Life in Balance: Amit D. Chaudhary’s Blog
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I went to attend a meditation retreat called Vipassana course as taught by S.N. Goenka at the Northwest Vipassana Center in Onalaska, WA on Aug 24th 2006. Vipassana is a general term, referring to Buddhist Meditation techniques. This Vipassana course comes from the teachings of S.N.Goenka and is derived from Theravada buddhism, though that term is never used.

I left in the evening on the 4th day. It is a 10 day course. These are my thoughts for those who wanted to know what happened and for others considering it.

I do not plan to put in day to day or center details, there are some good articles end that do an accurate job of describing it at the end of this post.

Why I went:

-Because I wanted to follow a spiritual path and this one seemed non-controversial.

-It was easily accessible, center are fairly close, frequent courses and so on.

-It was recommended someone people I knew or read about including Nipun who mentioned “everyone should go to at least one Vipassana meditation camp.” and a friend’s brother attends these course and does revisit.

Why I left:

I had enough of the extreme pain. I followed the instruction on the 4th day and did not move my legs for an hour. I had so much pain, I wanted to scream.This on top of pain for all the last 3+ days made me realize I did not want a brutal method of spirituality.
The course is 10 days of meditation bootcamp. It involves sitting down 11 hours for meditation and 1 hour for a discourse day after day, this results in lots of acute as well as continuous pain (in knees, hips, ankles, back and neck, even wrists, etc.)

It is difficult to describe, but the pain was the worst I have ever felt in my life and it was “on” most of the time and for all of the 4 days. It does not go away during the course, students doing their third course were limping.
I do acknowledge, I have only known minor pain in my life: Overdoing a 3000+ft, 11+ mile hike or my first hot yoga class so that I can barely hobble the next day instead of walking, a few cuts around .5 inch, etc.

In trying to show how it was like, I could think of two analogies. To practically see what it implies: Sit for meditation without moving ‘at all’ for 90 minutes in the morning and evening. Do not apply or use anything to ease the pain except sleep and a hot shower once a day. Then do it again next day and then think this happening for 10 days. Another way to get an idea: Imagine a hike or jog double of your current capability, now you have to do this everyday for 10 days. You can go slow on the way, if you want, choose your pace and continue. Use only sleep and shower to ease the pain in the night.

Additional reading on pain: On pain during meditation, Nipun’s pain experience during a Goenka Vipassana course and On Pain and Cycling.

Would I recommend Vipasana course by S.N.Goenka to others: NoInstead I would suggest

-Find your reasoning for meditation (knowledge, Moving towards understanding of God or higher powers, Calmness, wisdom, creating happiness through insight, developing love, getting more energy aware, etc). See my recent blog post: Ideas to think consciously about your spiritual goals and evaluating spiritual paths

-Pick a meditation with goals closest to your goal, learn from a teacher in a short course, 1 hour per day for a few days and do it 30-90 minutes whenever you can. I would suggest trying out teachings of some teachers such like Erich Schiffman, etc.

-Find someone has done that spiritual path and who will be frank with you about it’s drawbacks and advantages.

-Check up RickRoss, the cult information site to ensure the approach is not tainted or outright dangerous.

My notes and opinion about what is Vipassana course by S.N.Goenka:

I believe it might work for some, one needs to understand learn more, what is implied and what is said. It should also be noted, generally the better lies are those based on half-truths. There are other not so obvious aspects to Vipassana course which one should know before signing up.

-It claims to be the path as originally taught by Gautama, the Buddha. It’s purpose is to to make one get to happiness by developing awareness that things are ever changing. Since things are everchanging, one should not react to positive things (cravings) or negative things (aversion), this should eventually result in going through life calmly.

-It has 3 parts: Sila(Conduct), Samadhi(Developing concentration) and Vipassana\Paanya(Develop awareness.)

-The actual method involves going deeper until one is aware of the smallest change on every part of the skin. It is meant in the literal actual and physical sense. One does become very sensitive to be able to detect minor sensations on smaller portions of the body. I got a glimpse of this, it is a new experience and yet freaky. The idea is that continuing this would later result in being used to be able to detect mental thoughts as soon as they arise, avoiding reactions. I did notice that awareness about self, eating, feelings, etc does increase during the course.

-It’s primary appeal is that it is so accessible and free to get into, with donations accepted at the end from those who complete it. There are centers everywhere and courses as they call it (bootcamp, I would say) are happening all the time. It is non religious which appeals to many.

-The assistant teacher and volunteers seem genuine people interested in other people’s benefit and growth. Some other meditators ran into inexperienced teachers, see Jhanananda’s experience

-It is a heavy detox program. No spicy or sweet food, no meat, minimal caffeine, no overeating (no dinner, only fruits at 5 pm, though I do not remember being hungry), no external stimuli(no TV, no reading, no talking or eye contact with anyone on the the course), sleep on time (9:30 pm to 4 am and 12-12:45 if you can squeeze it in) I lost 5 pounds in 4 days, dropping from 174.4 to 168.8.

-About money making. The course is free to enroll into, something does standout.

• If you want to attend a longer course (20 day and then 30 day.) one has to attend two 10 day course and serve one 10 day course (servers or volunteers prepare food, take care of the place, etc)
• None of the teachers or volunteers are paid.
• The old students attending a course are asked to sign up for cleaning up the kitchen and toilets and they do. There was no paid help in the whole center.
• The number of centers is growing, List of those in North America and India. The centers tend to be pretty large (the NorthWest one should be around 80 acres), it makes it easier to be able to have a nice place to walk around and men and women can have separate areas (kitchen, dorm and walking areas.)

-There is no force or holding people back against their wishes. I was out in 45 minutes after I decided. The main volunteer however became more paranoid once I mentioned I was leaving and followed me to the car and waited till I actually drove off.

There are a few not so positive aspects of it, that became more clear as time went by. They are not enough to make it a cult, but are worth knowing.

-There is talk and mention of old feelings and stuck emotions coming up as pain. I believe that is incorrect, the pain is created due to the continous sitting and exertion. But the effects and emotions that surface are real, the pain and isolation probably make it easier to surface.

-There is an almost revered respect for Goenka, the assistant teacher sits on a higher seat and behind him are two higher seats, I guess for Mr. & Mrs. Goenka.

-There is a lot of control and secretiveness, only Goenka teaches the course (through audio talks during group meditation and video during discourse) Areas for servers are off limits to students including other buildings, etc.

-You cannot skip any of the meditation time. If you are too tired, taking a walk or even nod off while say when meditating in your bed, the volunteers are on the lookout to point it out.
-The course is a form of extremism in physical self punishment and in mental breakdown like the sadhus (ascetics) of India or other spiritual approaches I have heard of including Chinmoy\Chinmoy cult link, Zen monks(See above pain article), Zen Master Rama-Frederick Lenz cult link and Landmark forum\Landmark cult link. The physical pain is barely hinted at it on the website by words like “it is an intensive course” and so on.

-Mention of other religions and spiritual methods. The direct statements in the group meditation and discourse, is to keep your current religion or spiritual method on hold for the duration of the course. The website and material statements are equivalent of “Hold no judgement against them”. However during some of the discourses, some of the jokes seemed aimed at major religions, though I will admit, it did sound funny.

Here is one: Vipassana is a spiritual path of 1. Knowing the right way. 2. Analyzing with a rational mind on it being a right way. 3. Experiencing the right way.

Here is an analogy of what it means. If one person is unwell and goes to the doctor and gets a prescription. Then it takes the prescription paper, goes home puts a picture of a doctor, prays his doctor is so great, repeats his prescription 101 times, he won’t get well, that is just knowing the way. If the same person decides to ask the doctor, how the prescription will help and the doctor explains to him. It understands the reason behind it. Then it says, great now I know, this can really work and goes all around saying my doctor is great, your doctor is no good, I have checked and he knows his, this is just analyzing the way. Only Vipassana (this course), teaches experiencing the way, that is taking the medicine. This should be on day 3 of the 10 day Vipassana discourse DVD, if one decides to check it out.

-I noticed an irony, the older students respond to Goenka saying, Bhavatu sabba mangalam. (May all beings be happy.) with Sadhu, Sadhu, Sadhu, though the notice board says it means “We agree.” Being from India and knowing Hindi, I knew different and as the course progressed the irony stuck. Incase some wants to read more, here is a link to a wikipedia article on Sadhus (ascetics) of India.

Please leave a comment or message, if you need more information.

Meditation Hall Image thanks to MarkandMichelle at flickr.

Links to experiences by others:

Ajit covers instructions on each day during the course.

Simon covers day to day schedule with personal experience during a course in Ladakh and notes on Goenka and his voice, etc. He also mentions “On day four and for the remaining days during the group meditation sessions, we had to remain in one posture without moving the legs, hands or opening the eyes. It is called Strong Determination” and “I did not sleep that well the last couple of days and I had big back problems on the final day.”

Erik’s 43 things entry: What do you actually do on a 10 day course and on the NorthWest Vipassana Center where I went. He also concludes like I did “It’s not relaxing at all” and “It feels a lot like being hypnotized and getting beaten up at the same time. It feels like you could convince yourself that you were a dog if you really wanted to. At least it did for me. You walk out of there like a zombie, covered in tingling and soreness, and just want to lay in the sunny grass until the next gong rings.”

Jhanananda, an experienced meditator goes to a Goenka Retreat and leaves before it is over. A comment: My own experience with the assistant teacher as the main co-ordinator is called was pretty good. He seemed wise, approachable and being able to work with a variety of personalities. Since, they are volunteers, I can understand why this is not a given. He does point out correctly issues with not returning to his car, the assistant teacher not being able to handle Odd or Weird Experiences and General secrecy.

Josh writes about his experience in May 2007 in Vipassana Meditation Boot Camp in two parts.

Technorati Tags: Vipassana Goenka Meditation Buddhism Theravada Buddhism spirituality retreat

Update:

I would recommend going through the comments on this blog post.

My thoughts a year after the course, a little more clearer, a little less raw: More Goenka Vipassana Course thoughts and other information

Last updated: July 2007

Wrapping up the thread comparing living in Seattle (Eastside aka Bellevue-Redmond-Kirkland) versus Silicon Valley (San Francisco Bay Area aka Mountain View-Sunnyvale-Santa Clara-San Jose)

4. Traffic, Commute times and Pollution

The Traffic in the Greater Seattle area is much worse than most of the Bay area. This was a major surprise for me personally. For example, Most of the days, it is not possible to leave Bellevue by I-405 to go to Kirkland or Bothell during typical work hours (7:30-9:30 am and 5-7 pm) without getting stuck in slow or non moving traffic. The result, a typical drive of 15 minutes becomes 45 or more minutes.

The same applies when trying to come from South (Renton, etc.) to Bellevue or Seattle or trying to go to Redmond(Microsoft offices which means roughly 30,000 people come into 2 exits in a 2 hour interval.) or in the evening at the junction were 520 ends in Redmond to get to Sammamish & Fall City. The only directions with smooth moving traffic to travel as of now are I-90 to Seattle and within a city itself using non-freeway roads. Since the IT jobs are in Bellevue, Seattle and Redmond, any other place implies a commute of 45 minutes each way. 60 minute commute is common and I know people with 90 minute commutes.
The traffic is equivalent of that on the bridges into San Francisco, the commute time same or more than as coming from Evergreen or South San Jose to the Silicon Valley. The roads here are smaller (2-3 lanes each side) and HOV hours are all through the day (9 am-7 pm.) The mass transit (bus service) is much better though with regular bus services, large bus stations and so on.
The reasons for lack of roads could be a combination of various things including No state income which implies lower state revenues, cities with local only agenda (From what I read, efforts to expand the 520 bridge have been tied up due to cities like Mercer Island resisting it) and overall lack of planning for population growth.

The NorthWest is more green and has less cars and people, but the pollution is much worse, even when on internal roads.

I am not sure, if it is the better emission or fuel standards in the bay area and California in general, but it is an anecdotal and consistent observation.

5. Miscellaneous

Most of the other items are more or less the same. There are good restaurants including Indian in both places, the Indian grocery stores are decent in Bellevue and around, items do go out of stock for 2-3 weeks at a stretch. There is a good Health club in Redmond called Pro Club, schools and daycares are good too, though maybe hard to get into.

One thing, I noticed is that Alcohol in Washington is sold only through Government stores, this means whacky prices for items like Single Malts (Glenlivet 12yr is 60% more than bay area), most shops are shabby establishments, do not open on sundays or holidays like MLK and close most days at 7 pm.

It is one of the contradictions, at one end is the lack of facilities (Poor Roads, No Showers in any National Park Camps, poor State Park facilities, etc) as an exchange for low taxes (No State income, no State Park parking fees) and at the other end is the forcing rules on others and deciding what is right. A mix of Republican and Democrat policies.