How to Think Like a Cat - Stephane Garnier 2018

Your Cat Knows What It Wants, and Is Direct About It

’There are many intelligent beings in the universe. Most of them are owned by cats’

OLD POLISH PROVERB

Cats don’t beat about the bush when they want something from you; they will pester you until they get what they want. Cats are demanding, and you can’t dupe them with a new brand of kibble if they’re not crazy about it. At best, your cat will sulk, or knock over the bowl, and you’ll be forced to put the new pack away in the cupboard and go out and buy the usual brand. Your cat knows what it wants and will stick to its guns.

By the same token, you will never be able to force your cat to come in at night if it’s strolling about or happily ensconced in a flowerbed two feet away from you.

Cats are excellent hunters, and when they are pursuing their prey nothing can distract them from their objective. This stubborn obstinacy is the cat’s great quality. Cats always know what they want. There’s no point even trying to negotiate.

How often should we ourselves have to make compromises according to some external factor?

There’s a saying that goes: ’I don’t really know what I want, but at least I know what I don’t want.’ I only half-like this saying, which often serves to cover up true desires which we sweep under the carpet, not believing ourselves capable of attaining them.

’What do you really want?’ is a question that we should all ask ourselves regularly and with the utmost honesty. All too often we end up settling for what our friends and family ’want’ or ’expect’ of us, rather than what we ’believe’ we are made for. We forget the motivations and desires that truly drive us.

’What do you really want?’ Cats know exactly what they want, and spend their whole life focused on that alone.

Knowing what you want is one thing. The second step is to give yourself the means to achieve it, to be demanding and direct in your aspirations. Don’t beat about the bush.

This mania we all have, to a greater or lesser extent, of avoiding saying exactly what we wish to say or clearly asking for what we want, is exhausting in more ways than one.

Be straightforward. Don’t be scared to call a spade a spade, to tackle subjects directly, to tell the truth as it appears, and to state explicitly what you desire. Be direct, and you’ll save both time and energy.

Finally, although cats know what they want, they do more than merely demand it through their attitude or behaviour (at least we humans are fortunate to have the power of speech): they act.

Be direct, ask. ’I want, I can, I do!’ should become as natural for you as proud whiskers are for a cat.