CHAPTERS on Spirit animals

and failing to set goals for 2024 🐱

Welcome back!

To celebrate getting married on NYE we ran off to the countryside the following weekend for a ‘mini-moon’ and the most unexpected thing happened. I encountered a fortuitous visit from my spirit animal.

I know this sounds very cooky and you’d be forgiven for thinking a screw has been loosened over here! So I feel I should state for the record that I’ve never been sold on the spiritual world thing before. Okay, I admit, I do enjoy a star-sign deep dive to assess a friend’s compatibility with their potential love interest. And I did once go and see a psychic because it was a freebie but that only dispelled any believability around this sort of thing. So stick with me here if you’re a cynic because I was sceptical too.

It’s been a heady few weeks and this year looks set to be a busy one. I already feel like 2024 is going to fly by but at the same time the last few days, for me, have felt long and reflective. (Anyone else?!) As January is the traditional time for resolutions, I’ve been doing my best to decide on some goals for 2024. In previous times intention-setting has been an enjoyable, exciting and easy task for me, particularly in my 20s. I was striving to tick off the checkboxes on the list of life’s big milestones prescribed to us all by societal norms - save money to buy a home, find a partner who I love, get a promotion etc.

However, now edging towards my 33rd birthday I’ve been thinking beyond the set of socially-accepted criteria for success. My goalposts have widened to consider more important but less tangible things - finding worth and meaning in my work and the existential questions around having a child. These two topics swirl around my brain like one of those retro screensavers bouncing from corner to corner. My goals are unclear and kind of intimidating me and so instead I’ve been trying to accept and find peace in that - but sometimes it makes me more tense when I’m trying to locate my zen. (Anyone else?!)

I had hoped that a trip to the spa on our mini-moon would help. Joyfully I lay face up on the massage bed covered by a blanket, eyes masked with a little towel, luxuriating in an hour of reflexology. I've always loved the idea of spirit animals but I realise now that I deeply misunderstood their true meaning. They have nothing to do with the fact you liked giraffes as a child or think you have an affinity with urban foxes. I’ve since learnt that a spirit animal is your guide from another realm. It chooses you and, in my case, can appear unannounced to offer some guidance via an unsuspecting hotel masseuse.

As I sat up at the end of the treatment she asked, 'Do you have a grey cat!?' the question blurted out as though she'd been holding it in for longer than she could stand. “No…” I said, eyes still half closed, baffled. She seemed a bit embarrassed. “Okay, I don’t know what it means but I've been getting a really vivid image of a grey cat with specks of black in its fur and bright blue eyes. Are you going through a lot of change in your life?” This question, though more generic, was more accurate. I nodded. “Ah okay,” she said “I think it must be your spirit animal.” She told me to look up the meaning later on and at this point she had really lost me. I didn’t know what to make of it.

But then she went on. “You’ve had problems with your kidneys in the past, they are weakened.” Correct. “Your intestines too.” Correct. “You’ve hurt your shoulder I think?” Correct again. How she got all this just from touching my feet I will never understand. “You need time alone to feed your soul, you recharge from alone time?” Again. Correct. She explained that my masculine (right side) and feminine (left side) energies were fighting each other and this was causing me a lot of confusion. My work life was changing, my provider instinct was kicking in and my maternal, caregiving voice was trying to be heard over this noise. She reckoned the cat had something to do with this and might be trying to help me through it. Perhaps representing the feminine voice. She reiterated that she didn’t know the meaning of the cat and urged me to look it up later. Which obviously I did as soon as I was reunited with my phone.

If this isn’t some sort of message from the universe then I don’t know what it is.

The grey cat is believed to be a sign that you have been going through a transition period in your life and are coming out the other side. Grey cats are a symbol of independence and they help people find their way when they are confused. They are a reminder to spend time alone, enjoying your own company. They are a symbol to trust in your gut feelings and follow your intuition. They help you work on your version of balance in life and are here to reassure you that this transition will improve your overall wellbeing. It's a sign of acceptance, perhaps in the form of accepting defeat, accepting some things are out of your control and accepting that things will get better.

I read about the grey cat’s spiritual symbolism for days after. There are so many ways to interpret the meaning. Arguably it can mean whatever you want it to and that in itself is interesting. I found out that in some cultures the grey cat is presented to newlyweds to bring them good fortune. (I’d like to choose this meaning please!) Some see the grey cat as a sign of luck, others as an omen of change. Of course it could all be utter rubbish but I am in total amazement at this experience. It seems closed-minded to disregard symbolism in every day life, particularly when you’re in a state of flux.

Listening to your intuition is all about noticing the things you are drawn towards, following that little voice in your head and trusting the process. When something unusual crops up it reminds me that much of what will happen this year is out of our control. Your version might not be a spiritual experience but perhaps it’s learning something new from a chance conversation, maybe it’s missing the bus and then crossing paths with an old friend or stumbling across a tv show, film or book which changes your world view. No matter how easy or hard you’ve found setting goals for 2024, I hope this provides a comforting reminder that there is only so much you can do. The rest is up to the universe. And you never know when you might have an unexpected visit from a spirit animal.

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See you next week xx