2on-2off DVD - Where are we at?

My last several weeks have been devoted to my 2on-2off DVD, which has definitely been a labor of love.

As I'm quickly figuring out, the challenge with a DVD is that it lacks the instant feedback a personal lesson has to offer. But at the same time, it's imparting a huge piece of informative knowledge on the overall direction.

The 2on-2off concept is simple and straight forward, but it does require an eye for understanding what is happening and the direction the training should be heading toward.

While trying to share all of this factual and intuitive knowledge, my concern is that the video will appear too detailed or worse yet, not detailed enough. Trying to decide where to start and stop the knowledge has been a challenge and I'm going to have to come to terms with the fact that some subjects (i.e. training a release) really need to be left as a topic all of their own to be discussed on another day.

At any rate, the DVD is coming along great and I'm very proud of the product so far. Just 2 more chapters to go and it will be available for download as well as being sent off to have professional DVDs made.

Spot-On 2o2o Contact Training

Well, today I officially jumped off the deep end and committed to making a DVD on how I train my 2-on-2-off contacts. Nope, my methods haven't been featured in Clean Run Magazine, I've never seen them in print and each time I tell someone about them (and how flipping easy it is), I always get a wild-eyed look of amazement. Oh, and the light bulb goes off for the handlers too.

Now that I've made the commitment, there are so many details to attend to. Some things are factual in nature and some things are a bit softer and not so obvious. Specifically, I didn't come into almost 15 years of training experience by living in a bubble. There are so many people who have shared tid-bits of information with me over the years. Those tid-bits add up and here I am leaping off of a cliff to pursue a new adventure in my professional dog training career.

This personal project of mine has been developing in my head for the last few years. But specifically over the last year I've felt a directed pull (or should I say push) to move forward. A few things fell into place for me and my comfort level and tested practical experience are exactly where I need them to be.

But what really became the final 'test' or catapult was when I happened upon someone (half-way across the country) who was at their wits end when it came to contacts. After asking if she was open to an idea, I showed her the base of my training during the 20 minutes we spent together. I left her with easy, but specific homework and I guided her through the remaining steps in just a few e-mails. I did get weekly updates via Facebook that she was double-queing, but it wasn't until she sent me a video of their training results that it hit me. Her contacts were beautiful, spectacular, a work of art, amazing and well, perfect!

I don't want to take away any of the credit from the handler because believe me, she did her homework and worked it, but I can't help but know that I had at least a little bit of a hand in the transformation. It really makes me feel all warm-hearted!

So, that was the final push, that little thing that said "Get off your butt, put away your fears and JUST DO IT!" So here I am, planning to either share my knowledge with the world or I may fall face first into a mud puddle. Either way, I'm going to enjoy the journey and hope all those details I mentioned above work themselves out in a smooth manner.