Cesar Millan Archives - Page 2 of 27

Cesar Millan

A Single Baby Step

Here’s something I’m pretty sure almost everyone learned at one point but doesn’t remember doing: How to walk. It’s a pretty basic skill that we develop before our brains really start making memories, but as any of us who’s been around toddlers has seen, it doesn’t come without a lot of trial and error. Before you can learn to walk, you have to learn how to fall down. Developmental specialists say that it should take up to fifteen months for a child to learn to walk on their own. That’s over a year and it seems like a long time,

August 25, 2019 No Comments

Cesar poses with one of the dogs he is training.

Cesar Millan

Your Dog Is A Verb

Think back to how you learned your first language. Chances are that before you went to school, you were able to have basic conversations with your parents, generally by the age of two-and-a-half. Your sentences were not grammatical, but they communicated. And you got to this point by listening and repeating. As a baby, you made nonsense sounds. Slightly older, you were giving one word commands: “Food!” By two years, you were using two words: “Mommy hug” or “Sleep now,” and then, in the next six months, it exploded into true communication. But you didn’t learn language by having someone

August 22, 2019 No Comments

All About Dogs

Are You Killing Your Dog With Kindness?

Recently, we covered the story of Dennis the dieting dachshund, a tiny 12 year-old dog who weighed in at an incredible 56 pounds — or about 25 kilograms. Fortunately, his family did the right thing and, with proper diet and exercise, he managed to trim down until his weight matched his age. He was clearly much happier and much healthier. The story of Dennis is, sadly, not unique. According to the Association for Pet Obesity Prevention, 52.7 percent of dogs are overweight or obese. Just like with humans, excess weight in dogs can lead to all kinds of health problems — canine

August 21, 2019 No Comments

Be the Pack Leader

Not Quite Sure…

I want you to remember a time when you went into a new situation or a strange place, and then think about how you felt. Maybe it was starting a new school or a new job, or visiting a city you’d never been to before. Maybe it was a first date — or a second date with someone you really liked. Going into New Situations Now think about how you felt going into that situation. Chances are you were anxious, or maybe a little scared. Maybe you even tried to avoid that situation because of the way you felt. But

August 18, 2019 No Comments

All About Dogs

Why I Love Pit Bulls

Go beyond the stereotype and you’ll discover a smart, calm, and loving companion, just as I did 20 years ago A dog is a dog. It seems a pretty obvious statement, doesn’t it? Go to your dog park and sit back and watch how they interact. You’ll see Chihuahuas chasing after Labs, Westies happily socializing with Rottweilers, and purebred Irish wolfhounds checking out the mutts. What matters is the energy a dog gives off. Dogs try to avoid any animal that isn’t balanced and acts aggressively — it doesn’t matter whether it’s a big dog or small dog or what

August 8, 2019 No Comments

All About Dogs

Ending Dog Bullying

When I was a little boy growing up in Mexico, I always hung out with the dogs, listening to them and learning from them like my grandfather had taught me. But there was no honor in my own country — other kids called me “el perrero.” It means “dog boy,” but the insult is a lot stronger in Spanish than it sounds in English. In many countries today, there are children who are not honored by their peers. The problem has affected not only the US, but countries in Europe, Africa, and Asia as well. Studies have shown that children

July 22, 2019 No Comments

Cesar Millan

Well Trained But Not Well Behaved

A lot of people think that I’m a dog trainer, but that’s not what I do. I’m a dog behaviorist, which means that I rehabilitate dogs, and I train people. It’s an important distinction, and one that can be hard for people to understand. “But Cesar,” people say, “You get the dog to behave. Isn’t that the same thing as training?” The short answer is, “No.” Now here’s the longer answer. I’ve seen very well-trained dogs that still had behavioral issues. These dogs could do a lot of tricks, like sit, shake hands, roll over, or fetch — but still

July 18, 2019 No Comments

Cesar Millan

Are You Keeping Your Dog In Prison?

Wolves hunt as a pack every single day. They did it before dogs evolved and they still do it today. They do it every day, whether the hunt is successful or not — and some biologists have estimated that a wolf pack is only successful in the hunt 5% of the time. Now if a group of humans were this unsuccessful at something, they might take a break, try to figure out why they’re failing, and either change their methods or quit. Not so for wolves. The pack hunts every single day. A Dog’s Need to Hunt While new research

July 17, 2019 No Comments

All About Dogs

The Ability Dogs Have To Move Forward

One of the most remarkable things about dogs is their determination. We’ve all heard stories of dogs traveling ridiculous distances to get back to their owners, like Buck the Labrador retriever, who journeyed five hundred miles on his own, or about dogs saving their families from fires, like Teddy the golden retriever. In many of these cases, the dogs had been rescued from shelters, sometimes after being abused, and yet they still felt enough loyalty to humans to endure hardship to be with them or risk their lives to protect them. These stories are remarkable enough, but there’s another aspect

July 9, 2019 No Comments

Cesar Millan

Silence Can Be Incredibly Valuable

I want you to take a moment to think of the most powerful thing you can. Maybe it’s an elephant. They seem pretty strong. But an earthquake is clearly stronger than an elephant, and so is a nuclear bomb. Tornadoes and volcanoes are more powerful than nukes, but think bigger. The sun is very powerful. In one second, the sun dumps more energy on the earth than all humans use in an entire year. And there are lots of stars bigger than the sun. But what I’m thinking of is powerful for a different reason. That’s because it’s something that

July 9, 2019 No Comments