Monkey Trapping 101

Good morning-

As we embark on this new year and onto new journeys, allow me to  pose one simple question; “What is the greatest obstacle we continually face on our quest toward personal improvement or societal growth?  What’s the #1 hindrance to you becoming the person you desire to be, a better version of yesterday’s self?”  Oftentimes I hear answers like “fear of failure”, “close-mindedness”,or perhaps “procrastination”.  These answers may be partially true, but they’re far from complete.  The true answer lies in something a bit closer.

 It's what you did yesterday.

In fact, quite often it’s what you did yesterday that actually worked for you….yesterday.  In lay terms, it’s the status quo or your “habits” that make up your greatest nemesis.
 
Why?  Why are we such weak creatures, so wrapped up in our petty comforts and conveniences that we completely disregard our insatiable need to grow and advance?  In order to answer this question, I need to explain how to trap monkeys. 
 
Have you ever felt that insatiable urge to drop everything you’re doing, pack your suitcase, fly to India, and trap wild monkeys?  Me neither!  But please bear with me and allow me to act as your instructional guide and share with you how the local trappers do it.  First, find a well-used monkey trail.  Then, take a coconut and drill a small one inch hole in its side.  After this, drain the milk from the fruit shell, and fill the hole with useless trinkets, shiny fake jewels, coins, marbles, and then chain your coconut to a tree near the trail.  Then you simply wait.  Your patience will soon pay off, because eventually a monkey will wander by and spot the coconut.  It will peer in and become instantly mesmerized by the useless trinkets filling the cavity.  Filled with curiosity, the little primate will undoubtedly jam its small hand into the opening and grab a handful.  However, when it attempts to remove the trinkets, it finds that  its hand, balled up in a fist, is now stuck.  At this point there are two options: release the “junk,” easily slide that hand from the coconut, and run off to freedom, or stubbornly hold on to the “treasure” and wait for a brutal and fatal clubbing.
 
Those options really don’t even seem like options.  It seems obvious to more advanced primate brain.  I’m letting go and getting the hell out of there. Ten out of 10 times, I am releasing the spoils and removing my hand.  If I were to wager, I’d have my money on you doing the same.  The unfortunate side to this is that the monkey does  no such thing.  He holds tightly and awaits death.  The monkey holds so aggressively, so stubbornly, so blindly to these useless items that the only option left is death.  Eventually the hunters come back and club the screaming animal.  How sad!  What a stupid little creature.  I’m glad we humans are much more intelligent than a monkey.  Right? 
 
Hold on there just a moment.  Let’s internalize this lesson a bit.   How many of you have your own hand caught in the monkey trap as you read this?  How many of us are stubbornly and blindly holding so tightly to our own useless trinkets that we can’t foresee the clubbing that awaits?  Our trinkets may not be shiny or sparkly, but trust me when I say that they’re probably just as useless and deadly. They may simply be our old habits, worn out ideas, or yesterday’s behaviors.  And when we refuse to let these go, life and its effects has a way of sneaking up on us and clubbing just as fatally.
 
The process of pulling your hand out of the coconut is called “creative destruction”- the ability to destroy what you’ve created yesterday in order to create an even better version.  This phrase was coined by world renowned Austrian economist, Joseph Alois Schumpeter (Feb 8, 1883-January 8, 1950) when he stated:
Capitalism…is by nature a form of method of economic change and not only never is but never can be stationary…
 
The fundamental impulse that sets and keeps the capitalist engine in motion comes from the new consumer goods, the new methods of production or transportation, the new markets, the new forms of industrial organization that capitalist enterprise creates…
 
The opening up of new markets, foreign or domestic, and the organizational development from the craft shop and factory to such concerns as U.S. Steel illustrate the same process of industrial mutation – if I may use that biological term – that incessantly revolutionizes the economic structure from within, incessantly destroying the old one, incessantly creating a new one.  This process of creative destruction is the essential fact about capitalism.  It is what capitalism consists of and what every capitalist concern has got to live in.        From Capitalism, Socialism, and Democracy  (1942)
 
All acts of creation are simultaneously acts of destruction.  In order for something new to come to life, something old, conventional ideas and methods, must be destroyed through the act of replacement.  When Neil and Buzz set foot on the moon’s surface on July 20, 1969, the idea of a lunar landing being beyond the scope of man’s ability became a thing of the past.  The creation (the landing) also caused a destruction (old beliefs or disbeliefs).  To the human brain, the fear of loss is a more powerful motivator than the desire for gain.  Perhaps, this is why, like the monkey, we cling so aggressively to our no-longer useful trinkets and habits instead of leaping to more fruitful grounds.

What are your usless trinkets?

Choose Success!
Brian Bosley
Performance Coach and Professional Speaker

Torch Consulting
1451 Lake Drive SE
Box 6044: Grand Rapids, MI 49516
Direct line 616.366.2789
[email protected]

Please contact me at anytime with questions, requests, or feedback.