ABSTRACT
Being an animal-assisted therapist is an eye-opening experience. Despite preparation through reading and research, many things about my current day-to-day activities are very different from what I originally imagined. It was easy to watch other handlers with their registered therapy dogs and imagine that my dogs would behave in a similar manner or would enjoy similar interactions. My original vision centered on the work my dogs would do directly with clients. While that direct client contact work is part of my professional life, handling therapy dogs has brought so much more-an unexpected broadening of the original vision. Working with dogs, while rewarding, is also humbling. It takes one from a place of predictability and control to a place of adventure and openness to what may come. It has helped me realize that this is the place from which our dogs live their lives. Dogs do not plan or envision themselves in the future. They simply take each moment as it comes, enjoying (or tolerating) everything that comes their way. They do not look forward to vacations or time offsomething that is so central to human work life. They have a wonderful, innate ability to find the simple pleasures in each day. (This trait is, to a large extent, what makes them so effective in their work as therapy dogs.) Because of this more accepting way of interacting with the world, humans who work with them are frequently invited to set aside human agendas and worries of the future and past.
