Chronicles of Vipassana – November 2019 - Evgeniy Kharam

Vipassana - a 10-day meditation course with very interesting conditions.

I want to start with the fact that when I decided to write chronicles, I did not think that I would recommend this course to anyone. Everyone should decide this for him or herself. However, on the seventh or eighth day I realized that even though it was difficult, I would still recommend this experience to others. There are many different reasons for this: the most basic one is simply to disconnect from electronics and understand more about yourself.

Many years ago I heard that there was some kind of retreat, a course or who knows what to call it. The main idea of the course was for a large group of people of different ages to go to one place to learn to meditate, and it all happens in complete silence. That is: you can’t talk to anyone for 10 days! 

Everyone who knows me would probably laugh right away at the idea of “Evgeniy not speaking for more than 15 minutes”. When I first learned about this course, I laughed as well and said that there’s no way  I am doing it. Then, about three years ago, I heard about it again, and I became a little more interested to see if I could remain silent for so long ...

At the beginning of this year, I felt that I was ready. I read a little more about the course and found out that it’s not just talking that’s not allowed; you can’t use a phone, you can’t write anything, and you can’t read anything. Basically, the day consists mainly of meditation, eating and sleeping. And the food is strictly vegetarian. I had been living without meat for some time, so that didn’t scare me much. I didn’t know anything else and honestly had no idea at all how they would teach and what would happen during the 10 days.

In short, I was wondering if I could go through with it and what I would understand and discover about myself. I was already interested in meditation and the topic of subconsciousness so why not go. In the summer I signed up for the course. Interestingly, the course is strictly donation based. I will go a little deeper into the topic of why this is important and very interesting. Still, to register for the course, you need to register about 4 months in advance. I also found out that there may be 500, 600 or 700 people who are on the waiting list for each course. One guy from our group got a notification that he could go, just two days before the course began.  In total, there were about 90 people plus teachers and waiters in the course. The waiters, by the way, are also volunteers. They meditate with the rest of the group, and in their spare time from meditation, they serve food (they have to complete a ten-day program themselves before they can return as a volunteer). The person who is the cook/kitchen manager is also a volunteer and has been living there for a year and a half.

Men and women live separately; approximately 35 men and 50 women. We were all on the same territory but separated, and we only saw each other in the meditation hall but were not allowed to communicate. The only communication allowed is with instructors by appointment only. The dining room is divided into two parts by a large curtain. 

Returning to the main point, in my opinion, the course is divided into several parts: the first is the meditation itself, the second is that you are therefor ten days in complete silence, and the third is that you have no outlet for your frustration, nothing to switch your focus to. Well, let's start in order.

 Vipassana and the technique itself:

The technique that I describe here is the technique of one of the most popular branches of Vipassana and it is led by a man named Goenka. There are other movements that I am not familiar with but I am planning to read about them. As I understand it, this branch is the most popular one or at least the biggest one. I’m now very interested to see how Vipassana can be combined with the WimНоf method or Tai Chi (I don’t know Tai Chi) and a lot of other techniques. 

Vipassana is not a meditation in the traditional sense,  where we try to visualize some pleasant places, and there we can talk with our subconscious or something like that (I'm not an expert, don't kick me ). Vipassana is more focused on training or retraining our brain to deal with difficult situations and being in harmony and balance (Equanimity). The technique is studied over ten days and every day something new is added, changed, and gradually leads you forward and deeper into the practice. 

            It is important to mention that in the first four days you do the preparatory part and the remaining six days you do the Vipassana meditation itself. It’s a little hard to explain what you’re doing and would be easier for me to show, but I’ll try. I would advise you to try it for yourself, not just read about it. If something doesn’t work for you, write to me, and I’ll try to help you. In my opinion, even if you learn the technique yourself at home without a proper environment, it's unlikely that you will get the full benefits. I know there are 3-5 days courses from other branches, but I’m not sure if they can provide the full experience. 

In the first four days, we are taught how to focus our attention and work with sensation, so that later it will be easier to do Vipassana meditation itself and learn how to feel sensations on your body. It happens like this: we each sit in an arbitrary position, with our eyes closed, and we are told to breathe through the nose, no matter left or right nostril, or both nostrils together. We must focus on how the air enters and leaves your body. First, you need to focus on the tip of the nose, then as the air passes through the lips and other parts of your face. What is interesting is that it needs to be practiced for an hour. I will elaborate on the daily schedule later, and it will be more clear how  “interesting” it is. You very quickly realize how much of a monkey brain you have.

Later I realized that almost all newcomers have the same problem; you can’t just focus on exhaling, inhaling and feeling the movement of air, because, after 15-30 seconds, your brain begins to think about everything: what you want now, about problems at home, about your kids, about work, school, vacation, you name it. Of course, they tell you that this is normal; there is no problem; that as soon as you start thinking about things, you just bring your focus back to your breath, blah blah blah. The problem is that it can take you 5 minutes, 10 minutes or even longer before you realize that you are no longer focused on your breathing, but rather flying in the sky, and you very quickly start feeling like a complete idiot. The first question that comes to mind is: when Buddha was teaching the technique, did he know about learning disorders, short attention spans, etc.? You start to wonder whether you would be better off just using the time to catch up on sleep. Some people did leave, one dude on day 3 and one on day 5 (not sure exactly what their reasons were).  Then you pull yourself together and realize that you are already here and that you have come here for a good reason- to work on yourself. Over time you know it will be easier, so you tell yourself to stop complaining. I noticed that after 3 or 4 days it became a bit easier for me to concentrate; I even took a stopwatch and set the timer to 5 minutes and was just focusing on my breathing.

The second and third day you do the same exercise with focused breathing via the nose, but now you are asked to focus on the sensation of air in the nose; maybe when you breathe in and out, you feel a little tickled, maybe you feel cold, maybe you feel air on the lip or nostrils. Apparently, this is not so trivial, to the point that you can feel how cold air enters, but slightly warmer air comes out. Later on, while talking with other people on day ten, I realized that it took some people a day or two to feel some kind of sensitivity in their body. Another reason not to talk to each other-  this is not a competition, and everything is very individual, so it takes whatever it takes.  The part about feeling sensation was relatively easy for me, and it didn't take me a long time to start feeling it. But the problem with focus didn’t go anywhere, I just constantly zoned out and lost focus.

Quickly (in two pages) I’ll tell you about the daily schedule. Very simple: we sleep, we eat, we meditate ...

So rise and shine is at 4:00 AM; at 4:30 AM, you should already be meditating, either in the meditation hall or in the room. I honestly tried twice, but since I slept very poorly (I will explain why later) I abandoned the idea to meditate at 4:30 AM. One must meditate by himself until 6:30 AM and somewhere around 5:30 AM, they turn on chanting. At first, I found it annoying, but eventually, I got used to it, and even liked it…

About music- I realized that it was a big mistake to listen to music on the way to the course. It took me about six days until I stopped humming two Russian songs that I listened to on the way there. In short, if you decide to, don’t listen to music on the way:). After six days the songs faded and switched to chanting … Well, at least better than what it was before.

Back to the schedule. At 6:30 AM, there is a simple breakfast: porridge, fruit, toast, tea, and coffee.  Following breakfast, there is some free time, which is when I usually went to take a shower. By the way, upon arrival, you must choose the time you want to take your shower and sign up on the shower schedule (roughly one shower for every 8 people). It is very useful and important to settle issues such as room temperature with your roommate before the period of silence begins, as you will not be able to discuss these things after that point. We discussed room temperature, but I forgot to raise the issue of whether or not to leave our room door open or closed. He kept closing the door, which infuriated me because I wanted fresh air. I had to go talk to the manager (there is a dude that can solve all sorts of problems, and you can speak with him, but only if something is needed specifically….he does not discuss the weather with you). 

At 8:00 AM, the first of three mandatory meditations begins, and continues for one hour, after which there is a short break, followed by more meditation until 11:00 AM. You can do these meditations either in the hall or in your room. During this meditation, there is usually a review of the instructions on technique. At 11 AM there is lunch, usually soup, rice, and some vegetables that can be mixed to mix a salad. The food is simple but tasty. All the food is labeled, indicating if it contains gluten, soy and so on for people with allergies. Those who can’t live without meat probably will have a harder time, but it's manageable.

Generally, there are many things at the center that are well thought out, such as their rule that all personal hygiene products must be fragrance-free because of some participants may be allergic to certain scents. At first, it seemed strange, but honestly, when you need to constantly monitor your sensations, smells can be distracting.

After lunch, there is free time again, during which I’d go for a walk in the area. This is the only thing you can do in terms of physical activity, and usually, everyone walked. It was also very interesting because though you can’t talk to anyone, people still tend to group together in some way, usually eating with the same people, walking with the same people at the same time, or meeting the same people on their way. Another interesting fact: when you arrive for your course, but before silence begins, you have some time to speak with other participants, and somehow, the people with whom you spoke at the beginning, automatically seem closer to you, even after silence begins and you may no longer speak or make eye contact them. But you notice them everywhere, you watch what they are doing, and you know that at the end of the course you will talk to them and ask them about their experience and feelings. One such guy came here a second time. He told us that on the sixth day he had a bliss state. Of course, that thought got stuck in my head…” when will I have a bliss state?”. ... So it’s better not to think about it, and not to expect anything in particular: focus on the technique and not on exceptional experiences (in fact, one of the most important aims of the technique is to help people shed their cravings).

The next meditation was at 1 p.m. We had to meditate either in the room or in the hall. It was the hardest time of the day for me. I could not meditate and I could not focus.

At 2:30 pm you have the third meditation, which is mandatory and is an hour-long. After this, there is a break and another meditation that you can do wherever you want. At this point in the day, things would usually get a little easier for me and I would cheer up.

At 5:00 pm, a very light meal (more like a snack) is served. By very light I mean there is only tea, coffee, and fruits (apples, oranges, bananas). People who are there a second time may not eat dinner; they may only drink tea, while first-timers are allowed to eat. I skipped dinner several times to see if it will change my focus or will affect the mediation.  If someone experiences stomach or other dietary problems while there, they can speak with the assistant teacher, and may be allowed to put some of their lunch food in the refrigerator, and heat it up for dinner. I must say that the food is very high quality and tastes good. It’s really hard to find something to complain about. Well, probably only the coffee…it was terrible. I even thought about not drinking it, but as I mentioned earlier, I was tired of not sleeping well so I decided to drink it. The reason I slept poorly was that I had broken my collarbone about a month ago, making it very uncomfortable to sleep, and causing me to wake up often throughout the night.

After dinner, there was another short break, and at 6PM, we began the next meditation, which was mandatory. After that, there was a short break, followed by a video recorded lesson from Goenka, the main teacher.

I guess it's time to explain how the course works. There is no live teacher who leads the course and whom you can ask questions. You have an assistant teacher who handles the video and audio recordings of the main teacher teaching this course. The video is from 1991 when Goenka was teaching his last course in Los Angeles. All courses that are held around the world in numerous Vipassana centers are done this way.  For people who do not understand English, or who prefer a translation, there are about 40 different languages available, and the center will provide headphones with your preferred language. The same main teacher gives pre-recorded instructions and leads you during meditation. There is a discourse/video every evening, lasting about 80 minutes. Goenka provides good and interesting explanations, although at a much slower pace than I’d prefer. He gives a lot of explanations and examples of why certain things must be done in a certain way. The beginning is always a little comical because he starts by saying what day ended today and how many days you have left, even though this seems like common sense. He also tells many different stories as analogies to help you relax and connect to the practice. From my conversations with people on the last day, I realized that these stories also help them a lot.

After this lesson, there is another little break and the last meditation for the day, which usually lasts 30 minutes, and provides some new instructions for the next day. During the day, there are just reminders to help you along the way. 

            At 9 pm the final meditation ends, and at this time you can go to the assistant teacher and ask some questions, but there will be other people around. After this, you can retire for the day, although, for me, it’s almost impossible to fall asleep so early. There is another time for questions to the teacher’s assistant, at 12:00 pm.  You may sign up and talk with him one on one, ask him some questions, solve problems that bother you, and clarify some concepts. Although there were quite a few participants, not everyone went to these question periods. I talked to him about three times for 15/20 minutes each time. He mostly paraphrases or repeats very much what was on the video with the main teacher, but all the same, these conversations help. I then understood many more things, having spoken to people who had completed the courses earlier and had done the same courses a couple of times. So in a way, you pick up pieces here and there.

A bit more about the meditation itself. On day four, we switched over to the main study of Vipassana meditation. At this point, we were trained to use the sensation of the breath in our body during meditation. You are asked to focus your attention on the head, specifically, on the top of the head, and to pay attention to the sensations. You may be warm, it may be itching somewhere, it may be cold, it may hurt. Now you need to gradually shift your attention, scanning your body to understand what kind of sensation you feel in your body. You scan/focus your forehead, eyes, ears, cheeks, shoulders, chest, arms, legs, and so on, and over time, you begin to feel something on every part of your body. You may then scan further up and down; you can scan faster, slower; there are different scanning options. But the basic idea is that you scan your body and gradually reach a state where you have sensations. Sometimes you eventually feel a sensation throughout your entire body, and this is the whole idea behind the meditation; when you at this stage you want to train yourself to stop craving pleasant sensations, or vice versa, wanting to stop unpleasant sensations. So you can program your brain to react in a balanced way to both the pleasant and unpleasant things.

By using this technique, you teach your brain to take control over certain problems or things that suddenly burst into your life and knock you out of your rhythm, by responding to them in a more balanced way. My initial reaction was “they are trying to make a zombie out of me.”  But over time, in the process of listening to the instructor’s video stories, you realize that things are a bit different. For example, we want to plan a trip, but when we are done planning, rather than let go, we continue to think about it constantly; we do not live in the present moment; we live as though we are already on the trip, on an airplane ... and if the trip gets canceled, if we are unable to go, then we are very disappointed. Moreover, if we do go on our trip, instead of focusing on the here and now, at the end of the trip we get angry that it ended so quickly. The same goes for bad things. If something bad happens, we begin to get angry and to freak out, instead of letting these events move through us and letting them go. At first, I couldn’t believe that this works, but over time you understand more about the technique, and that is can actually work like this.

Another important aspect here is that, in the three meditations which are mandatory, you must, in theory, remain still (Adhitthana, strong determination). As you can imagine, the hands, back, knees and so on begin to hurt. This contributes even more to the challenge of not being annoyed by the inconvenience of certain bodily sensations. I was sitting near the wall, so it was easier for my back, but my knees and legs were very numb. I was able to measure the passage of time based on how numb my legs were. When I could no longer feel my legs, there was about half an hour left until the end of the meditation. After all, with your eyes closed, you can not determine the time. 

Beginning on approximately day seven I was able to sit for an hour and not move, although it was pretty hard. I found it helpful to think of it as “training myself.” However, my focus was still a big problem; I was still zoning out. I would usually start with one body scan, and then would think about everything in the world. And since there is no pen/paper with you, you cannot write down your thoughts, to get them out of your head. I remembered the Memory Castle system and began to fill in my various ideas and thoughts with the help of the system. I made one castle at home, one at a friend's house, parents house,  work office, and even did one right there at meditation so that I could remember what I wanted to ask the assistant instructor later.

 Moving on to the other two aspects of the course, namely the “long” duration, and that there is “nothing to do” ...

While at the course, you remember and think about the current problems in your life or about the problems that you had in the past. About the “long” duration (10 days), it really does feel long. If you stop for a second and think about it, most of us have never been with just ourselves for that long. We are always busy: spouse/partner, employees, children, gym, television, Twitter, cooking, shopping, work and so on. Perhaps you spend a lot of time inside your head, but still, there are minutes when you switch to something else. At the center, there is no such opportunity; there is nothing to switch to. I honestly learned the menu of my smartwatch by heart :),  as well as all the signs that hung at the center. Two were especially amusing; one above the other: “Please do not kill insects in the dormitory” and immediately below it “In case of emergency call 911”.  Later on, I discovered that not everyone understood why it amused me so much.

Another thing about being at the center is that it gives you time to work through some of your problems and to discover something new about ourselves. It also makes you realize that a lot of what we do in our everyday life is not a solution to our problems, but rather a shift of attention to something else: getting drunk, going to the gym, going for a run, going out with friends, watching TV and 1,000,000 other things. None of these is an option at the center. There really is nothing to do there. The only thing left for you to do is work through these problems with yourself. Though focusing and meditation help with working through problems, they can also bring up memories of other, older problems that you have not recalled for a long time. 

Ideas and stories that the teacher tells in the evening on the video, also help a lot. From my conversation with the guys, after the period of silence ended, I found out that almost everyone had some aha moment of enlightenment on certain topics, and no one said that they regretted coming to the course. It was difficult for everyone, but they all realized that they had a good reason to be there. By and large, this is a study of psychosomatics and is better than the help of any psychologist.

There were two days when I simply did not know what to do with myself. I couldn’t focus, I couldn’t meditate, and I couldn’t get my problems out of my head. I just wanted to bang my head against the wall. It seems that the only thing that stopped me was knowing that the people who would have to repair the wall would-be volunteers. It was very difficult to marinate in my own thoughts, but it was definitely worth it.

And now, a few words about charity. All expenses for maintaining the premises and hosting the students are covered by donations.  This is the way Goenka wanted it to be. If you feel like you are not benefitting from the course, you are free to leave whenever you want. You have neither lost your money, nor much of your time. But if you found the course beneficial, you can make a donation, which will provide someone else with the same opportunity that you had. I think the donation part makes it very unique.

Several things suggest that students who participate in the course, do in fact get something very meaningful out of it. Firstly, the fact that there are quite a few students who return to repeat the course. Secondly, the fact that former students return to the center as volunteers to help with cleaning and food service. And finally, the very well-groomed grounds and pleasant environment suggest that donations are generous and well managed.

Very often during the evening discourse, the main teacher reminded us how important it is to maintain silence, which he calls “Noble Silence”. On the seventh day, he told us that we would be allowed to talk on the tenth day. We will move from “Noble Silence” to “Noble Chattering “. On that day, we still went to the three mandatory meditations, but the rest of the time, we were allowed to communicate with each other in the dining room or dormitory. I met very many interesting people that day :) Even though I saw them every day, I was now able to exchange stories with them and learn more about them, what they do and who they are. People were very eager to talk and to join into conversations, and no one was bothered by the fact that it was  -5C outside. People had very different stories. Firstly, I was very surprised that some people were there 5, or even 7 times, and that some traveled around the world and had done such courses in different places. At first, I couldn’t understand why anyone would do this so many times,  but on the morning of the last day (11th day), the teacher explained that this way you can deepen the practice; you can “dig up” and work out old or new problems. Also, if you do not do the practice every day, then gradually, of course, you will lose touch with the technique. Repeating the training again can help to return or go deeper into the technique.

There were many different people at the retreat. I don't think I can point out one particular type of person. In our group, we had yoga instructors, life coaches, entrepreneurs, nuclear engineers, retired people, math students, etc… One story that impressed me was about a man who owns a door-to-door alarm sales company. He brought his whole group of salespeople. There were 6 of them there, and they all did this training together. He (the owner of the company) was there for the seventh time. All the other guys were there for the first time. Everyone really enjoyed the experience and learned something new about themselves,  but I can’t imagine being there with friends, whom you see every day, and with whom you live together in one house for six months. These guys are living somewhere, renting a house together, and selling alarm systems from house to house (didn't know its still a thing). In the mornings, they all meditate for 30 minutes and visualize a successful day. Another man had a big problem with a relative who told him that he had betrayed him, although he was trying to help him. He told me that one of the teacher's stories helped him to get out of the situation. He had finally realized that he was just getting himself into deeper and deeper trouble. Another story: a man could not get over the death of his father and came to Vipassana, after which his son came too, just to learn the technique so that he could live a more balanced life.

I also found out that in Canada, The Ontario Vipassana Centre is exceptional compared to other centers, and that it offers many extra options. There are also one-day courses for children where they are trained in the observation of natural breath. I plan to sign up for my friends’ children, but they don’t know this yet:) There are courses for ages 8 to 12 or 13 to 16. It’s too early for my ninjas.

There are other practical uses for the technique, aside from brain training.

For example If something happens, and we get angry at someone, instead of reacting to the source of our negative emotions, we can focus on breathing through the nose and on sensation, and surprisingly, quite quickly, we can calm ourselves down. Works like a charm once you understand what and how to do it.

A few words about the meditation technique.

According to Goenka’s explanation, what makes this technique radically different from other techniques that try to calm our brain, is that in other techniques, we use artificial reassurances or methods, such as a word, sound, or counting (1,2,3…).  He calls it artificial vibrations. Yes, they calm, but not in the same way as when we work with our breathing and with the sensations of our body. We teach ourselves to calm down using our personal vibrations with our sensations, which are unique to each person and cannot be found or replicated by anyone else.

Another use of the technique is before bedtime and early in the morning: Just lie down and scan your body 5 minutes before bedtime, and as soon as you wake up. Very interesting and helps to fall asleep.

Sila(morality) --> Samadhi(concentration)-->Panna (wisdom)

That’s all of it.

Evgeniy