This Lil’ Thistle

Now, normally Flynn "finds" benches when we're in the woods & there are only a few seats total. However, a few days ago we went for a short walk round the old churchyard & along the length of one side of the church is a whole long row of benches. I DID sit down on the 1st bench Flynn "showed" me, which he was pleased about. Here he is monitoring my sitting:

After a cpl of minutes, Flynn decided a) he was bored &/or b) I'd had enough rest, so he encouraged me back up. We continued on our way... well, sort of. Flynn passed one bench, but we had a standoff beside the one after that, because he wanted me to sit & I did not want to sit. In the pic below, it looks like he was merely sniffing the seat. No. Flynn was alternately poking at the bench with his nose & then staring me dead in the eye, to make sure I was getting the message...

Despite my attempts to jolly him along, our progress down that row of benches was s l o o o o w... Flynn would sulkily go past one or 2, but then decide I should definitely sit on the next bench & we'd have another standoff. This last pic was at the last but one bench. Flynn was now quite annoyed with my wilfulness. For a few seconds he just looked at me & then he suddenly slapped his paw on the bench & then he did it again & just waited. The message was clear: "See where my paw is? You sit right there! Sit!!".

respectfully: this is exactly the misconception that i am talking about in my original post.

herding breeds and their mixes are some of the most popular pet dogs in the western world. there are hundreds of thousands of shepherds, shelties, aussies, collies, heelers etc living their lives as pets. i can guarantee you that 95%+ of these dogs are not given the types of jobs you're describing here. and they are fine.

would they be good at doing that type of work? yeah probably. would they be happy doing that type of work? most likely! do they need to do that type of work in order to be well-behaved, happy pets? absolutely not.