macaques and lemurs

In the original audio, the animals that are referred to as lemurs are actually langurs. Sorry for the confusion.

I am sitting on a hillside in the foothills of the Himalaya, in the north of India. And this particular hill is home to some primates, some monkeys. On one side of the hill, there are a large number of macaques. Now macaques can be cute, but this group has come to depend on the nearby town. They have become scavengers. And they behave sometimes quite aggressively towards humans. It's quite sad to see these creatures who could, in a natural environment, look after themselves perfectly well. Instead they're rummaging in the waste bins, looking for anything edible. They have debased themselves. On the other side of the hill live some lemurs [langurs] and these are altogether different. They live up in the treetops mostly, eating what food they find there: fruit of some sort I guess, or the flowers of the rhododendron trees. Sometimes they come down to ground level, in the more open areas, to move around. But they move with a dignity, a grace. They seem so noble in their way of life.

And seeing these two groups of monkey makes me feel each of us also has these two sides. We can debase ourself, become needy, scavenging – if not for food, then for work, money, or love. And it's not that these things are bad, but when we make ourselves beggars, when we begin to act like scavengers, then something has gone amiss. And at the same time, in each of us, is the noble part: that part that can move gracefully, with the head held high, looking after ourselves in a noble way, without recourse to scavenging. We can behave this way in all aspects of our life: from the way we earn our living, to the way we behave in relationships. We do not need to debase ourself. So let's acknowledge that we have these two sides in us: the macaques and the lemurs [langurs]. But let strive to be more like these noble lemurs [langurs], and live with integrity.