Path & Paws™ was created for people who are generally doing well, yet still feel the steady accumulation of everyday stress.
It grew from a simple observation: many people naturally feel better with their dog, but do not fully understand how that support works or how to access it consistently in daily life.
Path & Paws™ was designed to bridge that gap by offering a thoughtful, non-clinical wellness experience that helps people work with the support already present in their lives.
Path & Paws™ is intentionally not psychotherapy and not dog training. It does not diagnose, treat, or correct behavior. Instead, it focuses on awareness, relationship, and choice, using the human–dog bond as a steady and everyday source of support.
Dogs are not tools in this work. They are sentient partners whose individuality, consent, and wellbeing are central to the experience.
Calm does not look the same for every person or every dog. Some dogs support calm through closeness and stillness. Others through movement, play, and shared energy. Path & Paws™ was built to honor this range and to help people discover what genuinely helps them feel better, rather than prescribing a single approach. The work is practical, embodied, and grounded in real life.
Path & Paws™ was co-created by Annalisa (“Lylly”) Smithson and Jeff Dentler, bringing together complementary expertise in human wellbeing and dog behavior.
Lylly is a mental-health professional with extensive experience in animal-assisted and nature-based approaches to wellbeing. Through years of clinical and community work, she observed that while therapy can be valuable, many people need support that lives outside the therapy room and fits into daily life.
Jeff is a canine behavior expert with deep experience in force-free, welfare-centered training and human–dog communication. His work emphasizes consent, relationship, and ethical engagement rather than control or correction.
Together, they developed Path & Paws™ as a structured wellness program that respects professional boundaries, centers animal welfare, and offers practical support for everyday stress through the human–dog relationship.
Path & Paws™ began as a small, in-person program and is growing through licensed facilitators who share its values and standards. Each program is delivered locally with care and consistency, ensuring the experience remains aligned with the principles it was built on, for both humans and dogs.
Path & Paws™ exists because calm does not require fixing, and because meaningful support is often already beside us.
Path and Paws™
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Path & Paws™ is an educational program and cannot take the place of medical care or mental healthcare.
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