Silence….
Note: This is a prelude to Part 2 ‘Reflections on an 8-day silent zazen meditation retreat’. I found myself reflecting on this in relationship to a first residential silent meditation experience, 10 years ago. Offering you space and fodder to consider both and what may call you to the deeper draw of meditative silence one day. Noting too that meditation is a cornerstone of yoga.
It’s 2014. I hear about the UK Vipassana meditation Dhamma centre from a guy I briefly dated. Having left the corporate world of financial services the previous year to teach yoga, nutrition and share the deeper medicine of the healing arts, there is something about this Vipassana that calls. A sacred crumb tossed my way unexpectedly – I do follow the trail.
A 10-day silent meditation experience, donation based and in the Herefordshire countryside. My request for a single room is granted. For me, there’s a heartfelt wish to embrace a regular meditation practice, without the guidance of anyone else. It felt that a secluded, stripped back period would open this path. This was important as a newer yoga teacher, that I understood the challenges of any aspirant, to meet clarity in mind and how that danced and swirled with feelings and experiences in the body.
How do we carve out that time just to be in beingness?
How do we drum up the inner motivation to sit with ourselves and feel?
Following arrival, registration, and orientation, the silence begins. There is a clear code of discipline, including no eye contact, no reading, writing, listening to music, sexual activity and mobile phones are locked away. Men and women sit separately in the meditation hall. No drugs, alcohol, or meat. All the food is vegetarian and prepared by volunteers, all of whom have experience with Vipassana.
‘Vi’ meaning clear,’ passana’ meaning to see. Commonly Vipassana is translated as ‘insight’.We might say it is the endeavour to see things as they are rather than the myriad tendencies the human mind has to project, anticipate, catastrophise, fantasise and so on. We wash our bodies regularly, our minds not so much…stinkin’thinkin’ accumulates without an outlet!
Vipassana is a long established and handed down form of meditation, circa 2.500 years old springing from Gotama Buddha to a more modern form from S.N Goenka. Talks from him were played in the evening via old school video and were helpful. They were insightful and humourous, albeit he had died at 89, the year before in 2013. His talks live on in this way.
The first 3 days focus only on a meditation form called Anapana. The sole intention is to feel the sensation of the breath at the top of the lip, beneath the two nostril openings. Breathing mindfully. To bring one into a relationship with breathing. Of course, the mind wanders and physical frustration and pain arise when in attempts to sit still on the floor. We are bearing witness to all the crud and seemingly endless, ceaseless streams of thought. All my body familiarities came up over the course of the 10 days – migraines, nausea, gall bladder attack, fatigue. It was interesting to me that sitting and bearing witness, tussled up the patterns held in the body. This was some years before pursuing the deeper studies of somatic and embodied movement and cultivating a wider understanding of breath and its profound effect on the nervous system.
For it is not possible to separate mind and body. The following 6 days are of vipassana. Paying attention. To sensations, thoughts, feelings, what arises and cultivating equanimity. To let go of reactivity. The evening talks add a voice of experience to remind us all, the things our minds are throwing up, are indeed universal. The struggle is a shared experience.
Early rise, the bell rings at 4 a.m. About 10 hours of meditation a day – some seated collectively in the hall with options to sit some of the meditations in your room. 2 meals and a lighter snack and shower blocks. The basic needs are taken care of, and walking is allowed in break times around the nearby woodland.
On the last day when talking is again permitted, I remember sitting for longer in the meditation hall, not wanting to break the silence quite yet. It offered such insight into how much energy it takes to talk, to listen, to communicate. There were some, younger, who immediately whooped and laughed, which felt a bit abrasive at the time. Getting the coach back to Gloucester and having a couple of hours before my train back to London, I remember walking down the high street and a young, curious guy walking by, smiling, eye to eye as we pass, he says clearly and mystically, ‘Who are you?’ and I just smiled. We both do. A simple and truthful exchange, an acknowledgment that something has shifted inside. Freedom emerging. I see you. The real meaning of ‘Namaste’.
The whole experience was very worthwhile. It came at a time I was needing to bear witness to difficult things. The slow decline of my first kidney transplant and all that was tilling up from childhood and early teenage kidney failure. I’m so glad of it. It helped me to embrace the joy of living a life on my own truer terms, that although yes there was challenge, it had facilitated the intuitive courage to leave banking, to set up Wholly Aligned, to delve into mysteries and complexities and hilarities. To share the home-grown wisdom. To ride boldly upon a new strong horse of sovereignty. It helped me honour a regular meditation that as the years have passed, continue to be of soulful sustenance and in many forms too. Every year since, I carve out 1 to 2 days, usually at the beginning of January, to be silent, sit in stillness and receive the relief of the inner well.
It’s not perfect at all. It’s rocky and turbulent, it changes, then it flows again. Tones of years change. We say farewell to old versions to trust the new is quickening. I get lazy, then I remember and am reinvigorated. Like our own unique river – we remember to stay close to our riverbank, our source of life, and to live a life as full as we can.
Things to consider:
Vipassana as a 10 day residential offering, is a chance to embark on a deeper insightful journey into yourself. It’s a great option for many, given it is secular and whilst holds its roots in Buddhism, is open to all.
The essence of fairness perfuses this type of meditation being donation only. Whether you pay £10 or £1,000, is up to you and your circumstances. The teachers who hold the space over the 10 days also take no remuneration. All donations are put back into the centre to keep this donation based so all kinds of people can experience it.
If you are in the throes of spiritual crisis, mental psychosis that is not manageable, or experiencing panic disorders and high anxiety, you may wish to consider this at another time or mention it on your application for Vipassana (they get booked up very quickly) so you can receive the best guidance for your current context.
Don’t rule this out if the above may apply to you in someway. Given meditation helps blossom our self-awareness and compassion, it can help considerably in healing psychic wounds and the debris of traumatic scarring. I know myself this to be true.
As ever, be in the willingness to launch your own research assignments, in all the many forms that can come. The quester is on a quest to live free. That moment is always possible from within. It’s here. It’s now. Find your ways in. There are many threads to tug…
For more information on the UK centre: Vipassana Meditation (dhamma.org)
Vipassana residentials are available in many other countries across the globe.
If you have any questions or just something stirring within you that I may help with, feel free to reply to this post.
Part 2 soon follows – the much more recent (April 2024) 8-day silent zazen meditation in the wild beauty of the Monchique mountains in Portugal.
In warmth,
Ciara