For all of the insights the other pillars of L.E.G.S.® can provide, your dog’s self will ultimately only be his own. Gather up all of the details that you can about your dog’s unique internal conditions and experiences. You can measure and test, diagnose and treat, recognize and resolve many of the health variables influencing his behavior. And you can enjoy his personal quirks, and the things life has taught him that influence his behavior. You can appreciate where he is in his personal development. Knowing as much as you can will allow you to have a thousand perfect moments with your bizarre and beautiful, green-ball-crazy, bed-stealing bozo. He is that one in a million. He is Bob.

CONCLUSION

No matter how much we wish that we could avoid having expectations about a relationship—no matter how much we dream of simply giving someone we love the room to be who they are—the truth is that we are going to have expectations anyway. Though wise men may council us in the art of mastering nonattachment (and there is much to be said for such an endeavor), most of us will find that expectations—about people, situations, experiences, and even our animal companions—are inevitable.

This is the most natural thing in the world. We are not the only species that attempts to anticipate the environmental circumstances we may encounter. Our genes are primed to expect certain events to occur in our lives, designed as we are to fit perfectly within a unique orchestra of conditions specific to our niche in the world. The experiences we have teach us how to live and survive; and, if we are learning well, we are constantly adding to our expectations about the world around us. We do this without even realizing it.

The problem we run into is that we often fabricate unrealistic expectations about life, especially about relationships and the behaviors of those around us. Without meaning to, we create impossible or arbitrary standards to which we feel others should conform. Unchecked expectations can lead to a host of misunderstandings, resentments, and false assumptions. We may miss out on the chance to know someone, to meet them at all, because we are so caught up in the fact that they have failed to live up to an ideal we have in our minds. When we are incorrect in our presumptions, we don’t give them the break they need. We give up. All because we had incomplete information.

There is no reason for you to feel badly about having expectations of your dog. He will certainly have expectations of you—that you let him out to pee in the morning, that you feed him his breakfast every day, that you return from work at the end of the day. It’s only reasonable that you have expectations of him, too.