The Dogs Queen of Gambit

[Music]

it was

10 years ago when i started playing

chess with vika

she blew my mind completely

because always been very active

emotional

extremely smart and so unpredictable

she would jump into the water in the

middle of winter

or attack someone during our classes

she’s never been easy but i’ve never

given up

well she forced me to become the queen

of gambit

because my thinking must be faster than

hers

to avoid many dangerous situations

vika is a dog

but i could also call her a tasmanian

devil

when she was a puppy her behavior was

unbearable i was crying a lot

because of her it was so depressing

especially when she was aggressive

towards other dogs

i still remember when she beat my little

sister

because her dog stood next to her

vica pushed me out of my comfort zone

but thanks to her i met amazing people

who helped me and now here i am

a person who’s been learning about dogs

for the last 12 years

i’ve observed hundreds of them

how they function in our society how

people treat them

and what they can teach us

now it’s me who helps others

so why do i care about that

just think about it dogs

are the most common animals kept around

across the globe for the last dozens of

thousands of years

i’m sure that everyone here has met a

dog

even if you’re not the owner they’re

around

at parks in the streets maybe your

friend or family has won

and yet we still know so little about

them

sit stay leave it

come

probably some of you think

that working with dogs is only about

training them

how to take orders but nothing could be

more wrong

in fact training means understanding and

respecting the needs of an animal

not just commanding

imagine that you’re calling a kid for

dinner

while he’s playing computer game almost

impossible at the beginning

am i right same thing

happens when your pup is exploring some

interestingly smelling bushes

it’s quite hard for him to resign from

this compelling activity

what i do is translate the dog’s

behavior

to our human language and the exciting

thing about language

is that it has an impact on our

perception

let’s take max

he’s pulling on the leash probably

you’d label him just as stubborn

impolite but imagine that you

are him you’re attached to a leash

you can’t do what you’d like to do

wouldn’t you try to free yourself

we also feel bad when we are not

understood

and limited by restrictions

anger fear frustration

these emotions which we know from the

lockdown situation

can be also the reason of max’s behavior

can you imagine living in constant

pain and pretending that everything is

okay

tigan was

but she didn’t want to be touched i

don’t know how many times

she beat her owner’s hands because of

that

deegan’s human consulted many doctors

behaviorists and even a dog psychiatrist

before she realized that her dog was

misbehaving

because she was suffering

there is no such thing as a bad dog

the thing is that we mostly base our

knowledge

on superficial beliefs your friend told

you something about your dog

your neighbor complains about him almost

every day

we can say the same about children who

by the way

are very similar to dogs

even scientists use identical methods to

study the minds and behavior of both

children and dogs

somebody once said that children don’t

cry to manipulate impulse or

whatever and the same goes for dogs

they are not born to dominate us

this dominance theory has been busted by

science

i don’t know what’s going on

but i’m so stressed

says max during the so-called

traditional training jerked on a leash

push down to make him sit

lay or whatever

this kind of old-fashioned practices

lead to physical and mental pain and

usually they produce