The Dog in the Year of the Wood Dragon 2024

Dog Pic by @elliespinelli

Who is a Dog?

Years:         1946, 1958, 1970, 1982, 1994, 2006, 2018.
Month*:      October
Hour:          19.00-21.00

Day: you’ll need a Chinese Calendar.

* Caution: the start of the Chinese month can be as early as the 4th & as late as the 9th, depending on the year. We can let you know this too.

What is a Dog?
The Dog is yang earth and a byword for faith and consistency. Terriers and Rotweilers are as fierce as they are loyal. In mediaeval heraldry and Renaissance painting, the greyhound symbolises constancy. The downside of this is that like 1946 Fire Dog Donald Trump and two of his three predecessors (ie not Obama – naturally), they can take some moving on. And the primary force in the world in 2022 remains the eclipse of the post-war era which opened in the Fire Dog year of their birth 1946, and the search for a new beginning in which humanity has some chance of survival. Only rejection of the dogma of perpetual growth which continues to ravage the planet offers an escape. You Dogs may be absorbed with that very question. Google the Volker Plan or the Nixon Shock, both cooked up in the Dog Year of 1970 if you want to fully understand this.

A Dog can be expected to revere tradition and have a strong family background. If a Dog commits to something they can generally be relied upon to see it to completion – for better or worse. The difference between male and female Dogs can be that the female gets the message quicker. Interesting to note that Kate Middleton and Prince William are twin Water Dogs of 1982; a very solid match because as a yang Earth sign, the Dog is pretty immovable, an ideal best friend or protector. These two are, whatever appears to occur to the contrary, first and foremost good friends.

The Dog’s thinking may not always be flexible but when he gets an idea, he really gets it; that’s yang Earth for you. His natural grouping is with the hunters, the Horse and Tiger where the apportionment of tasks is obvious: the Horse provides pace and the Tiger ferocity while the Dog watches the rear. If more people studied Chinese metaphysics, more workplaces would zing: in business the Horse will tend to be the sales person, the Tiger the closer or credit controller and the Dog the provider of after-sales service or er…HR department.

The Dog excels at service because he never gives up. He will return your phone calls and keep that appointment. He’s the friend who sends a card every birthday and the spouse who remembers every anniversary. He’s the charmer as well as the Tweeter at dawn.

The Dog perhaps surprisingly, also mixes well with the gentle diplomatic Rabbit. The Rabbit schmoozes while the Dog ensures that her openness is not abused. He makes a wonderful bodyguard and middle manager. A Dog employer will generally have achieved that position by sheer hard work and will demand the same from all around.

The Dog doesn’t like the Dragon because he’s such a smarty pants. Also the Dog hates success without effort and he sees the Dragon create with such apparent ease. Consider Trump’s man-crush on Dragon Vladimir Putin in this light. The Snake too; the Dog would resent the Horse as well, except that they are scrupulously loyal to their own team. And just as an aside, it’s a principle of yin and yang that opposites co-exist. So some Dogs will express these qualities in the omission rather than the observance. This may make some little sense of Donald Trump.

An unbalanced Dog is a bit of a shop steward. He knows his rights and the way things should be – often the way they always have been. An unbalanced Dog (such as one with an October or mid-evening birth) is rigid. Those recent US Presidents in a downward progress of de-evolution bottoming out at Donald Trump, have been champions of stuck, male, white, wealthy privilege. Make no mistake: it may not be clear very soon, but the post-War dispensation in the form of the Fire Dog, is over. The smart Fire Dog has already become mentor and confessor. That’s a pursuit at which he can often excel. The shallow Dog of course may never see this.

The Dog will often have a strong spiritual agenda and if he has a blind spot it may be the inability to tell the difference between religion and spirituality or spirituality and therapy. Because this means he sticks to his guns, the Dog is suited both to new age therapy and religious persecution. He will not be thrown off by the opinions of others once he has committed to a line of action. The unbalanced Dog can be thick skinned in matters of belief; this Dog would be ideally suited to being a Grand Inquisitor. The problem is that her motto is “Do as you would be done by,” and she thinks it already is. Resentment is a trap that is so easy to fall into.

The Dog can work well with other Dogs and even with the Pig. With the Pig he shares a love of home and team and they are so different they don’t crowd each other. Sometimes the Dog and Pig can be telepathically close; this is because they are adjacent signs in the calendar linked by the yang Earth that is a feature of both. Sometimes this Earth is expressed by banter or earthy humour, sometimes by complimentary delusions. Beware though: the yang Earth and the yin Water have to mix just right or it can all end in tears.

But the most powerful and most demanding role the Dog can play is in a creative team including the irritating Dragon, the autocratic Ox and the soft Sheep. If the Dog acts as conscience and bookkeeper, the Ox will relax, the Sheep toughen up and the Dragon acknowledge someone else for a change. If you are a Dog recruiting for non-executive directors, take note. What is great about the Dog is that if he finds advice that works he will adopt it as if it were religion. Bless. As for the unbalanced Fire Dog – it’s pretty much over. Change Horses, I should.

Dog in The Wood Dragon Year 2024

Not Tin Yute Nobody’s Helper

Sui Po Opposite the Tai Sui

Get flexible.

Some think of Dog and Dragon as merciless because neither does duty as Tin Yute, Nobleman Helpers. Tin Yute is the safe haven, the reassuring voice. Dog and Dragon don’t do that. Some say this makes Dog and Dragon Years bitter, there is no safe place in them. That’s not quite the point but in the tumultuous year that’s coming that’s a hell of a thing. A Dragon Year is one of constant change, the last thing the Dog enjoys and movement is what’s called for.

Technically the Dog is opposed to the Dragon. The Dog is slow and steady, the Dragon mercurial. The Dog wants to know where she stands. The Dragon bamboozles with fancy footwork. As a Dog you are in the cross hairs of the Dragon but the converse is also true. A smart Dog knows that resistance is useless. This year you may not progress much materially as the world judges it but on the levels that count you can grow exponentially if you are prepared to change. This may be uncomfortable.

Change to what? you might ask. To whatever presents itself. Use this year as a way to enter and stay in the flow. The Dog’s resistance is ultimately resistance to just that: trust and openness. There comes a time when loyalty amounts to cowardice and trust needs to be abstract, and not in something, even yourself. This year may feel like a headlong fall. You can not be guaranteed a soft landing but if you accept a jolt it may turn out to be a feather bed. No promises but this last is a better proposition than the continuity you had in mind isn’t it? Live a little.

Equally at this critical time in history the last thing the Dragon needs is opposition. The future hangs in the balance. Can you change enough to nudge it to safety?

The Dog is consistent, loyal and trustworthy. And stubborn. Also impassive, they tend to stand back and their positions tend to be fixed. Don’t argue with a Dog, you’ll just push them into a corner. Like the rest of us actually only more so. Truth is we change people’s opinions not by opposing but by giving them something to agree with. How do you feel about that?

The right answer is usually yes and the question is can you simply allow things to be as they are? That is can you change yourself? You’re unlikely to make hugely visible strides this year and you could know yourself in a way that could be worth more than immediate progress.

In January the Yin Earth of the Ox makes for an enchanted atmosphere, this is the time when the various levels of awareness are closest, when we can cross to the less physical realities and back. There is opportunity to meditate and visualise and manifest. Dogs who are traditionally poor at breathing and often sleepy rather than meditative can use the not-quite-in the-world energy of the Ox Month to become better acquainted with themselves. There are no prizes for this.

Once all indicators of the new year have kicked in – late this year (the 10^th February) – and the Dragon is fully here, the Dog can cruise a little with their friends and associates the Tiger and then the Rabbit. Together they make Fire which you might take as enlightenment and illumination. It is in the nature of the more unconscious Dog to be rigid and evangelical with ideas and the Fire you make with the Tiger can bake you into stasis. Here is an opportunity to become more flexible. At this time and throughout the year, remember to call upon your allies Tiger, Horse and Rabbit with all of whom you are said to combine to Fire and as they arise adopt ideas that serve you, without – the Dog’s downfall – becoming a missionary. For missionary you might read populist.

And there are bonuses: a female Dog is most likely to find her true partner at Rabbit and Tiger times. And of course it may be that you did just that last year or the year before.

April is as they say a cruel month. Because you occupy the space in the compass at North West 2 (around 300º) you are diametrically opposite the Tai Sui, the strongest force in the new year’s arsenal of energy, You clash both with the Year and Month Dragon. The toughest part of this Dragon Month will be the 18 days of pure Yang Earth qi starting on the 17^th. Accept stillness at this point. You’re going nowhere.

May may irritate and June madden – the yang Fire of the Horse produces Earth in the sense that it encourages stuckness and resistance. Throughout the Fire Months (May –July) seek Water; stay lubricated, hydrated and forthcoming. Deep and especially emotional communication is Water. August is likely to be an especially wet one this year. With the poles melting what did you expect? As will November and December. In October, your own month there may be less Water, relief to some, a time to notice your tendency to fossilise and again to seek Water.

So a year of testing: that which does not kill me makes me stronger. You have the opportunity to learn a whole lot and to discover new worlds and people. But you need to keep saying yes and staying open.

Romance: no false moves.

Wealth: pockets of opportunity.

Health: to do with breathing.

Hexagram: 25 Wu Wang No Blame.

This forecast is prepared by comparing your own Chinese year Animal with the Wood Dragon of 2024. Your Year Animal is just one of the four that make up your Ba Zi or Four Pillars of Destiny. A fully-drafted ba zi can indicate possible futures and probable pasts as well as moments of decision. Knowing these moments can heal and prevent heartbreak as well make success and happiness more easily achievable. What is a ba zi?

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