When liberty is our goal versus makes things harder

Liberty has been one of my biggest goals with Scout for a long time. In my perfect world, she has a lot of freedom—we can trust her to make decisions in a range of common situations without micromanaging—and everyone is happier as a result.

I stand by that!

But I’ve realized focusing too much on wanting our dog to exist without our guidance can sometimes make things harder than they need to be.

Here’s a look at how we make decisions about managing Scout’s behavior in different contexts. You can read a TLDR summary in the below Instagram post!

paws.andreflect

A post shared by @paws.andreflect

Why is liberty a great goal?

We want our dog to have agency as a sentient being

We control almost every aspect of our domestic dogs’ lives. This is for good reason. Canines aren’t prepared to safely navigate the modern human world on their own. It’s our job as owners to keep them—and the world around them—safe!

As much as possible, though, I do want to give Scout the opportunity to make her own choices. She may not implicitly understand human society, b…