Week of

Setting a Trap for Monkey Mind

Awareness, or intelligence, is quite a different and separate category from the monkey mind. The intelligence or consciousness has less speed and does not carry a burden. It also expects some hospitality. This particular intelligence expects to be accommodated. Intelligence or awareness is therefore referred to as the rider, the herder, or the tamer who works with the ox, elephant and the monkey of mind. Awareness regards the mind as its property. So intelligence or consciousness is the owner of monkey-mind. The idea is that the monkey is supposed to have been domesticated a long time ago, but somehow, we did not get around to it! So now we have this big project of setting a trap and trapping the monkey.

From “Beauty and Absurdity,” in The Teacup and the Skullcup: Where Zen and Tantra Meet, page 85.

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