I’ve been watching myself closely.
Putting myself under a magnifying glass and looking at every single thought and action I have throughout the day. At times it’s been mentally exhausting, but some of the revelations have been life-changing.
I’ve felt like I’ve been watching a bipolar monkey running around a room full of toys for hours on end.
The realisation that I can watch this monkey has revealed to me that I am not it.
It makes me laugh. How delusional it’s been to chase this damn thing for such a large portion of my life.
If you have the willingness to do the same, you’re going to realise something confronting:
You are an absolute judgment machine.
You’re constantly judging yourself and others throughout the day.
Over and over again.
It’s actually insanity.
That’s what many of us have been living in for a long time... INSANITY.
In Buddhism, the inability to see the true nature of things is called delusion. Ignorance.
Without this awareness, we’re living a dream-like experience under a spell cast by our own emotions and judgments.
Throw mobile devices into the mix and we become zombies, feeding off an insatiable desire to consume—content, food, material things.
So that’s what I’ve been doing.
Following the monkey around all day.
It runs in circles and is never satisfied.
It swings from pure joy and bliss to anger, jealousy, and irritation.
It seems to have a purpose... but never accomplishes anything.
It’s a crazy monkey, I tell you. The mind.
It doesn’t just see an event. It interprets it, labels it, and then gets irritated at the label it gave it.
But when you really watch this monkey run around, you start to ask:
What container is it running in?
What field?
What playground?
This creates a knot in the mind.
Because now the math isn’t mathing.
If I’m not the monkey...
Where is the monkey running?
You’re like an ice-cream container.
You hold all the ice cream.
Which means—you’re not the ice cream.
It can melt. It can be eaten. It can slowly vanish.
And when the tub is completely empty, all that’s left is the container.
Same with the endless playground the monkey is playing on.
The more you become aware of the monkey, the more you’ll notice this:
If you leave it alone, the light of your awareness magically melts away the monkey’s madness.
It feels like I’ve been living through so many different lenses of a camera, I forgot what my own clear view even looked like.
I’ve been looking at the world through preconceptions and judgments.
Narrating a story to myself.
Then I got angry at the narrator.
I’ve been hitting myself with my own hand.
Not realising it’s my own hand.
A reference point is like an anchor.
It’s where your mind clings—to an identity, a label, a role.
You think you’re an office worker.
Or a fighter.
A mother. A son.
Straight. Gay. Rich. Poor. Black. Asian.
There are millions of combinations.
But let’s cut through all of it:
None of it is you.
Yes … I’ve been following a bipolar, crazy monkey around my mind.
Just to realise one simple truth:
None of it is actually me.
The scariest part?
The reference point you hold ends up shaping your decisions.
Decisions that might not even be in alignment with your true desires.
You compromise.
You hold back.
You fake interest.
You assume negativity.
You feel jealous.
You feel inadequate.
All because the reference point you’ve been unconsciously using is filtering your reality.
You’re so used to being “Greg.”
This job, this house, these friends.
You really believe you are Greg.
That deep delusion causes so much suffering.
As long as you hold onto a reference point built on the shaky, ever-changing foundations of societal conditioning, you will never find lasting peace.
Not happiness.
Peace.
It’s felt like my soul has always known it was a charade.
A game.
That everything happening around me wasn’t the whole story.
That it was all too shallow.
It’s like the soul knows—peace is just on the other side of a door.
And the door?
It’s made of the mental barriers we’ve placed between our heart and our thoughts.
We wear masks. “Greg.” “John.” “Matt.”
And we forget we’re wearing them.
No wonder we scroll for hours.
Drink our pain.
Escape with drugs.
How long can we let the monkey hijack our awareness and believe we are just as chaotic?
I’m catching myself now.
I’m watching the monkey.
Like a worried mum watches her child swim for the first time.
I’m watching with all my heart.
Because I know it can switch up at any moment and start running wild again.
And when it does, I forget who I am.
I believe I am the monkey.
But there’s no peace in following a bipolar monkey.
So start here:
Realise the reference point you’re using.
Be hyper-aware.
Really wake up.
To me, this is what it means to unplug from the matrix.
Your reference point is just as impermanent as the clouds in the sky.
It changes shape all the time.
Different masks for work, the gym, your friends, your family.
But the container that holds those masks?
That doesn’t change.
When this becomes clearer, you make room for a different kind of peace.
A peace that is always illuminating.
Always there in the background.
Behind the monkey.
There is an emptiness beyond everything.
And when you start to glimpse it, you feel a connection with the entire universe.
You begin melting away the illusion of separation.
The illusion that you are John, and he is Greg.
And you begin to touch unconditional love.
A love that simply is.
Not because it was taught.
But because that’s its nature.
You begin to love others the way you’d love yourself.
Because when the reference points melt away, there are no more points.
Only unity.
So…
Which lens are you looking through?
I’m still early in my realisations.
But the emptiness seems to grow in vastness the more I wake up and revisit it.
Eventually, I believe I’ll stop revisiting.
And instead remember—it is who I am.
And when that happens...
The ice cream will be fully melted.
If This Reflection Moved You…
Would you consider restacking or sharing it with someone on the path?
It helps others find this work and keeps me writing slow, honest pieces like this.
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Or sat with silence after heartbreak?
I’d love to hear what it taught you.
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May you walk in peace,
— Matt
Modern Monk