Activating Thoughts:
Inviting the Monkeys to Tea
“It is the nature of the monkey-mind to jump about and chatter.”
— Ramesh Balsekar
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Once upon a time there was a monkey. A lonely little mischievous monkey, wandering around all by himself in the big city, with a tiny little suitcase containing all of his worldly possessions. Or at least the most important ones.
You might’ve heard him pass by, chattering away to himself. They always do that. That’s how you know it’s the monkeys. They talk a lot. Always somethin’ to say.
Most of what they say is really just useless nonsense. They get a kick outa hearing themselves talk and can get pretty repetitive, babbling on and on about the topic of the day. Harmless really.
Unless you begin to believe them.
If they say the sky is green with purple stripes, you may want to think twice about trusting that information. I mean, it’s up to you but …
Sometimes they will actually try to convince you that it’s raining baseballs and you better get out your catcher’s mitt. If they do that, you can’t say I didn’t warn you.
I’m pretty sure you’ve already met one before. Matter of fact, on an ordinary day, there may be hundreds of them, even thousands, just passing by, yakkety yak, yakkety yak.
You may want to know whether or not to invite him in for tea.
Good question.
I’m glad you asked.
If you do meet a monkey one day, best to just sit tight and see how you feel. Maybe he makes you laugh. Maybe he makes you happy. Maybe he pokes you with his walking stick as he goes by. For God’s sake, don’t invite that one in for dinner!
Trouble is, some people do. And I ask you … seriously now … why oh why would you invite a monkey into your house if he’s behaving like that?
I mean, really.
Trust your feelings about who to invite to dinner.
I have lots of experience with monkeys so you really should believe me. And there are pretty much only two things to know so this should be easy.
Two tips about monkeys:
- Don’t believe a word he says. (But you already knew that because of the baseballs.)
- If what he says feels bad to you, just think, “Silly monkey!” Ignore the comment and he will walk on by and not even bother you. Trust me, it’s true.
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“Thinking is the grand originator of our experience.”
— William James
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Ever find yourself feeling not-the-best and wonder why? Been spending time with some particularly rambunctious monkeys lately? A-HA!
Remember:
You are the thinker of your own thoughts.
You are the one who invited the monkeys to high tea.
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“You wouldn’t eat something and then wonder why you had a certain taste in your mouth — you are always aware that you are the one who put the food in your mouth. We have innocently learned to interpret our thoughts as if they were ‘reality,’ but thought is merely an ability that we have — we are the ones who produce those thoughts. When we realize that thinking is an ability rather than a reality, we can dismiss any negative thoughts that pass through. As we do so, a positive feeling of happiness
begins to emerge.”
—Richard Carlson
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The worst thing you can do is to take a monkey seriously.
That one sentence just about sums up all of your potential monkey problems and it’s where most people go awry. Sure, monkeys talk an awful lot but who cares, if it’s just chatter. Hey, if somebody came up to you and said, “I hate your purple hair,” would you really be upset? No. Because you don’t believe for one second that you have purple hair. You wouldn’t feel hurt, you’d look at him and say, “Silly monkey!” Right?
Monkeys are harmless.
There will always be monkeys and that’s ok. They really don’t mean any harm and can actually be pretty entertaining. For one, they come up with some veeeeery good stories! If a monkey is telling a particularly tall tale and it happens to be about you, rather than getting insulted, you can think, “Wow, I’m impressed. Very creative!”
And did you know? They tell the best jokes!
Activate the thought that feels good. Invite a monkey to dinner if he makes you smile. Follow this advice and you really can go about your business, enjoying your life to the fullest, even having fun with any monkeys you may meet along the way.
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“Every thought is already vibrating and when you focus upon it, you activate the vibration of it within you. So, when you give your attention to something and it activates within you, we would call it simply
an activated thought.
Introduce into the mix a very important factor which is, ‘How do I want to feel?’ And ‘this thought feels awful’ and ‘this thought feels better’ and ‘this thought feels great.’ So now I’m choosing, not based upon what I formerly called ‘fact’ I’m choosing based upon what I call ‘the way I feel.’
If we can convince you that there is a vibrational relationship that you have the ability to manage and we can distract you from all those impossible or unmanageable or uncontrollable things that you think you’ve gotta control before you feel better, and we can show you that you can feel better now just because you want to, you’ll return to your power. You’ll return to the leverage inside the vortex. And things will shift for you
and they’ll shift for you fast.”
—Abraham
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Inspirations: Explore more ...
- Boo Monkey
by Ty - Who Cares?! The Unique Teaching of Ramesh S. Balsekar
by Ramesh S. Balsekar - The Principles of Psychology, Vol.1
by William James - You Can Be Happy No Matter What: Five Principles for Keeping Life in Perspective
by Richard Carlson - Manifest Your Desires: 365 Ways to Make Your Dreams a Reality
by Abraham-Hicks
I Cried
[ get your very own Juliette art print ]
First, a word from our sponsor (wink, wink)
“Different things will happen in your life that will cause you to ‘go there’ and when something causes you to ‘go there’ … GO there … take the hit of it … but then remember what rockets of desires you launched and then turn your undivided attention to that and tell that story.”
—Abraham
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Yesterday I cried. Hard. So hard that for a moment it actually scared me.
I didn’t want to go to a deep, dark place so my first thought was, “Omg, stop crying!” It desperately crossed my mind to change what I was feeling, to pretend I felt rosy. “I will change my story, I will change negative to positive,* I will change my feelings, omg, omg I don’t want to feel sad!” These thoughts came from a fearful place. And of course, that never works.
I never come to a better-feeling place at either extreme, especially when the dominant force running the show is big ol’ fear. Neither denying feelings nor losing myself in them works.
Best to acknowledge the emotions, tip the hat, then choose. Hello sadness. Oh, hi there, fear. Welcome to the party. Now what’re we gonna do at this party? Let’s decide.
So I told myself, “Ok, you feel like crying? Cool. Let it out. But first tell me this: After we’re done with that, what’s going to feel fun to do?”
A movie. That felt like a GREAT idea. That felt like a BLAST. Thinking of it filled me with anticipation, the good kind. A fun, colorful, utterly mindless movie. Awesome.
The feeling of sadness was still there so I laid down on the couch with my puffy pillow and fluffy blanket and cried and cried. In five minutes or so it flowed right through me and out. Then I got up, grabbed my DVD, and popped it in. Yaay!
This felt great.
My two cents:
If “negative” emotion arises, don’t criticize yourself for feeling it … or fight against it … or think you should not feel. If something unexpected plops down in your path, don’t worry about having attracted it. Use it as guidance.
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“Always things are coming to you to assist in this expansion … Did you attract the problem or did you attract the solution? Did you attract the question or did you attract the answer?”
—Abraham
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*Check yourself before you wreck yourself:
It’s unlikely that you can leap from fear to joy. (Got superhuman powers you didn’t tell us about?) Check out fear, waaaaay way down there at the bottom. “What will feel just a little bit better?” is all you need to do. Just that little feeling of relief. That’s what I’m talkin’ ‘bout. 🙂
Much love to you, my friends!
Thank you for being on this journey with me!
Inspirations: Explore more ...
- The Astonishing Power of Emotions: Let Your Feelings Be Your Guide
by Abraham-Hicks
In Optimism There Is Magic
The Fun Report:
Yesterday my parents (bless their hearts!) took me out on a 15-minute excursion for the first time in a long, long while (to the pharmacy, wheee! )
While I was there, I decided to explore the drug store for something playful and fun that I could get for my inner child. I saw something I used to looove as a kid – A pretty little pink box with ShrinkyDinks in it. Ha! I decided to treat myself. How delightful is that?
Take a 10-minute joy break. What can YOU do today to take your inner child out to play?
Note to my beautiful friends:
Part of strengthening my listen muscle is paying attention to when it feels good to be on the computer and when it’s time to take a break. I’m looking forward to getting better and better at that. Blogging is a reeeeeally good playground for this because when I’m here, I find myself wanting to go check on everyone and say something to them and be here forever and ever and ever! (You know it’s true!)
Thank you so much for your comments and messages! I absolutely adore hearing from you 😀 and will always write back, always.
And now … some words of inspiration and encouragement!
“We’re asking you to trust in the Well-being. In optimism there is magic. In pessimism there is nothing. In positive expectation there is thrill and success. In pessimism or awareness of what is not wanted, there is nothing. What you’re wanting to do is redefine your relationship with the Stream. We do not ask you to look at something that is black and call it white. We do not ask you to see something that is not as you want it to be and pretend that it is. What we ask you to do is practice moving your gaze. Practice changing your perspective. Practice talking to different people. Practice going to new places. Practice sifting through the data for the things that feel like you want to feel and using those things to cause you to feel a familiar place. In other words, we want you to feel familiar in your joy. Familiar in your positive expectation, familiar in your knowing that all is well, because this Universe will knock itself out giving you evidence of that Well-being once you find that place.”
— Abraham
Excerpted from the workshop in San Rafael, CA on Wednesday, March 4th, 1998 # 249
Inspirations: Explore more ...
- Ask And It Is Given Cards: A 60-Card Deck plus Dear Friends Card
by Abraham-Hicks - Shrinky Dinks
just for fun!
