Today’s Daily Stoic writing prompt: Am I in rigorous training against false impressions?

There is no hidden meaning in a cat who has settled on your lap.  There is no dissembling.  The language is unambiguous. The cat has chosen to be there, perhaps after some period of turning herself about, paws kneading, determining whether to settle. Or perhaps you have placed the cat there, in which case the cat then decides whether she agrees with this or does not.  In any case, no cat sits in your lap that does not wish to be there.  The cat’s agenda will soon be made manifest.  She will nudge your finger to be scratched in the spot of her choice.  Or perhaps she will rest her head on your hand. Perhaps she will doze.  Or perhaps she will just be, until that time she wishes to be elsewhere.  But there is no mind to be read, no intentions to decipher through clues, no ulterior motive to elicit.  A cat on your lap wishes to be there until she does not, and, with the knowledge that until then, you know her mind with certainty,  you may govern yourself accordingly.

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