Switch off your Monkey Mind
Monkeys in Plumb Tree
Mori Sosen, 1747-1821
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What’s this about a monkey?
The monkey mind concept comes from the Buddhist teachings. The untrained mind is restless and has a tendency to jump around from one thought to another chaotically, like a monkey playing in the trees. How many different conversations do you have in your head throughout the day and what purpose are they serving?The content of these internal dialogs are usually things like: earlier conversations recreated and touched up, rehearsals of future conversations, and various types of self-talk. If you have ever done any type of meditation practice you know that internal dialog is a major obstacle to success. This internal dialog is almost always with us. Sometimes it is soft and in the background while we are focusing on something, and other times it sneaks up on us and we suddenly find ourselves in the midst of a full on imaginary conversation.
Why switch it off?
The most obvious reason is that it distracts us from things. Sometimes we are working on something and or minds keep going back to a conversation that we had earlier that day, adding things that we wish we had said and then filling in the response of the other person. This is not only a time waster, it also clutters up your mind. In some ways your mind is like a computer operating system; if you have too many applications running at the same time, it slows things down. The other big reason to switch off the Monkey Mind is that it is impossible to be fully in the present moment with all that inner dialog.
To be fully in the present moment requires a still mind.
Internal dialog can be continuously controlled and used for creative purposes; however, for the most part it just runs completely out of control. How much time and brain power have you wasted just drifting off into imaginary conversations? No matter how many times you recreate that conversation in your head with your new witty and clever responses, you are not making any progress. In fact the less inner dialog that you’ve got going on, the more likely you are to be witty and clever in future conversations.
The Switch
Okay here it is, the most powerful and quickest way to silence your monkey mind: Relax your tongue! Next time you find yourself in the middle of an internal conversation, check your tongue. It will be tensed up. Go ahead and release is, let it just relax. When your tongue relaxes, it feels like it is getting thicker as it sinks down to the bottom of your mouth.
Develop the feeling of your tongue deeply relaxing:
This is the off switch.
Practice with different imagery to develop this feeling. The more you develop this feeling of your tongue melting and relaxing, the better the Switch works. Go ahead and include your jaw as well well as all the muscles in the face, especially around the eyes. The tongue is primary but the jaw and facial muscles are also involved.
The Switch works because the tongue is heavily involved in the sub-vocalization process that is occurring as your internal dialog is going. By keeping the tongue from activating, you are basically short circuiting the internal dialog process.
Monkey on Leash
Ando, Hiroshige 1797-1858
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Practices
The main practice is to take a few minutes out of each day to work on developing the ability to deeply relax the tongue. It is the feeling of the tongue deeply relaxing that needs to be anchored. During a period of meditation use the Switch as your focus rather than your breath for a while. Any time you catch your mind drifting you will notice that your tongue has also tensed up. As long as your tongue is completely relaxed your mind will be silent. Maybe it would be better to call in a push button rather than a switch because as soon as you let off the button, the mental dialog will start up again. After regular daily training, the base level volume of your inner chatter will start decreasing and will be easier to maintain.
After getting the basic feeling for it while sitting with the eyes closed, you can now start using it while doing other things. Start out by walking. See if you can walk for five or ten minutes while keeping the tongue relaxed. While walking, or meditating, you should also practice relaxing the jaw and face as well. This will help you relax even further.
The next thing to practice is using the Switch while listening to someone speak. In social situations it is more difficult to maintain the Switch because you will be engaged in nonverbal communication with those around you. It is very difficult to use your normal facial expressions while keeping your tongue quiet. Still you must learn to relax the tongue while you are listening. Many people are only partially listening to others; in their mind they are preparing the next thing that they are going to say. By keeping your tongue relaxed you will become a better listener because you will be more present with the speaker. The best way to practice this is while listening to a lecture of some sort. That way you will not be interrupted so often by the need to speak or use facial expressions. Soon you will be able to absorb more information because your mind will be silent and it will not take much of your attention to keep the tongue relaxed.
Hawk and Peonies
Source:http://lightworkers.org/wisdom/julie-miller/213770/switch-your-monkey-mind
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