Are you a dog person or a cat person? Or maybe you favour horses, canaries or gerbils?
Heck, I like the lot of them.
I have to admit that even snakes can be quite beautiful, when they are not anywhere near me or biting my dog.
But what has this got to do with the expectations we place on people and organisations and things?
Well, sit right down and let me tell you a story…
I was out for a walk when I noticed one of my neighbours had a new puppy rolling around on the grass at her feet. Fat as mud, and cute as cute wishes it could be. It went off for a crazy circuit of the yard like it was being pursued by the Hound of the Baskervilles, before coming back to do a short program of tail chasing at her feet again.
Now such a vision is going to get my attention at any time — who doesn’t love a puppy? But I almost got whiplash from the shock, because I know this person is a dedicated cat lover. Not just in the “my cat did the cutest thing the other day” kind of way, but in the “one of the unspecified number of cats who rule my life did the cutest thing the other day” kind of way.
So what is she doing with a dog?
Me: “You’ve got a puppy!”
Neighbour: “Yes. But I don’t know if I’ll keep it.”
Me: “Oh, why not?”
Neighbour: “It’s so dirty, it doesn’t keep itself clean. And it’s noisy and rowdy and it won’t leave me alone. It follows me around everywhere.”
I have had both dogs and cats in my life, and it strikes me at this point in the conversation that what she is describing is a dog from a cat’s point of view. I am too tactful to say this out loud, but I can’t help a followup question.
Me: “So why did you get a dog?”
Neighbour: “Well I always wanted one of this particular breed, right from when I was a little girl.”
And there we have it. She wanted something imaginary. The thing she wanted looked like this breed of dog, but behaved like a cat, cleaning itself, acting calmly, and respecting her personal space.
It was extremely easy for me to identify this flaw in her thinking, as it so often is when we look at the behaviour of others. 😉 But as I continued on my walk it dawned on me that I do exactly the same thing.
I want something imaginary and get frustrated when I don’t get it. Here’s a few of the ones I’m guilty of:
- Expecting a multi-national corporation to act like a small family business and care about my problems
- Believing my knees will cope with that mountain, and pouting when they hurt afterwards
- Wanting the weather in Brisbane to be like Alaska, and getting cranky when it’s hot and humid
- Expecting a risk-averse person to behave like an entrepreneur, and getting frustrated when they can’t see the possibilities.
Do you ever do this sort of thing?
Ah, so many options for cat-n-dog expectations in human life! But you know what the answer is that I am continuing to discover on a daily basis? Brace yourself, there’s a cliche coming, but it’s actually appropriate this time:
It is what it is.
Ha. 😉
So next time I find myself getting hot under the collar about someone or something that should have behaved differently, I’m going to ask myself: “Belinda, are you expecting a dog to behave like a cat?”
What about you? Do you struggle with expectations that are imaginary? What do you to do to cope with it?
Hi Belinda, me (again!). I enjoyed reading this so much the first time had to read it again 🙂 I just wanted to add to my first comment that i think the most important thing in life is to know “thyself”. It’s an important thing to have dreams, they fuel our imagination and keep us sane ( I think), but, as you say, we have to be able to rightly identify which ones are doable and which ones are daydreams. I think this is much harder than it sounds because papers/media are constantly telling us how to lead our lives and what we “need” to have or how we need to “behave” in oder to be fulfilled. It can be very confusing to know what we actually really want/need etc This is why posts like yours are so helpful. They help address the balance and remind us that having realistic expectations can make life more rewarding, so much less stressful and fun 😉
It’s so true, Marianne! We are bombarded by messages about what we should want — it can get hard to know what we actually want, as opposed to what we want to want. And I seem to be horribly persuadable. (How embarrassing 🙂 ) Sounds like you’ve got an idea for your next blog post. 🙂
Priceless – thank you Belinda! My new favorite saying will be ‘the dog’s behaving like a cat again’ – it makes me laugh – the perfect antidote for frustration. The old cliché was too melancholy for me.
Thanks Kate. Enjoy your dog’n’cat days! 🙂
You crack me up! I love the analogy. It’s perfect in every way❤ Thanks for being such a fresh breath of air, another appropriate cliche☺
Jacqui, I thought it was quite funny how easy it was for me to see my neighbour’s “problem” with her puppy, and yet how hard to see my own equally ridiculous expections. 😉
Ah, yes, the theory is always more tempting than the practice…
Mind you, having said that, my cat follows me around everywhere and is obedient like a well-trained dog, so I have the best of both worlds! Great analogy, Belinda!
Sounds like a splendid cat, Marina. I once had a cat who would lie under my chair to keep me company, same as a dog would. He was a treasure.
Ha ha ha! Brilliant! I couldn’t agree more, although I think just very occasionally some dogs can behave like cats and some cats like dogs 😉
You’re right! Growing up, my family had a cat that thought it was a dog. Hmmm… some thoughts there to apply to the rest of life. 😉
I think that’s definitely a universal! Just in the last couple of days I’ve found myself getting incredibly frustrated with some of my cat’s less charming quirks. They don’t do any real harm other than to knock the peacefulness level of things down a notch or two, and I realize that the only reason it’s as frustrating as it is… I’m expecting her to be able to be something other than what she is.
People are who they are and will only change if they feel a pressing need to change. Things will continue on even if we wish they were something else. The key to less frustration is definitely acceptance.
The next time I find myself getting frustrated because something is what it is rather than what I wish it was, I may just ask myself your question: “Am I expecting a dog to behave like a cat?”
Rei, I’m training a puppy at present, and I sometimes get so frustrated, because he’s being “naughty”… but I guess he’s not actually being naughty, he’s just being a puppy rather than a mature dog, and a dog rather than a human. If only I could remind myself of my own advice!
Acceptance is so important in every part of life.
Thanks for stopping by, it’s nice to have you here. 🙂
“Dogs And Cats And Expectations | Real Life on
a Beautiful Planet” definitely got myself addicted with your page!
I reallydefinitely will be back way more regularly. Thanks ,Bernardo
Ah yes, it’s dogs and cats and so much more. And while I continue to work on releasing expectations of humans, I will never give up wanting my cat to stay the heck off my paper-covered desk with her litter-tracking paws and restrict her existence to ground level, just like my dog. 😛
Haha. I have a cat-loving friend who hasn’t had a Christmas tree since she got her cat 16 years ago. And I thought, smugly, “Lucky me, I have a small, well-behaved pooch, who stays on the floor and leaves all my stuff the heck alone.”
This coming Christmas, (if he survives that long) I will have a very young, larger dog, who loves to leap at things and explores the world through his mouth. Hmmm…
I’m sure there’s a moral to that story that could be applied to our human relationships, something about flexibility and adaptation, but for now I’d better just go move a few more things out of reach of the dog. 😉
I think sometimes we have to lower our expectations or at least not place an expectation onto something or someone else. I love animals too, so I was pleased to find your blog. Beautifully written, Fiona
Thanks Fiona. Glad to meet another animal-loving writer! 🙂
I’ve learned that we often want the ideal of a thing, rather than the thing itself. When I was young, I wanted a certain breed of horse. It was unaffordable, so we bred one of our mares and got a halfbreed.
This turned out relatively well, but as I grew older, I still wanted that special horse. We live in the country and have our own hay and barn, so the only cost involved is the price and the work to care for it.
But now when I see one of those horses on the silver screen, what I see is not the horse, but the amount of work, time and training that got that screen horse to the stage it’s at.
In line with your neighbour’s experience with the puppy, my life lesson is: sometimes (often) wanting is better than having.
Hi Louise, it’s funny that you mention horses, because I have always adored horses, but being a city girl, it was more of a pop-star type adoration. Yes I got to ride one a few times, but mostly I just loved them from a distance, in that silly way that many little girls do.
As I grew older, it began to dawn on me that they were not only expensive but also a lot of work, and so I stopped nagging my parents for one, and just enjoyed the dream. Nowadays I love to see people who really know horses riding them and interacting with them at shows etc.
You are right that some dreams are best kept as dreams. Why spoil it? 🙂
Thanks for stopping by.