part of the Taming the Monkey Series
When was the last time someone told you to calm down? I’m willing to bet that it didn’t work. This is something I reinforce often when I’m teaching anger management and crisis intervention classes because it is directly related to the mind monkey, and in this installment, I’m going to talk more about why that is.
It’s a rite of passage for a kid to be told not to touch the stove because it was hot. It’s also a rite of passage for a kid to touch the stove and inevitably burn themselves because it was hot. It’s a natural inclination to go against what we’re told to do because kids view defiance as independence. It is, in fact an important – if painful – lesson that can inform us as adults to exercise caution in decision making.
I came up with an acronym when I first started to help people understand mind monkey work. The mind monkey is the enemy of calm. It’s erratic and frantic, robbing us of our peace, and it feels as though your foot is weighed down on the gas pedal. But it doesn’t have to be that way if you learn to apply the BRAKES. Breathing, relaxation, acceptance, kindness, exercise, and service are powerful tools that can go a long way toward taming the monkey, creating a new baseline of calm.
I’ll be exploring each of these areas separately, to provide the space to thoroughly discuss the technique and how it works, along with how it can be applied in the fetish and kink world to improve and deepen both the Dominant and submissive mindset.
Let’s start by talking about the science behind the mind monkey and what it does to you.