Cats, by nature, are perpetual and territorial. They thrive in dependable, familiar, safe, and secure environments as a part of their nature. This is just how cats are designed to be. They enjoy homes with safe boundaries and where they can see familiar faces every day. They like to make territories in environments they can trust and be dependable on.
However, some cats can be additional aggressive, withdrawn, or portray immense behavioral problems like extreme spraying and scratching around the house. This has everything to do with the confidence levels of cats. So if you want to change the behavior and instill confidence in your cat, you would need to instill high confidence in them while growing up.
Here are some ways you can get that done:
❖ Deal with Cat Behaviors in a Consistent Manner
As mentioned above, cats thrive in environments that are dependable and familiar. So to encourage kittens to grow into confident cats, you will have to deal with their behavioral problems consistently from start to finish that are familiar to their senses. Giving your cat predictable outbursts of reactions to their behaviors will provide them with a greater sense of familiarity.
Stay consistent with reactions to your cat’s behaviors that annoy you, like scratching the furniture or urinating on the kitchen counter. You will need to call out their behavior time and time again for them to be able to predict and get familiar with the reaction. This will significantly help you tame the cat and help it grow into a confident animal.
❖ Pick a Meal Schedule and Stick to It
For more familiarity and taming the behavioral problems of your kitten, as well as making it more confident as it grows old, you must keep a consistent feeding schedule for your cat. Food usually is a touchy point for cats.
To tame your cat’s fierce and independent quality, keeping consistent and exact feeding schedules can help immensely. It is also a great source of easing anxiety and stress in cats as they grow up. In any case, if your eating or working schedule is not the same as your cat’s and does not allow you to be home when it’s time for your cat to eat, you can try assigning a feeder for consistency. For instance, you can ask your neighbor to feed your cat at consistent times every day in case of your absence.
❖ Push Cats to be More Curious
Cats have powerful instincts to understand and get familiar with their surroundings. If you want to instill growing confidence in your cat, the best way is to encourage curiosity in them. Push them to explore their surroundings, smell, listen, taste, watch, and touch around in their territories to be more familiar and confident as well.
Give free space to your cat around the house to explore and get used to its surroundings. But make sure this activity continues for as long as they steer clear of any danger to themselves or other family members.
❖ Ensure a Safe and Secure Environment
As already mentioned above, cats thrive and stay confident in environments that they find safe and secure to be present. Give them a safe space inside the home where they can take a break from the active playing and love around the house. Because every cat, regardless of how brave and outgoing they are, needs it.
Cats typically find safe and secure corners in closets or under the sink of houses to be in private for some time. But make sure that these places are cleared of any danger like bacteria or harmful components for the cat. If your cat is still a tiny kitten and hasn’t carried out this activity yet, create a safe, secure, and isolated corner for them yourself and give them a place to relax from the buzzing house.
❖ Encourage Hunting and Interactive Playtime
A cat can be confident if it is independent in its territory, feels safe, and stays curious to find new interactive activities. Encouraging interactive playtime for your cat will instill a sense of hunting in them, which is a great way to boost confidence nonetheless.
Playtime that encourages hunting and interaction can be playing with a laser, stick, ball, or a fake mouse. This helps your cat develop hunting, preying, and killing instincts and makes them more confident. Suppose, in any case; your schedule does not permit you to give your cat an interactive playtime every day; a battery-driven toy can get the job done in your absence as perfectly as anything else.
❖ Keep Low Volumes Around the House
If you have noticed, you would know that a cat’s hearing ability is extremely sensitive compared to human beings. The same is the case with dogs as well. In fact, it is stated that a cat’s hearing is five times more than a normal human being’s hearing sense.
So startling and loud noises can instill fear in them, which is directly proportional to lowering confidence. Such loud noises can be over the top for their hearing senses and create an unsafe environment inside their own homes. This, in turn, breaks the cycle of familiarity and can affect the confidence build-up of your cat. Suppose you do not have direct control over loud noises in your house, temporarily or permanently, give your cat a safe space to isolate, away from the startling noises.
Final Thoughts
In the end, it is essential to notice that every cat has a different nature and personality from the other. At the same time, their underlying behavioral problems and reactions can be various because of different past events as well.
So design confidence-building activities for your kitten according to its nature and personality. Carefully gauge the behavior and moods of your cat to devise a perfect confidence-building activity plan that will work for them perfectly in the end.
But don’t worry, the task isn’t as complicated as it seems. Building up confidence in your cat can be extremely easy if you start from an early age.
