Don't just do something ... sit there!

My cat, like all cats, spends a lot of time virtually motionless. She'll either just lay on the living room windowsill, or curl up on the recliner or my bed. Sometimes she sprawls out on the parquet floor. And a lot of the time, she stares quite intently at some unknown spot in the distance.

Cats, more than most creatures, and certainly more than humans, don't have a need to be busy or occupied. They're perfectly happy to find a cozy spot or a nice sunbeam to lay within, and just let life pass until something (like a bird), gives them a reason to spring into action. Sometimes I like to think that they're trying to reason out some sort of Zen koan: where does the human go when she walks out the door?

In many ways, Hattie reminds me that we all need to stop and contemplate, just as much as we need to have activity and meet our daily obligations. In other words, sometimes those obligations need to include inactivity. We get so caught up in having to do something that doing nothing seems wasteful and unproductive, except maybe when we schedule it as part of a vacation. Many of us beat ourselves up about it. But sometimes maybe our bodies -- and our psyches -- force the rest time.

Other times it's the cat who forces us to slow down and just sit there. Sometimes they plant themselves in your lap and just won't get up.