MONKEY MIND

Last Wednesday I wrote about “imposed healing.” Ha, the joke’s on me, because by Thursday morning, my imposed healing had begun. Apparently writing about it invited it in. Well ain’t that a barrel of stinky monkeys.

I woke up refreshed, ready to greet the day and made mistake number one. I opened my email (insert ominous music here). There, fresh as a steaming pile, was an email from a friend that not only threw a monkey wrench into my day, but sent my head spinning as well. The email came out of the blue, left field, or wherever surprising events originate.

I called another friend, not to discuss the contents of the note, but to hear her voice. She teases that her relationship to me is a “minion of God.” But it’s true! Many times in our past, she has delivered powerful information like a lightning bolt straight to the heart of things. Born in the South, she has a wonderful speaking voice and an infectious laugh. No surprise she’s a singer.

She is gifted with the ability to convey the truth with a powerful zing and then just laugh. Needing a shot of her medicine voice, I called up God’s minion. In fact, that’s how I started the conversation. “Hello? Is this God’s little minion?”

She laughed her morning, smoker’s laugh and it sounded as if she’d been asleep? “No, but I’m still in bed, loving my mattress.” Her brand new, luxurious mattress is another story, but it’s safe to say, anybody who’s talked with her recently knows about her fabulous new mattress.

We chatted a few moments and then I confessed that while things in general were going really well, a little poop storm was brewing that I hadn’t seen coming. Now here’s the deal between the two of us, we’ve agreed not to discuss petty details with each other because we’re familiar with the Law of Attraction. In fact, she’s the one who introduced me to the idea in 2005.

I had just returned from New York and we were at her house, let’s say drinking tea, and I was telling her all the ups and downs of the trip, including details about my traveling companions. Instead of reveling in the nasty undertones and gossipy tidbits, she blindsided me with her new philosophy.

“I know why all that happened,” she said.

“You do?” I was all ears. How on earth did she know (sitting in her leather armchair throne in Oregon) what my New York trip was all about?

The minion of God spoke. “It’s because of your point of attraction.”

“My what?” I was trying to play it cool. I’d just been in Manhattan after all, playing with the big girls and boys.

“Everything that happened to you occurred because of your point of attraction, your current vibratory set point.”

She might has well have been speaking high falutin’ gibberish because even though her mouth was moving and sounds were coming out, the words made no sense. Perhaps it was the drool caking in the corner of my mouth or the glazed look in my eyes, but she shifted tactics.

“You do know that everything in this Universe is made up of energy, right? Everything that appears solid is really a dance of vibrating atoms?”

Recalling high school physics, I nodded my head. She continued, “Your thoughts and emotions are no different. Because they vibrate at certain frequencies, the Law of Attraction (like attracts like) is the force behind the join-up.

“The join-up?” I repeat things.

“This phenomenon brings energies together that are in sympathetic vibration to each other. Haven’t you noticed that when you’re in a really bad mood additional frustrating events seem to occur? Or let’s say you’re having an excellent day and doesn’t the whole world seem to smile in your favor? So your point of attraction is your vibrational offering. If you’re angry or insecure, that’s what you are putting out into the world and then other people who are feeling angry or insecure will be a perfect match to you in that moment.”

I quickly flashed on the events and people in New York and saw the truth in what she was telling me. In that moment, instead of feeling like a victim of random people and seemingly unrelated events, I saw how my thoughts precipitated my emotions and how my energy went ahead of me, creating my day-to-day life.

My day-to-day life was about to change. The mental shift that had just taken place jump- started a hunger to learn more, and God’s minion loaded me up with all kinds of listening and reading material. The first suggestion was to stop jabbering to everyone about everything.

“Cold turkey?” I asked, a little bit afraid. She assured me that every time I opened my mouth to complain, I was simply asking the Universe to give me more to complain about. That sounded unpleasant.

I quickly learned how difficult it was to break the addiction of whining and sharing woes. I could rein it in, but the reaction from others was unexpected and disappointing. Turns out expressing dissatisfaction is a currency. Humans love drama and when I stopped using it as a medium of exchange, can you guess what happened? I was no longer in the thick of things, the one to call.

When I asked, “How’s it going?” I heard an enthusiastic recital of complaints. When I altered the question to, “What’s the best thing about your week?” I received a litany of silence. Talking about what is good was not on the forefront of many people’s minds and it equaled boredom.

I persevered anyway and was amazed at the improvement to every area of my life including relationships and finance. Encouraging, what? I practiced that for three years until I was ready to stop complaining to even my closest friends (mostly). I indulged in this new habit for a year, which brings us full circle to my imposed healing last Thursday. Remember the distressing email from a friend?

With God’s minion supine on her legendary mattress, I whined to her that I hadn’t been whining, so where did this poop storm originate? And this is where it gets good. She told me that while I had stopped complaining in general, I had not stopped telling the stories to myself.

“When you stop the drama in your head, then you’re home free.”

All at once, I could see it. What a relief to have this mysterious process reduced to an identifiable journey. While I may have been putting a smiley face Band-Aid on things, I had not yet truly broken my addiction to complaining. Even if I had reduced the impulse, I was manufacturing drama in the head, which in turn, still created a vibrational offering to the world. I now recognized where the poop storm originated.

It was not out of the blue or from left field.

It was from me.