by Jester

Created on: July 18, 2009   Last Updated: July 19, 2009

In what universe is "Training your cat is possible"? Seriously, you humans are so gullible. You'll believe anything. It is not possible to train a cat. I should know. I'm a cat. Given the proper motivation, a cat might...I say might...do some of the things that you ask. But, read my lips. (Yes, cats have lips.) A cat will not be trained.

Let's take a look at this topic from a cat's point of view. After all, if you're silly enough to attempt to train a cat, doesn't it make sense to at least ask a cat how to accomplish this? Starting with the title of this article, do you notice anything wrong? Of course you don't, you're a human. If you were a cat, however, the words "your cat" would jump out at you like a mouse from a cheese tray. No cat is ever "your cat". Even if he's lived with you for years, sleeps on your head or sits at the table with you while you eat dinner, a cat is always his own cat. A better title for this article would have been, "How a Cat Will Fool You into Believing He's Been Trained".

No other animal has mastered the art of fooling people like a cat. For generations, cats have handed down tried and true methods of fooling people into believing they've been trained. Think about this for a moment. If a cat knows you're going to like him, possibly even love him, whether he's trained or not, why would he do anything more than the minimum necessary to keep in good standing?

While the cat who lives with you has more than likely built up quite a long list of ways of fooling you into believing he has been trained, the top three are probably:

1) Responding to basic requests like, "GET OFF THE KITCHEN COUNTER!"
2) Performing perfunctory tasks like using the litterbox right after you've cleaned it
3) Using the scratching post before using the arm of the chair

So, if you can't train a cat, how do you at least motivate him to do what you ask? The best way to begin is to realize that you control nothing and he controls everything. It is a proved scientific fact that a cat has three times more Free Will than a human. It's also important to understand that a cat is not motivated by a pat on the head or the phrase, "good boy". He could not care less whether or not you think he's good. He is more likely to do what you ask if you give him something useful, like a treat.

Unlike dogs, cats respond only to practical rewards for which their time is not wasted. Find out what that reward is and maybe, just maybe, "your cat" will let you think you trained him.

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