In This Article:
- What is the Five Element theory and how does it apply to dogs?
- How to identify your dog’s dominant personality traits
- Understanding stressors and emotional responses in dogs
- How to support your dog based on their Five Element type
- Using this system to help rescue dogs find the right homes
Understanding Your Dog’s Personality Through the Five Element Theory
by Elizabeth Anne Johnson, author of the book "Know Your Dog's True Nature".
For centuries, we humans have tried to understand and deepen our relationships with our original best friends, dogs. These furry creatures that eat, travel, protect, work, snuggle, wiggle, wag, and share life, home, and pure love with us still hold a sense of mystery.
Today more than ever, with over 470 million dogs as pets in the world, there is still a heartfelt quest to simply understand our furry family members. We humans want to know: why do dogs do what they do?
Do you sometimes wish you had superhero “x-ray vision” to see into the deep recesses of your dog’s behavior and personality?
Five Element X-Ray Vision
Properly trained, a man can be a dog’s best friend.
— Corey Ford
Learning the ancient art of the five elements is like having “x-ray vision” into your dog’s personality. The five elements explain the five distinct archetypal patterns of behavior we may see in our dogs, other animals, humans, and ourselves.
This interspecies “x-ray vision” gives us a clear understanding of these five personality types, which can help us develop patience, empathy, and compassion within our dog/human relationships. It’s a fun and easy way to create harmony with our dogs and in our heart, home, and life with others.
All animals, especially our dogs, are wisdom keepers. Dogs can help us see and feel things that we might not otherwise be aware of. They act as our teachers and guides.
When we quietly observe them through the Five Element lens we see the patterns and teachings of each archetypal element. This gives us great practice for learning how to bring the Five Element theory into our human experience.
The Five Element Theory
The Five Element theory is a mindful guidance system for finding harmony, balance, empathy, and compassion. Just by observation, we can learn to understand the dynamics of our animals, ourselves, and others, and create the best version of ourselves and our dogs.
The five elements—Wood, Fire, Earth, Metal, and Water—are part of a nature-centered, ever-flowing, five-thousand-year-old modality of assessment and healing, which ultimately strives for balance. It will help you understand the “why’s?” of your dog’s behavior while learning how to navigate challenges.
Extracting the Five Element personality piece from this complex healing structure, creates a profound awareness and understanding of how personality dictates how our dogs, ourselves, and others deal with stress and daily life. We know stress can have tremendous effects on our health, well-being, and balance. And, so it is with our dogs too.
Five Element Observation
When you experience life in the neutral space of Five Element observation, you are able to work with tricky situations, with your dogs and others, with a more open mind and heart. Thanks to the elemental understanding of who and what you are dealing with, you can guide the situation instead of reacting to it.
As we learn about our dog’s element, we see shades of these archetypes in ourselves and possibly in other humans. The human Five Element personality and behavior closely resemble each elemental dog description. Our dogs as archetypal teachers give us a gentle way to enter into “who am I?”
Learning your own Five Element personality is often a profoundly honest experience that paves the way for weaving and blending the dog’s elemental personality and wants and needs, with your elemental personality, wants, and needs. These perspectives will help you understand how both you and your dog deal with change, stress, relationship dynamics, and even aging.
The five elements—Wood, Fire, Earth, Metal, and Water—are based on the universal, nature-centric premise of movement, change, and balance. Traditional Chinese medicine’s Five Element theory is based on these everchanging dynamics and interrelationships.
As with nature, the Five Element theory has one persistent and ultimate goal—to create balance. My mantra has long been: Life is good, balance is better.
We humans and our animals have all the elements in our personalities. You may initially see several elements reflected in your dog. However, there will be one or two elements that clearly stand out. Once you identify your dog’s predominant elements by observation of archetypal traits, finding their default emotions under stress, and numerous other clues, you can use your support tools of simple lifestyle measures to keep them balanced and happy. And it will also be easier to find your own element and create balance within your relationship.
Wants, Needs, Stressors, and Support
We can look for clues about our dog’s element by dominant personality and behavior traits such as wants and needs, reactions to stress, and supportive measures, as shown in the list below.
Wants: Good to excellent options for maintaining balance in the element.
Needs: Necessary for maintaining balance and harmony.
Stressors: Things that create imbalance within each individual dog element.
Response to Stress: Emotional and physical response to stress.
Stress Balancers: Actions that bring relief and balance, often the same as wants and needs.
Supportive Therapies: Can be ways to help your dog that are related to physical action or emotional relationship.
Relationship Support: Pathways and actions that this element needs to feel safe and loved.
Life Lesson: Reflections of what each dog element can teach us.
In the following table you’ll find a quick hybrid reference guide for all five dog elements.
Quick reference guide for the five dog elements
(to see a full-size jpg of the chart, click here)
Rescue Dogs and Shelter Applications
As anyone who goes into dog rescue knows,
it is not a “for-profit” business,
but the rewards are priceless.
— Emmylou Harris
Thankfully, many dog owners provide loving homes to rescue dogs. These dogs come from all walks of life and are often given up or rescued due to difficult circumstances. The one thing they all have in common is a prior lifetime of stress.
Stress can actually be a helpful indicator of what each dog needs for a balanced life. When we can identify a dog’s stressors, we can identify its element and learn more about the dog’s personality, wants and needs, possible triggers, and desired lifestyle.
Shelter staff and kennel workers have keen senses and huge, strong hearts that often can detect a dog’s stressors, their mechanisms for coping, and their general wants and needs. First responders out in the field picking up animals are the first ones to have a pulse on “who the dog is.” This initial awareness can be the key to identifying how to handle and manage a frightened animal with, hopefully, a cooperative approach.
Approaching an animal and noticing how it reacts guides us in understanding its stress behavior reflex. Is it aggression, panic, worry, hiding, or deep visceral fear that turns into fear aggression? Each one of these comes from one of five unique archetypal reactions.
Having the simple knowledge and wisdom of the dog’s element can be a great help. How a dog reacts to stress is the first solid archetypal indicator; what each dog wants and needs follows from that. Understanding the dog’s primary element can be valuable in calming the dog and working with it. Application of the Five Element theory is invaluable here.
Finding the Right Human Companion
The Five Element personality assessments can also be used to help these animals find the right humans and transition smoothly into their new home, hopefully their last home. With a few simple questions on an adopter’s application, the perfect elemental human match can hopefully be made, and result in a lifetime of love and balanced care.
As shelter staff work with the dog and get to know it, Five Element information can act as relationship counseling information and can be given to the new potential owner. To be able to categorize some of these aspects for rescue dogs will give them a better chance at finding and keeping the perfect forever home.
The Five Element theory has the potential to change the lives of many animals in rescue situations, to find the right homes for them and help them stay in those homes. Sending home element profile information with a new, excited, big-hearted owner can ease the dog’s transition, and create a solid understanding in that happy, forever home that we all desire for these animals.
I have personally utilized the Five Element techniques with the 17 rescue dogs that have been part of my life to date. They all became happy, well-adjusted, and balanced lifelong partners. We also integrate this into our humane wildlife and feral dog capture programs and teachings. It can be a powerful tool for creating harmony and saving lives.
Copyright ©2024. All Rights Reserved.
Adapted with permission from the publisher,
Findhorn Press, an imprint of Inner Traditions Intl.
Article Source:
BOOK: Know Your Dog's True Nature
Know Your Dog's True Nature: Understanding Canine Personality through the Five Elements
by Elizabeth Anne Johnson.
With sensitivity and skill, master animal healer Elizabeth Anne Johnson takes you into the body, mind, and heart of the dog—sharing intimate stories of working dogs who are changing the world, rescue dogs who change us, old dogs offering profound wisdom, and humans making the world a better place.
Introducing the five element archetypes of the Wood, Fire, Earth, Metal, and Water Dog, Know Your Dog's True Nature illuminates practical ways to gain insight into the unique personalities of your animal companion. As you explore the similarities and dynamics between dog and human, you'll come to appreciate the mutually supportive structures and richness in your relationships, an understanding that helps to create a peaceful and happy home environment for all.
Click here for more info and/or to order this paperback book. Also available as an audiobook and as a Kindle edition.
About the Author
Elizabeth Anne Johnson, EEBW, CBW, has worked on behalf of the health and wellness of small and large pets, exotic animals, and wildlife for 35 years. She is a holistic animal healer, wildlife biologist and rehabilitator, mentor, adventurer, and howling partner of Wilbur and Pretzel, rescues extraordinaire.
Author's website: ElizabethAnneJohnson.com
Article Recap:
The Five Element theory is a powerful tool for understanding your dog’s personality, behavior, and emotional needs. By recognizing whether your dog is a Competitor, Party Dog, Caregiver, Librarian, or Empath, you can provide the right balance of support, structure, and care. This approach is especially valuable for rescue dogs, helping them transition into forever homes with the right human match. Learning to work with your dog’s unique element enhances your bond and ensures a happier, healthier life for both of you.
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