Don’t just follow the crowd but create your own path

22 octobre 2025

Don’t just follow the crowd but create your own path

In the dog training world, I see something happening more and more often: people playing it safe. They follow. They copy. They stay inside the comfort zone of what others tell them is “the right way.” A big influencer posts a carefully staged video. Maybe the dog looks perfect, the handler calm, the setup beautiful. Within days, thousands of trainers start copying it. The same gestures. The same words. The same timing. The same props. Suddenly, this one video becomes “the truth.” But here’s the problem: when we all follow the same path, we stop thinking, we stop questioning, we stop growing. And that’s dangerous not only for us as trainers, but for the dogs we work with.

The loss of critical thinking

We live in a time of incredible access to information. Never before has knowledge been so close, so fast, and so visual. With just one swipe, you can watch the world’s best trainers demonstrate techniques that once took decades to observe. That’s amazing, and I love that the dog training world is becoming more open and connected. But there’s a downside: the easier information becomes, the less effort we sometimes make to think critically about it. It’s easy to see something online and believe it must be right, because it looks polished, because many others follow it, or because the person behind it has a huge number of followers. But numbers don’t equal knowledge. Popularity doesn’t equal precision.

Critical thinking means asking questions like:

Why does this method work?
What’s the science behind it?
What does the dog learn from this specific moment?
Does this fit my own philosophy, my dog’s learning style, and my goals?

When we stop asking those questions, we become repeaters instead of thinkers. And when we stop thinking, we lose the creative spark that drives real progress.

Inspiration should spark thinking, not silence it

I love to be inspired. I’ve spent my entire life learning from others , trainers, scientists, behaviorists, and even people far outside the dog world. Inspiration is fuel. It keeps us curious, open, and connected. But inspiration should never silence your own voice. It should ignite it. It’s great to admire someone’s technique, but the real magic happens when you start asking: “How can I make this idea my own?” When you take a concept and adapt it, test it, challenge it, twist it, and rebuild it until it fits your own training philosophy, that’s when it becomes yours. And that’s when you start to innovate. Blind copying doesn’t create growth. It only creates clones. And the dogs we train, with all their differences in genetics, temperament, and learning speed, deserve better than copy-paste methods.

Every dog is unique. Every handler is unique. We all have our own personalities, our own strengths and weaknesses, our own way of seeing the world. What works perfectly for someone else may completely fail for you, and that’s perfectly okay. Failure isn’t the enemy. It’s the foundation of learning.

The courage to ask “why?”

In the early days of my career, I had to rely on observation, books, and conversations. There was no YouTube, no online courses, no instant feedback loops. I learned by watching my dogs, by making mistakes, by trying again. And honestly, that process taught me more than any single video ever could. Because every mistake forced me to ask: Why didn’t this work? What did the dog understand? What did I miss? What can I change next time? That “why” is the single most powerful question in learning, for both human and dog.

But today, many people are afraid to ask “why.” They see a famous trainer do something and assume there must be a good reason for it. They accept it as truth without analysis, because challenging it might seem disrespectful or risky. Yet science itself is built on questioning. Every major discovery came from someone daring to ask “why” when everyone else said “that’s just how it is.” In dog training, we need that same courage.

Progress comes from curiosity

Progress never came from comfort. It came from curiosity. It came from people who dared to experiment, fail, and try again, even when others laughed or said it couldn’t be done. Think about how far we’ve come as a community:

The understanding of operant conditioning and learning theory.
The creation of precise bridging signals.
The use of sensors, data, and timing systems to improve accuracy.
The science of odor imprinting and environmental generalization.
The training of radio and laser guidance camera dogs.
The hard surface tracking dogs

All of these breakthroughs started with curiosity, not copying. Someone looked at an old problem and said, “What if we try this differently? They didn’t wait for permission. They didn’t follow the trend. They just experimented, and documented their results. That’s how innovation happens: one brave idea at a time.

The danger of the comfort zone

Social media creates a powerful illusion: the illusion of perfection. You scroll through a feed full of dogs performing flawlessly, handlers smiling, and results looking effortless. You rarely see the process, the long hours, the mistakes, the frustration, the trial and error. So you start thinking that training must look perfect all the time. You start doubting yourself when your dog struggles or when your method doesn’t work immediately. And slowly, without even noticing, you start copying others to “fix” it. You stop experimenting. You stop playing. You stop trusting your instincts.

But perfection is not the goal. Connection is. Your dog doesn’t care about social media likes. Your dog cares about you, your energy, your timing, your consistency, your joy. Training should be a conversation, not a performance.

Authenticity over approval

It takes courage to be authentic. To say, “I see it done this way, but I’m going to try something different.” To share your experiments publicly, even when they’re not perfect. To say, “I failed, but I learned something important.”

Authenticity is risky because it exposes your process, not just your results. But it’s also what makes your work real. If we all hide behind polished videos and borrowed techniques, we create a culture of imitation instead of innovation. But when we show our true journey, the real training sessions, the thinking, the questioning, the small steps forward, we inspire others to think for themselves too.

Every dog Is a teacher

The most powerful trainer in your life isn’t a human. It’s your dog.cEvery dog you work with will teach you something new, if you’re willing to listen. Some dogs challenge your patience. Others stretch your creativity. Some will make you doubt everything you thought you knew. That’s not failure. That’s evolution. When you work with a dog, you’re not just applying knowledge, you’re creating it. You’re observing, adjusting, refining, and building understanding in real time. That’s why it’s so important to think independently. Because your dog doesn’t read the same books or watch the same videos you do. Your dog reacts to you, your timing, your consistency, your clarity, your emotional state. If you simply copy what someone else does, you’re missing the most important feedback loop: your own dog.

Science and art, the perfect balance

Training dogs is both science and art. Science gives us the foundation, the principles of learning, behavior, and motivation. It tells us how learning happens.

Art gives us flexibility, the creativity to adapt those principles to each unique situation. It’s the how we express our knowledge.

Without science, training becomes superstition. Without art, it becomes robotic.

When we stop thinking critically, we lose that balance. We either reject science because we “just do what feels right,” or we copy protocols mechanically without adapting them to the dog in front of us. True mastery lies in combining both. Learn the science deeply. Respect the data. But then, make it personal. Make it yours. That’s where innovation lives.

Stepping away from the noise

Sometimes the best thing you can do for your development is to step away from the noise. Log out. Put the phone down. Go outside with your dog. Just train. Just play. Just be in the moment. When you’re fully present with your dog, you start seeing details again, small signals, subtle shifts, the real communication happening between you. That’s where you’ll find the next breakthrough, not on your screen, but in the field, in the relationship, in the quiet space of curiosity. Remember: silence is not emptiness. It’s space for thinking.

Be brave enough to think for yourself

I’ve been training dogs for more than 30 years, and one thing I’ve learned is this: There is no single “right way.” There are principles that work. There is science that guides us. But the application of those principles will always depend on you and your dog. So be brave enough to think for yourself. Try new things. Question old beliefs. Be curious. Be open. You might fail a few times, but you’ll also discover insights no one else has. And that’s how our field keeps evolving. Progress doesn’t come from copying the masses. It comes from curiosity, from trying, failing, adjusting, and trying again. It comes from daring to be authentic instead of perfect.

The joy of the journey

At the end of the day, dog training isn’t about showing off. It’s about connection. It’s about two living beings communicating, learning, and growing together. Your dog doesn’t care about trends. Your dog doesn’t care about influencers. Your dog only cares about you, your clarity, your patience, your joy.

So go out and train with a big smile. Laugh at your mistakes. Celebrate the small wins. Because that’s what makes you a real trainer, not your followers, not your videos, not your image, but your ability to connect, to learn, and to keep moving forward with an open heart and an open mind.