The Monkey Who Found Bliss

The monkey is placed in a room.

At first, it seems ordinary. Clean. Quiet. Nothing alarming. He walks the perimeter, curious but calm. The light filters in gently. The floor is cool beneath his feet. For a moment, there is no story—just presence.

Then the mind awakens.

He notices what’s missing.
No trees. No familiar sounds.
The walls feel closer now.

He begins to label things as wrong. The air is too still. The room too small. The silence unsettling. His thoughts spiral, and with them comes panic. He paces, scratches, searches for an exit. The room tightens—not in reality, but in meaning.

What was neutral becomes threatening.
What was quiet becomes oppressive.
The room becomes hell by interpretation alone.

Eventually, the monkey tires.

Exhaustion does what fear cannot: it slows him down.

He sits. He breathes. He looks again.

This time, without urgency.

He notices the warmth of the light. How it lands gently across the floor. He notices the stability of the walls—how they hold, protect, contain. The room is not hostile. It is intentional.

The quiet begins to feel like rest.
The stillness like safety.

He stretches out on the floor and feels a strange ease. For the first time since entering, he is not trying to be somewhere else. He listens. He watches dust dance in the sunlight. He feels held.

The room becomes a sanctuary.

In time, he grows fond of it. He knows where the light falls in the morning. He enjoys the way shadows move in the afternoon. He discovers a rhythm. A peace. A sense of enough.

Bliss arrives—not because the room changed, but because resistance ended.

And in that bliss, without searching, without urgency, he notices something almost incidental.

The door.

Open. Quiet. Unassuming.

It had never been locked.
It had never been hidden.

But now, it doesn’t even matter.

The monkey doesn’t rush toward it. He doesn’t flee the room in relief. He simply knows—I am free. Free to stay. Free to go.

The room was never a prison.
It was a teacher.

The Truth Beneath the Story

We spend so much of our lives desperate to escape the room we’re in—this job, this season, this struggle, this uncertainty.

We believe peace waits on the other side of the door.

But often, God teaches us peace before release.

Bliss isn’t found by changing circumstances.
It’s found by changing perspective.

You can turn the best situation into suffering with fear.
And you can find heaven in the hardest place through faith.

Freedom doesn’t begin when the door opens.
Freedom begins when we stop insisting we must leave.

Scripture

“Godliness with contentment is great gain.”
— 1 Timothy 6:6

“I have learned to be content whatever the circumstances.”
— Philippians 4:11

“The kingdom of God is within you.”
— Luke 17:21

Closing Prayer

Lord,
Teach me to stop fighting the room.
Give me eyes to see the light already here.
Help me find peace before deliverance,
contentment before change.

And when the door is open,
let me walk through it not in fear,
but in trust—
knowing You were with me the entire time.

Amen.