How to get a dog to stop jumping on you

I learned this like twenty years ago, when people actually could go to a library and check out VHS tapes! I had just moved to A new town, and there was this awesome library that had great educational materials and audiobooks, and one day I saw a tape that was about dog training. Most of their educational materials were on DVD, but there were a few left that were still on VHS .... this was probably around the year 2003. I don't remember the name of the video, but I do remember it was put together by a bunch of Monks that trained dogs regularly, i think they did it for a living.

I didn't have a dog at the time, but i used to walk my neighbor's dogs for free, because I just loved dogs so much. One of the dogs, Ronnie, kept jumping up on me, and I don't remember if this is why I checked out that video, because like I said, I didn't have a dog. Maybe I was thinking about training a little bit. But whatever the case I ended up not actually using the training much, but the one thing that stuck with me was their tip on how to keep a dog from jumping up on you. 

This is what you do if you want to discourage a dog from jumping up on you. I have to say this actually does work, if you do it regularly. It kind of depends on how serious you are about getting them to not jump up on you. I currently have just one dog that likes to jump on people kind of regularly. His name is jet, and I actually think it's kind of cute. When he does it, so i'm not the best about discouraging him from doing it. But there have been times I have used this trick. And I think he doesn't jump on me. Nearly as much as he would if I had not used this method in the past. I don't mind the occasional excited jumpy greeting. I just don't want it all the time. 

Okay so here's what you do. 

When a dog jumps up on you, make like you're being totally receptive to the jumping. I remember the monk grabbing the dog by the paws an acute and playful way, as he said out loud, " Oh, you wanna dance? OK, let's dance!"

So he would hold the dog's paws, and basically make like he was "dancing" with the dog. This will be fun for the dog for about ten seconds. But after a while, the dog will want to sit down. And this is where the magic lesson kicks in. 

When the dog starts showing you that they're ready for you to drop their paws and let them go back to having four paws on the ground.... don't let go.... at least not yet. You have to make like, you're totally oblivious to the clues, and just keep dancing with them, and saying, oh, you want to dance? Okay let's dance! 

Eventually the dog will get it that, oh geez, i'm the one who asked for this, and this is what i'm getting..... so maybe I shouldn't ask for this anymore! And now, you have a dog that's going to think twice the next time before they jump on you again. They may try it a couple more times but trust me, if you do this three times in a row, you are going to have yourself a dog that jumps way less than it did before, and it may never even try it again. 

At the very least, i can tell you this method works way way better than trying to "knee" the dog to get them to stop jumping on you. I can tell you from experience, that method does NOT work very well, especially because it's not exactly healthy for a dog to give them a knee to the chest!!! 

Anyway I hope this works for you. If it does, let me know!