Help with Leash reactivity

Reactivity is a tricky word, because of course, we all react to things we notice in the environment! Think of it as "over-reactivity", so in the case of walking or generally being on a leash, an over-reaction would be things like barking, pulling frantically, lunging, growling, as well as things like cowering, trying to run away, and yelping. 

For the most part, it's you who decides what is a level of reaction you're happy with, and what you're not. However, if you're noticing that other people are giving you meaningful looks, avoiding you and your dog, or saying something about your dog's behaviour, that could be something to consider. 

Almost all leash reactivity is created by one of two things: either the dog is afraid or threatened by things they notice on walks and over-react to try to get them to go away, or the dog is really keen to interact with the things they notice and over-react because they're frustrated they can't get to them. 

There are lots and lots of ways to train dogs (and people) - the way that I choose to train gives the dog as much agency and choice as possible, uses motivational techniques rather than suppressing behaviour through punishment, and is tailored to each individual dog and handler dynamic - we're all different, after all! 

There are several aspects to this. The first is safety - you need to be safe, your dog needs to be safe, and other things in the environment need to be safe. To address this, you need to have secure equipment, be physically capable of holding your dog if they over-react, and really think about what environments your dog is currently capable of walking in. If they are over-reacting, they're not in a mental space where they can learn, so you need to keep them "under threshold" as much as possible.

In this context, threshold is like a tipping point: over threshold is where your dog decides to over-react, and under threshold is where they notice the thing, but are able to control themselves and not over-react.