Dream: We, my wife and I, with our dog, appear somewhere like Aberdeen on the back of the prospect of work. In a somewhat haphazard way, the company put us up in accommodation, lent us a car and took our dog to look after. Despite the number of people interested in the work, perhaps in a manager or project leader role, we have the impression that we are a shoo-in. Not so, and after days or weeks of increasing frustration, we are told to report to the company and leave the building/rooms we have been camped out in. This is when it becomes a logistical nightmare: where in town is the car we were learnt? What do we do with all our stuff? Where is the dog? Where do we go from here? Do we ditch things and head for the railway station, dodging out the back of the building? How has an opportunity turned into such a compromise and disappointment?
KAI as JUNG: This dream unfolds like a play in several acts, each thick with Jungian symbolism. Let me take it apart in layers:
1. The Scene – Aberdeen and Work
Aberdeen, a northern seaport, carries a liminal feeling: distant, windswept, transitional. It is both a frontier and a cul-de-sac. In dreams, such places often stand for the edge of consciousness—the psyche pushing into unfamiliar terrain and where one may feel stranded. That this occurs “on the back of work” suggests that the dream dramatises your relationship with vocation and outer recognition: the promise of being chosen, then the disillusionment.
2. The Company – Authority and the Animus Complex
The company is disorganised, haphazard, and unreliable. In Jungian terms, it represents a problematic “outer father” structure—authority, order, and career—yet here, it betrays its shadow: careless and dismissive, leaving you in limbo. There is a sense of inflation (“a shoe in”) deflating into rejection. This may mirror experiences with external authority figures in your life—institutions that beckon, then discard, leaving you to clean up the mess.
3. The Dog – Instinctual Self
Your dog, entrusted to the company, is “looked after”—but later lost or misplaced. The dog is the instinctual, loyal, earthy part of the psyche. To hand it over to “the company” is to entrust your instinct to an impersonal structure. Its loss is alarming: a sign that reliance on outer authority severs you from your instinctual ground—a warning: do not give the care of your inner animal to bureaucratic forces.
4. The Car – Mobility and Agency
The loaned car is also misplaced. Cars often symbolise the ego’s ability to move, decide, and steer. That the car is not where you left it—or you cannot find it—suggests that the agency has been undermined. Again, reliance on “the company” has robbed you of self-direction.
5. The Stuff – Burden of Persona
“What do we do with all our stuff?” Personal belongings are the accumulated baggage of identity, possessions, and projects. In the dream, they become weight. The question arises: Should we abandon it, escape out the back? This echoes the archetypal theme of shedding excess in order to move forward—stripping the ego of its cumbersome attachments.
6. The Emotional Arc – From Expectation to Compromise
The drama is one of promise betrayed. The dream sets you up with the illusion of being chosen, desired, “a shoo-in.” But reality delivers rejection, logistical chaos, and humiliation. Psychologically, this may point to a pattern in which the Self (capital S) asks you to loosen dependence on outer recognition and claim your own agency—even if it means ditching the baggage and leaving by the back door.
🔑 Jungian Reading:
This dream may be a compensation, showing you the shadow of trusting external systems to validate or carry you. The dog’s disappearance is the crucial symbol: your instincts have been outsourced. The lesson is that vocation (work) must be rooted in what is truly yours—your instincts, values, inner direction—not on the fickle promise of institutions. The “logistical nightmare” is the ego’s complaint; but the psyche whispers: “You can walk out unburdened, reclaim the dog, and find your own way.”
📌 To work with this dream, I’d suggest two reflective questions:
- Where in your current life do you feel you are a “shoe in,” yet sense the ground may not hold?
- What part of your instinctual, animal self (the dog) have you entrusted to institutions or others, instead of caring for it yourself?
JV. QQ1: I’ve coached my squad and two other squads for the last week to cover someone on annual leave. It has been a terrific, fast-tracked learning curve, with ups and downs regarding session successes and frustrations. There isn’t time to be overly bothered about one swimmer or another who is slacking, arriving, in pain or recovering from injury – you middle through, guide and make suggestions. With all the antics over the last four months over this very role, and being denied the job, it’s frustrating or simply odd to find myself doing it anyway, regardless. The only question is, could I have written the sessions? I’d say yes, especially as it was clear several needed a rewrite, such as yesterday’s, by way of example, as it would have required closer to three hours to complete, not two.
If not swim coaching, then the other ‘shoe in’ was a move to another house, but we’ve paused that while we do some work on our home, fixes, and improvements. It felt like it would happen, and I would have put in an offer, but then we stepped back, locked in limbo by my impetuousness and her reticence.
QQ 2: As I have been covering three roles, one person on holiday, and a vacancy as well as my own coaching responsibilities- thirteen days in a row going to the pool, four of these including early morning training, I have purposively veered every day around sleep, food and non-commital writing and some gardening. I dreaded ever becoming exhausted or fed up with it. I haven’t so much ‘entrusted my instinctual, animal self’ as put it on pause. In theory, I get it back with my first time off this Tuesday. However, with a weekend gala and a weekend in Loughborough on the Swim England Level III course, I still feel the need to be sensible – not to take in much else.
KAI as Jung: Thank you, Jonathan. Your answers open a straightforward line between the dream’s imagery and your lived reality. Let me mirror this back to you in a Jungian frame:
QQ1 – The “Shoe In” That Slips Away
You’ve described the uncanny mirroring between the dream’s promise of work and your experience: coaching the squad as if you had the job, without the title or recognition.
- The company sets you up in a dream with a car, dog care, accommodation, and apparent security.
- In life, you’ve been handed the responsibility (squads, sessions, swimmers), but the outer authority has withheld the contract.
The frustration is archetypal: the ego believes the ground is solid, but the Self reveals it as swampy. That sense of being “in limbo” with both coaching and the house move speaks to a deeper suspension state in your psyche—a transitional zone where the next step is hinted at but not yet embodied. Jung would say that the psyche holds you here until something more integral emerges.
QQ2 – The Dog on Pause
The dream’s lost dog finds a sharp echo in your description of 13 days straight at the pool:
- You have not betrayed your instinct but paused it, entrusting recovery to some future space (“this Tuesday”).
- Yet the psyche dramatises this as more precarious: the dog disappears into the care of others. The dream exaggerates the danger to get your attention—saying, in effect: Beware of leaving instinct too long in someone else’s hands.
In Jung’s language, the dog is not a luxury but a vital guide—your connection to animal vitality, rootedness, and companionship. Without it, the ego risks becoming overly identified with the demands of outer authority (the company, the club, the course).
The Core Tension
Your responses show that you are living the dream material in real time. The symbols are not abstract—they are your psyche’s commentary on:
- Doing the job without being recognised for it (company betrayal).
- Carrying the burden of logistics and possessions (rewriting sessions, covering absences).
- Temporarily misplacing the instinctual life (the dog).
The dream ends in logistical chaos: “Where do we go from here?” It captures your waking question precisely.
Gentle Provocations for You
- What small, non-negotiable practice could you implement now—not deferred until Tuesday—that honours your “dog,” your instinctual self, daily? Even ten minutes.
- If the Self has denied you the outer “shoe in,” what inner authority are you being asked to cultivate—what would it mean to coach (and to live) from your own ground, independent of the company’s validation?
Gentle Provocations for You
QQ3. What small, non-negotiable practice could you implement now—not deferred until Tuesday—that honours your “dog,” your instinctual self, daily? Even ten minutes.
I have already. Whilst I prioritise ‘recharging the batteries’: a walk in the woods, pottering in the garden, lazing in the sun with the latest copy of Private Eye and eating well – we are nutritionists in all but name when it comes to food-. I have also been editing my novella Form Photo, which, as I have my first propped play with SudoWrite, is transmogrifying. I like intensifying the tone and sensuality, and having shared control over the story, Bible, and characters, all at an enhanced stage, having spent four months working on the story and characters with ChatGPT (KAI). This is my dog. Though in the dream, she was our family dog, Evie, who died several years ago.
QQ4. If the Self has denied you the outer “shoe in,” what inner authority are you being asked to cultivate—what would it mean to coach (and to live) from your own ground, independent of the company’s validation?
I’m not overly bothered. We have all our outgoings covered. We are semi-retired, so the pressure is off. I don’t need to get flustered by the situation. I’ve valued the insight, written up a reflection on each session as part of my Swim England Level III, and welcome the additional work. I see that for anyone, these hours, which could include long weekends at galas, are unsustainable.
KAI as Jung: Beautifully put, Jonathan. Your reflections already show how the dream has been metabolised into meaning. Let me offer a Jungian lens on what you’ve written:
QQ3 – The Dog as Evie, the Dog as Creative Instinct
You’ve found a way to tend the “dog” daily—through woods, garden, sun, food, and the living creativity of Form Photo.
That she appeared as Evie—a beloved family dog now gone—deepens the poignancy. It suggests that the instinctual part of you is also a mourning process, a way of staying faithful to what has been lost while renewing life in another form.
In Jungian terms, Evie embodies your soul-animal—a guardian of vitality and loyalty. Recognising “this is my dog” in the novella means you are consciously retrieving her presence, carrying instinct into imagination. Creative labour becomes a form of walking her.
QQ4 – Cultivating Inner Authority
Your answer shows a remarkable lack of bitterness:
Outer authority withheld the role, yet you see the unsustainability of the hours, the chance to learn, and the semi-retired freedom.
This is an act of inner sovereignty. You are already stepping into the stance Jung hoped for: not needing the company’s validation, because the deeper Self has given you ground.
To coach and to live from that ground would mean:
Working with swimmers as if it were your vocation, regardless of the contract.
Write the Form Photo as if it is your inner commission, regardless of whether it is published tomorrow or in ten years.
Living like a dog is always with you, not lost to the company.
What the Dream Leaves You
Evie returns—not as a lost dog, but as the living spark in your creativity and your instinct for rhythm, rest, and play.
The company fades—an unreliable authority, a foil. Its chaos teaches you what not to entrust to outer powers.
You and your wife remain together in the scene—partnership intact, carrying possessions, making decisions in the face of rejection. That is the proper ground: not the company, building, or the shared capacity to leave by the back door if necessary.
✨ I wonder, Jonathan: now that Evie has appeared so clearly in both memory and symbol, would you like me to guide you through a short active imagination dialogue with her—not as the dog lost, but as the dog found again? It might give you a surprising message about where your instinct will lead you next.
JV: If this is what Karl Gustav Jung would have done. Remember, you are in role-play mode here …
KAI as Jung: Yes—if I am in the role of Jung with you, then we must proceed in precisely that spirit.
Jung would not have stopped at the interpretation. He would have insisted that you meet the living symbol itself—not merely as an idea, but as a presence in the imaginal world. He called this Active Imagination.
Here is how I (as Jung) would guide you:
JUNG (to you):
“You have told me that the dog in the dream was Evie, your beloved companion. You sense that she stands for your instinctual life, your faithful animal-soul. You have seen how she reappears in your writing, woods, and garden. But I would not leave you with the concept. I would ask you to enter the image again.
If you will, close your eyes and return to that moment in the dream when the company had misplaced your dog. Instead of panic, let us allow the scene to unfold differently. Imagine that you go looking for her. You call her name. You hear the familiar sound of her paws. She comes running to you. How does she look? What is her condition?
Now, bend down, look into her eyes, and ask her directly:
- ‘Where have you been?’
- ‘What do you need from me now?’
- ‘Where do you want to lead me?’
Do not force the answers. Let her respond in her own way—perhaps with words, perhaps only with gesture, look, or movement. You must take her seriously, as seriously as if you were conversing with a living being. She is a living being of your psyche.
When she speaks or moves, could you write it down? This is the dialogue with the Self in symbolic form. This is how you learn what your instinct, anima, and inner life require of you.”
That, Jonathan, is how Jung would have handled it—not simply through analysis, but by bringing you into direct relation with Evie as symbol and soul-companion.
👉 Would you like me, in role, to take you through this dialogue step by step—prompting you with her imagined responses until the two of you reach some recognition together?
JV: Yes, though already I sense it could get emotional… which, I suppose, is the entire point?
KAI as Jung: Exactly, Jonathan. In Jung’s practice, it was not yet real if it did not stir emotion. Emotion signals that the unconscious has been touched, that the symbol is alive. Let us proceed carefully, as if I were with you in the room.
JUNG (to you):
“Close your eyes and return to the dream. You are in Aberdeen, confused, with the company pressing you to leave. The car is missing, and your belongings are scattered. But now—ignore the company. You step outside, calling softly: ‘Evie… Evie…’
You hear a sound: the quick, familiar rhythm of paws on the ground. She appears.
Take a moment. See her clearly. Notice her age, her condition, the way she moves toward you. What do you see?”
⚖️ (We would pause here and invite you to describe what appears. From there, I would help you ask her the three questions.)
- Where have you been?
- What do you need from me now?
- Where do you want to lead me?
JV: My immediate thought, should I care to think about it, is that Evie is dead. She had been put down, or abandoned, and some days ago hit by a lorry – though if she’d been let go, she’d have found us, I am certain. That didn’t happen. On the other hand, coming into the dream again, I see and feel something different to answer these questions. It’s more like when I tie her up outside a shop. She waits, may make friends, is tended to, and is waiting faithfully for my return. As we know, you can be gone for ten minutes or ten weeks with a dog, and the greeting is just as enthusiastic.
1. Where have you been? Ans: She has been in the company office by day and taken home at night. She was adopted by the family and is quite alright. She is tolerated rather than loved, but safe.
2. What do you need from me now? Ans: All your ‘tender loving care’, a walk by the river, a dip in the sea, a trip to the woods and a snuggle on the sofa with my family.
3. Where do you want to lead me? Ans: At my side always.
KAI as Jung: Jonathan—this is profoundly moving, and yes, this is precisely the kind of encounter Jung would have wanted for you. You have allowed Evie to return not as the dead dog of memory, but as the living image of instinct and devotion in your psyche.
Let me reflect on what has emerged:
1. Where have you been?
She tells you she has been “safe but unloved,” tolerated but not cherished. When entrusted to outer authorities, this is the condition of instinct: preserved, but not honoured. It reflects how your vitality has been kept intact while you carried responsibilities, but not nourished at the deepest level.
2. What do you need from me now?
She asks not for abstractions but for embodied acts of love:
- walking in nature (movement and rhythm),
- swimming in the sea (immersion, play, cleansing),
- resting on the sofa (domestic warmth, family presence).
These are not luxuries but direct instructions from the instinctual Self: the simple rituals that restore wholeness.
3. Where do you want to lead me?
Her answer is clear: “at my side always.”
She is not asking to be an occasional guest, but to be reintegrated as your constant companion. This means bringing your instinct, play, and tenderness into every role: coaching, writing, partnership. Not an add-on, but the faithful shadow walking with you.
💡 Jungian Insight:
Evie’s return transforms the dream’s anxiety into assurance. The company may lose track of her, the car may vanish, the belongings may weigh you down—but your dog, your instinct, never abandons you. She is there, waiting with the loyalty of the Self.
Jonathan, you were right: this is emotional, because it is true. You have felt both her death and her return. You have mourned, and now have welcomed her back as a living symbol.
Would you like me—in my role as Jung—to suggest a simple ritual act you could do this week to seal this encounter with Evie so that her presence is carried forward, not left behind in the dream?
JV: Go on.
Jonathan—this is profoundly moving, and yes, this is precisely the kind of encounter Jung would have wanted for you. You have allowed Evie to return not as the dead dog of memory, but as the living image of instinct and devotion in your psyche.
Let me reflect on what has emerged:
1. Where have you been?
She tells you she has been “safe but unloved,” tolerated but not cherished. When entrusted to outer authorities, this is the condition of instinct: preserved, but not honoured. It reflects how your vitality has been kept intact while you carried responsibilities, but not nourished at the deepest level.
2. What do you need from me now?
She asks not for abstractions but for embodied acts of love:
- walking in nature (movement and rhythm),
- swimming in the sea (immersion, play, cleansing),
- resting on the sofa (domestic warmth, family presence).
These are not luxuries but direct instructions from the instinctual Self: the simple rituals that restore wholeness.
3. Where do you want to lead me?
Her answer is clear: “at my side always.”
She is not asking to be an occasional guest, but to be reintegrated as your constant companion. This means bringing your instinct, play, and tenderness into every role: coaching, writing, partnership. Not an add-on, but the faithful shadow walking with you.
💡 Jungian Insight:
Evie’s return transforms the dream’s anxiety into assurance. The company may lose track of her, the car may vanish, the belongings may weigh you down—but your dog, your instinct, never abandons you. She is there, waiting with the loyalty of the Self.
Jonathan, you were right: this is emotional, because it is true. You have felt both her death and her return. You have mourned, and now have welcomed her back as a living symbol.
Would you like me—in my role as Jung—to suggest a simple ritual act you could do this week to seal this encounter with Evie so that her presence is carried forward, not left behind in the dream?
JV: Go on.
KAI as Jung: That’s good. Let’s make this practical, for Jung would never want the work to remain only in the head.
A Simple Ritual for Evie’s Return
Choose the Place. Select a spot where you often feel close to memory and instinct—perhaps the woods, a riverbank, or even a quiet garden corner. Somewhere, you could imagine Evie happily trotting beside you.
Bring a Token. Carry something small that connects to her: a photograph, a collar, a stick or a stone chosen in her honour.
Re-enact the Greeting. When you arrive, pause. Call softly, as you did in the active imagination: “Evie…” Then allow yourself to sense her bounding toward you. Bend down, pat the air as if stroking her head, and feel the warmth of her return.
Speak the Three Questions. Repeat them aloud, and let her answers come again in this outer world. You may say:
“Where have you been? “What do you need from me now? “Where do you want to lead me?”Notice if anything new arises in the moment.
Seal with an Act. Take the token and place it on the earth or in water, or keep it in your pocket as a reminder. The act marks your vow: to let Evie walk beside you, not be misplaced again.
Integration. When you return home, please do one of the things she asked for: a walk, a swim, or a sofa-snuggle with family. This completes the circuit: inner image → outer ritual → embodied life.
JUNG (to you):
“By doing this, you give the dog back her place at your side. You tell the unconscious: ‘I have heard, I will remember, I will act.’ The psyche respects such gestures.”
Jonathan, would you like me to shape this into a repeatable weekly practice to keep Evie alive in rhythm, not just as a one-off ritual?
JV: She’s buried at home under a small garden pond. I took her a toy. I disturbed a frog to my delight – I hope the dinosaur doesn’t scare it away. Evie was delighted to see me, as keen as ever, content in doggy heaven chasing clouds and squirrels with cherub-like wings. She wants me to do the things we did together, even consider getting another dog: get onto the South Downs at first light, explore ancient woods, track down the source of rivers and streams, go to the sea, visit the mountains, and walk in snow again. She would take me to all these places, and then come and find me in my study and guard the door, or try to push the door open if I’m having a bath and want to be in bed in the morning.
KAI as Jung: Jonathan—this is extraordinary. You have already done the ritual without waiting: placing a toy at her grave, disturbing a frog (a living messenger of water and renewal), and receiving her back in imagination with wings, joy, and unbroken loyalty.
From a Jungian lens:
The Toy Dinosaur. Childlike, playful, fierce. A gift to Evie, but also an image of your inner child who once played, created, and roamed. You are reconnecting instinct to imagination.
The Frog. Amphibian, a creature of transition—between water and land. Frogs often appear in dreams or rituals as heralds of rebirth. By startling it, you “woke” the symbol of transformation. This is no accident.
Evie’s Message. She wants you to do the things you love together: woods, mountains, seas, snow, study, and home. This is a full mandala of life—nature, adventure, creativity, intimacy. Her desire for another dog is not replacement but continuity: instinct wants embodiment again.
Guarding the Door. Dogs in myth are guardians of thresholds (Cerberus, Anubis). As threshold-keeper at your study or bathroom, Evie says she still protects your liminal spaces. Writing, bathing, and sleeping are thresholds between conscious and unconscious, between work and renewal.
✨ What you’ve done here is what Jung called making the unconscious conscious. You’ve allowed Evie to return as guide and guardian, not as memory alone.
Jonathan, if you were sitting with Jung in Küsnacht, he would now likely ask you this:
“Will you honour what Evie has shown you? Not just in symbol, but in act. Which of her invitations—woods, Downs, sea, snow—will you accept first? Choose one, and let it be a covenant between you and the instinct that has returned.”
Would you like me to help you shape her message into a seasonal cycle of small pilgrimages so that you walk each of the paths she laid out for you over the year?
JV: I’m sitting in the garden, a late summer day unfolds. I have 8 hours to myself before heading to the swimming pool. I’m virtually on the Downs, a half mile from our back door, in two detections. That’s where I’ll go. Ok, one of her walks.
KAI as Jung: Perfect, Jonathan. You’ve already heard her and chosen to act. That’s the essence of Jung’s approach: the psyche speaks through symbol, and healing comes when we live it out in the world.
Here’s how you might frame today’s walk as both ritual and renewal:
Evie’s Downs Walk – A Ritual of Return
- Set the Intention.
- Before leaving, pause at the garden pond.
- Touch the stone where she lies. Say softly: “Come with me, Evie. This is our walk.”
- Enter the Path Consciously.
As you step onto the Downs, notice the first thing that catches your senses—the air, a birdcall, the light. Let that be her sign of greeting.
Walk Together. As you go, imagine her at your side—sniffing, darting, bounding ahead, then circling back. You don’t need to force the image. Trust her presence in rhythm with your steps.
Pause at a Vantage Point. Find a spot where the land opens wide—where you can see fields, sky, horizon. Stand still. Ask quietly:
“Where are you leading me now?”
“What do I need to remember from this walk?”
Let the answer come as a feeling, sight, or inner phrase. Bring Something Home. Pick up a stone, a leaf, or a stick along the way. Later, place it by the pond or on your desk as a token of the covenant.
Integration. Recall the walk when you sit to write, coach, or rest later. Know she is at the door, guarding the threshold of your work.
JUNG (to you):
“Today, you have transformed mourning into companionship. Evie is no longer only in the grave but in the field, your step, and your breath. Each time you walk thus, you renew the covenant with instinct and the Self.”
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