The monkey appeared by the fruit bowl, snaffled two armfuls of oranges and made a clean getaway before any of us could react. It legged it for the wall with swaying, monkey gait… but had to climb a tree to make good its escape.
The monkey did its level best to run up the tree, leaving arms free for the stolen oranges, but eventually needed a hand to climb. It dropped one orange, lunged to catch it and dropped another, which lead to an increasingly frantic juggling act until it climbed back down to reclaim them and try again. This act was repeated a couple of times before the monkey gave up, abandoning several oranges and scuttling away up the tree with several less than it had hoped for, chattering angrily all the way.
How many oranges are you juggling?
Are you approaching a tree?
How many oranges can you possibly hope to get up it?
What will happen to the things you drop?
It’s probable that some of the things you can’t take with you are important to you, and that some are fragile – maybe some are oranges, but some are eggs. You’ll need to put them down carefully, somewhere safe, before you start dropping things.
Will you choose to focus your attention on what you’re carrying, or on the things you’ve left behind?