He explained that as long as she was alert and locked into her environment instead of submissive and attentive to him, her instincts would override her ability to listen and obey. Potus, meanwhile, was casting me dismayed glances.

Down the block, two yapping dogs emerged from their house and jumped around, growling and barking, behind an iron gate. Potus reared up and wriggled, trying to break free of Cesar's grasp so she could bark at the dogs.

Instead of becoming agitated, Cesar seemed pleased. "This is good. This is an opportunity to learn," he said. He calmly pushed Potus into a sitting position, facing slightly away from the dogs. Potus reared up again, yelping, and he pushed her down again, forcefully, but without any sign of aggression or unnecessary roughness. When she looked in the direction of the dogs, he gave her choke chain a little yank. After about two minutes, she was sitting calmly, ears back, not looking at the dogs at all. Then we moved forward -- a reward for achieving a calm, submissive state.

Around the next block, a guy from a city work crew across the street spotted Cesar as we walked by. "Hey! It's the Dog Whisperer!" Cesar waved at the guy.

"I love your show, man! It's the best! Keep up the good work!"

Cesar didn't look surprised. "Does that happen a lot?" I asked.

"Yeah. Not in South Central, though. They don't watch National Geographic there."

Cesar gave me the leash, then noted that I seemed tense when we walked by a barking dog. Having watched the show for months, I was annoyed that I hadn't successfully imitated the calm, dominant stance I'd seen Cesar demonstrate. But imitation wasn't good enough, Cesar explained. I had to feel completely relaxed in my role as boss. Some of my ex-boyfriends would be alarmed that this role doesn't come naturally to me, but Potus' immunity to my attempts to subdue her had left me with a Pavlovian response to the sound of jingling dog tags, and Cesar could sense that. Instead of imagining quick results, he explained, I needed to focus on setting up good habits and maintaining a calm, confident attitude. He was right -- I was hoping for some endpoint when I wouldn't have to work as hard, and Potus and I could go back to being lazy peers.

When I drove down to South Central to visit his Dog Psychology Center the next day, he rounded the corner on his rollerblades with a team of dogs on leashes, just as I was pulling up in my car. All of the dogs were looking straight ahead, and moved at the same pace. Once we were inside, I said hello to one of the dogs behind a fence, which prompted Cesar to explain the ground rules: no eye contact, no petting. The key is not to do anything that will excite the dogs or make them think you're not dominant. "If you don't act dominant, these dogs might think that women aren't dominant. I can't have that."

Potus looked nervously at the sea of dogs behind the fence, which included at least 15 pit bulls, four or five Rottweilers, a few German shepherds, a standard poodle, a Boston terrier, two Italian greyhounds, a smattering of mutts and one tiny Chihuahua. Cesar pointed out the Chihuahua and said, "That one has been attacking big dogs."

Cesar slowly let the dogs in to smell Potus, and while many of them were once troubled dogs, I wasn't nervous. On his show, Cesar sometimes brings aggressive dogs to the center. In one episode, one of the dogs in the pack acted up, and Cesar merely pointed in his direction, and he backed up 5 feet, and then rolled onto his back, exposing his belly. Wouldn't it be nice if you could elicit the same response in an annoying human?

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