Ego bashing has been in fashion ever since humans woke up to the embarrassment of owning a consciousness. Here, instead of heaping more abuse on that part of our mind that we live our days in, let’s pay homage to Monkey Mind, that magnificent magician.
Monkey Mind is always on. Like a hyperactive meth addict found loitering downtown at all times, that conscious critter in the brain never really goes away, except when he is knocked offline with lots of drugs or a heavy blow. He never sleeps, until the creature sleeps too, and even then he comes onstage periodically to perform at dreams. What other part of the crowded bag of organs and algorithms known as a human being works so tirelessly and thanklessly, every waking hour and a good part of the sleeping ones too, without being asked to? Thank you, we say, to our lungs for breathing, our gut for digesting, and our kidneys for purifying. The Monkey Mind mainly just gets our abuse and condemnation, especially between the hours of 3AM and 5AM, for not being able to go the fuck back to sleep.
It’s so much fun for the Monkey Mind to catastrophize, dramatize, and generally be paranoid regarding all manner of things, whether he is thinking about that strange lump that could be cancer of the rarest kind, that new boss who may be angling to fire you since he asked for a meeting next week, the partner who may be cheating on you because people in relationships do that sometimes, or that creepy neighbor of yours who just doesn’t seem right and may invade your home while you sleep. Not to mention the ever present threats of chemicals in the food, toxins in the water, radiation at the dentist, financial meltdowns, unexpected bills, tax season, ageing, dying, termite invasions, 5G, AI, FOMO, terrorists, global petroleum reserves running out, the earth’s magnetic field suddenly flipping, the sun burning out, rogue asteroids, and that trigger-happy maniacal despot of that other country with access to nuclear weapons.
This is the Monkey Mind’s specialty, to extrapolate and infer from scant data, to take giant leaps of conclusions, and to work himself up into a crazed frenzy with or without any help from external reality. Anything and everything sets the Monkey Mind going, like a jittery caged animal suffering from lengthy abuse-related trauma. Nothing goes to waste, and even the most innocuous of itches, urges, and sensations are utilized as plot inspiration by the Monkey Mind to begin writing a sensational novella in the head.
A slight mid-day rumble in the belly leads to thoughts about being hungry of course, but the next act of carefully considering the pros and cons of various restaurant options for lunch is quickly interrupted and overwhelmed by a rising tide of thoughts that caution how that tasty dish being envisioned in the mind’s eye may impact one’s current body weight, which naturally results in a vicious self-recriminating diatribe about one’s dating prospects at that weight, which is followed by a short philosophical digression into the unfair nature of existence that prohibits such unmistakably delicious things as a tub of icecream from being a healthy snack, but since nature is generally beneficent while it is humans who are corrupt, one finally lands on the unmistakable conviction that there must obviously be a global conspiracy afoot via which big supermarkets and big pharma collude to prevent delicious foods from getting too healthy, and therefore one should probably visit that small, family-owned natural foods store that a friend has been raving about…
A quick glance to catch a reflection of oneself on any shiny surface and suddenly one is worrying, with unfailing persistence and for only the 9,128th time, that the ears one was born with might jut out too large, and soon one is wallowing in misery about how it’s just been one long line of big ears running in the family all the way down from great-grandpa, but then to remedy the hopeless situation one magically and heroically digs up a distant and faint memory of a fashion tip read in a magazine article about how the right hairstyle can disguise one’s facial features, from which one cunningly conjectures that haircuts are great and all but more pertinently it’s almost summer, and about time to buy a new hat to replace that brown one that is getting tired and misshapen, which leads to making oneself a silent and prudent reminder to thoroughly browse Amazon for outfits that evening after work, and finally ends with a steely resolve post a new and updated social media profile picture to conclusively prove to that ex from six years ago that one is still hot and desirable.
An approaching stranger across the street is quickly sized up and his evidently high fashion suede jacket leads to a reverie about wealth and success, which causes a splitting between two opposing factions of thought, one camp still firmly holding on to the belief that money can’t buy happiness, and the other camp working hard to introduce doubt into this notion, and as these two sides are busy trading arguments, they are ambushed in mid-debate by that train of thought that has been running on the same loop of tracks for six months now about how terrible one’s job is and what can be done about that, but since a new house has just been purchased and the mortgage is pretty high, one is clearly trapped – unless, unless – one can somehow manage to chuck that job and sell that house and move out of this goddamn expensive neighborhood and maybe relocate to Nicaragua… although, crime may be a problem there and one would be clearly a target of all those criminal gangs that prey on foreigners, so one must be careful to avoid living in shady towns where one can’t walk down the street at night alone, and just as these meticulous life plans are getting somewhere, the stranger in the suede jacket smiles at us to say hi and we’re back to square one.
And then there are those Easter Eggs that the Monkey Mind loves to leave all around our heads, such as when one has the sudden realization that the song “Livin’ la Vida Loca” has been playing on repeat all afternoon in the space between the ears, which, after the initial puzzlement fades, one can trace back step by step using old fashioned detective work to the very origin, which as it turns out, was the random sighting of a dog while driving to work that morning, which recalled the memory of a similar breed of dog that one had in one’s childhood, which led to some fond reminiscing of just how unconditionally loving that pet was, as opposed to the selfish sort of love one sometimes encounters in relationships with human companions, which was followed by an impromptu exercise of trying to stack rank one’s past girlfriends from least crazy to most crazy, but before long one had leapt into thinking that nobody could be as crazy as that one Puerto Rican woman that a friend was dating, and she was clearly loco, and Ricky Martin was from Puerto Rico too, hence that catchy song made perfect sense to pull up and loop on the brain’s jukebox. Really quite straightforward how Monkey Mind gracefully leaps and bounds from point A to point B, when one thinks about it.
Remember that children’s game called Telephone, where one player comes up with a message and whispers it into the ear of the person next to them, and so on until the last player tries to guess what the original message was? Each step garbles and modifies the message for a variety of unknown reasons. The game has no winner, and the entertainment comes from simply passing along messages, and occasionally comparing the original and final messages. Basically, Monkey Mind loves to play an endless game of Telephone in our heads, every second of the day, and this constitutes what we consider as a perfectly normal experience of the world for all human beings.
The difference between a ‘crazy’ homeless person and a ‘normal’ individual is that the former’s Monkey Mind has unrestricted access to their vocal cords and thus ends up speaking out loud the rambling torrent of thoughts, while the latter’s Monkey Mind generally stays muzzled and is prevented from vocalizing to avoid ridicule from others, unless this individual has just been cut off in traffic or landed a hammer on their own thumb. Both kinds of people talk to themselves, but the latter do so silently and thus can think much crazier thoughts in the private confines of their heads without anyone knowing.
Throughout the ages, wise people have attempted to come up with all sorts of strategies to try to banish the Monkey Mind. Basically, there are two types of tactics advised to those who wish him to go away. The first involves burdening the mind with some pointless and arbitrary task that completely occupies it. Examples include paying attention to such things as one’s breath, endlessly repeating a nonsensical chant, staring at a candle flame, scanning all sensations in the body from head to toe, or counting up to infinity by fingering the beads on a necklace. This is Meditation Type I, also known as Focused Meditation, which attempts to bring order to consciousness by focusing all attention towards a single point. The idea is that if one can fill up all available cognitive space with a chosen task, Monkey Mind is squeezed into a corner with no room to breathe and will ultimately begin to shrink, fade away, and curse loudly as he disappears in a poof. Empty thy mind of thoughts, the sages tell the desperate masses.
Obediently, folks try to do so, and that’s when Monkey Mind’s finest skill becomes apparent. He powers up the Random Thought Generator. Just when it seems as if all thoughts have been calmed, along comes a new one out of nowhere. A fragment of memory one didn’t even know existed, from years ago and of no relevance to today. Trivial details of mundane occurrences from the days past. The face of a stranger one will never encounter again. An item for one’s to-do list, an item already on the to-do list, or an item that has already been struck off the to-do list. A song caught in the head, a boil bothering on the butt, a nose needing to be scratched. Any odd thing will do, conjured up from thin air, for no explainable reason at all. Once that seed for a thought has been planted using the Random Thought Generator, along goes the Monkey Mind, merrily playing that game of Telephone again. Empty thy mind? Methinks no, says Monkey Mind!
Empty thy mind? Methinks no, says Monkey Mind!
Dedicated meditation practitioners – austere folks with shaved heads and years of experience in concentrating their attention – discover to their consternation that as they journey forward in the glorious pursuit of enlightenment, somebody has come along for the ride. The minds of monks are just playgrounds for Monkey Minds. He too grows older and wiser, marching alongside them, quietly yet doggedly like that man saying ‘Taxi Amigo?’ keeping pace with a tourist exiting an airport in Mexico. Monkey Mind doesn’t choose direct confrontation with such disciplined, no-nonsense types as they practice sitting with their legs folded in lotus posture on a hard cushion for hours on end. No, he waits for them to gradually get sleepy or sloppy or overconfident, as one always does eventually, and once they are slipping smoothly into dreamland or fantasy or reverie, that’s when he emerges and takes over. Playing that goddamn Telephone again. If there’s one thing Monkey Mind hates, it is being exiled from center stage.
Incidentally, this explains why addiction is so prevalent in society. All addictive things, from drugs to gambling to porn to video games, are essentially involuntary forms of Type I Meditation. Engaging in them brings temporary order to consciousness, without the need to use willpower to focus attention. They are legal outlets provided by the modern economy to help those really suffering under Monkey Mind to temporarily silence him. Thoughts automatically get suppressed as one loses oneself to the addictive activity or substance, which is the same as saying Monkey Mind has been sedated and subdued, or overstimulated and overwhelmed, at least for the moment. When addictive things are mostly good for us, such as sports or exercise or work, we euphemistically call it being in the flow state. When they are generally bad for us, we’re still in a flow state while it lasts, but the inevitable aftermath is ugly. That’s when Monkey Mind comes back online, as he always does, and he makes sure to tell us what a terrible human being we have been to cage him in a corner while we selfishly enjoyed ourselves with something that wasn’t even good for us. This, of course, leads to thoughts of shame, which can conveniently be suppressed by more of the same addictive activity.
A second, slightly (but only slightly) better tactic for dealing with Monkey Mind involves giving him some room to roam free. A tightly cornered animal is a fierce combatant, after all. Furthermore, if one cannot get rid of a foe, one must learn to make friends. This conclusion then leads to the practice of Meditation Type II, also known as Open Monitoring Meditation. Rather than trying to beat Monkey Mind down into submission with some arbitrary repetitive routine to overwhelm cognition with, the trick here is to merely observe as he runs riot. All types of stimulus coming into awareness are witnessed without judgement as they arise and dissipate, including the venerable Mr Monkey himself. Sights, sounds, smells, sensations, emotions, thoughts, all are observed without comment, unless they are indeed commented upon in which case the comments are observed too.
The brilliance of this technique is that one can do this at any and all times as one goes about the day, merely by learning to devote say 10% of the brain’s cognitive capacity towards the task of observation. The stupidity of this technique is that it is practically indistinguishable from actually not doing anything different at all. Many a times, a spiritually inclined soul who thinks he or she has discovered how to make Monkey Mind disappear will discover with dismay that they may have indeed succeeded. Then, whenever they thought they were busy meditating, a concealed primate was running the show from behind the scenes. Nothing is different, but they’ve fooled themselves that it is. Evidently, Monkey Mind does not like being observed, especially when he picks his nose or scratches his butt or generally engages in behavior that cast him in poor light and cause derision to fall upon him. It takes a saint not to judge oneself, and nobody is a saint. What else is a poor beast supposed to do but hide if thrown stones at?
So then the Observer gets better at not judging, and just witnessing. Monkey Mind flees like a mafioso under surveillance, driving like a maniac and taking one side street after another, trying to shake the Observer on his tail. His chosen detours of thought are by no means random, and designed to confuse. When all that fails too, he pulls out a sneaky tactic as a last resort. Now Monkey Mind knows the Observer very well, since he’s been around the scene just as long. He sees that underneath the Observer’s seeming calm and composed nature is an emotionally sensitive and fragile reactionary, easily triggered by scratching any number of wounds from the past. Fully aware that he is being watched, Monkey Mind leads the Observer to a small stream of memory, and enters it to begin floating downstream. The Observer, wanting to observe, joins him. Soon though, that small stream turns into a raging river of fear, anxiety, guilt, shame, sadness, or hostility. Monkey Mind then gets out, shakes himself dry, and stands by the bank to watch the Observer get carried away to drown in great currents of emotion.
The Mandukya Upanishad is the shortest of the Upanishads, the Vedic Sanskrit texts that supply the basic tenets of ancient Hindu philosophy and form a bridge between Hinduism and Buddhism. Mastery of this particular Upanishad alone is supposedly sufficient for knowledge to gain Moksha. Its twelve short verses discuss the syllable Aum; assert that the universe – Brahman – is this self (Atman); and present the four states of consciousness.
The first state is the waking state, in which we are aware of our daily world. Attention is directed towards objects both external and internal to the creature. Since the subject is lost in object contemplation, it loses awareness of its true nature as ‘subject’ itself, which is pure Awareness.
The second state is the dreaming mind. Attention is focused inward, in the imaginative realm of dreams, where both external and internal objects are imaged as if they were as real as they are in the waking world. Again, the subject gets caught in object contemplation in the dream world, and loses awareness of its true nature as pure Awareness.
The third state is the state of deep sleep. In this state the underlying ground of consciousness is unperturbed. Attention is simply not there, like the non-existent ripples on the surface of a calm lake when no rock is thrown. The creature is free from object contemplation but has not yet transcended itself. It is a state of bliss, except there isn’t anyone around to experience the bliss.
The fourth state is pure consciousness. It is the background that the creature realizes underlies and transcends the three common states of consciousness (waking, dreaming, and deep sleep). There is pure awareness of Awareness, without getting lost in conceptualization of objects. Only when this state appears do we realize that the seemingly solid physical world in which we live is also like a dream.
It turns out that Monkey Mind is very kind. Of course he fights back tooth and nail if one tries to corner him or shoo him away. After all, he is a very capable creature in his own right, and he does exist, and so he needs some living space to call home. One observes though that he is very careful to not overstep his bounds. He does not squat where he does not belong.
