06/16/2026
“But why? ...But why? ...But why?”
If you’ve ever spent time around a young child, you know this relentless loop well.
Children are natural investigators because they aren’t satisfied with surface-level answers.
But somewhere along the way to adulthood, many of us stop asking “why.” We replace curiosity with assumptions.
In the pet world, we see a challenging behaviour and immediately focus on the “what”:
“The cat is peeing on the rug.”
“The cat is pacing around the house.”
But if we stop at the “what,” we fail the animal. We have to reclaim that relentless curiosity and look for the underlying reality.
The What: A cat completely abandons the litter box.
But why? Because it hurts to eliminate.
But why? Because they have active, unmanaged gastrointestinal distress like Feline IBD.
When we stop asking why, we end up trying to train away pain, modify a symptom, or blame a psychological trigger that isn’t actually there.
Behaviour is communication across the board for all species. But truly listening means refusing to stop at the surface. It means looking deeper than what we can see and asking “but why?” until we uncover the actual root cause.
When did you stop asking why? Let’s start asking it again.