"I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the esssential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived." - Henry David Thoreau
If you read Part One of this story, you are well aware of my
decision to celebrate my 40th Birthday at a Vipassana Center. If you haven’t read it yet, here is your
chance to go back and read it now…
Part Deux:
My experience at the Vipassana Center was life changing and while
I would love to share each moment of everyday of my experience with you, I am
choosing not to. Instead, my 40th Birthday gift to you is a broad
overview of
what I experienced in hopes that one day you will attend any of the worldwide Vipassana Centers and experience it on your own. Besides...mediating up to 8
hours a day and having no access to a pen or paper to write my story, makes it
difficult to retain every component of my experience. And, despite the program structure being the same for all the
participants, it is your unique self that makes the experience.
So rather than you being influenced by the specifics of my story, my hope is
that you attend with no expectations and embrace your own experience.
My gift to you:
·
BE PRESENT TO EVERYTHING, INCLUDING NATURE - Attending
a 10-day Vipassana course allowed me to become truly present with myself. What
I realized is that I am not truly present to everything in my life. Even the
way I peeled an orange, was a new experience for me. And every time I peeled an
orange, I was in creation to peel it in a new way! Since I had no communication
(verbal or physical) with other human beings, I was in constant observation of
how the course landed on my breath, body and mind. Furthermore, when I was not meditating
I was immersed in the landscape of my mind and my surroundings, completely
observant to my thoughts and nature.
The ability to take 10 days for myself... to shut
down technology and turn off the world... to be with nature at its finest moment of seasonal change, was enlightening. During my Vipassana, I spent my free moments
exploring nature. I witnesses bees and chipmunks working diligently in
preparation for the winter, all as the trees shed their pine needles, pine cones, or maple leaves. I saw truth and answers about life in the nature that
surrounded me. It is truly all there in front of us, we just have to be present to
it in order to see.
·
GET UNCOMFORTABLE and OBSERVE THE TRUTH WITHIN
YOU – Rather than attending the closest Vipassana Center in Boston, MA, I
traveled 2 hours outside of Montreal, Canada to the Quebec Vipassana Center,
where the course was taught in both English and French. While I felt
uncomfortable, my three years of high school French was quickly resurrected.
Sitting in meditation postures consistently was uncomfortable in the
beginning but what I learned is that sitting through the discomfort, observing it and focusing on breath, the discomfort soon passed. The learning
experience came in each subtle moment of physical or mental discomfort, where I witnessed
the truth on my meditation mat or simply sitting with nature. Finding some of these small truths become a composite of the our larger Noble Truth. All we have to do is the work!
· IMPERMANENCE, METTA, and TRUE LOVE – The Vipassana
training used the notion of impermanence as a central tool to navigate through
discomfort. It was this notion of impermanence that I struggled with the
most. For me it was not in alignment with my heart. By day 2 of my Vipassana
experience, I missed my true love. In the past, we had spent time apart but never where we could not communicate with one another. It took me days... but soon I overcame this
notion that even though I couldn’t communicate with him, I could look up to
the stars, send my energy out into the world, and know that he was receiving me
thousands of miles away. And he was. I imagine it as powerful as a Greek Tragedy, where Penelope was longing for Odysseus who had been on a 10 year journey home, and she not knowing if he was dead or alive. So, the pain passed and LOVE also became impermanent. It was metta that took it's place. Metta is "a warm-hearted feeling of fellowship sympathy and love" which grows exponentially for everyone and everything in the world. It is "universal, unselfish and all embracing love." With metta, love need not contain misery.
· NON-ATTACHMENT – The Vipassana training
completely detaches you from everything you know about life in an instant. Being detached from the comfort of communication, people, food, space, and
the way in which you spend your day is a challenge. And what I struggled with was the uncomfortable feeling of the unpredictability of the whole experience, even though I had always thought myself to be spontaneous.
There were moments I doubted myself and wanted to leave, and there were moments
when I sobbed uncontrollably. But by the time I was ready to go home, I saw
myself attached to the perfection of non-communication and the fear of
missing the Vipassana Center. How quickly in 10 days I fell into the trap of attachment
to a new place. And though I believed in an instant it was gone, it exists in my continued practice of meditation, my morning walks with nature, and my nighttime viewings of the earth's starry sky.
·
NON-JUDGEMENT and STAY OPEN FOR NEW FRIENDSHIPS
- When the silence sets in, the mind wanders. Yes it wanders during meditation, but when you are not able to communicate during the 8 hours of the day that you are not meditating, you are conscious to everything around you, including human beings. And it's easy to judge people by the way they look, how they act, and the things they do, without ever say a word to them or even looking them in the eyes! During my experience, I observed myself judging people just based off of assumptions of how they looked, their actions and/or facial expressions. But as soon as I became aware that I was doing this, I stopped judging them and just observed them. I observed what they were doing, how they were preparing their food, the way they meditated, the nature they were uncovering and how they were ritualizing their experience. I found compassion for them, that they were experiencing similar feelings that I was experiencing and soon we were one. Once we finished the meditation, we had a 1/2 day to communicate with other attendees. I engaged those I had judged or observed. What I discovered was those I had judged were some of the warmest and friendliest people. And those I observed I had learned so much from just by witnessing their actions. We were all artists, in creation with what we had been given. When we communicated our findings to one another, we realized that each brought a different perspective to the same experience and we had been observing and supporting one another through our energies all along. We were a collective body of interconnected energies... we just didn't know it at the time. And collectively, we had a goldmine of experiences and friendships!
·
TRUST LIFE - Sometimes you just have to trust life and let things happen as they are supposed to. This was a big lesson for me on my trip. The lesson commenced 2 days before I was set to depart when I had a last minute cancellation for my ride to the center... a location 2 1/2 hours outside of Montreal and difficult to get to unless you have a car. When I first discovered I was without a ride, I started to panic. But just by putting myself out there, in an instant, I received an email from a fellow Vipassana attendee and had a ride. Not only did I get a ride, but through that experience, I obtained a life long friend and a new way of living. We shared an amazing car ride, talked about our life's experiences and took a mini-tour of Montreal. Our discussion ended talking about how we need to just let go of things. And poignantly, he ended our journey at the airport with a notion of how we were suppose to be after Vipassana.... using a French phrase "Faire confiance a la via"... To Trust Life! And so I was off... to spend the next 40 years of my life living from this place of trust.
So, what does this all mean in light of being 40. Vipassana offers the freedom to go deeper and examine ourselves with clarity... with an intention of coming closer to our Noble Truth. It is part of the journey towards enlightenment. All you have to do, is the work.
Life is short, so get messy!
If you are interested in participating in a Vipassana visit their website at http://www.dhamma.org.
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