THE SYMBOLISM OF DOGS IN DREAMS

Dogs and humans have been intimately tied together for thousands of years. Living and hunting as one. Dogs have senses far beyond the human reach and they make great guides and hunting partners. They have a truth of heart and can help us to symbolically find what we have lost and how to truly love.

Dogs we are told of old - meet us at Rainbow bridge and guide us across to the otherworld. They are said to have keen abilities to communicate with the dead. And many a client has come to me over the years asking about their dog’s behaviour, sitting and staring at a photo of a lost one or sensing “ghosts” around the house. They do of course also dig and bury and uncover bones and many devour the carcass of dead rats, and birds and fish.

Dogs are known as “man’s best friend” and have thrown off their wolfish ancestry to show humans unconditional love. In many cultures they are a guide between the worlds of life and death, the known and the unknown, human and animal and symbolically between the conscious and the unconscious mind.

They also have myths connected to the hell hound and other ferocious guarders of the gates to the underworld. The dogs who pull us into the depths or retrieve the dead back to life like a lost ball.

Churchill famously writes about the “black dog” of depression. Being taken into the depths and back out again.

It’s important to note the colour of the dog and breed. What energies does the particular breed of dog bring to the dreamworld?

Dogs are famously linked to gods like the healer Asclepius, or the messenger god and healer - Hermes, who is the only god who can travel between worlds as well as Artemis the hunter and Shiva who removes all evil from the world.

We can look up at night to the dog star, Sirius as a reminder of dogs’ constancy and the brightness that they bring to human life.

We might entreat the Egyptian dog-god Anubis to weigh our heart to assess its ability to love. Can we be made more open to love? Can our soul dog sniff out our path where we have lost the way?

Often who we dream about is an aspect of ourselves rather than an outward person separate to us. Jung teaches about the animus and anima, the masculine and feminine that appears in dreams as aspects of our inner selves. What does the dog or your dog mirror to you?

If it is your dog who is appearing in your dream, what is your relationship with your dog? If they are akin to your child this may be how they are appearing in your dream. Or as your inner child, representing your childhood past. What is your childhood story and does your dream more tell of you, the child version of yourself as the dog in the dream and the circumstances around them?

I have parental anxiety dreams about my dog, where they are getting run over, or stolen from me and other times they are just simply there in the dream with me. Sometimes the dream is about neglect of the dog and yet I am not neglectful of my dog in real life. And it is then that I advise myself to take a look at my own childhood wounds and parenting styles of my ancestors. To replace the dog in the dream with the child in myself.

Remember the symbology of the dog: companionship versus loneliness, unconditional love, friendship, protection and security.

Your dog may be representing a friend or relationship in your life. What is it telling you about your most intimate relationships with others?

Note how your dream made you feel and what were the other symbols and colours in the dream to give you clues as to its meaning.

DOG SYMBOLOGY some fun things to consider…

Breed of dog: Researching the breed of the dog in the dream can help to further define the energy they bring to the dream. For example is the dog bred for hunting, retrieving, sports or herding for protection? Do they love water? Different dogs will mean different things.

Your dog: can represent you in childhood, a friend, a relationship, your feelings around loyalty, companionship and protection.

Dog roles: In Greece they traditionally guarded the place of the dead, or in other cultures they protected the sheep. For many cultures they are companions. When I was in Thailand at a Buddhist meditation in a graveyard, local street dogs followed us (they were stranger dogs to us) and four dogs followed and sat at the corners of the square graveyard. Protectors… they seemed to innately know their role.

Questions to ask: Are you in need of companionship? Do you need to be more protective of your territory? How is loyalty and faithfulness showing up for you? How open are you to love?

Dogs and Gods: Dogs are linked to various healing gods who may be showing up in disguise in your dream to provide a healing for you. Or messages for your health.