How to Teach a Dog to Settle | Long Down Training
Does your dog ever just stop?
I don't mean sleep because he finally exhausted himself. I mean can he be awake, have things happening around him, and simply decide that none of it requires his participation?
Some dogs genuinely struggle with that.
They follow you every time you stand up. They pace from room to room. They patrol the windows. They pop up every time another dog moves. They cannot sit beside you while you talk to someone without climbing into the conversation. They wander through the house looking for the next thing to do, and if nothing is happening, they will happily invent something.
These dogs may know plenty of commands. They can Sit. They can Down. They may know Place, Heel and Come. Some of them have had a tremendous amount of training.
What they don't know is how to turn themselves off.
That is where I use the Long Down.
The Long Down is not about exhausting your dog. It is about teaching him that he can be awake, aware of what is happening around him and still do absolutely nothing about it.
What Is the Long Down?
The exercise is sometimes called “Sit on the Dog.”
No, you do not actually sit on your dog.
You sit on the leash.
Your dog settles beside your chair while you read, watch television, work on your laptop, drink coffee or otherwise go about something that does not involve entertaining him.
The leash creates a small physical boundary. The dog has enough room to lie down comfortably and reposition himself, but not enough leash to wander across the room, climb into your lap, patrol the windows or begin finding jobs for himself.
And then you become very boring.
You aren't repeatedly rewarding him.
You aren't constantly petting him.
You aren't handing him toys every time he looks restless.
You aren't giving him a chew so that he has something else to occupy every minute.
You are giving him something many dogs get surprisingly little practice doing:
Nothing.
Why Would I Teach My Dog to Do Nothing?
Because doing nothing is a life skill.
Your dog cannot spend every waking hour exercising, training, playing, eating enrichment toys, chasing balls, sniffing trails or being entertained by you. Nor should he need to.
There will be times when you are talking to someone, watching a movie, eating dinner, working, sitting at a coffee shop, waiting at the veterinarian, visiting family, traveling or simply existing in your own house.
I want a dog who can exist there too.
For the dog who is chronically over-aroused, constantly seeking interaction or unable to tolerate a lull in activity, that can take practice.
I don't want to spend my dog's entire life trying to keep him tired enough that he behaves. I want him to learn how to settle even when he still has gas in the tank.
The Long Down Builds Frustration Tolerance
This is one of the reasons I like the exercise so much.
Your dog may prefer to walk around.
He may prefer to check the window.
He may prefer to follow you.
He may prefer to go bother the other dog.
He may prefer that you throw a ball, give him a chew, rub his belly or otherwise provide an alternative to simply lying there.
And for a while, the answer is no.
Nothing terrible has happened.
The dog is safe. His physical needs have been met. He has room to lie comfortably. You are right there.
He simply cannot do the thing he would rather be doing at this particular moment.
Learning to tolerate that mild frustration without unraveling is valuable.
Dogs encounter frustration throughout normal life. They cannot greet every dog. They cannot chase every squirrel. They cannot go through every open door. They cannot demand dinner whenever they feel hungry or insist that every person in the house entertain them on command.
I want a dog who can hear not now without treating it like a crisis.
The Long Down Is Not the Same as Place
I use both exercises, but I use them differently.
Place teaches the dog to remain on a defined object or surface until released. That might be an elevated cot, mat or dog bed. It is incredibly useful for visitors, cooking, family activity, doorbells, household management and situations where I want the dog to remain in a specific location.
The Long Down is less about a particular object and more about settling beside the handler for an extended period without entertainment or constant direction.
With Place, the dog thinks, This is my boundary. I stay here until released.
With the Long Down, I am building more of, Nothing is happening right now, and I know how to be okay with that.
There is overlap, of course. Both develop duration, patience and impulse control, and a dog who becomes good at one often gets better at the other.
But I would not eliminate either exercise because they are not doing exactly the same job.
And It Is More Than a Formal Down-Stay
A traditional Down-Stay is usually taught as an obedience command. The dog assumes a position, remains there while we add Duration, Distance and Distraction, and waits for release.
The Long Down certainly develops duration, but I care just as much about what happens to the dog's state while he is there.
I don't want thirty minutes of a dog lying rigidly on the floor staring at me and waiting for the starter pistol.
I want the dog to stop anticipating.
Eventually I want the hip to roll over, the head to come down, the breathing to slow and the dog to realize that he doesn't need to keep asking what happens next.
That's the off-switch I'm looking for.
Which Dogs Benefit From the Long Down?
I use this exercise with all kinds of dogs, but I especially like it for dogs who:
- follow their person from room to room and struggle to settle independently;
- pace or patrol the house looking for something to do;
- are constantly pestering people or other dogs for interaction;
- become over-aroused easily;
- have difficulty settling after exercise or play;
- believe every human movement concerns them;
- struggle with frustration when they cannot immediately access what they want;
- have plenty of obedience skills but little ability to simply relax;
- are puppies or adolescents who need to learn that life includes downtime;
- need better duration before advancing Place or other stationary work; or
- are constantly being entertained because their humans are afraid boredom will create bad behavior.
It can also be very useful for dogs who have been taught that every minute with a human is interactive. Those dogs aren't necessarily anxious. Sometimes they have simply never practiced being near you without being the center of whatever you're doing.
What You Need
You don't need much equipment.
- A secure, properly fitted collar or other appropriate training setup your dog cannot simply back out of.
- A standard five- or six-foot leash.
- A comfortable chair.
- Something for you to do that does not involve the dog.
- Enough uninterrupted time to actually let the exercise work.
I commonly use a properly fitted martingale or slip-lead setup depending on the dog and the rest of the training plan. The important part is that your equipment is secure and appropriate for the individual dog.
The dog must be supervised for the entire exercise.
Never Leave a Dog Unattended on a Tethered Leash
The Long Down is an actively supervised training exercise. Do not sit on the leash, attach the leash to furniture and then leave the room for twenty minutes.
Leashes can tangle around legs, furniture and bodies. Dogs can chew through them. Equipment can snag. You are present during this exercise.
If your dog has a neck, spinal, orthopedic, airway or other physical issue that changes what equipment or position is appropriate, modify the exercise for that dog rather than blindly following a generic setup.
How to Set Up the Long Down
Start somewhere boring.
Your living room while nothing exciting is happening is considerably easier than starting during a birthday party with twelve people, three dogs and a pizza delivery at the door.
Before you begin, make sure the dog has had a reasonable opportunity to potty and that his normal needs have been addressed. I am not interested in asking a puppy with a full bladder to demonstrate an hour of inner peace.
Bring the dog beside your chair and arrange the leash so he has enough length to stand, sit, lie down naturally and adjust his body, but not enough to wander around the room.
I usually drape the leash across the chair and sit on it, or place my foot over it so I can quietly control how much leash is available.
The leash should not be pulling continuously on the dog's neck while he is lying down.
When he settles into the correct area, the leash should be loose.
Does My Dog Have to Know Down First?
No.
If your dog already knows Down, I may ask for it once because that gives us a useful starting position.
But one of the things I like about this exercise is that the environment itself helps the dog discover the answer.
There isn't enough leash to roam.
You're not going anywhere.
Nothing interesting is being offered.
Standing around eventually becomes fairly pointless.
The dog sits.
Then eventually he lies down.
And we begin teaching something deeper than simply responding to the word Down.
How to Teach the Long Down
Step 1: Set the Boundary
Sit in your chair with the dog beside you and enough leash available for him to lie down comfortably. Your dog should not have enough leash to wander away, patrol the room or repeatedly jump into your lap.
If he knows Down, ask once.
Then stop talking.
Step 2: Become Boring
Read a book. Watch a movie. Work on your computer. Answer emails. Do a crossword puzzle.
The activity does not matter very much as long as you can remain in your seat and resist the urge to turn the Long Down into forty-five minutes of interacting with your dog.
This is harder for some pet parents than it is for the dog.
Step 3: Let the Leash Hold the Boundary
Your dog may stand up and try to walk away. He may circle. He may try another direction. He may decide your lap looks promising.
You don't need a big correction every time he discovers the leash.
The leash simply says, You aren't going over there.
Keep the space small enough that wandering isn't productive and large enough that the dog can comfortably lie down and reposition.
Step 4: Stop Negotiating
This is where many humans accidentally keep their dogs activated.
The dog stands.
“Lie down.”
The dog looks at you.
“Go on. Down.”
The dog paws at your knee.
“Stop that. Down. Come on. Be a good boy.”
Now there is an entire conversation happening, which is considerably more interesting than settling.
If I have already given the cue and the dog understands the exercise, I become quiet. The physical boundary remains. The dog gets time to figure out that nothing exciting is coming from me.
Step 5: Let Settling Happen
Eventually most dogs reach the point where standing, fidgeting and trying different options stops paying off.
They lie down.
At first the dog may still look ready to spring up at any second.
That's okay.
Stay boring.
Over time you may see the body soften, a hip roll to the side, a sigh, the head come down or the dog actually fall asleep.
Now we're getting somewhere.
How Long Should a Long Down Be?
The name is a clue.
This is not a thirty-second Down.
For an adult dog who can physically tolerate the position comfortably, I commonly begin around thirty minutes and work toward an hour or longer as the dog understands the exercise.
Some dogs who are already familiar with duration work can eventually settle beside you for a movie, dinner on a patio or a couple of hours while you're working.
Puppies need a more reasonable progression based on age, bladder capacity, developmental stage and previous training. I may begin with a shorter session and build.
The important part is that you do not quit at the exact moment the dog becomes frustrated.
If every session ends because the dog fidgets, paws, complains or stands up enough times, you may accidentally teach him that persistence ends the exercise.
At the same time, there is no prize for putting a completely unprepared dog into a two-hour session on day one.
Build duration.
Don't End the Exercise in the Middle of a Protest
This follows the same logic we use around crate exits, doors, meals and other impulse-control exercises.
If your dog is actively pawing, climbing, barking, whining or fighting the boundary and you immediately stand up and release him, pay attention to the lesson you may have created.
That worked.
I would rather wait for the dog to settle again, even briefly, and then end the exercise from a calmer state.
The release should not become payment for escalating the protest.
What If My Dog Keeps Standing Up?
Let him stand for a moment.
If he cannot go anywhere and nothing interesting happens, standing eventually becomes less useful.
If your dog already understands Down and repeatedly gets up to leave the exercise, you can calmly remind him once and use the leash to prevent him from walking away.
What I don't want is a wrestling match.
If you are spending the entire session physically fighting your dog to the floor, something about your setup, expectations, equipment or understanding of the exercise needs to change.
What If My Dog Jumps on Me?
Don't turn it into a game.
Quietly block the dog from climbing into your lap and adjust the available leash if he has enough room to repeatedly launch himself upward.
The dog must still have enough leash to lie comfortably, but he does not need enough room to climb all over you.
Then go back to being boring.
For the dog who has discovered that jumping creates hands, words, pushing and attention, your lack of enthusiasm can be very informative.
What If My Dog Chews the Leash?
Some dogs decide that if they cannot wander, the leash itself should become the day's entertainment.
If your dog already knows Leave It, use it.
Otherwise, calmly interrupt the chewing and prevent him from spending the entire exercise gnawing through your equipment.
This is also one reason I don't leave dogs unattended on drag lines or tethered leashes. A leash is a training tool, not a chew toy and not unattended confinement equipment.
What If My Dog Nibbles My Feet?
Wear shoes.
Seriously.
Some puppies and busy young dogs quickly notice that human feet move, and moving feet are apparently much more interesting than doing nothing.
Keep your own fidgeting to a minimum. Quietly block persistent mouthing and go back to your book.
You do not need to turn toe nibbling into today's central training event.
No Toys or Chews During the Initial Teaching Phase
This is intentional.
I use enrichment. I use chews. I like giving dogs appropriate things to do.
But the purpose of the Long Down is not to teach the dog to remain stationary as long as he has a bully stick, stuffed toy or constant stream of snacks available.
I want to know whether the dog can eventually settle because settling itself has become familiar.
Later, once the dog understands the skill, there is nothing wrong with giving him a chew while the family watches a movie or relaxes together.
But during the teaching phase, I want him to discover the off-switch rather than simply replacing one activity with another.
I Also Don't Constantly Feed the Long Down
Food can absolutely help teach behavior, and there are dogs for whom strategically reinforcing early calm is useful.
But I do not want to spend an hour dropping treats between the dog's paws every fifteen seconds.
That can create another form of anticipation:
When is the next one coming?
The Long Down is one of the exercises where I intentionally allow quiet and inactivity to become normal rather than requiring continual external reinforcement.
The dog is learning that nothing happening is not a problem that needs to be solved.
The First Few Sessions May Not Look Relaxing
This is important because people sometimes try the exercise once and decide it doesn't work.
Your dog may fidget.
He may stand up repeatedly.
He may stare at you.
He may paw at you.
He may sigh dramatically enough that anyone listening would assume he has been assigned hard labor.
He may test every available inch of leash looking for another option.
That does not necessarily mean the exercise is making him more anxious.
A dog who has never practiced frustration tolerance may look frustrated when he first encounters a boundary.
Our job is to distinguish ordinary frustration from true distress and panic rather than deciding that every moment of discomfort is harmful.
Frustration Is Not the Same as Panic
A dog being mildly annoyed that he cannot get up and patrol the house is not the same thing as a dog in genuine emotional distress.
I am comfortable letting a dog experience some frustration.
I am not interested in trapping a terrified dog beside a chair while his panic escalates.
If the dog is becoming increasingly frantic, trying desperately to escape, injuring himself, redirecting aggressively, unable to recover or showing a level of distress far beyond ordinary protest, stop treating the problem like a basic duration exercise.
That dog may need a different starting point and a broader look at what is driving the behavior.
Known Bite or Redirection Risk Changes the Exercise
If your dog has a history of redirecting onto handlers when frustrated, biting when physically restricted, guarding personal space or escalating aggressively when prevented from leaving, do not casually shorten the leash beside your legs and wait to see what happens.
That history changes the safety plan.
Use appropriate equipment, positioning and professional guidance for the individual dog. Your hands and face should not be placed in bite range simply because an internet article told you to sit on a leash.
Your Job Is Mostly to Stop Helping
This can be surprisingly hard for dog moms who are used to constantly checking whether their dog is happy.
He stands up and we ask him if he's okay.
He sighs and we pet him.
He looks bored and we get a toy.
He wanders and we start a training session.
He paws us and we give him attention.
He stares at the treat cabinet and we decide perhaps he needs enrichment.
Sometimes the dog doesn't need anything.
He is allowed to be bored for a minute.
He is allowed to discover that every feeling does not require action and every lull does not require you to fill it.
You are not responsible for making sure your dog is entertained every waking minute. Part of living comfortably in a human household is learning how to settle while humans do human things.
Don't Exhaust the Dog First Just So He'll Lie Down
You can absolutely meet your dog's physical and mental needs before asking him to settle, and I recommend that you do.
But I don't want the only way the Long Down works to be running the dog until he has no remaining option except passing out.
If your dog can settle only after two hours of hard exercise, we haven't necessarily taught an off-switch. We may simply have emptied the tank.
The skill becomes much more useful when the dog can settle even though he could physically get up and do something else.
Use the Long Down During Real Life
Once the dog understands the exercise in a quiet room, begin making it useful.
Practice while you drink coffee on the porch.
Practice while your family watches a movie.
Practice while somebody else moves around the kitchen.
Practice while you're talking to a friend.
Practice in the waiting room when appropriate.
Practice at a quiet outdoor café before expecting your dog to handle the busiest patio in town.
This is where the skill begins translating into the dog you actually want to live with.
Add Distraction Gradually
Just like every other behavior, the Long Down becomes harder when the environment becomes more interesting.
Your dog lying beside you while the house is silent is one level.
Your partner walking through the room is another.
A child playing across the room is harder.
Another dog moving around can be harder still.
The delivery driver coming to the door may be an entirely different exercise.
Don't teach duration for three days and then become irritated because the dog broke position when six people arrived for Thanksgiving.
Build Duration, Distance and Distraction thoughtfully.
The Long Down Can Help the Velcro Dog
There are dogs who believe their human standing up means they must stand too.
You shift in the chair.
The dog gets up.
You reach for your coffee.
The dog gets up.
You walk six feet to throw something away.
The dog follows.
Some of these dogs are anxious. Some have separation issues. Some are simply very attached and have practiced following their person thousands of times.
The Long Down can help teach an important distinction:
She moved. Nothing happened. I can stay here.
That does not mean I use this exercise as a cure for genuine separation anxiety. If the dog panics when left alone, that needs its own evaluation and plan.
But for the dog who simply believes every human movement requires canine supervision, this can be very useful.
Use an Indoor Leash to Carry the Lesson Into the House
The Long Down is one reason I use leashes indoors.
A supervised indoor leash allows us to create boundaries and follow through without chasing the dog around the house.
It can help with house training, greetings, Place, impulse control and teaching a dog to remain with you rather than wandering off to find trouble.
As always, the leash is supervised.
What About Puppies?
Yes, I teach puppies how to settle.
In fact, I think puppies desperately need this skill because many pet parents accidentally create a life in which the puppy moves from one activity to the next all day long.
Play.
Walk.
Training.
Enrichment toy.
Another play session.
Another outing.
Then everybody wonders why the puppy becomes a land shark at 7:00 p.m. and seems completely incapable of shutting down.
Puppies need movement, exploration, play and learning.
They also need enormous amounts of sleep and practice transitioning from activity into rest.
I start with age-appropriate duration and build gradually. I account for potty needs and developmental limitations rather than expecting a tiny puppy to produce an adult dog's Long Down.
The lesson begins early:
Sometimes we do things. Sometimes we don't.
What About a Senior Dog?
Senior dogs can benefit from calm duration work too, but physical comfort comes first.
If lying on a hard floor hurts, give the dog an appropriate surface.
If arthritis, spinal disease or another condition makes one position uncomfortable, do not insist on a textbook Down for an hour to prove that the dog understands the exercise.
The behavioral goal is settling.
I can accommodate an aging body while still teaching the brain that it doesn't need to patrol the house.
When a Dog Truly Cannot Settle, Look Deeper
Training can absolutely teach an off-switch, but sometimes a dog who cannot settle is telling us more.
If your dog is suddenly pacing when he never did before, waking repeatedly at night, panting while resting, constantly changing positions, getting up every few minutes or seeming physically unable to become comfortable, I don't automatically assume we need more Long Down practice.
Pain, digestive discomfort, itching, urinary urgency, medication effects, cognitive changes, poor sleep and other physical problems can show up as restlessness.
Behavior happens in a body.
If the inability to settle is new, extreme or inconsistent with the dog you know, look at the dog rather than simply adding more training pressure.
How Often Should You Practice?
When I am first teaching the exercise, consistency matters more than making every session heroic.
For an adult dog, you might begin with a thirty-minute session once or twice a day and increase duration as the dog becomes successful. Some dogs progress quickly. Others need more repetitions before the body truly softens.
I care much more about establishing the pattern than racing toward a two-hour record.
Once the dog understands it, you don't need to formally “train the Long Down” several times every day forever.
Use it.
You're watching a movie anyway.
You're having coffee anyway.
You're sitting through your kid's practice anyway.
You're working on your laptop anyway.
Let the skill become part of normal life.
When Do I Stop Sitting on the Leash?
The leash is there to help establish a boundary while the dog is learning.
It is not supposed to become permanent furniture.
As the dog consistently settles, you can begin giving more leash, resting your foot lightly over it rather than physically pinning the available length, and eventually letting the leash lie loose while you remain close enough to follow through.
From there, you may progress to a dog who simply lies beside your chair because that has become normal.
Just don't rush to remove the tool while you are still using it every thirty seconds to prevent the dog from leaving.
That dog is telling you he needs more repetitions before you increase freedom.
How Do I Know the Exercise Is Working?
Don't measure success only by whether the dog's elbows stayed on the floor.
Watch the whole dog.
Does he settle faster than he did last week?
Does he stop reacting every time you shift your chair?
Does he sigh and soften sooner?
Can another person walk through the room without him launching himself upright?
Can he remain settled when another dog moves?
Does he recover faster after excitement?
Can he lie beside you at a café instead of scanning the entire environment for his next assignment?
Those are the changes I'm looking for.
This Is One Piece of the On-Off Switch
I want dogs to be able to turn on.
I like dogs who play hard, work hard, run, sniff, hike, train, chase balls, engage with their humans and enjoy being dogs.
But a dog who can only turn on is difficult to live with and often difficult to take anywhere.
The other half of that dog is the one who can finish the activity and come back down.
Long Down, Place, duration work, crate comfort and impulse-control exercises all help build that side of the dog.
Different exercises. Related skills.
I don't want to take the drive out of a dog. I want the dog to learn that drive has an off-switch.
A Simple First Week
If you want a practical place to begin, keep the first week boring and consistent.
- Choose a quiet room. Do not begin with major distractions.
- Meet the dog's needs first. Potty, reasonable movement and physical comfort matter.
- Set up the leash safely. Give enough room to lie and reposition, but not enough to wander.
- Ask for Down once if the dog knows it. Then stop narrating the exercise.
- Sit down and do something boring. Read, watch television or work.
- Let ordinary frustration pass. Do not create a conversation every time the dog fidgets.
- Prevent wandering without wrestling. The leash creates the boundary.
- Wait for actual settling. Look for a softer body rather than merely a dog technically touching the floor.
- End from calm. Do not make escalating protest the thing that earns release.
- Repeat. Once the quiet version becomes easy, gradually use the skill during more interesting parts of life.
The Hardest Part May Be You
The dog may complain.
The dog may look bored.
The dog may stare at you with the deeply wounded expression of an animal who has apparently never been so mistreated as when asked to lie on a comfortable floor for thirty minutes.
Your job is not to fix every second of it.
Let the exercise work.
Be calm. Be boring. Be patient enough for the dog to stop searching for another answer.
Eventually you begin to see the change.
The dog who used to pop up every thirty seconds stays down.
The dog who used to patrol while you watched television falls asleep beside the chair.
The dog who thought every movement in the house required his involvement notices something happening and decides not to bother.
That is the breakthrough.
Not exhaustion.
Not surrender.
Self-regulation.
When Your Dog Still Can't Come Down
If your dog knows the exercises but remains chronically hypervigilant, reactive, unable to settle or constantly “on,” I want to look beyond whether he needs another obedience command. Sometimes the training is there and the dog is still struggling with state of mind, environment, relationship, stress or something happening in the physical dog.