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Speech Transcript (very little editing so not exact)

Time To Shine Today Podcast Varsity Squad!. This is Scott Ferguson and episode 287. It was a little bit different than when I bring on coaches, therapists, consultants, whatnot. My good friend Billy groom from upward dog allergy. She works with cognitive behavior therapy, the technique that she works with dogs, because dogs do have a perception I know for a fact because I have my Pitbull stitch and I know that he has thoughts going in his head, and really trying to get those out and get it communicated. And we hate euthanization I hate that word. I believe in no kill shelters. And Billy is out there saving our fur babies lives. So just if you have a dog and you’re having a little bit of issue with it, please listen with him or her. Please listen to this podcast and you will pick up some serious serious knowledge nuggets on how you be able to level up and if you’re at a sticking point, we’d love to make a warm introduction to Billy so she can help you. So without further ado, here’s my really good friend Billy groom. Let’s level up. Time to shine today podcast mercy squad. This is Scott Ferguson. And as my listeners go, which I appreciate you for listening, that I’m a huge huge advocate for animals. I’m work here at the Peggy Adams rescue here in South Florida Big Dog Ranch, Jupiter furry friends, and I have somebody that is going to just fit right in perfectly for an interview. And her name is the fantastic Billy groom and she’s an animal animal advocate who has dedicated the last three decades as 30 years peeps to decreasing canine behavioral euthanasia and surrender, increasing adoptions and changing the way people perceive dogs with checkered past. She’s an expert in canine cognitive behavioral therapy therapy, and award winning author and a podcast host. She’s a member of the animal behavior society, the comparative cognition society and dog Writers Association of America and also her company was the winner of the 2021 Global Business Awards. And don’t go there now. But I will put in the show notes or podcast. Dog Training disrupted with upward dog allergy was fantastic. You have to go check it out. There’s so many awesome knowledge nuggets, and how to raise your furbaby in the correct way especially if they were adopted into your family. And the last one I just listened to resonated so well with me because when I adopted my pit stitch, he came from a surrendered family. So I had to figure out ways to communicate with stitch to get him to eat. And I unfortunately couldn’t contact their family. But I wish it would have listened to this podcast before because it will just shorten that learning curve. And so Billy, thank you so much for coming on. Please introduce yourself the time to shine today podcast versus spa but first, what’s your favorite color and why? gray, gray,

gray. Gray because it’s not black and white. It’s gray and that gray area second important area oh

my gosh living in the gray area that’s awesome. You do?

Yeah you do. There’s no black and white when you’re working with dogs there’s no right or wrong it just is what it is and you have to be flexible and and graze a really good foundation and you need a good foundation. Right Grace a foundation for glue which is an awesome color and you’ve got white thrown in there and I don’t know what’s versatile, flexible it is

and it actually is in your it’s in your color wheel too. So you can you can rock or if you want to wear it as well. Awesome. Anyone actually kind of wearing gray today?

Yeah, like gray. I

love it. I love it. So let’s get the three decades that’s you know, obviously 30 years but let’s get into what you did before and then how you leveled up into the CBT for for for babies.

I did not intend to be a behaviorist at all I was on the West Coast doing a West Coast Canada I’m from Canada. Not a lot of anything although I got my I got my BA and I was sort of trying to figure out what I ended up with a guy from Texas actually we went down renovated a bus and on the way he had a dog i Two dogs and we ended up picking up dogs on the way and they were abandoned dogs and then when we got to Texas and you know yadda yadda yadda ended up with 24 acres in North Carolina. A lot of dogs on that that was sort of an unintended somewhere going back when dog rescue wasn’t the same way it is now there wasn’t internet there wasn’t it wasn’t as structured and registered and what I know of of how you it was grassroots, completely unintentional, and just learned a lot from those dogs learned a lot. They came from different backgrounds. And almost all of them were over the age of six months, which is only what I work with.

Gotcha. What what what is your, your degree in that?

Just a BA from Western University in Toronto. So I’m from that Toronto area. Yeah, awesome. I’m just a regular BA. But I’ve always had studied psychology as well, really interested in psychology. And I just, I really love it. So I, I ended up coming back up to Canada, him and I split, I came back up to Canada. And I ended up opening a dog daycare, which again, back then was not it was a you do watch, dog walking and dog daycare? What the hell? What’s that? So it was a super? Yeah, it’s a really trendy business now, and it’s a good one. And I think it’s a really good way for people to learn about dogs, which I did. Then I started to I always took in rescue dogs and took in, fosters that kind of thing. And then I really noticed that there were dogs in that adolescent stage, which for dogs is that kind of eight months to two years, people were struggling with them, people were challenged with what to do, they’ve done super well in their puppy stage, they’ve done all their house training and their socialization, they’ve got everything perfect. And then, you know, all of a sudden, at adolescence, their dogs, the guy at the party with a lampshade on his head, and they don’t know what to do. And that intrigued me, okay, and sometimes those dogs ended up being euthanized or surrender. So that bothered me. And then I started to work a lot with the rescue organizations. And they said that they did have a hard time with those dogs or dogs with disadvantage paths that came in, they didn’t really know how to integrate them into homes start to work more closely with them, or volunteer, I guess would be the word. So I still have my daycare. So that at some point and focused on these less and less dogs with not such a great pest. And then I started to work with the rescue organizations more and then people started hiring me and I never studied dog training, I never went to dog training. I learned from the dogs what worked, a lot of these dogs had aggression and anxiety. And they had their own way of thinking and they had their own thought patterns. And I resonated with that. I resonated with not having a conventional upbringing, and people not really understanding how to deal with that, and how to take that. So a lot of my clients really want to help their dogs they really want to do, but they just conventional methods are designed to teach right from wrong. So they’re great with puppies, right? But they, they weren’t working so well with a lot of these dogs. Okay, so I just, I just have my own way of doing it, I didn’t realize it was going to become something that the industry needed, and people need it. So I ended up becoming a behaviorist just because people hire me and it works. And, and it’s a it’s grounded in cognitive behavioral therapy, as opposed to you know, that now kind of getting into the psychology,

I get to see somebody for CBT i for insomnia. And it, it did for me worked, you know, it was worked, but that’s the thing people understand is like, you have a furbaby you want to make them part of the family and integrate them in. But there’s work that has to be done, right? It’s not like, Oh, it’s just gonna work. Oh, that’s what I kind of learned from my insomnia. It was it was terrible. So what did you take from like your psychology habit, the passion for psychology and then transmit that or transmute that into working with for babies with dogs, you know, that six months to two years? What part of the psychology passion Did you move into? Because obviously, they communicate a lot differently than human beings.

Sort of, yeah, in some ways they don’t. But I actually did really realize that I was using CBT. I didn’t study CBT, in the sense of applying it to dogs. I just worked with dogs. And as I kept working with them, I realized I had this method that was different than what is mainstream. So whether that’s positive reinforcement training or balanced training, or some of the the other methods that other trainers use Sure. I learned that as though those methods became more popular, and my profession became popular that I just wasn’t doing what they were doing. So I started to talk to psychologists and to veterinarians, and they’re saying, You’re not doing what’s common and you’re doing cognitive behavioral therapy. So I started to look into it more. And study the 10 principles of cognitive behavioral therapy and see how what I was doing so instead of taking cognitive behavioral theory therapy and formulating. It’s what works with dogs, I actually already had it working with dogs and then started to study what I did. And that really made it super clear. That was just this light bulb went off in my head. And it just all came together, and I could put it into this formula. And then I started teaching it 250 to 200 clients a year. Wow, for decades. So now we’re out about, you know, a decade ago. And that’s when it really started to, to just really flourish because I really had my head around what I was doing, it wasn’t just me being good with dogs and me knowing what to do, I was actually putting it into a formula that I use when I work with my clients. And they, they’re not necessarily well, they aren’t learning the entire formula. They’re learning how to apply it to their dog to meet their needs, whatever that is.

Got it. So when you’re starting to work with an owner, an owner brings you a dog that has the need for that your therapy. What, when you’re in that first kind of conversation, what do you notice that mostly owner’s blind spots are?

That’s interesting. Well, for one, they don’t bring me the dog. Okay, I have clients all over the world, I do a lot of Zoo, I can do a ton with Zoom, because we do videos and a lot of communication

when you’re talking to a person though, correct?

I am talking Okay. Yeah, they, they have their mind set on. They’ve all done positive reinforcement training, 98% of them have hired a positive reinforcement trainer who was certified and good, they’re good at their job. It’s the method that doesn’t work for the dog. So what they do is I try to encourage them to listen to my podcast, which I think you know, appreciate you mentioning, because it changes the mindset. So if they’re, if they’re stuck on positive reinforcement training, they’re going to try to fit a square peg into a round hole. So they just have to clear their mind. But most of my clients have, because they see that what they’re doing isn’t working. And they realize that it’s not because it’s a horrible bad method, or their trainer was terrible. It’s simply that method doesn’t work with their dog at that stage in the life to meet their needs. So they are open minded to absorbing something different and learning. And it’s so fun. And it’s so and once we start working together, they start seeing it the light bulb goes on and they see it in their dog. And it’s it’s such an awesome journey. It’s so great to work with and doesn’t always take a long time. They have to they have to do the work, as you said. But it’s not difficult. It’s not difficult. It’s not. It’s often not time consuming. So it depends on a lot of different situation,

it seems to me comes from love, you know, love for a family member. You know, like you said, they don’t just communicate in dog. They actually like I look at my guy stitch. And I’m just waiting for him to speak English because the communication is there. Right?

It starts with bond and communication. But you have to have the skill set to do that. So it’s sort of one thing to say you know, you need love, and you need patience, but productive Patience is a dream, right? You need what do I do today? Billy, what do I do right now? What skills do I need? That’s what we start right off the top. If people are hiring me, they love their dog and their patient. That’s a gimme, huh. So it’s more me providing specific skills that change the dog’s perception to change the behavior. And that’s what’s different with CBT CBT, not just for dogs, but you’ll know with your insomnia, you can sit there and someone can say to you, if you actually sleep tonight, I’ll reward you with a really good breakfast in the morning. If you’re not going to necessarily change your perception, you’re not going to be able to sleep, you have to change your mindset, something in your mind has to change. And then you can make that educated, calm decision to sleep. That CBT. So the dog we’re providing Well, I guess specifically on providing the people but the people are providing the dog with this skills to change the perception so they don’t feel the need to feel fear. They don’t feel the need to do a behavior that’s driven by a cognitive shift. Remember these dogs off the street, they’ve been using their cognitive skills, they’ve been harnessing those cognitive skills, that’s why they’re alive. So if we just go back to operant conditioning, sometimes it works. Sometimes you can do regular operant conditioning when you bring in a dog, but a lot of times if you don’t harness those skills, they you’re not using what they already know, and what skill so I actually harness those cognitive skills and that’s why I can’t work with puppies do use cognitive skills, but lesser I agree and then in a different way,

right? So when you’re every dog, just like a human kind of has different personalities, right? So when someone is looking to come into implement your therapy, is there any good question that you wish they would ask you but never do during the discovery period?

Ah, oh, that’s a good question. They ask all sorts of questions. My clients are really tuned in. They were really small, and they throw questions at me like crazy. This is why I mean, I do one on one, you’re, you’re right there, I’m on. It’s always on. I’m always on and I’m doing with my local clients, we might be at the off leash Park, we’re in different parks, we’re in public. I mean, you got you got to know what you’re doing. And it’s on because the clients right there, and they’re throwing stuff at you. So I love that because I’ve been doing it a long time, and I know what I’m doing, but it’s you gotta be, you gotta you gotta have trust in what you’re doing and be experienced. They ask everything. I have veterinarians, for clients. I have veterinarians, I have psychologists, psychiatrists, so they know what they’re talking about.

Sure. Sure. So with what do you feel, then in your field, your biggest strength is?

Well, dogs don’t get euthanized in dogs don’t get surrendered. And people people are, they’re really upset a lot. When they call me when they contact me. They think they’ve been told they have to euthanize their dog, they’ve been told they have to either for the rest of the dog’s life just cope or manage or avoid, or just continue to distract or avoid or put their dog away. You know, not in a mean way, not a horrible way, but just not be part of the family at certain. And they’re just really upset about it. And they’ve tried everything, they’ve had three or four trainers, they’ve done what they’re supposed to do. So it’s really great. I, it needs to be part of mainstream dog training. That’s for sure. It needs to be but the industry is very closed. And. And that’s why I’m in India while I get the reputation of an industry disrupter because I love it. I’m not really like a regular dog trainer, right? I don’t use the standard methods

for living in that.

Yeah, I live in. Yeah. And so that’s why I’m an industry disrupter totally unintentionally,

right? Do you do you ever? Do you have any dogs that help with the therapy? Like, the reason why I asked this and hear me out is that, you know, there’s a group here in Juno Beach called, you know, dogs, and we get a text every morning at 4:45am saying, We got sunrise and beach marker 30 with a Furbabies. So everyone brings their coffee and they left a dog. So I took stitch. And I’m thinking oh, man, this is gonna go back because I had taken him to the beach before. And he was just like, from my effectually an idiot. I call them I love my dog. And he knows you’ll meet him here in a second. But he like I let him go. And there’s just another gentleman just saying bears gotta and I’m like, What are you talking about? This might like my first time I brought him as like bears got him. And I had taken my Ridgeback who passed away that I rescued as well. And he would run with all the dogs. And it was like, It’s very sad when then I adopted stitch, but he’s like, bears got him. And he has a dog bear. He’s like a golden, an older, golden, and basically, bear kind of introduced them into other dogs in a sense, do you ever use it? And now I can take you to the beach? And he goes, and he doesn’t bother anybody? And that’s how it worked? Do you ever use other dogs? Or is it just simply your CBT approach to work through the situation? I’m just curious about that. I’ve been wanting to ask

a great question. It is because people want to do those things with their dogs, they want to go, you know, we have off leash dog parks here, which would be really similar to what you’re talking about. And, and people do have certain times that they go because they have their groups of friends and what they do. And so that’s basically the ones in my city or my second off or through my office basically. Okay, so I do and a lot of the people there are my clients, and there’ll be saying, Hey, Billy, do you want me to help you out when we come closer? Or even in on leash Park area, you know, around the lake that we have here? People go by and they’ll know me and see me and say do you want me to come closer or farther and so they do help out and sometimes in the sessions, we’ll set up, meet and greets to, to address whatever it is. But you have to remember we’re CBT you’re not necessarily focusing on the immediate behavior. You’re focusing on building skills. So those skills can be built or and should be built not in the time of difficulty. So if the dog has Difficulty with dogs we wouldn’t. But the dog is great with dogs. So that would be an awesome time to build skills that we’re then going to transfer over to the challenging time. But my clients, like I said, they’re all over the world. So I might ask them, Do you have a family member or friend that has a dog that you can do these exercises with? Or can you go to your off leash dog park? And they’ll send me videos, so I’m getting videos, and also depends on their weather too, right? Absolutely. Sure. There’s all sorts of things you’re dealing with. So it’s really cool, because you really got to narrow down and, you know, divide and do different exercises and get creative. It’s super creative, which

and I love that you said that because that you will ingrained other dogs for lack of a better term, but they have other dogs who can help because literally like stitch where I let him go, he just bolted north and I and then, you know, Chet, he’s just like, bear get him like he just whistled at him and embarr trotted down the beach barked, one stitch turned around and ran right back to him. And that was that was it. So it was like a godsend. That’s cool. Yeah. Stuff I wanted to share with you. And you know, I think

it’s great. The older dogs know what’s going on, right? They’ve got the whole thing together. So a new dog comes in. It’s just like people, in a sense, where someone comes into a new environment, and people are welcoming and friendly. But there’s always going to be that one person that makes sure that person knows what’s going on and follows the rules and right and you’re trying to think,

let me ask you something. And I’ve been wanting to ask you this, too. Why How do dogs understand the maturity of other dogs, meaning they will see an older dog. Okay, and he will not go be like he is stitches, like, like his best friend’s a Westie, that it’s like little right? And he’ll hold her down and be rough with her and have fun. But older does, why do dogs know? Or how do they know that a dog is more mature, and they don’t really mess with a dog.

If you know that is so true. That’s they a lot of people put weight on size or weight of a dog, they’ll say, Oh, my dog likes big dogs or small dogs. But age is our huge defining factor. And especially if people are bringing a second dog into their home. Okay, right. Sometimes dogs that are really, really close in age. And there’s no definite because they’re dogs, and they have personalities. But that can be a little more challenging than if one’s older and younger. Okay. And a lot of people think that the older dog is more submissive, and the younger dog is more dominant. But when it comes to what’s really important to that older dog, which might only be two or three things, and it’s not a certain toy, or not a treat, or something like that, or their food, it could just be where they sit in a car, or where they see something that’s just really important, or a time of day that their dad comes home, and not the time of day that their dad spends a few minutes patting them. And that’s important to them. So you’ll see that older dog, make sure that those few things that are important to them, but then just doesn’t give a shit about anything else. It’s like, steal his toy could run around could do all sorts of things, doesn’t care. So they do have those dynamics. And a lot of it is based on age. So I’ll ask my if, if my client says, we’ve gotten into a bit of a scuffle with a dog at the dog park, they might know that person might know that dog. And I would ask What’s the age of that other dog and that’s where you get interesting. Some dogs will give leeway to puppies. They know they’re puppies, they know they’re just little puppies, but at some point, they expect that puppy to get with the program. Listen to the person I hate, it’s like you got to be listened to the person you got to be and so they’ll start managing that dog. And people will start correcting the older dog fur being you know, maybe a little bit growly or whatever, to the younger guy, or bossy Yeah, when in fact, we just got to get that younger dog with the program. And then the older dog will inherently stop doing it. The older dog will be quite happy feeling Thank God, you know, Mike keeps getting on this. The dogs listening to my peep, and I don’t have to sit here and be the boss. Wow. So yes, they have their dynamics and they have so that’s a, again with CBT is you always address the reason for the behavior, not the behavior. So there’s a there’s a reason dogs do a behavior, whether it’s something they learned in their past or their perception, it’s always based on their perception. Wow, perception drives their behavior and that’s why they have cognitive skills. So when I say cognitive skills, that’s like memory, emotional intelligence. The ability to know that you just took their ball and put it in the cupboard. So they stand there and bark at the cupboard and jump on it. They know you put it there, right. They remember it there. Right? So they have cognitive skills that can put two and two together. And the cool thing is science studies this a lot now. So I talked to scientists a lot and, and I’m starting to work with them more scientists that study dog cognition, and I’ve started to connect with them more. Not just like canine enrichment. Canine enrichment is good. They use dogs, they use cognitive skills. So canine enrichment is games basically. Sure. People do it. Inherently they do it naturally eight year olds do it. Right. But then you also have service dogs and scent detection dogs and cadaver dogs, things like that. They’re all using cognitive skills. I just use it thank

you for saying that. Because it’s you know, it’s been with my guy keeps me because I’m always you know, traveling and speaking and coaching. whatnot. I’m like, my dude keeps me present. That’s what it happens for me. It’s like we walk around our because we have the ocean on one side, we have a lake on the other we walk around the lake. And it’s just like, sometimes I’ll become impatient. But then I have lately not lately, probably last five years, a switch flips in my head to be to watch him and observe him and it just brings my like, I’ll check my watch. And my my pulse goes down. It’s like so amazing with dogs can teach us as well. Oh, oh my gosh. Oh, my goodness. That’s a whole. Yeah.

Yeah, that’s a whole it’s amazing.

I’m sure you have. I’m sure you have a pocket that you know, as well, but I should do I should do well. Yeah. We’re gonna dig in a little bit about Billy here though. Okay, okay. Yeah, have you seen the movie Back to the Future?

No, I don’t watch movies. Okay, gotcha. So there’s this guy do but more like Quentin Tarantino? Okay, that’s fine.

Michael J. Fox. It’s a classic movie. If you haven’t watched him he entertains fantastic gets in this DeLorean. It goes back in time in visits his mom and dad back at that. Okay, so let’s get back into that. Don’t Don’t worry, Marty McFly. Let’s go to the 22 year old Billy, what kind of knowledge nuggets we come here at times 10. Today, would you drop on her to maybe help her understand things better? Level up, shorten the learning curve.

Collaborate, okay. And realize what you’ve got and move forward with it faster. Okay, but I got the same note my learning journey got me where I am. And and but I would say yeah,

no, I love it. I love the Collaborate community. You know, if you don’t know something, you know, collaborate and they’ll help you. I love that I called Get your asking here. You know, ask ask. Yeah.

I love it. So, and I’ve always been good at asking questions and taking people’s advice. Good. But I’ve always been a real loner.

Okay, gotcha. Believe it or not, I am too. That’s what people understand about me. They see me on stages. They see me out on network. I bought off right. But dude, I love going to restaurants by myself with my Kindle, which never leaves my side my Kindle. Right. And I will read it just chill out because it’s a time for me to decompress because I’m with people all the time. You know? So, Billy, how you want your dash remember that little line in between your incarnation date and your expiration that your life date and death date? How do you want that dash remembered for you?

Don’t do it. Sorry, say that again. I don’t get it.

Okay, so how do you want people to remember you? There’s a little dash on your

Yeah, I would say it just positively affected a lot of a lot around her. Wow, just really made a difference. You know, you don’t. I always say to myself, don’t don’t think about making friends. And don’t worry about making waves just focus on making a difference.

Oh my gosh, I’m writing this stuff down.

Because when you’re making a difference, you’re gonna make waves in the waves every night right? Just Just do it. And you’re going to make friends at some point if you’re true to what you do and people will support you and they will they will support you and they will see what you’re doing and they will hop on board. So just do what you do make a difference and the rest will follow. I

love that because I make to your to New Year’s resolutions every year since oh nine. Okay, and people didn’t know my story. I was homeless, blah, blah, blah. Me and my Ridgeback literally lived in a car and in people’s houses that weren’t there anyways, but I make two new year’s resolutions one is that I smile I make someone smile every Single Day, okay period there, I just won my day right there, too, is that unless I’ve hurt you disrespected you in any way, shape or form, I give zero no Watts about what you think about me. And that goes back to what you said, you don’t have to make friends and you don’t have to make waves you focus on making a difference. And it just happens. You know, I love love love that you said that. So, Billy What do you think people misunderstand about you the most?

I’m more fun and more silly than then I come across a lot. I mean, I do like to go to my local bar and drink my beer and listen to a local band and have fun and I’m certainly dancing around and things silly there. But I think like your childhood, or maybe yours wasn’t childhood, but you know, my childhood was I grew up had to grow up. Fast. So I don’t know. I think I’ve just done very serious but what I do because it’s important to me,

the moment you’re present, you have Yeah, I wouldn’t say you have a passion to output. I love that. I love it. So Billy, what what keeps you up at night?

Hello, everything God I need to I need to do CBT for insomnia. I got a start to ignite. I’ve listened to you say that. It’s like teasing. Yeah, but keeps me up is just keeping my promise to the dogs that I will. I will make a difference and I will change because those dogs. They’re the ones I owe it all to love. No, they trusted me. They trusted me. They were there for me. Oh, I hate you know. So being on your show. For one this, keep it going keep it moving forward, get it out there and, and make sure that dogs aren’t euthanized when they don’t need to be which is 90% of the time.

Right. I love that. I love that. So then what is Billy’s definition of a life well lived?

I guess I would go back again to making a difference making positive

hoping you’re gonna say that. I was hoping you’re gonna say that. It’s time to shine a podcast versus squad. We’re back and I got my awesome sauce friend, Billy groom and Billy, you and I can literally talk 15 minutes to an hour and each one of these questions right? You’ve got five seconds. I’m sure you’ve listened to. So you got five seconds to answer these questions with no explanations. You’re ready to level up.

Yeah, I’m laughing because I’m so bad at this kind of stuff. That’s fine.

We’ll go have fun with it. So we’ll start with this. Well, you know, a little softball one here. What’s the best leveling up advice you’ve ever received?

Received? Go in your gut. Guess.

share one of your personal habits that contributes to your success.

Car I’m a cardio junkie.

I love it. Love it and with dogs can’t go wrong. My dog keeps me in shape. I love it. Love it. So what’s the most commonly used emotion Moji when you text

thumbs up.

Love it. Love it. Any nicknames growing up?

I didn’t really have a family growing up but at some point, Squirt. Squirt. Love it. When I was little. My current one is funny. It’s grim. How are my last names ground taken off of boomhauer from king of the hill but yeah, not a lot from my childhood going on. So but yeah,

New Year’s resolution this year.

I always I wanted I want to start drinking hard alcohol some kind of hurt like I’d like my wine. I like my beer. alcohols really classy, and I can never start drinking it like god I just can’t seem to sure

we got to throw some back. That’d be awesome. That’d be American girl. I got some really good scotch it here. There Yeah. Okay, so chess or checkers?

I’d have to go chess because it’s an Alice in Wonderland but I’m not really a big I like my

glove it your go to ice cream flavor. Chocolate chip. Got it. So there’s a sandwich named the Billy groom. What’s on that sandwich?

Huh? Veggies veggies, veggies, lots of mushrooms and we got some avocados and maybe yeah,

I love it. Love it. So if you could get a time machine right and take it either into the future or to the past which would you pick past All right, very cool. Was any favorite charity I’m sure this is gonna be easy one for you. But any favorite charity and organization you’d like to give your time or money to?

It’s not easy. There’s 9 million I give. Probably because my expertise okay, I give my expertise on a regular I’m always donating and my expertise and love it. Yeah, I don’t do my

last Question, and you can elaborate what’s the best decade of music? 60s 70s 80s or 90s 60s 60s? Really? Who’s your jam? Who’s your go to?

Oh, I love that, you know, stones and Janis Joplin and three dog night. You know, just, I love the 60s. It’s so I’m a peace, hippie girl.

I love it. I love it. I love it. I love it. Yeah, it’s like I’m, I’m 50 I just turned 50 A couple of weeks ago, and like, I grew up kind of with the 80s I graduated 9090. So the 80s are my jam. But my parents, my dad and mom would always throw on the 60s and 70s. So I sometimes ask people, you know, were you more of a Beatles stones or Frankie Valli? You know, because those are the three though four seasons. So you said stones?

Yeah, stones? Love it. Yeah, for sure. I love the 80s too. By the way, I have this my best friend who’s always saying you’re such an 80s check because I just, if I’m going to run to something or rock I would just be it would be 80s music, but I’d have to say 60s is my true soul. Okay, I love the 80s.

Transforming, right, I mean, you had your yuppies and capitalism is that is a decade of actual, like overdue, right? But then like the music, he had the introduction of rap, you know, and then you had, you know, the invasions from you too, and Duran Duran and Culture Club and you had all of that but then you had the big air don’t care. It’s like you have everything you know. I love it. And so Billy, how can we find you love?

Triple W dot upward dog ology. So upward stands for urban people with adopted and rescued dogs. So it’s actually an acronym upward dog. ology.com. I’m also on Instagram. That’s a word dog ology. Twitter. For dog ology. LinkedIn, I’m on a therapist. I like it. It’s that’s Billy Graham. That’s I just go on my regular name.

So what was that urban people with?

Urban people with adopted and rescued dogs. That’s the name of my book actually. Okay, but adopted, but the A could also be adolescent obnoxious. The art could be rambunctious. Oh, no, no, no at all. Did a rescue dogs they can have their dog from puppy and done everything right? You know, there’s lots of they could have a mature older dog that’s just going through a weird change. So it’s really anything but that’s what upward kind of stands.

I love that I love that it is an acronym. I love, love, love it.

I love acronyms, I got a thing for them.

I love it. So Billy, to me one last favor and leave the listeners with a Knowledge Nugget that they can take with them internalize and take action.

I would say to figure out what your what resonates with you what your skills are, what you’re comfortable with, and really look into how you can use that to make your life the way that that you want what’s important to you and what sits well with you and take that and be creative and use it to the best that you can use it to.

Wow, well in squad there is I can’t even read my writing because I was writing too fast. I have to re listen to this interview with my good friend Billy groom, who, you know, she built skills, like not so much in the time of difficulties. But she you just have to go back and listen because I’m just like blown away about the CBT with the dogs, you know, like, there’s reasons for behavior perception drives drives the behavior. You know, she’s someone that is all about collaborating with people to help the puppies affirm Babies love love, because everybody, there’s therapy for everybody and even the dogs like I hate the word euthanization I frickin hate it. i That’s why I work and volunteer with all the no kill shelters that I can possibly get my hands into it, she is somebody that has a positive effect, and everybody around them. And she likes to throw back a couple of brain grenades every now and then. And she’s just such a fun fun person to be around. You know, she doesn’t want you to worry about making friends or making waves but focus on making a difference because the waves and the friends are going to come so are the haters. But again, you don’t really care about those people you care about the friends and the waves are they the people that will come into your life to help make a difference? She is known as someone that can be fun and silly. And you know in the urban or upward dog ology I love the acronym of urban people adopted and rescued dogs. And that’s just that’s fantastic. And if you watch Lastly, that if something resonates with you, you find a passion. Use that take action on it, get your asking gear if you don’t know about it, and level up and that’s what my good friend Billy does. She levels up her house. She loves opera Well, she helps all the Furbabies that she can and I’m so blessed to know you. I can’t wait to collaborate with In the future, I love you guys. Thank you so much for coming on Billy.

Thanks so much, Scott. This was awesome. Thanks for all you do for all you do for your listeners and for the

dogs. You’re welcome. Thank you love. I’ll talk soon. Okay,

okay, we’ll talk soon. Take care, Scott. Bye.

Hey, thanks so much for listening to this episode of time to shine today podcast. proudly brought to buy southern Nugent real estate real estate excellence who can be reached at 561-249-7266 and online at www dot Sutter in nugent.com. If you’re a business owner or professional who would like to be interviewed on top to shine today, please visit time to shine today.com Flash guest. If you liked this episode, please subscribe on Apple podcasts, Google podcasts, Stitcher, Spotify, I Heart Radio or wherever you get your podcasts. There’s a link in the show notes to our website. Also there you will see a recommended resources. We hope that you will support our show by supporting them. If you like what you’ve been listening to, it’d be great if you could just give us a five star rating and tell your friends to subscribe while you’re at it. I’m your host, Scott Ferguson. And until next time, let’s level up it’s our time to shine.

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