Love, Laugh, Woof

Along with knowing the downsides of having a dog and determining if you are ready for one is the question of whether or not you understand what it means to be a truly compassionate and fair pet owner? Have you ever thought about what it is like to be a dog? I mean really thought about it in depth. I am not referring to the basic everyday things like chasing balls, eating dog food or any of the day to day things that dogs do; I mean really putting yourself in their place, imagining what it is like to walk in their proverbial paws so that you are ready to make their first days with you the best that you can. This is the Woof in Love, Laugh, Woof, which is an essential component to living your life as a compassionate and fair dog owner.

Unless you were your dog’s breeder or the person whose home the puppies were born into, at some point you are a stranger to your dog. When you think about it, everyone in your world was a stranger to you at some point except for your mother and father; it is no different for your dog.

Your appearance, your voice, and your smells were all foreign whether you met your dog when he or she was eight weeks old or if you rescued them later in their puppyhood or adult life. Everything about you and your world is foreign to them, from your car to your home, your yard, your other family members and pets. No matter how happy of a home you are providing, every single experience with you is brand new.

Many new dog owners have no idea what experiences their puppy or dog had before joining them. Were they with a responsible and loving person who started to socialize them early to give them the best possible start to life? Did they come from a puppy mill where they were treated like livestock until they were shipped off to be sold in a pet store? Were they completely unwanted and left to fend for themselves with their mother amongst filth and garbage until a Good Samaritan picked them up? Or is it an older dog with a whole lifetime of experiences under their collar that you can never find out about because we do not speak the same language?

We as humans have a hard enough time understanding each other when we do speak the same language. We get caught up in our own stories, our own circumstances, and our own heads, and sometimes we cannot imagine what another person is going through. Don’t get me wrong, I love human beings and I think that we could live in a much happier world if we thought about what it was like to live in each other’s world for even an hour, and not in an envious way, but an empathetic way, so we could understand their fears and worries. We become better people that way. And when we can do that with our dogs, we become better dog owners and enter a higher level of being ready to be a dog owner.