What if Cesar Milan, The Dog Whisperer has it right. Could applying his principles to your own relationship allow you to tame your wild dog of a man? Could “Exercise, Discipline, and Affection” be all you need to create a relationship that is loving and satisfying. Let’s see…
Exercise. In Cesar’s world, Exercise is critical for a dog to burn off their excess energy. Exercise in this case isn’t just about exercising your ‘s about exercising you, too.
To quote the immortal words of Elle Woods in the movie Legally Blond, “She couldn’t have killed her husband. Exercise creates endorphins. Endorphins make you happy. Happy people just don’t shoot their husbands. They just don’t!” If you’re happy, all of those quirks that your man has that bothers you now, may not bother when you’re happy. Being happy makes you more attractive, makes you look younger and makes you more fun to be around.
Discipline. For Cesar, Discipline is about creating “rules, boundaries and limitations.” Enough said. It’s your responsibility to teach your man about acceptable behavior. They don’t show up knowing this stuff. If your man is doing something you don’t like, kindly and gently teach him what is acceptable. Rubbing a dog’s nose in his accident on the carpet won’t keep it from happening again, just like yelling and screaming won’t teach your man the right way to behave. Do your training early and do it quickly. As my friend Joseph says, “Kill the monster while it’s a baby.” It’s always easier to break a baby-size habit, than it is to break a gigantic Godzilla-sized habit
Disciplining your man may be the hardest part for you. When your man looks at you and says “I’m Sorry,” you’re going to want to give in and let the bad behavior go unchecked. No discipline in the beginning means you’re going to end up yanked all over the place later because you didn’t teach your man how to behave.
Affection. The third part of the formula is Affection. Ask yourself this question, “If I showed my man the same kind of affection that my pet shows me, would my relationship be better?” I know that my pet’s unconditional love is a great feeling to me.
Now greeting your man at the door every day with your tail wagging might be a bit extreme. Just show him in simple ways that you love and appreciate him. But be prepared, you may get some strange looks if this is new behavior for you. That’s ok. He’ll get used to it and seek out other ways to elicit this same response from you. Now everyone is happy!
