an innate ability to calm and comfort us with their presence.
Whereas humans over complicate things and focus too much on material things, or dwell on the past, or worry needlessly about the future, dogs enjoy a simpler, purer approach to life and live in the now. We should all try to "be more dog".
There is a saying "You have never really lived until you have done something for someone who can never repay you."
If you bring a dog into your home, you owe him food and water, comfort, companionship, exercise, kindness and a home for life. Your dog owes you nothing in return; after all, he did not ask for his species as a whole to be domesticated, and he as an individual did not ask to be brought into your household, a place in which human rules are law, even though those rules don't make much sense to a dog.
But even though he owes you nothing, your dog will give you so much more than any "payment" could add up to. He will give you unconditional love, devotion, loyalty and trust. He will make you laugh, be a comfort when you are sad, enrich your life in so many ways. Having a dog in your family will help your children to learn responsibility, patience and compassion. If every person you knew gave up on you, your dog would still stick loyally by your side. Even dogs who are not treated well will most likely give their (undeserving) owners these things.
All dogs provide us with so many opportunities to enrich our lives. They have the potential to give us so much. Too many people waste their dogs' potential and set them up to fail - by mistreating them, not training them, chaining them up all day every day, discriminating against a dog because of his breed and so on.
We owe it to dogs and ourselves to give them the best lives we can. In doing so we set up our dogs to succeed and to thrive, and the reward is that they will be the best friends we could wish for.
What have you learned from dogs?
I learn daily from dogs how to be a better person.
Every dog has so many positive traits that only the very best humans possess. Dogs do not discriminate. They are incapable of meanness, prejudice, or cruelty. In a person, these would be the attributes of the perfect friend.
Dogs are our helpers and healers. Some of them help and heal as guide dogs or therapy dogs but all dogs have an innate ability to calm and comfort us with their presence.
Whereas humans over complicate things and focus too much on material things, or dwell on the past, or worry needlessly about the future, dogs enjoy a simpler, purer approach to life and live in the now. We should all try to "be more dog".
There is a saying "You have never really lived until you have done something for someone who can never repay you."
If you bring a dog into your home, you owe him food and water, comfort, companionship, exercise, kindness and a home for life. Your dog owes you nothing in return; after all, he did not ask for his species as a whole to be domesticated, and he as an individual did not ask to be brought into your household, a place in which human rules are law, even though those rules don't make much sense to a dog.
But even though he owes you nothing, your dog will give you so much more than any "payment" could add up to. He will give you unconditional love, devotion, loyalty and trust. He will make you laugh, be a comfort when you are sad, enrich your life in so many ways. Having a dog in your family will help your children to learn responsibility, patience and compassion. If every person you knew gave up on you, your dog would still stick loyally by your side. Even dogs who are not treated well will most likely give their (undeserving) owners these things.
All dogs provide us with so many opportunities to enrich our lives. They have the potential to give us so much. Too many people waste their dogs' potential and set them up to fail - by mistreating them, not training them, chaining them up all day every day, discriminating against a dog because of his breed and so on.
We owe it to dogs and ourselves to give them the best lives we can. In doing so we set up our dogs to succeed and to thrive, and the reward is that they will be the best friends we could wish for.
