I recently went on a 10-Day Vipassana Silent Meditation Retreat in Delaware. Simply put, it was one of the hardest but most rewarding experiences of my life.
What is Vipassana?
Vipassana meditation courses are offered in 300+ locations across the world. The meditation technique taught is a non-sectarian one that originated in India over 25 centuries ago that utilizes self-observation to become in touch with reality and eliminate impurities in the mind.
The courses provide food and housing at no upfront cost, running entirely off donations from past participants. The catch? There are 10 hours of meditation scheduled each day, and you are not allowed to do any of the following: talking, gesturing, eye contact, physical contact, using phones, eating meat, eating dinner, reading, writing, music, working out, and basically anything else you could imagine. Men and women are also separated.
Why I Decided to Do It
At this point you may be wondering “Why in the world would you ever do this?? You might as well sign up for prison.” Although I also previously had this thought, I actually feel like I was somewhat destined to one day do this retreat one way or another because of my general interest in mindfulness. I’ve been meditating for 10 min/day for 4 years using Headspace, often read books and talk to others about the topic, and recently took a Koru Mindfulness class offered through the Duke Wellness Center. I found out about Vipassana through listening to a Mindset Mentor podcast episode on a week this past September when I was having a mini post-graduation existential crisis, and thought this would help and be a good next step in helping me become more mindful. I ended up signing up without telling anyone because I figured it was free and I could do more research later or worst case not end up going.
I eventually told the people around me that I was thinking of going and found a few friends/mentors that had done it. Some had transformationally positive experiences, and some said it was the hardest thing they’ve ever done, but all said every individual’s experience will be unique and you won’t know until you do it.
My Experience
To illustrate how uncertain I was up till the very start of the retreat, on the morning I was set to drive up I still felt like I could have just decided not to go. When I was registering after I arrived, I even remember seeing the box I had to check saying I’d commit to staying all 10 days and wondering if I should ask them how strict they were about that, but then decided not to.
We had arrived late afternoon on the day before the 1st official full day. After they took away our phones (and car keys — I guess they really didn’t trust us 😆) and the “Noble Silence” started, I already didn’t really know how to pass time. During the first practice meditation I was also fidgeting a lot, but at the same time I was optimistic that my prior meditation experience would help me a bit.
I had been bracing for this retreat to be the hardest experience of my life up to this point. I had also read in other people’s blogs about the pain starting from waking up to the 4am gong on the 1st morning, but surprisingly I woke up fine. For the 1st 3 days, we practiced observing our own respiration and feeling the sensations of our breath below the nostrils and above the upper lip without reacting in effort to sharpen the mind. I got through the first 2 hour meditation sitting by partly being excited to see what they had in store for the 1st breakfast which was right after. I also got through the morning sittings by anticipating the 1st lunch. Before I knew it, we had already made it to the evening lecture, where we learned more about the technique and received instructions for how to meditate the following day.
The 1st 3 days ended up being smoother than expected. I found out I was able to handle the long sittings, and was almost left wondering if I should have been feeling more physical or mental pain. Of course there were some rough patches though. On the mornings of Days 2 and 3, my nose was a little congested, which made it harder than normal to breathe, so that made me agitated. My brain was also thinking tons of thoughts and resurfacing many past memories I didn’t know I had — some positive, some negative, and often not in a logical way. I also pondered how major things could be happening in the world that I wouldn’t know about until after Day 10.
On Day 3, I was thinking “This is going well! I can’t wait to tell my friends about this when it’s over and maybe write a blog post about it!”. On Day 4, we started learning the actual Vipassana technique by using our now sharpened mind to scan for sensations (ex. itches, vibrations, prickling) throughout the whole body. Now we were not allowed to reposition our bodies during the sittings and had to learn to just observe the pain. By Day 5, I was thinking “OMG we’re not even halfway I can’t do it!”. I started wondering if it might be possible for me to just plunge into a terrible depressive episode I could never get back out of as a result of pushing myself in ways I was so not used to, but by Day 6 I reversed into “OMG we crossed the halfway point, we’re almost done and I’m going to miss this place!”
Some things I did to make it through including taking walks, singing songs in my head to pass time, and imagining I was one of my basketball idols Kobe Bryant or LeBron James — mentally and physically preparing myself to go into the sittings with focus and intensity, and determined to find something from each sitting I could learn from to make the next one better. The evening lectures were also pretty elucidating and motivating. During one of them, I was pretty exhausted and wondering if I could do it, but was encouraged when the teacher said that we should work seriously given that we had already set aside these 10 days to do the course and that we should view these days as some of the most significant of our entire life that will have a positive impact on our future.
Before I came on the retreat, I had heard some past participants describe having some of the best sensations of their lives. From Day 1, the teacher also described that if we were doing the technique right, we would feel our entire body vibrating with sensations, and that some students find it Day 7, 8, 9, 10, or on their 2nd or 3rd course. The overachiever side of me wanted to work as hard as possible to get there, and I also felt pressure from myself and others in my life that were skeptical about me going on this to make this a good use of my time. The counterintuitive thing though is that the whole technique is about observing your thoughts and not reacting, instead of craving a particular sensation or being angry when things aren’t going well. The thought of craving a blissful sensation across my body was the definition of running in the opposite direction of practicing the technique properly.
Ultimately, I did end up feeling vibrations throughout my body, but it was definitely a gradual process of getting there instead of suddenly feeling bliss. On Day 10, we were allowed to talk to each other as a shock absorber to help us adjust to the real world. It was an incredible bonding experience to finally be able to talk to the people we had been around for 10 days and had noticed the littlest things about, but weren’t allowed to even make eye contact with. We all bonded over the experience and learned about the toughest times others faced and almost felt like leaving at. I also felt a common bond with everyone in our mutual interests for living a mindful life in a world where it mindfulness seems harder and harder to come by.
Some other sidenotes:
-Days 2 and 6 are said by the teacher to be the most agonizing, but Days 4 and 5 were actually personally hardest for me. Everyone’s experience will be different
-Everything was extremely well-organized and well-run. Now that I’ve graduated to being an “Old Student”, I have access to a great “alumni network” as well as carefully curated events and resources made for Old Students. Usually I am the one that critiques and thinks of ways something could be run better, but for this I was just amazed
-By the 2nd half of the course, it became blatantly apparent that the women were a lot more serious than the men about the meditation. We had 30 men and 30 women each in the course sitting on 2 opposite sides of the meditation hall, and when I entered the hall at 4:30am for the start of each day it was not uncommon for me to see only 4 men but closer to all of the women on the their side.
-The food was great. It was all vegan and my favorites were rice noodles with peanut sauce and vegetable coconut curry
What I Learned
This experience not only tied together everything I had previously known, read, and pondered regarding mindfulness, but also helped me understand it all at a much deeper level. One of my biggest realizations was how much I make myself miserable by craving to accomplish the next goal. Vipassana is rooted in observing sensations instead of reacting with craving or aversion when we experience pleasant or unpleasant sensations respectively. I realized that after I achieve a goal and get the pleasant sensation associated with it, I aim for my next ambitious goal and end up craving that pleasant sensation of accomplishing the next goal. If I don’t hit the goal, I usually make myself miserable. I used to think this was okay and maybe even good for me, as I thought that the feeling pushed me to be at my best. Now though, I realize that the idea of not craving applied to this context is that after working as hard as I can, if I don’t hit a goal it’s okay and I can observe and direct my energy into how you can improve afterwards instead of sulking.
An exercise we did on the last day that involved imagining the people around us happy and extending our compassion to them made me realize how much I think about myself. Being outwardly nice and being egocentric are not mutually exclusive things.
In addition, I had always known that I should appreciate the small beauties in life more, but through this retreat I actually got to experience that. On the days of waking up at 4am each morning for a day of 10 hours of meditation, I found beauty in walking to the meditation hall in something as simple as the texture of the ground. One day it was very cold so the ground was rock solid and iced up, one day it was snowing, and other times it was rainy and muddy.
Overall, I learned a lot about myself and definitely think it was a good investment to do this, especially at a time where I’ve graduated but haven’t started working at a job yet. I will strive to continue to practice meditation and look to see how I can incorporate what I learned on my retreat into my life. If there is anyone out there interested in Vipassana that has any questions, please don’t hesitate to reach out! I hope to help others discover Vipassana just as many others helped me do the same.