The UPK9 Blog

What if the thing setting you off the most right now isn’t here to punish you. What if it’s here to teach you. It’s not here to destroy you, it’s here to reveal you. I turned 52 this week, and after 38 years working with animals and 22 years running this business, that’s the truth I keep landing back on: triggers are spotlights. They shine right on the spot where healing, growth, clarity, and leadership still need to show up. Yours and mine both.

Your Trigger Is a Spotlight, Not a Sentence

Here’s what I’ve learned in people’s homes, on the end of a leash, and honestly in my own kitchen. A trigger reveals things. Old wounds. Conditioning. Fear and insecurity. Unresolved pain. Reactive habits, and yeah, I said habits, because that’s what they are. Most people get triggered and they pop off. They go straight to emotional. But if you can own that pattern, you can lead it. And that is something to get excited about.

So grab a journal and get honest. What keeps triggering me, over and over? Is it failure? Embarrassment? Rejection? Your dog? Just being challenged? Then ask what emotion shows up first. Anger, fear, frustration, shame, anxiety, defensiveness. Write a three-sentence story about the last time it happened, what you felt, what you did, and what it cost you. Not money. The outcome. Because awareness is where transformation starts. You can’t go anywhere if you don’t know where you are.

The Dog on the End of the Leash Is Telling On You

Dogs are easy. We’re the hot mess. We’re the hard part. I say it all the time because it’s true. A dog mirrors the handler’s state, and they reveal it fast. Impatience. Inconsistency. Emotional instability in the house. A lack of clarity, which usually just means you’re not doing your homework. Nervous energy. A dog rehearses whatever gets repeated, so if you’re rehearsing reactivity at home, snapping, popping off, living on edge, you’re wiring that reactivity straight into your dog, your family, the people around you.

Now flip it. Rehearse calm. Breathing. Patience. Not popping off. That influences your dog too. What you rehearse emotionally gets stronger. What you practice and reinforce gets stronger. That’s why dog training turns into personal development real fast, and it’s why I became a coach. The dog was never the project. You are.

“Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind.”  — Romans 12:2

That verse has carried me through a lot of changing. Renew the mind. Refocus. Rehearse new repetitions. Decide who you want to become and how you want to show up, then practice it like reps. Because we’re getting trained whether we know it or not. If you’re on social media first thing in the morning, you’re being conditioned to swipe, judge, react, swipe, judge, react. That’s rehearsal too, and it’s making you more reactive, not less.

Breathe, Don’t Bark: The Pause Plan

Here’s the whole thing on a cheat sheet. When you feel the trigger coming, pause. Claim that little space between the stimulus and your response, the space most people never claim. That’s where breathing, not barking, lives. The moment you notice, you create space. Space creates a choice. And the choice is where your leadership shows up.

Four steps to run in the moment

• Notice the trigger. Catch the funny feeling. ‘I’m noticing something. I feel frustrated. My heart’s speeding up.’ That’s it. Awareness is the whole game.
• Slow the body down. Breathe in through your nose for four, pause for two, breathe out for six. Or just close your mouth and breathe slow and rhythmic, in for four or five, out for four or five.
• Get curious, not chaotic. The victim asks ‘Why me?’ The leader asks ‘What is this revealing in me?’ Curiosity opens growth. Defensiveness shuts everything down.
• Choose the next right action. Not the perfect response. The next right one. You’ll mess it up sometimes. Get up and take one more rep.

Do this and two things change. You stop being run by your emotions and start leading them. And you stop taking your dog’s behavior personally, which means you stop escalating in the exact moments your dog needs you calm. Our dogs don’t need our explosions. They need our guidance.

Insight Doesn’t Change You. Reps Do.

I coach high-level trainers who already know all of this, and I’ll tell you what I tell them. Common sense isn’t common practice. Just hearing it, thinking about it, nodding along, that’s passive, and passive doesn’t transform anybody. Repetition does. You don’t build a calm dog in one perfect session, and you don’t rebuild yourself in one good morning. You build it through small reps, done daily, with clarity.

Here’s a story that’s stuck with me from my conservation officer days. In the parks I’d tell people, don’t feed the wild animals. Why? Because they lose their fear of humans. Free food, easy access, and the fear melts away. Same principle with a nervous dog, just pointed the right way. Make him work for the meal, feed him around the things that worry him, and you start shaping calm, positive associations right on top of the fear. Keep the sessions short, two to five minutes, and shut it down while he still wants one more rep. He’ll dream about it like a kid who only got one day at Disney. Always leave them wanting more.

THIS WEEK’S CHALLENGE

For you: catch one trigger this week. Just one. The second you feel it, pause and breathe (four in, two hold, six out). Then ask, ‘What is this revealing in me?’ and choose a better response. Not a perfect one. A better one.

For your dog: two or three short sessions a day, two to five minutes each. Work on neutrality, feed around the fears, and end every session while your dog still wants more. One rep at a time.

There’s a black lab curled up at my feet as I write this, dead asleep, not a care in the world. He’s that relaxed for one simple reason. The room is calm, so he’s calm. He’s reading me before he reads anything else. And that right there is the whole episode.

Here’s the thing about being calm. Anybody can look calm when life is good and easy. The real question is what you do in the first ten seconds when things go sideways. Not after you cool down. Not after the argument. Not after the regret. Right there in the moment, under pressure.

Pressure Isn’t the Problem. It’s What Pressure Reveals.

Life is tough. It’s full of pressure, internal and external, and you don’t get to opt out. Get a helmet, right? But pressure itself was never the real issue. The issue is what pressure exposes in us. It exposes our habits. Our conditioning. Our nervous system. Our mindset. And if you never learn to go through it instead of around it, then pressure starts training you instead of the other way around.

So grab a journal and answer two questions honestly. First, what situation makes me lose my calm the fastest? Traffic, disrespect, money, a barking dog next door, a hard conversation with someone I love? Second, the one that stings: who gets the worst version of me when I’m under pressure? For most of us it isn’t strangers. It’s our family. That answer should wake us all up with a smack.

The Mirror On the Other End of the Leash

Dogs don’t lie the way we do. Some people can fake calm. A dog can’t, and a dog won’t let you fake it either. Your dog has a supersonic nose and reads energy better than you realize. He can smell your cortisol spike. He feels your heart rate climb and your shoulders tighten before you ever say a word. So when I meet a reactive, stressed-out dog, I am very often looking at a reactive, stressed-out handler standing right next to him. The dog is just being honest about the energy traveling down the leash.

This is why I say dogs are the easy part. We’re the hard part. It’s also why folks get it backwards when a dog struggles or shuts down. They blame the tools. They blame the method. But when you point one finger, three are pointing back at you. Spell blame out slow and you get B-lame. So don’t be lame. Look in the mirror, get some clarity, and lead.

Breathe, Don’t Bark

That’s not just a saying we put on a shirt. It’s the whole philosophy in three words. Your breath is the remote control to your nervous system. When you start to get triggered, your body is already escalating. Heart rate up, breath shallow, voice changing, chest tight, tunnel vision. That’s fight or flight switching on. You will not think your way out of that with “I got this.” But you can breathe your way out of it.

Try it right now. Close your mouth. Inhale through your nose for four seconds, hold for two, then exhale slow for six. The long exhale is the part that matters, because that’s the signal that tells your body you’re safe. Do three rounds with your shoulders back and your jaw loose. When you regulate your body, you create the space to think clearly. And a calm handler is exactly what a loaded, reacting dog needs, because he can’t think when he’s blown up either.

“Better a patient person than a warrior, one with self-control than one who takes a city.”  — Proverbs 16:32

Self-control isn’t weakness. Scripture lists it right alongside love and peace as fruit worth growing (Galatians 5). The strongest person in the room is usually the one who can stay quiet and steady when everyone expects them to explode.

The Calm-Under-Pressure Formula

When the moment hits, run this in order: slow down, breathe, don’t bark, get clear, then lead the moment. Underneath that, three habits make it stick.

• Slow the body first. Don’t try to fix your emotions with your thoughts while your nervous system is redlining. Close your mouth and breathe. Long exhales bring the whole system down so you make a clear decision instead of a panicked one.
• Stop rehearsing the chaos. Whatever you practice grows, in you and in your dog. If you wake up and immediately start scrolling, judging, and reacting, you’re literally training yourself to react all day. Ask yourself: am I rehearsing calm, or am I rehearsing chaos?
• Train for recovery, not perfection. You’re going to get knocked down. Resilience isn’t never struggling. It’s how fast you return to your leadership after you get your butt kicked. Reset after the bad rep, and never end on the negative, with your dog or with yourself.

I’ve Been Shaped Through Fire

I don’t teach this from a textbook. I’ve spent years as a first responder, in policing and conservation enforcement, in search and rescue. I’ve been in standoffs, chased people through the woods at night, been in car accidents, been burned out and beaten up. Emotion escalates a dangerous situation faster than almost anything, and I learned the hard way that you have to keep emotion out of it. There were seasons of my life where I was not calm under pressure. I had to be shaped through fire to get to where I am.

Today is actually my birthday. Fifty-one years of getting knocked around and learning to get back up. If there’s one thing I want you to hear, it’s this: calm is trainable. You are not stuck with the version of you that shows up when life punches you in the mouth. You can train a better one, one rep at a time.

THIS WEEK’S CHALLENGE

For you: When pressure hits this week, close your mouth and breathe. Lower your voice on purpose, or say nothing at all. Then ask one question: what would calm leadership look like right now?

For your dog: Practice calm duration. Sit together on a park bench. Every time something that could set him off comes into view, mark it and feed before he barks. You’re teaching him the trigger means look to you, not react.

And don’t ask me how to avoid pressure. That’s the wrong question. Ask the better one: who am I becoming under pressure? Breathe, don’t bark, and lead the moment.

Have you ever known exactly what to do — and still couldn’t do it in the moment?

You’ve trained for it. You’ve prepared. You’ve coached people through it a hundred times. But then your dog reacts on a walk, your kid pushes a button, your client questions your call, or your partner says the thing… and you blow up. Or you shut down. Or you freeze. Five minutes later, you’re walking it back, asking yourself, “Why did I do that again?”

If that resonates, welcome back to the Weekly Recall. I’m your trainer and coach, Uncle Duke. Grab your journal — because this one isn’t for passive listening. This one’s the work.

This week, I want to talk about emotional strength. Self-control. Because I think a lot of us — and a lot of our dogs — are caged by the lack of it.

The Question Most People Avoid

Here’s the question I want you to sit with:

Where are my emotions controlling me, instead of me leading them?

Be honest. Is it with yourself? I get frustrated with myself plenty — ADHD brain hunting for the thing I just put down. Is it with your dog when you’re tired and the two of you are not on the same page? Is it with your family, your team, a tough client, a friend who keeps disappointing you?

Here’s the truth most people avoid: you’re not stuck because you don’t have the knowledge. As a coach, that’s not where I see people getting stuck. People already know. They just aren’t unplugged enough, calm enough, or focused enough to access what they know — because we’re not thinking anymore. We’re reacting. We’re spiraling.

You’re not lacking information. You’re lacking emotional strength.

Dogs Reveal Us — Fast

Here’s the gift dogs give us: they don’t lie.

If you’re inconsistent, your dog shows it. If you’re emotional, they feel it and reflect it. If you’re unclear, they’re confused. That’s why I always say dog training is personal development in disguise. The dog’s part is honestly the easy part. We’re the hot mess. And if you’re still reading, you’re growth-minded — and I honor that.

What Emotional Strength Actually Is

Emotional strength is staying steady, calm, and grounded under pressure.

Anybody can be calm on the beach with the sun setting. That’s not the test. The test is harder than that.

• Can you stay grounded when your dog is losing it?
• Can you stay grounded when your child or your partner challenges you?
• Can you stay grounded when a client is frustrated, when your team drops the ball, or when life hits you so hard you’re punch drunk from it?

That’s emotional strength. And it isn’t easy. That’s why we’re talking about it.

The Loop That Steals Your Freedom

Weak emotional control creates reactive living. And the loop looks like this:

Triggered → React → Regret → Repeat.

That’s not freedom. That’s a cage that just keeps spinning. You see it on a walk all the time — your dog gets triggered, you yank back on the leash, the dog redirects in frustration, and now both of you are dysregulated. Sometimes you do nothing at all. Standing there like you’re watching a TV commercial while your dog reacts is still a leadership failure. It’s still inappropriate.

Now think about the word “triggered.” If I pull the trigger on a gun and there’s no charge in the chamber, it just goes click. The trigger means nothing. So what is the explosive in you? What’s the charge that goes off when something pulls that trigger? That’s where the work is.

What Freedom Actually Looks Like

When you build emotional strength, you get freedom from a lot of stuff:

• Freedom from overreacting
• Freedom from the stress cycles that wreck your nervous system
• Freedom from regret
• Freedom from the frustration and inconsistency that kills any habit or training plan

But here’s the better question — what do you get freedom to do?

You get freedom to think clearly. Freedom to breathe. Freedom to follow through. Freedom to be exactly who you want to be. And most importantly, freedom to lead — because that’s what your dog needs, what your family needs, what your team needs, and what you need.

Three Practical Ways to Build Emotional Strength This Week

Awareness without action changes nothing. Talk is cheap. So here are three things you can actually start doing this week — and they will directly improve your dog, because the two of you are in this relationship together.

1. Breathe, Don’t Bark

Before you react to anything — pause. Take a deliberate breath. I use the 4-2-6 method:

• In through the nose for 4 seconds
• Hold for 2 seconds
• Out through the lips for 6 seconds

That’s the space between stimulus and response. In your life, that pause is what stops you from saying things you regret, throwing energy you can’t take back, and overcorrecting. For your dog, it stops you from anticipating problems and pulling the leash before they’ve even done anything wrong. It stops you from drowning a calm dog in “no, no, no” when you should be saying “good dog.”

A calm handler creates a clearer dog. Every single time.

Need a daily reminder? Head to unleashpotential.shop and grab some Breathe Don’t Bark merch. Every purchase supports causes we care about — anti-trafficking work, mental health and PTSD support for veterans and first responders, addiction recovery, and balanced dog rescue organizations who put the animals first.

2. Stop Repeating Yourself — Follow Through

Talk is cheap. Say it once and mean it.

Stop repeating commands ten times. Stop replaying the same conversation in your head for three days. Stop warning, warning, warning. Set the intention, take courageous action, and then sit back and learn from the result. No emotion. No frustration. No ten warnings. Just do it, get clarity, and adjust.

This builds integrity in your communication. People start taking you seriously. You stop feeling ignored or disrespected — including by your dog. And your dog? Your commands actually start meaning something. The picture you present is clean. Dogs thrive on clean pictures, not noise. They’re not the ones doing the yakking. We are.

3. Build One Daily Emotional Discipline Habit

Not ten. One.

Ten habits at half effort gets you nowhere. One habit done with excellence changes you. Pick something small but meaningful and do it every single day this week. A few examples:

• Get up earlier and run a focused 10–15 minute training session instead of a long, dragging walk
• Morning prayer before you touch your phone
• Two to ten minutes of breathwork before your first session of the day
• Journaling before bed to wind down for better sleep
• Walking one dog at a time with full presence
• Not raising your voice — for a whole day
• Staying off your phone for 24 hours

Whatever it is, do that one thing with excellence. That’s how you build emotional endurance. Stable, confident, consistent — that’s the energy your dog reads, and that’s what lets them relax. A relaxed dog performs better. Period.

You Were Not Meant to Do This Alone

If you’re thinking, “Duke, this is harder than it sounds” — you’re right. Get a helmet. Life is tough.

Here’s what helps me. Isaiah 41:10:

“Fear not, for I am with you. Be not dismayed, for I am your God. I will strengthen you, I will help you, I will uphold you with my righteous hand.”

Let that sink in. Emotional strength isn’t just discipline. It’s alignment — with values, with vision, with God, with people who can walk this with you. I’ve tried to do it alone many times. The truth is, real momentum, real breakthroughs, and real thriving don’t happen in isolation. The old lion wants to rip you apart when you’re alone.

I’ll be transparent with you. Before I went all-in on dog training, I ran a pharmacy. I was deep in a partnership conflict, trying to buy out a partner, and I was getting reactive, bitter, resentful — costing me my mental health and my joy. What changed wasn’t more information. What changed was getting a coach, surrounding myself with a small circle of trusted friends, learning I wasn’t supposed to control everything, and learning to pray for my enemies. That was tough. But that’s the work that built the emotional strength I rely on now.

Your Challenge This Week

Catch one moment where you’d normally react. Close your mouth. Breathe — 4 in, 2 hold, 6 out. And in that pause, ask yourself: what’s the trigger, and how do I make it pleasant instead of explosive? Dog trainers — that’s just counter-conditioning. Same idea, different species.

If you want help with this, don’t go it alone. Join our UPX community for courses, coaching, breathwork, and people walking the same road. Or head to dukeferguson.ca and apply for coaching directly.

And if anything in here landed for you, drop me a DM on Instagram, Facebook, or YouTube. I’d love to hear about it.

Emotional strength isn’t about being perfect. It isn’t about being fake. It’s about being steady. So don’t ask, “Why do I keep messing this up?” Ask, “Where do I need to become stronger?”

Share this with someone who needs it. I’ll catch you in the next episode of the Weekly Recall.

— Uncle Duke

Have you ever felt like you’re doing everything right? Your morning routine is locked in. Your diet’s dialed. Your work ethic is solid. You’re sleeping well, showing up consistently — working like a dog, honestly — and yet there’s still a mountain in front of you. A weight that just won’t move. A stone that’s not budging no matter how hard you push.

If that’s you right now, I want you to stay with me for a few minutes.

I’m recording this Easter weekend, and there’s something about this time of year that hits different when you’re under pressure. Whether you’re a dog trainer battling burnout, a dog owner who’s at their wit’s end, or just somebody carrying more than you think you can hold — I’ve got three reminders for you today. And yeah, they’re grounded in my faith. But they’re also deeply practical. Because the Easter message isn’t just spiritual. It’s one of the most powerful frameworks for pushing through hard seasons I’ve ever come across.

So let’s get into it.

We’re All a Little Reactive Right Now

I talk a lot about reactive dogs. You know the ones — barking at everything, lunging on the leash, spinning out over triggers they can’t handle. But lately I’ve been noticing something. The dogs aren’t the only ones living reactive.

Look around. People are reactive. Marriages are reactive. Teams are reactive. You wake up, check your emails, and your whole day becomes reactive before you’ve even had your coffee. The keyboard warriors are out in full force. Emotions are running hot. And then everyone’s wondering why life feels like chaos and why they feel so lonely.

Here’s the truth I want you to write down:

You cannot build peace from panic. You cannot build trust from tension. You cannot build reliability from inconsistency.

Dogs teach me this all the time. If a handler is unclear, the dog gets more unsure. If the trainer is nervous, the dog picks up on it immediately. If there’s no calm, consistent direction — things start breaking down. Fast. Humans aren’t different from this. Not even a little bit.

Trainers, I see you. You’re carrying the emotional load of helping both struggling dogs and distressed humans, and you’re doing it while managing your own financial pressures and the weight of running a business. Dog owners, I see you too. The time pressure, the anxiety, the guilt — it bleeds down. Your dog is reading all of it.

So what do we do with that? Here are three Easter reminders that I keep coming back to.

Three Easter Reminders Worth Holding Onto

1. Dead Things Can Live Again

Maybe your hope feels low. Maybe your momentum walked out the door a few months back. Maybe your marriage needs healing, or your business is buried under stress, or your dog’s behavior has gotten so discouraging that you’re close to giving up.

I want to say this as clearly as I can: don’t confuse a hard season with a hopeless future.

A fearful dog isn’t disqualified. A family that’s overwhelmed isn’t disqualified. A trainer who’s exhausted and running on fumes is not disqualified. You might be in a season of rebuilding — and that’s okay. Rebuilding isn’t failing. It’s the work before the breakthrough.

Easter, for me as a follower of Christ, is a reminder that darkness doesn’t get the final word. The grave doesn’t win. Shame doesn’t win. Fear doesn’t win. What looks buried is not over. What seems dead — that’s not the end. And I’ve staked my life on that.

2. Peace Is a Practice, Not Just a Prayer

I believe deeply in prayer. But I also believe we need practices and habits every single day that match what we pray for. If you’re praying for peace but your morning looks like chaos and your communication is sharp and your breathing is shallow — those things don’t line up.

So ask yourself these questions — bust out the journal if you’ve got one:

• How am I breathing right now?
• How am I speaking to the people around me — and how is it landing?
• How am I preparing to show up today?
• How do I actually want to show up?

In dog training, we talk about calm repetition — deep practice. You don’t build a reliable recall or a stable dog with one good session. You build it through consistent, calm reps. Over and over. The same is true in life.

Peace with your dog — and your family, and your team — gets built through clear communication, simple structure, and showing up every single day. Not perfectly. Just consistently. Emotional self-control matters here too. Lead before you lose it. Breathe before you bark. That’s the practice.

3. You Don’t Have to Stay Stuck

What you’re going through right now — what you went through back then — that doesn’t define who you are or who you can become. I know that because I’m a walking example of it.

There was a time in my life where I felt completely lost. I was carrying a lot of pain, a lot of trauma, a lot of darkness. I believed lies about not being good enough. And I was close — really close — to losing control. Dogs were my lifeline long before faith was. They were the thing that kept me grounded when nothing else could.

Over time, through forgiveness and grace and a lot of messy, imperfect work, God’s done a deep transformation in me. Still is. My story isn’t pretty — it’s a hot mess. But it’s mine, and it’s not over. And yours isn’t over either.

That’s part of why I care so much about giving back through this message, through the coaching I provide to trainers worldwide, and through the mission we’ve built at Unleash Potential and UPCanine. Because I know what it feels like to be in the dark, and I know what the breakthrough feels like on the other side.

Breathe Don’t Bark — It’s a Lifestyle

Quick word about today’s sponsor — our own Unleash Potential merch. The phrase on the back of our shirts and hoodies is: Breathe. Don’t Bark.

That phrase isn’t just a catchy line we slapped on some fabric. It’s a daily reminder. Regulate before you react. Lead before you lose it. Breathe before you bark. It applies to your dog — and it absolutely applies to you.

Every time you support our merch, our services, or anything we do online, you’re helping us do more than build a brand. You’re helping us give back to causes that are deeply personal to me — veterans, police, first responders dealing with PTSD, mental health and addiction recovery, anti-suicide efforts, organizations fighting human trafficking and child trafficking, and dog rescue. This mission matters because I know what pain feels like. And I know what it means to want to be part of the light.

Your Win This Week Doesn’t Have to Be Huge

As we head into this spring season — the snow melting, the birds coming back, something shifting in the air — I want to leave you with this thought:

What if this spring isn’t just a new season outside… but a beginning of something new inside of you?

Maybe your win this week is small. Maybe it’s one calm breath before you react. One cleaner training rep. One honest prayer. One moment of self-control. One decision to not quit.

That’s enough. That’s more than enough.

The stone can move. Hope is alive. Peace is possible. Growth is still available. Transformation is real. And your story — with your dog, with your family, with your own calling — it is not over.

Don’t quit in a cave. That’s not the end.

Happy Easter. This is the Weekly Recall, and I’ll talk to you in the next one.

— Uncle Duke

 

Can a Tool Really Be Inhumane?

I want you to stop and think about something for a second. A tool has no heart. It has no soul. It takes no action on its own. A spoon is not inhumane — even though you could technically gouge someone’s eye out with one. But you could also use that same spoon to feed someone chocolate cake. The spoon doesn’t make that choice. You do.

I use that analogy because I’ve been there. I used to weigh 300 pounds. I had to lose 100 pounds, and I did it. But the spoon wasn’t the problem. I was the problem. The same logic applies to every single training tool in my bag.

I’ve been doing this since I was 12 years old. That’s when I used my first e-collar. I’m 50 now. In those 38 years, I’ve worked with tens of hundreds of thousands of dogs worldwide. I’ve seen what these tools do when they’re used correctly, and I’ve seen what happens when they’re misused. The tool is never the variable. The human always is.

What I Mean by Tactile Touch Tools

When I talk about training tools, I group a lot of them into what I call tactile touch tools — tools that communicate through physical sensation. That includes:

• Remote collars (e-collars, what some people call “shock collars”)
• Prong collars
• Standard leashes
• Gentle leaders and head halters

Used correctly, all of these do one thing: they deliver information. Touch is one of the clearest forms of communication a dog understands. Think about leash pressure — a gentle tug that guides direction, with the release of that pressure being the reward. The dog figures out fast: when I move with this, the pressure goes away. That’s clarity. That’s learning.

A remote collar works the same way. At the right level — and I want to be clear about this, because it matters — the stimulation from a properly used remote collar is often gentler than the vibration on your phone. I’m not overstating that. It’s a low-level tactile touch that gets the dog’s attention. Nothing more.

The “Shock Collar” Myth

Here’s the thing about the word “shock collar.” It’s chosen on purpose. It’s emotional language designed to trigger a reaction before anyone has actually thought it through. And it works, unfortunately, because a lot of people hear “electric” and their brain jumps straight to pain.

So let me walk you through what actually happens in a properly conducted session. Imagine I’m standing behind you and I poke you on the shoulder. Poke, poke, poke. You turn around and say, “What do you want?” That’s it. That’s the whole concept. I’m using touch to get your attention. I’m communicating. I’m not punishing you. I’m not hurting you. I’m saying, “Hey, look at me.”

Now if I walked up behind you and smacked you in the back of the head instead? That’s a different story. That’s a training failure. That’s what happens when someone goes too high, too fast, too soon — before the dog even knows what the sensation means. The answer to that isn’t to ban the tool. The answer is better education.

The same principle applies to prong collars and leashes. Any tool can be misused by someone who doesn’t know what they’re doing or someone with bad intentions. The car that kills someone on the road isn’t the problem. The person behind the wheel is.

Why This Debate Even Exists

I’ve thought about this a lot because I’ve been in the middle of it for a long time. In my view, there are three main reasons this fight keeps going:

• Fear. People fear what they don’t understand. When something is invisible and electronic, it feels more threatening than a visible leash — even when the reality is the opposite.
• Ignorance. And I mean that in the most neutral sense of the word — they simply don’t know. They’ve never used one. They’ve never watched a proper session. They’ve formed an opinion based on secondhand fear.
• Peer pressure and business interests. I’ve had veterinarians vote against allowing me into their college because of the tools I use. I’ve also had those same professionals come to me privately and say, “Please don’t tell anyone, but I need your help.” That’s not a values conflict. That’s peer pressure. And that’s a shame.

Proverbs 18:13 says that to answer before listening is folly and shame. I had to look up “folly” — it means foolishness, lack of good sense. And that’s exactly what’s happening in this debate. People are answering before they’ve listened. They’re judging tools they’ve never held, never used, and never studied in a real training context.

You can have an opinion. But if you’ve never actually used one of these tools, you don’t have authority to speak on them. Those are two different things.

Clarity Is the Point. Confusion Is the Problem.

Here’s why I care so much about tactile clarity in training. Confusion creates stress. Stress creates frustration — in the dog and in the handler. And when the handler gets frustrated, the relationship starts to break down. That has nothing to do with a tool being good or bad. That’s just what happens when communication breaks down.

A remote collar, used correctly, gives me the ability to communicate with a dog at 100 yards, 200 yards, 300 yards, with the same clarity as if they were standing right next to me. Once the dog understands what the tactile signal means — and once they know that responding to it brings relief and reward — learning happens fast. Problems that used to take weeks get resolved in days.

Some people call that lazy. Some people call it cheating. I call it being productive. I call it respecting the fact that I only have so much time with this dog, and I want us to get to the good part as quickly as possible. I want them to be safe. I want them to have a life. I want us to enjoy each other.

Using a tool that accelerates that process isn’t a shortcut. It’s a better path.

Dogs Are Paying the Price for This Fight

This is the part that really gets me. Because at the end of all this debate, all this emotion, all this posturing — the dogs are the ones losing.

Dogs are being put down that didn’t need to be. Dogs are being put on two, three anti-anxiety medications before anyone has tried adjusting their diet, increasing their exercise, building their confidence, or teaching them self-control. And yet, if a trainer suggests a remote collar in the same conversation, suddenly they’re the villain.

I’ve been in the pharmaceutical industry. I understand how that system works. And I’m not saying medication is never appropriate. But it shouldn’t be the first step. It shouldn’t come before training. And the fact that “give the dog a pill” is considered more humane than “teach the dog with a tactile tool” is something that I genuinely cannot wrap my head around.

I organized a community event once — a pack walk to raise money for dogs. And the question came up: should we allow remote collars and prong collars at the event? Because some people wanted to ban them. And I thought — if you’re so focused on the tool that you’re willing to exclude dog owners who need those tools to safely manage their dogs at a community event, then you’re not actually focused on the dogs. You’re focused on your feelings about a piece of equipment.

My Invitation Stands

I have extended this invitation for years, and I’m extending it again here. If you are a veterinarian, an animal behaviorist, or a canine professional who has concerns about these tools — come watch. Come observe a real session. Not a YouTube clip, not a secondhand story. Come and see what it actually looks like when a remote collar or a prong collar is used with intention, skill, and care for the dog.

I’m not asking you to agree with me. I’m asking you to look at the truth before you form your verdict. Because that’s what a growth mindset requires. That’s what your dogs deserve.

Nobody has taken me up on it yet from that side of the fence. But the door is open. It always will be.

The Bottom Line

If you take nothing else from this, take this:

• No tool is inhumane. Only the person using it can be.
• A remote collar at the right level is often gentler than your phone vibrating in your pocket.
• The debate exists because of fear, ignorance, peer pressure, and business interests — not because of evidence.
• Clarity in communication reduces confusion, reduces stress, and builds a better relationship between you and your dog.
• Dogs are suffering because we’re arguing about tools instead of educating people.
• The answer is always more education, more understanding, and less judgment.

If you’re a trainer or canine professional navigating these debates, know that you’re not alone. You don’t have to argue. Just show up, educate the people who need you, and keep going. That’s what community is for — and that’s what UPX is built on.

Find me at dukeferguson.com or unleashpotential.ca — and if you heard this on The Weekly Recall, reach out and let me know. That’s exactly why I do this