Coffee Shop Dog: An Invitation for Co-Regulation
When we first adopted our dog, the rescue agency required that we take puppy classes as part of the adoption process.
Picture it: we bring our new 14-week-old, highly energized puppy to class with a room full of other young pups (also highly energized) of all shapes and sizes, from Ginger the Boston Terrier to Margaret the Bernese Mountain Dog to Finn the shepherd mix. We were asked to bring dog bedding to the session, as well as an ample supply of dog treats.
The first “trick” we were taught was to settle the dog through something known as “coffee shop dog.” Coffee shop dog involves throwing a bunch of treats onto the dog bedding as a way to get dogs to “settle,” to lie down on their blankets while the instructor taught us the next move. Any time we were getting class started or were transitioning to new training techniques, we were asked to do a little “coffee shop dog” to settle our pups.
Imagine a bunch of exuberant puppies growing faster than you could say “coffee shop dog,” coming week after week to class, learning (and failing at) new tricks and techniques, and a bunch of puppy parents freaking out and frenetically yelling “coffee shop dog!” while their puppies ignored commands to curb their natural impulses. Our dog loved people and being the life of the party; Finn was sniffing something wonderful in the corner; Ginger was being a nuisance across the room; Margaret was just…big.
Coffee shop dog was a hilarious disaster. It was bringing out the most anxious and vulnerable parts of all of us, as we're grasping for a sense of control in a maelstrom of puppy chaos. I can laugh now, but in the moment, I was stressed. Not really about my puppy's inability to settle—but about my own inability to control the situation.
The Ripple Effect of Dysregulation
The world feels like this right now. Overwhelming stimuli everywhere, competing demands, everyone slightly dysregulated and looking for solid ground. For many of us, urgent demands and broken systems are asking us to do more with less while the ground keeps shifting. Leadership feels like this when teams are pulled in seventeen directions. Classrooms feel like this when we're creating conditions for learning amidst beautiful human complexities.
Here's what I learned watching us collectively lose our minds over coffee shop dog: our dysregulation was making everything worse. The dogs could feel our anxiety. They weren’t responding to the exercise, but to our frantic energy about it.
What helped most was remarkably similar to what neuroscience tells us about co-regulation in human systems. When we settled ourselves first—taking deep breaths, loosening our grip on control, finding appropriate humor and joy in the chaos—something shifted. Not perfectly, but palpably.
As leaders and educators, we're part of interconnected nervous systems. Our regulation creates ripples. But individual regulation isn't enough if the system itself is dysregulated. Those puppy classes revealed how we were all trying to individually manage our anxiety while collectively creating an anxious system. We need to look beyond what happens just for us and think about the communities around us.
Three Practical Strategies for Collective Grounding
So how do we actually build collective regulation into our daily work without adding one more thing to everyone's plate? Consider the following three practices:
1. Build a Two-Minute Meeting Reset. Start meetings by asking everyone to share one word about their current state, then take three breaths together. That's it. No discussion, no judgment. This gives everyone data about the room's collective state and creates a transition from whatever chaos preceded the meeting to what you collectively bring together.
2. Conduct “Energy Audits.” Once a week, have your team rate the pace of work on a scale of 1-5 (1=sustainable, 5=unsustainable). Track it on a simple chart. When you hit consistent 4s and 5s, you have data to make the case for systemic changes to the ways you work together.
3. Create Your “Before the Storm” Protocol. Identify your three go-to actions for when things get chaotic—maybe it's stepping into the hallway for 30 seconds, offering a “let's pause and regroup” message, or calling a five-minute break. Practice these when the stakes are low so they become automatic when pressure is high (kind of like fire drills, but for maintaining collective composure).
By now you probably realized that coffee shop dog isn't about getting dogs to lie quietly. It's about creating grounded energy in a constant state of flux. Yes, the world is asking too much. To some degree, it always will. Settling ourselves and our communities first is claiming the only control and influence we ever really have—making intentional choices to bring full presence into chaos, to be the steady ground when everything else is shifting. That’s how transformation becomes possible.
