Who’s Kicking Your Cat?

I’m sitting in my office when Jake’s dad walks in with a big smile. He was so excited to tell me how Jake is doing at home. Not only is Jake listening the first time his parents ask him to do something, but he’s also being kind to his cousin. The boy who once struggled to share is now happily sharing toys and helping out.

That conversation made my week. Hearing stories like Jake’s reinforce the belief that the work that we do here goes well beyond the dojo walls.

You see, improvement like that doesn’t stop with Jake. It spreads. Jake’s cousin benefits. Jake’s parents are happier. His cousin’s parents feel it too. And when families are happier, it shows up everywhere, at work, in relationships, in the community. One small change in a child can spread outward in ways we’ll never fully see.

But this cascading effect works both ways.

One of my favorite Zig Ziglar stories is called “Who’s Kicking Your Cat?” A boss gets a speeding ticket on his way to work and storms into the office fuming. He snaps at his sales manager. The manager, now irritated, barks at his secretary. She goes home and yells at her son. The boy, annoyed, sees the family cat stroll by and gives it a swift kick. Ziglar’s point is simple: Wouldn’t it have been easier for the boss to just kick the cat himself and spare everyone else? Then he asks the deeper question: Who’s kicking your cat? Or, even more important, whose cat are you kicking?

Our actions, good or bad, spread outwardly in ways we rarely get to see. A bad mood can travel from one person to the next like falling dominoes. But the opposite is also true. When Jake learns respect, patience, and self-control on the mat, those same qualities show up at the dinner table, in the backyard with his cousin, and in the way his parents interact with each other. Happier kids make happier homes. Happier homes make stronger neighborhoods. The positive wave keeps moving, often to people we will never meet.

More than four decades ago, my own Sensei, Luis Chiock in Lima, Peru, passed those same lessons on to me and to hundreds of other students. And I have watched thousands of students walk through our doors here in Colorado. Yesterday, as I watched our older students in the instructor-training program, I caught a glimpse of something great: those lessons will keep traveling long after I’m gone, through my students, through their students, and into families I will never meet.

So here’s the choice we all get to make every single day: Will we pass along frustration, or will we pass along kindness? Will we kick someone’s cat down the line, or will we be the person who brightens their day, lifts their week, and maybe even changes the course of their life?

You may never see the full effect of your smile, your patience, or your encouraging words. But trust me, it’s there. And that invisible, far-reaching effect is what makes every human interaction so important and meaningful.

Sensei Willy Strohmeier

Colorado Karate Club