I’ll bet you talk to your dog. Most people do. In fact, most people interact with their dogs as if they were people. Dog owners attribute all kinds of emotions, desires, behaviors to their dogs without ever knowing what their dogs want, feel or what their behaviors mean. “You’re happy, sad, cold, hot, sleepy, tired, grouchy.” “You’re hungry, want a walk, missing me, jealous, sad you lost your toy.”
These are all things we project onto our dogs and other pets. We regard these assumptions about our dogs as reasonable and even normal. Do we also do the same projecting onto other people without realizing it? Is it reasonable or does it create relationship problems for us? Is it reasonable for you to assume your partner wants a beach vacation just because you want one? Because you are a jealous, possessive person, is it reasonable to assume your spouse has extramarital affairs? You can see how these same techniques of projecting that people use with their dogs create chaos in people’s relationships. We cannot know what our dog thinks. But, we can always ask other people what they think, want, and how they see a situation. Yet, most of the time we do not ask. We just project ourselves onto their lives. This discounts the other person and leads to conflicted relationships. Has this happened to you?
