Reflections of a Beautiful Friendship Chapter 5

The Famous Five

On the 14th of April 2025 when Jem the Papillon who had shared his life with us for over 12 years asked me to honour my promise that when his troubles became unbearable I would do the kindest thing a dog person can do. I wrote for what became the original Reflections of a Beautiful Friendship which was pre_Reboundog*

‘Maybe I should write a blog about canine listening without pre-judgement, faithfulness & trust. All traits we have lost in human society, if we ever had them, though empathy & reciprocity may go some way towards.’

Well, Jem gave us just over 12 years of non-judgemental listening & friendship during which time we went through some really life destroying episodes. So, to have a friend who sits down next you and gives you the hope & reason to carry on is just life changing.

Why Chapter 5? Way back in my childhood there were a series of children adventure stories called The Famous Five by Enid Blyton. Well, to me the five dogs in the picture were our Famous Five and now none are no longer with us it's like the final chapter of a wonderful story has been closed forever.

Here's the original blog

Be honest how many times have you been in a conversation where you are forming your own opinion/ response before the person speaking has completed their story?

Now be really honest how often is your opinion influenced by your assumed viewpoint of that person, whether it’s their dress sense, vocabulary / accent or ‘social’ status.

Or even worse, have you been engaged in a conversation where you sense that you are being watched for your response, feel isolated from the social situation or find yourself under tremendous pressure to confirm to the group’s norm? According to Fels Institute of Government at University of Pennsylvania.

“Whenever we listen to a statement, particularly one that is charged with emotion, our immediate tendency is to evaluate it from our perspective. That’s natural and human and an impediment to communication if we don’t deliberately put on the brakes and control it”.

Step One in Effective Communication – Listen https://www.fels.upenn.edu/recap/posts/813

Based on the research of: Adler, R., Rosenfeld, L. and Proctor, R. (2001) Interplay: the process of interpersonal communicating (8th edn), Fort Worth, TX: Harcourt.

Canine listening without pre-judgement

So, if 45% of our time spent communicating is actually listening, are we? No, I don’t believe we are, primarily because we’re too full of our own self-importance rather than truly caring what the other person wishes to say.

This conversation we have with dogs is communication at an unspoken level, where there is an emotional response so lacking in many human situations that I can recall.

How many reading this have been bullied by a ‘so called friend’ into behaving not how you would wish to from your heart? On reflection this is usually as a result of their fear causing a manic desire for control & need to dominate.

If we looked at this from the other side of the mirror as in seeing what the speaker is seeing in us would we possibly change?

To do so we should enter into the conversation as a truly humble listener where the speaker has the most important subject to talk about – well it usually is to them.

Does your dog actually care about your dress sense, vocabulary / accent (unless you’re screaming at it) or ‘social’ status? A lot of which has been manipulated for a sense of power.

Faithfulness & Trust

What a dog probably cares more about is faithfulness & trust. Both of which can be established in human conversations through listening as a service to the person speaking.

Maybe it is time to quite our human cleverness both with ourselves and other species. The review below of Donna J Haraway’s When Species Meet expresses this clearly.

In this deeply personal yet intellectually ground-breaking work, Haraway develops the idea of companion species, those who meet and break bread together but not without some indigestion. “A great deal is at stake in such meetings,” she writes, “and outcomes are not guaranteed. There is no assured happy or unhappy ending-socially, ecologically, or scientifically. There is only the chance for getting on together with some grace.”

Ultimately, she finds that respect, curiosity, and knowledge spring from animal–human associations and work powerfully against ideas about human exceptionalism.

ISBN 978-0-8166-5046-0

For further insights to the trust that street dogs put in soldiers in war zones please visit

https://www.nowzad.com/our-work/soldier-rescues

Empathy & Reciprocity

If empathy is the ability to understand and share the feelings of another, which we seem to naturally have with dogs. Then why do we struggle in our human relationships? Is it because this relationship between a dog & it’s owner could be described as a form of mutualism as in the symbionts benefiting from each other.

Or are we just pre-conditioned to mistrust our human relationships from a survival aspect?

Reciprocity originates from the Latin reciprocus as in ‘moving backwards & forwards’ and thus if empathy is not quid pro quo as in Often times the concept of reciprocity arises when thinking about both the honour of giving and the honour of receiving as the basis for Native American philanthropy. Reciprocity is defined as “the obligation to return benefits for benefits received” (Moody, 1994). Further, Rebecca Adamson suggests that “The reciprocity [in Native America] is not quid pro quo but the gift is given, the beneficiary is expected also to give, not necessarily back, but on, so the gift is always alive” (Wells1998) https://www.learningtogive.org/resources/native-american-philanthropy-paper-i

Then is your gift of listening always alive and moving backwards & forwards?

So how can we practice our genuine listening skills to be of service to others?

One amazing way is through the work of programmes such as Karma Rescue’s Paws for Life Prison Programme in the USA

https://youtu.be/UlkM-eySqR8

where rescued dogs who don’t have much hope are trained to be sociable by inmates who have usually had nobody listen to them all their life. So that the dog develops social skills aiding its chance of finding a forever home & in reciprocation the inmates gain life skills enabling them to contribute to society after release.

This original blog was dedicated to the memory of Piran pup 11/06/2003 to 24/06/2018. Thank you for listening without pre-judgement & your faithfulness and trust. First published on 18/08/2018 on a previous website of mine.

*Those who've been a part of Reboundog, which will be 5 years old later this month, may observe that many of my observations above have been embodied in Reboundog, for example

Reboundog: Changing lives with pets and people ....one Sofa at a time

Our groundbreaking Sofa Meet-ups which create a trusted space for transparent & curious conversations to happen where we listen without pre-judgement

& to re-quote a few words from Haraway

"the chance for getting on together with some grace.”

In a few days time on May 8th we are continuing the conversation of Tech for Good where our guests previously discussed the potential of AI to benefit animal welfare.

This time we'll explore How can we empower excluded populations?

Reboundog Sofa Meet-up Emerging Technologies

How can we empower excluded populations?

The human-animal bond is a potentially huge enabler, but what if we changed the context to excluded population-animal bond?Then what if we explored how Emerging Technologies can help us scale that empowerment?

Reboundog is hosting Emerging Tech with Christopher Lafayette, Jean-Claude Artonne & Simon Robinson. Their Bios are in the LinkedIn Live Event description.

Make sure to attend it on May 8.

Please subscribe to & share our https://www.youtube.com/@reboundogtv

and also the blog traits underpin my Reboundog Coaching powered by Tricres

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NB: To help future clients during the current uncertain economic climate I have converted ALL programme fees from £ Sterling to US Dollars, saving you approx. 25%. Don't just bury your head in the sand, show true entrepreneurial spirit & invest in yourself & your team today.

Love how you're reframing “tough conversations” as growth levers—not roadblocks. When leaders combine emotional intelligence with systems that support smart action, everything shifts. Shenalyn Portugal

Reboundog Member News

Billie (Talyn) Groom

I am excited to announce I will be speaking at the PHAIR Animal Advocacy Conference in Scotland (yes, live! 😀) in July at the University of Edinburgh. This renowned conference brings together animal advocates, psychologists, and academia. The head speaker is none other than Peter Singer. I will be speaking on the necessity to implement human-psychotherapeutic practices to recognize canines as sentient beings. Thanks to my colleague, Marcus Neves, author of The Jacksons' Debate, for inviting me to join him to speak with him, leading to this wonderful opportunity. My goal for 2025 is to expand my PR to include LIVE conferences (I have done many virtual), which is a bit of scary move for an introvert (not the speaking part, but the travel and interaction). In May, I have the TedX Talk, followed by the International Anthrozoology Conference and then PHAIR, and I have others on the burner - stay tuned!As always, thank you for your support and all you do for the animals.

Gosh, Billie & I are planning to meet-up in person for the very first time as compared to Canadian travel distances I'm a mere 100 miles away.

Debbie Dahmer has invited me back for the 6th year onto her Voices Carry for Animals: Animal Advocates Radio on May 29th.

Topic: Changing lives with pets and people ....one Sofa at a time

Recent guests have included Liz Menegon & Billie (Talyn) Groom

I'm looking forward to my call with Beth Miller on May 6th. Always an opportunity for a wonderfully disruptive conversation.

Reboundog Updates

There are a few mega exciting things in the discussion & planning stages for which I haven't achieved the sign off yet. I'll hopefully be in a position to publish details in the next issue on May 11th (my apologies as this one was late going to press).

They have the potential to become the next chapters in the story of Reboundog.

In the meantime please subscribe to & share Reboundog News