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Jimmy Just Is.

Jimmy parachuted into his new life at the nursery. Then he tried to become friends with everyone. For months he had been surviving on his own, living off birds and rabbits.

He’d had enough; it was time for rest and recovery. Looking at him, it was obvious he needed serious medical attention, and it was administered a couple of days later.

Was he grateful? Not if his expression was anything to go by. But that was Jimmy, never let his true feelings show unless it was anger and aggression.

He had to win over three other inhabitants of New Brook Cottage. After a year, he nearly managed it. Along with one other friend, and two others, Jimmy would be going to a new home.

Rumoured to be descended from a long lost local sage, Jimmy’s closing account of his life at Scruttom is destined to become a feline classic.

‘So, at last we are going are we?’ purred Jimmy to no-one in particular. He was a little agitated, remembering the last move his previous keepers had made, and it brought back painful memories.

‘I’m told moving house is one of the most stressful things you humans can do. I’m wondering why that might be. You seem to thrive on stress, with divorce, loss, speaking in public and imprisonment also pushing your buttons. Aren’t most of the things that stress you out caused by your own actions?’

‘When I’m settled in down the road, I too will look back on all this and smile. It begs the question why I can’t make myself feel better now by smiling.’

Jimmy was in his element, fundamental questions about feline and human existence were his bag.

‘So let’s follow this through. I’m only partly fazed by the move. And only that because my keepers are. It rubs off. So if I make myself smile, believe life is a can of red salmon, believe everything is for the best when all around me is being clawed and bitten, I’ve cracked it?’

‘Logically, I need a new set of beliefs. Beliefs which will create a new reality for me that make me immune from pain and suffering?’

Ginger tom Max, Jimmy’s nemesis, was just out of paw’s way, but he was listening to all this and absorbing it better than fuller’s earth cat litter.

‘I’ve heard Jimmy’s keepers tell him that everywhere they have gone, ‘problem cats’ have all been ginger toms. And yet despite my battles with him, they still feed me. I’m wondering if they are fools or just too nice.’

Never one to just rest on his blanket, Jimmy found comfort, and answers to difficult questions by being in communication with the Great Cat [God to everyone else]. He always adopted a very reverent expression and become very calm and composed when he was doing it. What follows is Jimmy’s dialogue with the GC.

‘If I think about my life so far, it’s been created solely by my own beliefs then? I reckon these are the ones that have caused me the most trouble:

• grey and white cats good, ginger cats and dogs bad

• life is a struggle

• only some humans are to be trusted

• too much cat food makes you lazy and stops you moving

Let me get this right. All the bad stuff in my life is because of what I think. So, from now on, I’ll believe:

• cats, dogs and all animals good

• life is a perpetually clean litter tray

• you can trust all humans

• you can have all the cat food in the world and still move

But I’ll have to have another one won’t I? I will have to believe that life will be great from now on. If I don’t, the next knock I get [so life won’t be great] will take me back to the first list.’

The Great Cat never hissed or squawked. He never told Jimmy what to do. Jimmy just ‘goes with the flow.’ He’s still in there:

‘So, I’m next to Max, who up to now wants to eat my dinner. So I believe Max is an angel and my dinner is safe? What about Max’s beliefs? Because I think he’s an angel, will that be enough to stop him being hungry and greedy? So, I can change the world by just believing everyone is wonderful.’

‘How many cats does the world need to believe we are all angels before it comes about?’

Jimmy couldn’t get his ahead around the idea that Max couldn’t talk to the Great Cat. Part of him was convinced he never would, because how could the GC lower himself to speak to a mere ginger tom? More likely was it that the Dirty Dog [the devil to you and me] had Max on his payroll.

The Great Cat, if he had an agenda, which of course, the Great Cat couldn’t have, was to convince Jimmy to just be, rather than take on the human obsession of doing.

Max had his own life, and whilst Jimmy might fight him and face him down, it was inconceivable the Great Cat would ‘fix’ him for his ’mate’ Jimmy.

Often [almost always] the Great Cat would say nothing. He left it to Jimmy to work it all out for himself. For reasons he could never explain, he couldn’t get this thing about being out of his mind.

He began again.

“So, whatever I want be now, I am. I am happy now, despite ‘evidence’ to the contrary.”

Then he thought “What is evidence? I notice Max, but two of my feline siblings don’t.”

Then he did something amazing. He started to pay attention to his thoughts.

“I’m always thinking about eating and facing other cats down. Whatever I resist persists. And if I’m always thinking, don’t I need information to think about? Suppose I slowed down or even stopped thinking for a while, might I see things as they are, rather than filtered through my eat and face down mind-set?”

Jimmy appeared to be on the brink of a great discovery.

“We are told [by those who wish to liberate us, rather then enslave us] that we should become feline beings.

In order to do this [we’re like humans in this respect] we need to know why, what it is, how we can do it, and what happens when we do.

Why? Because DOING ULTIMATELY GETS US NOWHERE. And our minds [yes even us cats] are programmed by wall-to-wall doom and gloom. Being helps us find the solution to life’s opportunities and delights, rather than spend for ever thinking about them. We can change how we are feeling by changing how we are being. Being raises our awareness. Doing gets us face-to-face with the immovable object!

What is Being? A ‘state’ or place that requires no effort to maintain it once we are there. Happiness? Be happy. Abundance? Be abundant. It is a choice, not a response. What I am being gives birth [and meaning] to what I am doing. When I am happy, I don’t need anything else. In truth, I don’t need anything.

How can I be? By just being! Meditation and silence will prepare me for it? Being isn’t something I do is it? How can it be? I just am. We cats are silent for 18 hours a day. It’s our birthright.

Am I grateful for all this? You bet I am. Isn’t gratitude a state of being? It feels like it is.

And what happens if I just am? I wake up! I see and experience the world as it is! No need for facing down, pre-occupation with the dish. I am aware. I am at one with the Great Cat within. My life flows.”

Jimmy also reflected on the fact that he didn’t need to trust all humans. Some would do him down, but if he was in a being state he wouldn’t come across them.

When he and his siblings eventually moved, he felt he was already home.

He often thought about the quote he had once heard Max utter:

‘The language of the Great Cat is silence.’

At least he thought it was Max. He was grateful to whoever said it.

Jack Stewart, April 2008.