Don't Sip From My Coffee
Admin Team
Resource guarding is the practice of protecting your stuff from threats. We all do it, and I have a massive ring of keys to prove it. I lock the door to our training center, my home, and my car when they aren’t in use. Why do I do this? To prevent people from stealing from me and destroying my stuff, of course. I also guard things that are far more valuable, like my daughter and my husband, from perceived threats. And, I must admit that I guard things of very little value whatsoever, such as my morning cup of coffee and my favorite dry erase marker.
We guard things that hold value for us, and that we think could be taken away by a threatening other. So, if my husband comes to the breakfast table and attempts to drink from my coffee cup, he’ll receive a warning glare. However, since we have an established relationship, I’ll probably let it go from there. If, however, I was at the local coffee shop and a stranger walked up and took a long draught of my coffee, it wouldn’t go over so smoothly. I might stand up and confront the miscreant. How dare she! A series of ritualized displays of aggression might ensue, wherein she postures and asserts her right to drink what she will, and I scowl aggressively and demand that she learn the social rules of order. It is unlikely that it would come to blows, simply because I can afford a new cup of coffee and I am a very well socialized human.
On the other hand, it would be an entirely different story if a stranger attempted to have any kind of unsanctioned interaction with my 6-year-old daughter. My daughter’s value to me is far higher than the value of my morning coffee, and my role as her protector is biologically programmed. That is, I am a ferocious mama bear, and you don’t want to test me. Most people aren’t aware of my passion for training in martial arts, but that offender would quickly become aware of that training!
What’s happening here is a complicated internal process that has been honed over many thousands of years of evolution. Quickly, during every social interaction, my body and mind work to assess each situation for possible threats and react according to this assessment (rightly or wrongly) to keep me and the things I value safe.
There are many variables at play:
How valuable is the object I am protecting?
Who is the person or other animal that is threatening this object, and what is our history?
How severe is the threat to this object?
What is the context of this interaction?
What is my history of dealing with threats to this object?
Dogs are no different from humans in their desire to protect their valuables. In fact, for thousands of years, we humans loved it when dogs helped us do just that. Since dogs tend to find us valuable, it’s a win-win. Dogs have senses of smell and perception that elude humans, and they have therefore been essential to our success at protecting our homes, families, and stuff. Nowadays, however, we don’t really need them to do this much anymore. We have reliable deadbolts on our doors, and on-call police officers to whom we outsource any need for violence in the protection of our things. In addition, we live in very close proximity to each other, especially apartment dwellers. Dogs who guard our property tend to annoy (or terrify) our neighbors, so we don’t want them to do that, no matter how natural it may seem to them.
So, we want our dogs to be pacifists.
Actually, we need our dogs to be pacifists. Otherwise, they could scare our friends and even harm our family. In their overzealous urge to keep us and our stuff safe, they might actually do the opposite of what they are intending.
For the next couple of weeks, we are focusing in on resource guarding. Follow our instagram, or stay tuned to our newsletter and blog to find out more about how to prevent guarding, how to identify problem guarding, and how to solve it!
We are offering $50 off the February run of our brand new Stop Resource Guarding! Workshop by using code 50OffResourceGuarding at checkout through 1/7.