Paw Prints & Pentagrams :: Part 1

Welcome to the Black Dog Star.  This is a new blog which will be focusing on the phenomena commonly known as Synchronicity.  To begin with I’m going to look at how my fascination with Synchronicity was kick-started by two innocent looking symbols: the ‘Paw Print’ and a ‘Pair of Pentagrams’.  Once the foundation for the story has been built in Parts 1 and 2 I’m then going to continue adding new layers in future posts, and gradually reveal what these two symbols taught me.  My intention with this blog is to provide you with some food for thought and hopefully lead you to some interesting conclusions of your own in regards to these two particular symbols:

So let’s start at the start and ask ourselves one simple thing:

What is the purpose of Synchronicity?

I asked myself this question about two  years ago while sat back in a comfy chair, half-heartedly watching the movie ‘Scooby Doo 2: Monsters Unleashed’. I watched as the main characters Scooby and Shaggy exited a limousine, and noticed two symbols flash up on the screen.  The first one which caught my eye was the ‘Pair of Pentagrams’ which we see here in the form of Scooby’s glasses:

The second one to catch my eye was the ‘Paw Print’, which we see here on Scooby’s signed photograph:

Now under any other circumstances I wouldn’t have given the Paw Print and the Pentagrams a second thought, but as I sat there watching the scene unfold I was puzzled to say the least.  The reason the two symbols grabbed my attention was because the previous day I’d been watching an episode of the Heroes TV show and had noticed one of the main characters holding the ‘Pair of Pentagrams’:

In this scene the character Noah (aka ‘The Man with the Horn Rimmed Glasses) had held a pair of tickets (above) while talking to his daughter Claire Bennet.  When Noah looked up from the tickets displaying the ‘Pair of Pentagrams’, I had noticed that there was a Paw Print to the left of his shoulder:

These were my very first encounters with the Pair of Pentagrams:

And my first encounters with the Paw Prints:

On the surface the Scooby Doo movie and Heroes TV show were completely unrelated, and yet they both had the exact same two symbols appearing in the exact same sequence. Weird, I thought. Maybe they were common symbols that appeared in movies all the time, and I'd just never noticed them before. I put it down to just another one of those strange little coincidences in life, but I started to wonder: What is the purpose of Synchronicity, and what do these random moments of coincidence mean? I had no answer to these questions so without a second thought I turned my attention back to the movie and forgot all about it.

However, a few days later I was tidying away some of my daughters toys and as I picked up a bouncy ball lying on the floor I noticed that it displayed the same two symbols. I’d found them in a movie, a TV show, and now on my sitting room floor!

Here is my daughters bouncy ball (slightly chewed by my dog) displaying the Pair of Pentagrams:

When rotated slightly we also see the outline of a Paw Print:

Holding the ‘Dora the Explorer’ bouncy ball in the palm of my hand I acknowledged the coincidence, filing it away in the back of my mind, and went on about my day. The symbols weren't of any personal relevance to me other than the fact that this was now the third time I'd encountered them in the space of a week.

Synchronicity wasn't a new thing to me. Like everyone, I've experienced strange things which defy the laws of reason, and I'm sure many of us have experienced déjà-vu at one time or another. I was always fascinated with these strange surreal moments which forced me to question reality. I'd wonder how I could have known that the person was going to say those exact words before they even said them. Synchronicity, in my mind, was like those moments of déjà-vu. They were strange occurrences that seemed to be completely random, and yet happened quite frequently.

At one point I had a journal to document the most bizarre moments and I would split the synchronicities into two groups.  There were the ones worthy of recording so I could look back at them one day and try to bend my head around them. Then there were the ones that were 'minor' examples, like thinking of a family member and the telephone rings, and it’s that very person on the other end. Or times when my mind would drift onto someone from my distant past, someone I never saw anymore, and I'd be walking down the street that very afternoon and who would I bump into? I didn't record those kinds of 'minor' instances, and initially I didn't pay much attention to the Paw Print and the Pair of Pentagrams, but that was about to change.

Sometime in the following weeks I happened to be watching the movie Spiderman and what do I see flash across the screen? You guessed it!  In this sequence we see Peter Parker chasing his school bus which has a banner displaying the Paw Prints and a Pair of (green) Pentagrams:

This time I was really scratching my head as I’d never observed synchronicity behaving in this manner before. I was coming into the path of these two particular symbols for a reason, but I had no idea what that reason was. I wasn't going out of my way to look for them, and yet they were appearing in my life with increasing regularity. After encountering them for the fourth time in ‘Spiderman’ I can honestly say that the symbols were now beginning to bug me (excuse the pun!).

At this point in my life I’d stumbled across the work of Jake Kotze who had developed a unique way of interpreting the synchronicities which he’d encountered in movies and mainstream pop culture.  His observations helped me look at Synchronicity from an entirely new perspective and without his Blogs, The Brave New World Order and The Blob, I don’t think I would have had the tools with which to craft my own investigation.  Many thanks for the inspiration Jake! :)

So I took some screenshots of the Paw Prints and the Pair of Pentagrams which had appeared in Scooby Doo 2, Spiderman and the Heroes TV show.  Saved on my computer for future reference I tried to figure out their meaning, but I just couldn't place them. The synchronicities were like separate pieces of a large jigsaw, but none of the pieces seemed to fit each other, and there were just too may gaps in the puzzle to make out the picture was meant to be.

I asked myself: If this is the universe nudging me 'from above' to pay attention, then why choose these particular symbols? There just didn't seem to be any message there - Paw Prints and Pentagrams....big deal!!! The Paw Prints suggested a path for me to follow, and on the journey I hoped I might figure out what the 'Pair of Pentagrams' represented.

So I gave up trying to fathom them out. I trusted I'd get to the bottom of them one day but the question was now firm in my mind: Could synchronicity be trying to teach me something? If that was the case, then who was the teacher? Was the universe placing the symbols in my path to steer my thoughts in a particular direction, or was I making a big deal out of nothing?

You can be the judge of that as I use this blog to go step by step through some of my findings,  but before we continue here's something you might like to test out:

Try thinking about a Paw Print and Pair of Pentagrams, or two symbols of your own choosing, and see if you can attract them into your life. You might be familiar with the concept of ‘The Law of Attraction’ and this is a simple way to put it to the test.  Spend no more that 2-3 minutes contemplating the symbols a day (for the first couple of days, or as long as you think necessary), and see if they manifest in your daily life. Don't go looking for them. They should come to you. You might see them while watching TV, notice them on a poster, or spot them while out for a walk, it doesn't really matter where. The symbols must come together as a pair, or you don't win the point.

Realistically you could be waiting a long time. The chances of it occurring once in the first couple of days/weeks would be great, and maybe something to tell a friend about. But what would be the chances in the long term, say a few months or a few years? Would you keep seeing the same pair of symbols connected with one another? Would you be willing, or even bothered, to put the time in to attract these symbols into your life. I certainly wasn't, and yet they kept coming anyway.

If you do decide to put this to the test and you get a result then I’d love to hear about it.  Please drop me an email or post your experience in the Comments section below.

Anyway, weeks passed without any new leads and once again I forgot all about the synchronicities.  That was about to change as I watched the kids animated movie 'Flushed Away' and the symbols ‘blipped’ onto my radar once again. Here we see the red Paw Print on the plaster cast of this Rat:

A little later on in the movie the Pair of Pentagrams made their appearance in the form of the bottle top chair in this scene:

In ‘Flushed Away’ the two symbols didn't appear in the exact same sequence like the previous movies, but the fact they appeared at all suggested that I pay attention.

The Frog in the 'Flushed Away' scene above (a character in the movie called 'Le Frog') was voiced by the actor Jean Reno. Because he appeared in a scene beside the Pair of Pentagrams I wondered if he had any other connections with the Paw Print. I followed the lead and discovered that Reno starred in the sequel to the Pink Panther movie. Notice anything familiar?

At this early point in the investigation a third symbol came to my attention.  The next clue came in the form of two letters - PP.

I noticed that the 'Paw Print' and the 'Pair of Pentagrams' both shared the initials 'PP'. So I decided to put this new symbol to the test. For the letters 'PP' to be of any relevance to the investigation it needed to fit the previous pieces of the puzzle I'd already discovered. If it fit snuggly then it would become my third symbol (or sign post) which I hoped would help point me in the right direction.

So I looked back at Scooby Doo and found a connection to the letters 'PP' through his sidekick Scrappy Doo, whose catch phrase in the show was 'Puppy Power!' It was a mantra he repeated in every single episode when he was about to take on the villain.

Next up was the Heroes TV show. Claire Bennet and her father Noah were certainly involved with the Paw Prints and Pentagrams so it was no surprise to discover that Claire’s brother, one of the other major stars of the show, is called 'Peter Petrelli'. So far so good.

Next I looked at the ‘Dora the Explorer’ bouncy ball which was responsible for my third encounter with the symbols:

First I found a reference to the Dog and the letters ‘PP’ through the phrase ‘Puppy Power’ (notice that the Pair of Pentagrams make an appearance at the top left):

Dora was also linked to the (PP) Purple Planet:

Next up was Spiderman, and he was simple. All I had to do was look at the name of the hero himself in the form of: Peter Parker.

In the movie 'Flushed Away' I'd found 'Le Frog' (Jean Reno) beside the Pair of Pentagrams.  He also starred in the ‘PP’ resonating 'Pink Panther 2'.

So far each synchronicity was connected in some way with the initials PP – Puppy Power, Peter Petrelli, Peter Parker, Pink Panther, and of course the ‘Paw Print’ and the ‘Pair of Pentagrams’.  While doing some research on the Pentagram itself, I learned that it was originally called the (PP) 'Pythagorean Pentagram':

So was it just a random series of coincidences that kept bringing these three sets of symbols together? The investigation was beginning to evolve and I learned that the letters PP would need to become an integral part of constructing the jigsaw puzzle. Any future synchronicities now had three criteria to fit:

1. The movie/episode in question featured a Paw Print
2. The movie/episode in question featured a Pair of Pentagrams
3. There was a connection to the letters PP

As you can see, I was making up my own rules as I went along. I still had no idea where the synchronicities were leading me but I wanted to fine tune the process nonetheless. If I was ever to find out the meaning behind the symbols I needed to narrow things down a little. My search was beginning to evolve, but I still didn't have a clue what I was really in search of.

Weeks would go by without anything of interest, and then while watching 'The Chronicles of Narnia' there was my next clue on a piece of old parchment:

Now I never found the Pair of Pentagrams in this movie, but it just so happened that there was a ‘PP’ resonating character called 'Peter Pevensie' in the very same scene as the Paw Print. Peter Pevensie was the eldest of the four children who visited Narnia, and it was Peter who slayed the Wolf 'Maugrim' whose Paw Print we see above.

One of the most recent clues came in the movie 'Kung Fu Panda'. The star of the movie is the ‘PP’ resonating  'Po the Panda'. In this poster we see that the Paw Print is a visual stand-in for the Sun. Notice the rays of light emanating from it:

Up until this point I didn’t really know what the Pair of Pentagrams was supposed to represent. I had no context for them, and therefore couldn’t understand their significance.  I had no idea that ‘Po the Panda’ would help point me in the right direction.  From the ‘Kung-Fu Panda’ poster I concluded that the Paw Print was somehow connected to the Sun.  After-all a Sun is a Star, and synchronicity suggested that the Pair of Stars/Suns (or ‘Pair of Pentagrams’) were somehow connected to the Paw Print.  I now had a new way of interpreting the symbolism of the Pentagram and a new place to begin looking for answers – outer space!

I found confirmation for this new theory when I took another look at the ‘Dora the Explorer’ bouncy ball.  Here we see an impression of the Paw Print:

However, when we look at what this Paw Print really represents, we find that it’s actually a Sun:

If I was being ‘nudged from above’ to look up at the constellations and stars, then why was the Paw Print of a Dog/Wolf relevant, and which Star/Sun was synchronicity pointing me towards?  Was it the Sun that lies at the heart of our own Solar System, or was it one of the millions of Suns/Stars which are visible in the night sky?  The words ‘needle’ and ‘haystack’ sprung to mind!  And even if I did learn the identity of the Sun which I was supposed to be focusing on, what was the relevance?  Why was it important?  Why, why, why!!!!

This Sun/Pentagram relationship was something of a breakthrough for the investigation for reasons which will become more apparent as we progress. To say I was confused at the start of this journey would be an understatement (and if your confused reading this, then I don’t blame you!), but I trusted I was being lead somewhere interesting, and lead there for good reason. The answer must be in the details, so I waited patiently for further signs and looked at the details.

In Part 2 we’ll take a look at some of these leads, but as we’ve come to the end of this introduction let's do a quick recap on what I had to work with. Here are all the 'Pair of Pentagram' synchronicities looked at so far:

Here's a recap on the Paw Print connections (let’s also recall that each one is linked to the initials ‘PP’):

In Part 2 we’ll take a closer look at the Paw Print and the Pair of Pentagrams, while also examining the symbol of the Solar Cross, a Dog called Gromit, a serial killer called Dexter, a Red Hand Print, the DNA helix, and an archaeo-astronomer with a passion for binary stars.  All will be revealed!

I hope you enjoyed this introduction and hope you’ll join me in the next section: Paw Prints & Pentagrams Part 2,  where the story continues and we take a step closer to understanding who, or what, the ‘Black Dog Star’ really is.

Thanks for reading!

RA