Question
Greetings,
I'm currently writing a magazine article about meditation. During
my research I have come accross the term "monkey mind" often.
Can you please explain how this term came about? Was there
any particular Buddhist monk or abbot that coined this phrase?
Much appreciated,
Chris Bird
Answer
Hi, Chris.
Thanks for the note. I have no idea who first used the term but I think the origin and meaning of it become clear if you try to sit quietly without doing anything in particular.
We like to pride ourselves in controlling our minds, in accomplishing creative things with our minds and in the sense of intelligence. And these can be good and useful qualities of the mind. But anyone who has spent quiet time letting go of any particular activity of the mind and just letting the mind reveal itself as it is - along with everything else around us revealing itself, the sounds, the movement of the air - can soon see that there is an aspect of the mind that is highly reactive, automatic, restless, fueled by fear and anxiety. And that the mind can learn to suppress itself or redirect itself but is helpless to fundamentally free itself from this automatic reactiveness.
This is what's called the monkey mind, though I think monkeys are much more alive and responsive. To describe it more concretely, we can notice that we have certain automatic patterns of reacting, for example maybe when someone criticizes me I sort of physically cringe in a certain way, get depressed and have certain typical kinds of thoughts that go around and around, maybe about how I could please that person and then about how dare they criticize me and then about how I just feel bad about myself.
Looking carefully at this reaction, sitting quietly with it without trying to change it or interfere with it, one may notice that the whole process is happening as an automatic thing on its own. It may also become clear that at a certain point it is not helpful, just the same thoughts running over and over until one is exhausted, as the thoughts seem to also stimulate the body in certain ways that alternate between energizing and draining. This is the aspect of the mind that runs on blind habit reactions - the monkey mind.
The deep question for many people in coming in touch with this in themselves is "Is there any alternative to this meaningless and exhausting working of the mind?"
I will stop here and if you have more questions, please feel free to contact me again.
Best wishes,
Jay Cutts
