Dogs can improve your state of mind

A UK study reveals that owning a dog is good for your health. And having a pet dog improves your physical and mental wellbeing more than having a cat. This is the conclusion of a study by a senior lecturer, Dr. Deborah Wells, from the Canine Behavior Centre of Queens University, Belfast in Northern Ireland.

But she is not the only one who came to this conclusion. You may have seen this guy on National Geographic or just heard of him, Cesar Millan. Better known as the dog whisperer he goes across the world to help people understand their dogs and help them with their problems.

Cesar lives by a couple simple rules when it comes to dogs:

• Exercise
• Discipline
• Affection

Always treat your dog in that order and you should be fine. When you enter the room or meet a new dog you have some basic rules to:

• No touch
• No talk
• No eye-contact

Dogs can feel our energy, our state of mind. So, basically our emotions have an effect on the way our dogs treat us. When you get angry at your dog, but you don't act upon it, he will still feel your energy. Cesar learns us that the way we feel effect our dogs, so in order to address our problems we must look at our own emotions. When we sort them out our dogs will notice the change in energy and will act upon that energy. Well, what is the energy I should have? A calm and assertive state of mind is the perfect way to be a balanced pack leader for your dog. It gives you rest and your dog is happier. A win win situation!

Below a short clip with Cesar's house rules:

A guy eating dog poop? - Ameriquest Commercial

I was surfing on the internet today, trying to find a funny commercial, and I found alright! It is a bit of an old commercial, but it's still funny if you ask me. This commercial is from the mortgage company Ameriquest, the slogan they used in their commercials was: "Don't judge too quickly, we won't". What they created were some really funny commercials, there are a lot of them. All of them are very short and straight to the point, which makes them very funny. The one I found hilarious was this one:

In this commercial you see a guy with his dog, just sitting in the park and enjoying the weather. Deciding that it is time to go home he starts to gather his things and stands up. The dog then sees another dog and gets excited, pulling the guy forwards. The guy then drops his chocolate brownie (or whatever chocolaty thing it is), it lands behind the dog. An elderly woman and her granddaughter walk on by and they see the two dogs. Our guy pick up his brownie with a paper, making it seems like he is picking up the dog's poop. He cleans it up a bit and start to eat it. The disgust is obvious on the faces of the elderly woman and her granddaughter. The guy is happy with his brownie, then he realizes what it must seem like to the elderly woman. He quickly tries to sign to them that this is not what it seems! The emotions that the commercial transfers to us, the viewers, are obvious. We sit on our couch with a great big smile on our face. That is what I love about this commercial is all the emotions and the body language, there are no conversations, the entire story is told with emotions. What can I say, strong commercial, strong message, and a very good looking brownie.

Personal hero

When it comes to personal heroes, I have to say that it would be Paul Ekman. I have mentioned him quite a lot in my previous posts. When it comes to the research in recognizing emotions and spotting liars, Paul Ekman is the leading man. He is the man behind the series "Lie to me," his research has been the base of every episode in the series. Paul Ekman was present at every shooting of all the episodes, just to be sure that the facts were right. Even on his website he put up a blog about the show, explaining into precise detail the science behind the show. Separating the facts from fiction.

Paul Ekman got me interested in recognizing emotions and even got me studying his literature. I wanted to know what he knows and to be able to do what he does. Watching the series and reading the books, I have to say I am nowhere near the level of expertise of Paul Ekman. I can say that I can recognize more now than I could before and I know what to do with that information. So I say thank you, my hero, Paul Ekman. Thank you for your inspiration and eye-opening research.