“I hope that you’ve come to this book because there’s a cat in your life you love. And assuming that you have, I am going to also assume that we are all here for other reasons as well, among them, because we sense a stirring in our souls that tells us the meaning of life is not fully explained by biology, environment, or luck. There is something else going on in the world. There is something we understand as ultimately mysterious and indefinable. . . . There is something more. In fact, for some of us, that may even be a name for God: Something More.
"Then, there is probably another reason. We know that the stirring in our souls is not simply a "feeling inside. So much that stirs our souls and waters our spirits is what we experience through our senses. It is what touches our skin, looks into our eyes, tingles our tongues, leads our noses, and makes noises that our ears take in all day long – that which comes through the created world surrounding us, of which we are only a very small part; all of it is essential to our spirituality. Most immediately, this surrounding world comes to us through the creatures that live in our homes. We have welcomed them in because we like how they stir us up and inspire us.
"I believe that a relationship with an animal is a part of our unfolding as human beings. There is a revealing and opening of ourselves as people that takes place in close connection to other species. They show us our animal side. They reveal the world to us in ways that books, and even other people, cannot. Sometimes, ironically, it’s the animal that even reveals our humanity to us. They help us discover our senses, responses, and feelings in ways that other humans cannot as much. If you have loved an animal, you have probably experienced this. You know what I am talking about.
"A spiritual dimension of life unfolds in a relationship between a human and another animal species. We begin to grasp our soul’s capacities, living with cats, in ways that human-to-human connections cannot as fully do. There is another mind and heart and spirit (yes, animals have spirits) at play around us, and we begin to unfold as we discover how and why we are different from these others. . . .
"To look upon an animal companion with an intention to find similarities of spirit and heart is to begin to know ourselves in an expanded way, but then to look upon an animal companion with a gaze of love, already grasping a shared understanding, brings something particularly special. If you haven’t experienced this already, I hope this book will accompany that experience for you."
