Of Mindsets and Monkeypots

Petr Karel Ontl, "Of Mindsets and Monkeypots" (BPS/ATI); Dhr. Seven (ed.) Wisdom Quarterly

I'm going ape over your dancing, baby. Dance, baby, dance! (rawstory.com)

  

Monkey King

In rural India, I am told, there are people who earn extra money by trapping and taming monkeys to be sold into slavery as pets.

 

Over the years, through trial and error, several ways have been devised to capture these clever but greedy/grasping primates. But the simplest method is said to be THE MONKEYPOT. 

Hey, monkey, it's a trap. Just let go! (redxb9)

In a clearing, the trapper fastens a short piece of cord or chain to a stake or tree-stump. To the other end is attached a small pot with a narrow neck. Into this pot are dropped several nuts, fruit, or a clump of precious salt, and a few more are scattered on the ground. The trapper then hides out of sight.

 

Soon a band of monkeys arrives and descends to feed. Before long, one of them discovers the contents of the pot. It puts its hand in the pot easily enough. But having grasped the enticing treat, it cannot pull its clenched fist out through the narrow opening no matter how hard it struggles. 

[Why? Its narrowed hand can go in the neck, but its full hand is too big to pull out -- and, due to its grasping nature, it never thinks to let go.]

Lust is the strongest manifestation of SENSUAL CRAVING, tanha and lobha or thirst and greed, just as VIEWS are the mind's obsession (Williams/laluzdejesus.com).

 

It panics in fear and the trapped monkey creates a ruckus, which brings the trapper running with net and cage or skewer. The monkey's fate, for all its cleverness, is sealed.

 

At first glance it would appear that the villager is the trapper, the baited pot his trap, and the poor monkey his victim. No doubt the villager sees things this way. The hapless simian, were it able to speak, would probably agree. 

However, a closer look shows a different perspective. The villager is NOT the trapper, nor the pot the trap, because there is nothing holding the monkey:

It could very easily remove its hand from the pot and rejoin the free monkey in the treetops if only it would let go of the nuts, the fruit, the salt. If it would only let go!

  

Monkeys only? 

I just want more and more love and...

The monkey in this anecdote does not suspect that it is being held prisoner solely by its mind. It has found some treat. 

Greed -- unreasonable and unreasoning desire -- has arisen. Though the jungle abounds with nuts and fruits and salt and all kinds of foods, the monkey's conditioned reaction dictates that it must have these as well.
 

Its narrow mindset is the only thing that imprisons it, that prevents it from letting go, from seeing the absurdity of this predicament, this enslavement, this "trap" -- or the obvious way out of it.

 

Now, before anyone makes any smug comments about the monkey and its intelligence, or the apparent lack thereof, and before we congratulate ourselves on our vastly superior reasoning powers, let us see where we ourselves stand.

 

This business of letting go is so easy, yet so hard, for monkey and for human alike. We are both caught up in the same predicament. The details may differ, played out on higher levels of sophistication or complexity [and higher ones where celestial beings are caught up in more alluring space worlds], but the end result is the same: enslavement by concepts and conditioning. 

While the monkey is done in by its greed for a few nuts, we humans are done in by our greed for wealth, fame, power, status, pleasure, and shiny trinkets and toys which we believe we absolutely must have and cannot live without. 

You're still not getting it! I want what I want when I want it, and I expect you to know what that is without me having to explain it every single time. I don't think that's too hard!

 

Even more fundamentally, we become enslaved by our attitudes and feelings toward them.

 

We endlessly seek gratification for the senses: pleasant things to look at, to listen to, to touch, to taste, to smell. Moreover, we are spurred on by thoughts or concepts created by our ego-driven minds. 

These last can be the hardest to satisfy since we cannot just please our senses and be content. Rather, we strive to fulfill fantasies of outdoing our peers, of turning them green with envy by having the biggest, the costliest, the latest, the shiniest. We are caught up in competition, in a game of one-up-manship. 

 

It cannot even be said that we are materialistic: We don't know how to be! We do not genuinely enjoy and appreciate the material things we have, much less life itself. We don't even know how to relax. More

• Petr Karel Ontl was born into a Bohemian-American family in Prague, Czechoslovakia, in 1942 and emigrated to the USA in 1949. He has been a Theravada Buddhist for the past 20 years affiliated with Bhavana Society, West Virginia, USA.

Five Bonds of Desire: Monkey Mind (sutra)

Amber Larson, Dhr. Seven, CC Liu, Wisdom Quarterly translation based on Makkata Sutta by Andrew Olendzki, "The Foolish Monkey" (SN 47.7)

"Monkey mind" is mental frenzy brought on by the Five Hindrances (patheos.com)

A monkey with a foolish and greedy nature will soon be ensnared (childhoodrelived.com).

 

On Himavat, king of mountains (the personification of the Himalayas), there is rugged and uneven land where neither monkeys nor humans wander.
 
And on Himavat there is rugged and uneven land where monkeys indeed wander, whereas humans do not.
 
And on Himavat there is a level stretch of land, quite pleasing, where both monkeys and humans wander.

There a hunter set a sticky trap on trails used by monkeys in order to ensnare them. Some monkeys there were foolish by nature, but not greedy. Seeing the trap, they stayed away.

The burnt nose she-monkey (motifake.com)

But there was one monkey who was both foolish and greedy by nature. He went up to the trap and grabbed it with his hand. His hand got stuck there. "I'll free my hand!" he thought. And he grabbed it with his other hand. It got stuck there.

Thinking "I'll free both hands!" he grabbed it with his foot. It got stuck there. "I'll free both hands and a foot!" he thought. So he grabbed it with his other foot. It got stuck there.

"I'll free both hands," he thought, "and both feet!" He grabbed it with his snout. It got stuck there.
 
Now that monkey, ensnared in five ways, lays down and howls. He has fallen into trouble, fallen into ruin, for now the hunter can do with him as he pleases. Not releasing the monkey, the hunter skewers him then picks him up and goes off with him. This is what happens to those who wander beyond their range, in the sphere of others.

Therefore, meditators, wander not beyond your range, in the sphere of others. Wandering there, Mara (the killer, the corrupter, obstacle to enlightenment and liberation, the personification of death) will gain access, will gain a foothold.

Whoa, you're skating on thin ice, boss! - What? I'm just monkeying around, worker.

  
Beyond one's range
And what, for a meditator, is beyond one's range, the sphere of others? The five strands of sense desire are. What are the five?

1. forms discerned with the eye -- appealing, pleasurable, yearned for, and lusted after
2. sounds discerned with the ear...
3. fragrances discerned with the nose...
4. flavors discerned with the tongue...
5. touches discerned with the body -- appealing, pleasurable, yearned for, and lusted after. 

These, for a meditator, are beyond the range, in the sphere of others. Wander within your proper range, in your natural sphere. Then Mara will not gain access, will not gain a foothold.
 

The range of meditators

What, for a meditator, is within range, in one's natural sphere? The Four Foundations of Mindfulness are. What are the four? Here [in this Dharma and Discipline], meditators:

1. One abides observing body as body -- ardent, mindful, clearly aware, leading away from unhappiness and worldly concerns.
2. One abides observing sensations as sensations...
3. One abides observing mind as mind...
4. One abides observing mental phenomena as mental phenomena -- ardent, mindful, clearly aware, leading away from unhappiness and worldly concerns. 

These, for a meditator, are within range, in one's natural sphere.
 

Commentary
Andrew Olendzki (edited by Wisdom Quarterly)

Andrew Olendzki (dowling.edu)

This cautionary tale does not end well for the monkey. Fables like the adventures of Curious George deal with foolish monkeys.

The story is taken from the collection of discourses which discuss the Foundations of Mindfulness (Satipatthana Samyutta), the root teachings of the insight (vipassana) meditation tradition. The message has to do with applying "wise attention" (yoniso manasikara), changing one's frame of reference through which we  receive and process sense experience.
 
If we give our attention to the appeal of the pleasure that accompanies sensory experience (the sticky tar trap), we are necessarily caught by the object of perception. There can be no freedom of mind/heart, because we are subtly and usually unconsciously yearning for more gratification. Instead of satisfying our desires, such experience merely stirs up more desire. We take it as normal, so we seek satisfaction of sense desires by pursuing pleasure in the realms of the senses.
 
The intensive-meditative and monastic ideal that shaped early Buddhism involves a different way of relating to experience. The idea is not that monastics avoided or ignored sense data -- which is hardly possible when all of our sensory experience passes through these gateways. Rather, the instruction is about not getting ensnared by our craving for sense pleasures. Sense data itself is not harmful, but the sweetness of pleasure wrapping each sense ensnares us when we are overtaken by our "foolish and greedy nature."
 
The different strategy is that an intensive-meditator wander in a more fruitful range, within the Four Foundations of Mindfulness, in the presence of equanimity. Insight meditation trains us to attend more dispassionately to alluring and annoying experience. When we simply observe with mindfulness and clear comprehension, we undermine what the hunter has set for us (i.e., Mara's trap). We are then able to overcome death and attain "deathlessness" (nirvana).

• Wandering too far: Six missing in Nevada cold found alive Couple and four children get lost in Nevada desert, under an overturned jeep, and survive -16 degree overnight temperatures before being rescued.
• Not wandering far enough: Two charged with child abuse Mom and stepdad kept her three daughters -- ages 12, 13, and 17 -- in their rooms for two years in Tucson, Arizona.

"Affection" (verses from the Dhammapada)

Amber Larson, Wisdom Quarterly; Acharya Buddharakkhita, Dhammapada, XVI, "Affection"*

Inspiring quotes from the Dhammapada, the imprint or path of Dharma (House of Doves)

 

Verse 209. Giving oneself over to things to be shunned then not exerting where exertion is needed, one who craves and seeks after [sensual] pleasures, having given up one's own true welfare, envies those intent upon theirs.
210. Seek no intimacy with the desired nor with the undesired, for not to see the desired or to see the undesired, both are anguish.
 

(The Dhammapada/flickr.com)

211. Therefore, cling not to what is held dear. For loss of or separation from the dear is painful. Yet, there are no bonds for those who cling to nothing desired or undesired.
212. From endearment springs grief, from endearment springs fear. For one who is wholly free of endearment there is no grief. How then any fear?
 
213. From addiction springs grief, from addiction springs fear. For one who is wholly free of addiction there is no grief. How then any fear?
214. From attachment springs grief, from attachment springs fear. For one who is wholly free of attachment there is no grief. How then any fear?
215. From lust springs grief, from lust springs fear. For one who is wholly free of craving there is no grief. How then any fear?
216. From craving springs grief, from craving springs fear. For one who is wholly free of craving there is no grief. How then any fear?

• How can one possibly be free of clinging, endearment, addiction, attachment, lust, and craving? It is only possible through liberating absorption (jhana) and insight (vipassana), not by a triumph of will, deprivation, or austere self-torment.

(The Dhammapada/flickr.com)

217. People consider dear one who embodies virtue and insight, who is principled, who has realized the (liberating) truth, and who does what one ought to be doing.
218. One who is intent upon complete freedom (nirvana) dwells with heart/mind inspired (by supramundane wisdom) and is no more trapped by sense pleasures -- such a person is called "One Moving Upstream." 
219. When, after a long absence, a person safely returns from afar, relatives, friends, and well-wishers welcome one home on arrival.
220. As relatives welcome a dear one on arrival, even so one's own good deeds will welcome the doer of skillful deeds who has gone from this world to the next. More
 

*Edited from Buddhist Publication Society's The Dhammapada: The Buddha's Path of Wisdom, translated by Acharya Buddharakkhita introduction by Bhikkhu Bodhi (Kandy, BPS, 1985).