What Cats Taught Me About Trust, Trauma, and Healing

All right, let's talk about the cats. Some of you are wondering about the cats, especially people who are over on Instagram where I do a lot of cat updates here on YouTube. Not so much, but uh I'm going to explain it all. What's with the cats? Okay, so as you know, we're here in Soulward Studios. This is the podcast studio in the basement of Soulward's uh studio. Well, so Soulward Studios is in the basement of so the Soulward's house which the first floor functions for events, classes, Fabangans. The basement is where we do our studio. Okay. So about two years ago, a little over two years ago, when I got this property, which is a half a block from the from the Babach's resting place, I started to notice there were some stray cats that wandered around the neighborhood. And you know, I get ideas from time to time, just random ideas. And it popped into my head. I was like, "Hm, I wonder if I can get those cats to trust me." And I've I've never owned a cat and didn't have cats growing up. Um not sure I've even previously ever pet a cat. I've seen them. They're all over the place, but I had no particular connection with cats. But I I thought, wouldn't it be interesting to see if I could get these cats to trust me? So, what the first thing I did, I went to the dollar store and I bought some pet food and I put it out and they would not come anywhere near it if I were around. And I had to go inside, close the door, or they would not eat the food. Then I could come outside and they would eat the food if I were like standing like really far away, like 100 ft away. Um, long story short, it took me a year, but I eventually won their trust. Now, if you want the whole saga of winning the trust of the feral cats, you can go look at it. It's on the first uh link here, the YouTube link. So, this is a video. I actually did this with Avi Fishoff at his crisis center for parents. And um I explained these are parents who are dealing with kids who are high risk, who are dealing with a lot of issues. And I explained to them what I learned from winning the trust of these feral cats about how to put another living being at ease and win their trust. And that a lot of times when you have kids who are traumatized, some of the basic skills of how to like put off uh easygoing energy and how to make a safe space and how to practice energetic self-containment. You learn that from dealing with feral cats. So, if you want to check out the whole saga, it is this uh it's 27 minutes and 2 seconds here uh on YouTube, but it tells you the whole saga of the stray cats if you don't have the patience for it. So, I can show you some clips of the stray cats. Uh let's go to here. This Instagram link, link number two. This is when I'd already won their trust to the point where they would hang out by the door. Uh they sort of somewhat trusted me. So those two guys, the black and white and the orange and white, were my first cat teachers. And they taught me so much about relationships in general, about respecting the space and the autonomy of another living being and how to form bonds of love without encroaching. And it was really it was eye openening stuff that I knew, but I had to internalize it on on a deeper level because cats are not codependent. That's one of the things I learned. Um, you know, maybe dogs are a little bit people pleasers and they'll put up with behavior from people that they don't necessarily like. Cats, if they don't like something, that's it. They're not they're not going to make themselves uncomfortable for you. At any rate, I learned so much from the cats. And that was that was the first thing. And I did it as an experiment just to see if I could do it. Okay. So then I guess, you know, it could be that because I got used to cats, I started noticing cats more. It could be because I got used to cats. Cats sense in me that I'm a kind of person who can handle cats. I definitely know that cats read people really well and they know who to interact with and who not to interact with. So, it could very well be that the cats sensed something in me that they knew, oh, that's a that's an experienced person. He's he's he's safe. Uh, no, I don't think the cats tell each other. I don't think they have like a WhatsApp group where they let people know who which people are safe. But I do think there people who are safe for cats, they give off something and cats know it. At any rate, that was my first foray into the feline world where the two stray cats at the Soulwards House. People ask me, do I have names for them? No, I don't have names for them. They're not my pets. I don't own them. That's one of the lessons I learned. I don't own them. They are wild animals. They live outdoors. You're going to say, "But it's so cold. Let them come in." I've opened the door hundreds of times. They've actually come inside the house. They'll walk around a little bit, but then they leave. I've even put out shelters in the backyard. They don't use the shelters. These are wild animals. They That's how they live. that I guess they were um you know they were feral for so long they just they can't be socialized. Now if you noticed um they have like a flat ear. It's called an ear tip. That's because somebody did TNR trapneuter release on them. So they uh they've had medical care and uh that was taken care of by whom? I have no idea. Um, but it's a common thing for like animal control to do. And then they just because they're not socialized, they're not adoptable, and they just put them back in the outdoors, wherever it is they come from. And that's that's these cats. Okay. Now, chapter two in my cat journey was a couple months ago, I started seeing a cat hanging around my house. my actual house where I live in five towns, not the Soulwards house which is for uh the Soulwards community where we do events and where we have the Soul Words Studios, but at my actual house in Five Towns. So, I started seeing this cat. My kids were noticing the cat and this gray cat. And then one day my kids told me, "Hey, the the cat has a kitten, a little baby." And I I hadn't seen the kitten, but then one day I did and it was actually it was the day before uh which is known as a shiner. It's the last day of sukus. And I pulled up and this little kitten, this little calico kitten was looking really pathetic and crying. And my kids were like kind of like looking at it like, "What can we do for you? We don't even know what to do for you." So I picked up the kitten. I brought it inside. I posted it on Instagram and I said, "Guys, I'm experienced with feral cats that don't really need my help. I'm not experienced with kittens. I'm not experienced with this kitten clearly looks like it's needing some help. What should I do?" And thank God, um, it's one of the advantages of having hundreds of thousands of followers on Instagram. Within 10 minutes, I had hundreds of comments saying, "This cat needs to go to the vet right now." And it was true. I brought the cat to the vet to Dr. Waters, who I'd never met before. I just randomly called vets until they said, "Bring her in right now." And uh Dr. Waters is now like our official soulwards vet in uh Huelet. Uh and anyways, I brought I brought this cat in and she said, "This cat would not have survived the night." And if you want the story of this cat, um you can you see the link that says uh story of Tova's rescue. So here's the here's the story right here. Let's click on it. Here's some still shots when I brought her to the vet. That's Dr. Waters office. I brought it she's wrapped in one of my old t-shirts. And then there's Dr. Waters checking her out. She was in bad shape. And that's what she looked like. And this is what she looks like. Well, that's what she looked like in foster care. And then also go to um the next link, the Instagram link. Tova now adopted. This is what she looks like now. All clean and healthy in her forever home. Tova has been adopted. And I didn't name her Tova, but um the her foster care, her foster mother uh knew that a rabbi had found her and wanted to give her a Jewish name. So she called her Tova, which means good in Hebrew. And she is good. She's a good little cat. And um so her name is Tova. She's a little calico, little calico long hair. And she has a forever home. A lot of people were saying to me, "Rabbi, she's yours. The cat distribution system brought her to you. You got to adopt her." And I spoke to my wife and she's like, you know, we're busy people with a lot of responsibilities. I'm not sure we're ready for cat adoption. And I was like, thank you for keeping me grounded. And realistic, you're right. We're not ready for cat adoption. Um, we're really not ready for cat adoption. I'm going to tell you in a 2 minutes how I know I'm not ready for cat adoption. But I I if I would have adopted any cat would have been Tova because she was the kitten who we found her when she was, god forbid, almost at death's door. And thank God now she's living her best life, healthy, happy, living with a loving family who has another cat for her to play with and she's doing great. Thank God. Okay. Oh, regarding Tova's mother. So, I just want to um You see that link there? Tova's mother's still living outside. So, just click on that. So, she's she's gray. People call her a Russian blue. I think that's the name of an actual breed. I don't think she's a particular breed. I think she's just a gray cat. Um, she basically lives on my porch in Cedarhurst and I'm in touch with people to trap her and get her proper medical care and uh, God willing, we may even have news about that today or tomorrow that she will be trapped and she'll be given care and then they'll see how she's not really sociable like uh, I've tried the tricks on her that I did with the two strays of the Soulwards house. I was able to scratch her head a couple times. She barely tolerated it. Uh since that that was a few weeks ago. Since then, I wasn't able to touch her again. She just she's not into She'll come very close, so she's not like terrified of me, but she doesn't want to be touched, which is you got to respect that. You know, that's the one thing the cats teach you. Um you know, their boundaries are very clear, and you got to respect their boundaries. But we'll see. They're going to trap her. And if she is sociable um or potentially could be socialized, then we'll try to adopt her. Otherwise, they're going to do uh you know, like they did like whoever did it with the these ferals here, the TNR, they'll do the TNR, uh for you know, that's what animal control does. They uh they just re-release them if they're if they're too feral and they'll just re-release them to uh where they come from. And I put out food for her. So, and she, you know, if that's her choice to live outside, then she'll live outside and, you know, I'll provide food for her. Okay. But now here's here's the latest development. So, people were contacting me. I guess people like the cat content, or at least a certain segment of my audience likes the cat content. Some people don't like it, but which is which is fine. It's a real thing that's going on in my life. I don't do it for the clicks. Actually, it's really part of my life. So, I share part of this. Um, so a lot of people were saying, "Oh, Rama, you have a really great way with cats. You're a cat whisperer." Definitely not a cat whisperer. I don't think I'm amazing with cats. But it's undeniable. I did have some success with cats that were not socialized and winning their trust. And okay, so you know, if you have a talent, you have to use it. This is one of the tenants of our faith that when God gives you a gift, you have to show appreciation by using the gift. So people were saying, "You have a way with cats. Really, you should use that gift." A lot of people were saying you should adopt Tova, which I already told you, you know, I had a discussion with my wife. It's like we're not ready to adopt any cats. All right? So, we did not adopt Tova. Um, but there's there's a Instagram account called uh Strays of Brooklyn and and she said to me, "Listen, Rabbi, um, no pressure, but I have all the strays that I can I I take rescues off the streets in Brooklyn. I have all my spots filled right now, and there it's getting cold outside, and I want to trap some more and bring them inside, but I'm full. could you take a cat or two off my hands just to foster? And I said, "Let me try it. Let me try it." So I said, "First of all, um, give me like easy cats." I give I said, "Give me two because it's not going to be at my house. It's going to be at the Soulart's house and, um, you know, they're going to be alone at night because this is like a workplace." So, uh, give me two of them so at least they have each other at night. Um, I said, "And give me easy ones." So, she says, "I I have these two brothers for you." They are brothers. They were both rescued off the street. And here, look at this link here, the Instagram link called Fosters. Just click on that. This is a picture of them last night sitting on my couch. Now, it makes it look like they were immediately chilling out. They weren't. Um, first of all, they didn't want to come out of their crate. I had to actually pull the blanket they were sitting on to get them out of the crate. And then when they were out of the crate, they hid in the corner. They didn't want to come out of the corner. Um, but I just chilled out for a few hours and did work on the computer and event they're in the office of the Soul Words House and eventually um they were able to like hang out with me and then by the end of the night, you know, by 2:30 in the morning, they're just sitting on the couch being all relaxed and they're very mellow, very relaxed boys. Um, anywh who, I'm officially fostering them at the Soulwards house right now, but we're looking for a forever home. And that's that's where we're up to right now. I'm so glad I did not adopt Tova because last night was the first night of h of fostering these two cats. I'm overwhelmed. I've got a lot of guidance. Thank God. I'm in touch with Dr. Waters. I I'm in touch with a few different people who are experts. You know, Strays of Brooklyn, uh there's another local person does a lot of cat rescue. I'm in touch with a lot of great people giving me a lot of guidance and advice. I'm glad that I've had the experience. Um but you know, yeah, I'm definitely not for a forever home. And this isn't a forever home anyways. This is a place of I don't want to call a place of business, but this is this is not a a home. A family doesn't live here. This is the soulward's house. This is for um public gatherings and meetings and classes and stuff like that and for recording content. Okay. So, we are looking for a forever home for these two boys. Now, how about this? I'm sitting in Soul Words Studios. I told you they're hanging out in Sward's office, which is literally next door. I think I'm going to try to see if these two boys, they're brothers, they were dumped by, they're so social. Um, the sad story about them, they're both one years old, is that they're from the same litter. They were dumped on this. They're clearly they were not born in the wild cuz they're so comfortable with people for whatever reason. Somebody just dumped them outside and Strays of Brooklyn uh picked them up and grabbed them. They weren't chipped or anything. Now they're chipped, by the way. They're chipped. They have a clean bill of health. They've been checked for everything, all the tests. They're they're completely healthy, thank God. And they're chipped now. Um and and and they're fixed. So everything's been done with them. And uh I'm going to go see if they want to make an appearance. So just wait a second. Okay. >> Okay. Hopefully this gets these guys adopted. Helps them find a forever home. Come on YouTube, do your thing. Um, I call these guys these are two brothers and they're tuxedos. They like to wear black and white. So, I call them Jake and Lwood. They're also on a mission from God to teach you kindness to animals. Anyways, look at these guys. These they they are so chill. Like this is their first day, their first 24 hours here in these new surroundings. And look how comfortable they are with affection. And look how calm they are. If you're looking for cats that are just going to like hang around and give you warm fuzzy vibes, these these brothers are totally your uh your winning choice. Anyways, contact us. serious inquiries only for responsible, experienced cat owners who are going to give them a real proper forever home. Uh you can contact us at uh [email protected]. You can email us [email protected]. These are the boys. Anyways, h it's a little overwhelming. You know, I have a litter box in the office. and it smells funny and I have to feed them. And I mean, I'm used to feeding stray cats, but with stray cats, if you don't feed them, then they'll find food somewhere else. With these guys now, they're depending on me. So, it's a lot of pressure. And yeah, it's a growth experience, but uh I would love if they would find a forever home soon. Anyways, boys, look at the camera. I told you they're just relaxed guys. They just They're just relaxed. That's it. They just chilled out.