This interpretation of a dog in a dream comes from one of my active imaginations, where the dreamer encountered two dogs: one black and one white.
The dog is first and foremost an animal. The dog, therefore, takes us back to the symbol of the animal. When we see an animal in our night dreams or while awake, it’s primarily about our relationship with our animalistic side. We share common aspects with animals, which we call instinct. Therefore, it’s about our instinctive life. Our instinctive life can sometimes violently conflict with parts of ourselves. The great challenge of our human reality will not be to reject this instinctive life, but to integrate it correctly. We must give it its rightful place, as some religious doctrines advocate. Order will not be restored by repressing or mistreating these instincts.
Instincts manifest themselves through three types of drives:
- Food
- Sexuality
- Survival
Instincts are not inherently bad; they serve life. They are fundamentally good. They become harmful when, from our perspective, they are disordered, or when they take the place of higher faculties. We must therefore control them. We are familiar with the pathologies related to food instincts. This can be bulimia, anorexia, etc. From a psychological perspective, these eating disorders reflect compensation for other needs. It could be emotional needs or deficiencies. We should look at our emotional lives, our relationships, and find the things we don’t like.
Sexuality is a place of blockages, inhibitions, and compensations. Blockages and inhibitions due to a bad relationship with one’s body. We don’t love ourselves. As a result, this will reflect on sexuality. Moreover, if we are not very communicative with our partner, you can imagine the double or triple knots that can arise at the level of sexuality. The problem is not organic at all. The real challenge of sexuality does not play out organically but psychologically, at the level of our soul.
The imbalance of these two instincts occurs to compensate for the shortcomings we have at a higher level. If the higher faculties are not honored in their own needs, then we will divert instincts. We will divert food, which instead of serving the health of the body, aims to compensate for the pleasures we don’t have enough of with our life partners. We will also compensate for other types of shortcomings, such as our place in society, whether or not we are comfortable in our work, and the frustrations we may have socially through sexuality. Addictions and drug addiction are processes of compensating for emotional, sentimental, social, but much deeper metaphysical discomfort.
Survival will manifest itself through three behaviors that we often use spontaneously and depending on the situation. In our world as human beings, we are exposed to various dangers, like any living beings. Sometimes situations arise that are emergencies in which we must preserve our own lives. Hence this famous survival instinct, the instinct for conservation that serves life. It is designed to allow us to live. These three strategies in response to danger are:
- Escape
- Attack
- Immobility
Each behavior has its reason for being. For example, facing wasps, the strategy of immobility will be a winner over the attack. Facing a crowd that wants your skin, escape will be a better strategy than attack or immobility. On the other hand, facing a pigeon that bothers you, the attack will probably be the best solution. When the balance of power is not in your favor, do not engage in lost battles. The attack can also be defined as aggressiveness. This aggressiveness can be preventive or reactionary. For example, some people entering a room will puff out their chests, impose their personality, and try to dominate others. It’s aggressive mode; it’s a distortion of the follow-up instinct. Anyone with some psychology notions will immediately see that this person is insecure. He will use this aggressive strategy to preserve his life. This aggressiveness can also be reactionary. It could be, for example, a colleague who had a bad weekend and who, just by asking him how his weekend went, will become aggressive and retort that it’s not the time to talk to him, that he has work, etc…
It is interesting to reflect on the day, every evening, to examine our conscience to understand why we used this or that attack strategy. What element made us insecure and how to correct it?
To come back to the dog, the relationships with them are interesting to reflect on our instictive life, but also to reflect on the right attitude that needs to be developed concerning our life. Hence the reflection on what makes a good master for a dog? The one who takes care of him, who feeds him, who cuddles him. Here you have the metaphor for what we must be with our instictive life. In the metaphor of being a good master, there is the word “master”. This means that instincts must not command. The master commands, but he must be a “good” master. He must be good and take care of instictive needs. We must therefore take care of our food, our sexuality, and our security. So just because a drive presents itself doesn’t mean we have to obey it, whether it’s our own or someone else’s. Instincts must necessarily be subordinate to higher faculties. That’s what sets us apart from animals. A bad master is a master who ignores his instincts. Some people don’t listen to their instictive needs. We need, for example, a balance between our work and our rest. Some people will work non-stop without rest. Do we make our pets work all the time? Did,last century, horses work all day in the fields ? No. Similarly, we must also allow ourselves moments of rest. This approach with dogs in dreams is also to connect with our instincts, talk to them, communicate, and create a harmonic link. Just as we treat our animals.
The colors of the two dogs, white and black, in this dream refer to consciousness (white) and the unconscious (black). If you had trouble seeing or apprehending one or the other of the dogs, it means that you have problems communicating and taking care of one or the other parts of your soul. Were the dogs small? Big? Affectionate? Aggressive? Their physical appearance and behavior are an image of what your conscious and unconscious are. It’s up to you to connect and take care of them in the dream. It will also benefit them in concrete reality and therefore benefit you as a physical person. Recognizing and knowing well is also integrating the instincts of others. But be careful; it doesn’t mean suffering them, but treating them well. This will involve talking with the person concerned. This is especially true with sexuality. We must not suffer the sexuality of others, even that of our partner. It will then be necessary to communicate with him and tell him, for example, that it is not the time, etc…
