What
@dumpsternavel said. So much of that. Consistency and patience. My dog still has her issues but walking her has gotten a lot better. I do the same thing #DragonBreath mentioned. Right hand leash, I encourage her to walk on my right side and vice versa left hand left side. I don't like the term "heal" but I do think it's really important to associate a word to the action you want from them. I've used the word "don't" for a few different behaviors. Don't beg, don't bark, etc. So when I started trying to break her from pulling "don't pull" just became the command I use.
A couple really helpful things I learned a long time ago when training my first dog were-
Name them using no less than two syllables. Two to three syllables is sufficient. You wouldn't ever want to name them something that's often used in people's everyday speech. My brother named his dog "King" this is a terrible dog name not only because it's just a dumb name but also think about that word. Dogs are listening for their name, that's their queue to pay attention. It might mean a treat, it might mean a walk.. they want to hear their name and they listen for it.
So the name King is awful. Anytime you or others say words around the dog like "SmoKING, DrinKING, MaKING, FucKING, etc.. that dog's gonna take notice and be like what's up oh.. thought you meant me guess not. Eventually it might not react too well to a name like that. So you want a distinct sounding name that doesn't mirror others. Also use a sharp consonant in the name. Sharp like B, D, G, K, etc. I named my dog Kaya. It has everything I want in a dog name. K is extremely sharp, and it's two syllables. A dog is way more likely to hear their name if it's something like Dexter, T-Bone, Bricks, etc than they would Molly, Muffins, etc. There's nothing sharp about Molly, Lulu, etc.
Beyond naming, it's really important to say your dogs name before each command. You want to first get their attention, then give the command. Otherwise we probably just sound like we're talking, perhaps not directly to them. So it's Kaya, sit! Kaya, come! Kaya, don't pull!, Kaya, be nice, Kaya, other dogs and people can exist jesus christ calm down killer they're like 600 yards away from us this isn't our beach ya psycho.. things like that.
I realize you're not asking how to train a dog and a lot of this is probably shit you already know or use. I'm just leaving it for who knows.. the next reader that might take something away from it. You can teach dogs anything though. Eventually they understand you even when you're telling them things you've never told them before. They just know you that well at some point, if you're good with them.
I went hiking up Bidwell park canyon with a few friends and dogs many years ago. My friend Matt had a dog named Sorbae, she was just a long haired terrier mutt of some sort. Chris had Pookah, a 92% wolf hybrid. You'd think the wolf would have more agility and be perhaps more at one with terrain and environment than the terrier but he was kinda.. SImple Jack really. We had to traverse some pretty hardcore rocks at one point and when we reached the top we noticed Pookah was just standing down there below unable to find the right pathing.
We called him and called him and he just kinda darted around stressed out looking for paths but then just kept looking up at us like we're supposed to go down and get him. Sorbae was up with us, she made it fine. Matt turned to her and said in this exact phrasing" Sorbae, go down there and show Pookah how to do it" she immediately darted back down the path we took and turned in front of Pookah and came right back up to us, leading him. There's no fucking chance in hell Matt had Sorbae trained to understand the phrase "Sorbae, go down there and show Pookah how to do it" but she knew her human. She just got it. Dogs are incredible.
