How to keep calm? Lots of structure

Langley is still a bit of an anxious guy, in spite of the meds.  When given free time to just hang out and do his own thing, his anxiety seems to ramp up and then he displays a lot of stress behaviors and things tend to spiral out of control.  To manage that we try to keep his time structured.  I use lots of puzzle games and treat toys so that what would typically be open play time for most dogs is keeping him engaged in an appropriate activity and also keeping his smart brain busy. 

We also do a lot of basic training - things you'd learn at doggy obedience class - and Langley loves to run through speed drills of these things. He is fast and his eyes never waver from me once he is really on a roll.  "Sit - down - play dead - break - heel - down - stay - break - sit - shake" (we are working on adding to our repertoire).  In this video you see him doing this type of work.  He is a bit distracted because (a) he just ate dinner and isn't super hungry and (b) Frodo just went downstairs with a bully stick and he's not sure what he wants to do about that.  Still, he pulls it off in spite of distractions and a full belly.  Good work,  Langley!