Blog Post #27: “What if I Kick the Teacher?” (Details of My First Vipassana Retreat)

Read time: 11 minutes

TLDR:

My first vipassana experience was rough…I cried a lot, but it was completely life changing in how I function and view the world

Background:

Dear Readers,

Hello from Ipoh, Malaysia! While I’d love to share a bit about the last month of adventures in Vietnam, I’ll save that for the next post as I figured it would be a great time to share the experience of my first vipassana retreat because guess what? It’s been a little over 1 year since I started practicing vipassana!

If you poke around my blog a bit, you’ll find that I’m a huge vipassana fan. Why? Because after 12 years of mental health challenges, I was able to finally learn a practice that is free, makes me independent/self-reliant, and is obliterating my PTSD flashbacks, ADHD boredom, distractibility, anger and resentment as well as making me a more compassionate, more peaceful and patient person.

Related:

My Mental Health Background: Blog Post #10: My Mental Health Past and Vipassana Meditation…My permanent ticket out of depression, anxiety, PTSD and negative habits

Barcelona, Spain + Arrival at Dhamma Neru:

My first retreat took place in Barcelona, Spain. I didn’t know much about the practice or what it entailed. I just knew I wanted to go. The course was free (paid for by past students) and it involved meditation and 10 days of silence. A flight ticket, a week of respite and train/car ride later, I arrived at Dhamma Neru.

(Photos 1 and 2 taken from Dhamma Neru Website)

The Schedule:

I’ll take a moment to quickly show the schedule for all of the courses.

Day 0: Arrival at the Centre + course starts
- give up all your valuables/distractions – phone, wallet, computers, books, smart watches, non-prescription medication etc.
Day 1-9:
- 4-4:30am: Wake up
- 4:30-630am: Meditation
- 6:30-8am: Breakfast + Rest time (i.e rest, laundry, shower)
- 8-11am: Meditation
- 11-1pm: Lunch + Rest/Questions with Teacher
- 1-5pm: Meditation
- 5-6pm: Tea Time (Yes…no dinner, but fruits and milk for new students)
- 6-7pm: Meditation
- 7-8:15pm: Discourse (i.e Detailed explanation of what we’re doing and why)
- 8:15-9pm: Meditation
- 9-9:30pm: Questions with teacher + prep for bed
- 9:30pm: Sleep

Days 1~4: Anapana Meditation (Concentration of the mind using breath meditation)
Days 4-9: Vipassana Meditation (Feeling sensations on the body)
Day 10: Metta Day (Loving-Kindness Meditation + Yay! We can talk again)
Day 11: Back to reality

The Course:

Day 0: Arrival:

“I only need my phone for using white noise while I sleep. This way I’ll sleep soundly and can properly meditate and learn the instructions. The teacher will definitely understand if I tell her I won’t use it for any other purposes. It’s logical and if I don’t sleep enough, I have had thoughts of self-harm in the past. She’ll let me have my phone”

…No she did not let me it.

Oh how that first day was rough for me. I spoke with the course manager who took me to the teacher who said: “No. If you need your phone, you cannot attend the course”

What could I say? She was so calm and serene that I had no arguments in my mind. Also, this course took me 1.5 months to get into and there was such a waiting list.

I walked out of the teacher’s quarters and proceeded to cry heavily. Like sobbing. (Queue cry/sobbing #1)

Weirdly enough though, I remember having thoughts that something was right about how this was going. She wasn’t just going to let me have my way (I was able to argue my way into specific situations before). It also showed me the seriousness of this course. They won’t let people fool around and wow. She was so gentle about it too…

Day 1: Meditation Begins

To be honest, actually meditation starts on the night of Day 0, but we’ll just go into Day 1. Everyone will say they have control of their own mind, but ask it to concentrate on breath around the nose for 10 hours a day? It’s like standing on a beach ball. Hardly 2 breaths and zoom. Mind is gone to the clouds. (analogy taken from An Ancient Path – by Paul Fleischman, Yale-trained Psychiatrist and Vipassana teacher).

Anyway, my mind was extremely fickle and thankfully another old student told me that everyone has a monkey mind before we had to keep silence. I was used to excelling at things in life. I generally pick things up fast, I’m typically quite efficient, sharp-minded etc. I’d also meditated for 5 years prior. This meditation? No sweat!

One breath and my mind wandered.

Queue frustration. Queue Cry/Sobbing event #2.

Days 2-5:

I’m Sick and Feel Sicker:

I actually started feeling ill 2 days prior to the retreat, but I’d specifically come to Barcelona for this retreat so I went anyway. It was only some aches and pains plus some fatigue in the beginning so I thought it would go away. No. During the retreat, it got worse.

I started developing chills and bad body aches. I was wearing my down jacket, several layers of clothing and also 3 blankets to bed and yet I was still cold. Luckily, I carried a little pharmacy with me and had some ibuprofen with me. This helped with the body aches/chills for 2 days…but then I ran out.

“No problem! I’ll just ask the teacher and she’ll give me some medication for the pain/chills and then I can concentrate properly and learn this meditation!”

Chatting with the Teacher:

Her response? We’ll take your temperature and we’ll decide at then.

*Takes temperature* – no fever

No Fever = no medication

…Continue with meditation.

(Btw, I should interlude here that this teacher was incredible. She helped me so much and was incredibly kind. When I told her my history of insomnia and self harm thoughts, she checked on me regularly in the morning to make sure I was sleeping properly and feeling okay/safe)

“Do I Have Pneumonia?”

I started developing a colourful runny nose and a cough that went into my chest. I went to the teacher. I had a plan.

Me: “I’m a pharmacist and that fevers are based on averages. Some people don’t mount a fever that will give a temperature. I’m worried that this will turn into pneumonia. Please give me some medication so I can continue learning this meditation”

Kind Teacher: “If you need to see a doctor, you’ll need to leave the course”

Me: “I’ll stay”

Queue Crying/Sobbing #3.

No Chair for you:

This centre has a lot of different pillows you can prop yourself up on so you feel comfortable. I was a student who had quite the pillow throne. I was in lots of pain and I was wanting to avoid it (though I know now that it’s normal to feel pain as brain starts to regurgitate one’s past negative habits/reactions).

I saw other students get back rests and chairs and my brain was like “yo…why not me too?”.

Me: “Can I have a chair?”

Teacher: “If you keep trying to rely on external supports, you will never develop your own internal strength”

Queue Cry/Sobbing #5. (Deep down I knew she was right.)

~Day 5: “What if I Kick the Teacher?”

What was I to do? I was already on day 5 or so by now and everything was extremely logical that was happening. Teacher said I’d get sensations above my upper lip, I got sensations there. Teacher said I’d start getting different emotions coming up and pain, I got it. Teacher said it would go away. I got that too. Teacher said I’d feel happier and lighter. It happened.

I’d heard that some people get psychosomatic illnesses while meditating, but obviously mine was a physical problem. Regardless, I wasn’t about to quit then. I’d already passed through 5 days and there was only a few more to go!

(To be honest, that first retreat was hard, but they also get much easier as the mind becomes stronger and stronger hahaha. Anyway…back to the story)

Skip forward to the group meditation later that day and I remember being so angry. I had thoughts like “hmm…I wonder what would happen if I went up and kicked the teacher. How would they respond?” and “If I get sick and end up in hospital, it is YOUR fault”. But alas, I couldn’t do anything because we were in adhiṭṭhāna – sitting of strong determination. No changing my posture for 1 hour.

I was infuriated, but I was determined to stay. There was a specific moment where I remember thinking “I’m staying. If I end up in hospital because of this illness, then so be it.”

Immediately after that thought, it’s like someone poured water over my head. A cooling sensation went from the top of my head, down my arms and legs. The chills broke. The images of wanting to kick the teacher and the anger disappeared. All that came to mind was a distinct image from my childhood:

My family, Mom and Dad still together (not divorced yet). My brother was 4 and I was 2 and being held by my dad. We were blackberry picking in the backyard and were so happy. It was a sunny day. The grass was so lush and it was summer.

It was at that moment that I knew my long-held decade-long resentment toward my family was gone.

Queue Cry/Sobbing #4

(Also, my illness started to clear up. Psychosomatic stuff is no joke. Cough went away and nose stopped being a colourful faucet)

Days 6-10:

After those two incidents with the illness and chair requests, the meditation retreat started to become easier. I was actually sleeping soundly through the night (ironically I was so exhausted the first day I didn’t even hear the morning bell and only woke up at breakfast), I was beginning to understand how to observe the that things arise to pass away and my pillow throne had reduced to that of only a couple pillows.

I was oscillating between moments of sadness (queue some more crying, but not crazy sobbing like before), anger, frustration, but there were also beautiful moments of peace and tranquillity.

I felt lighter. I felt like I did when I was a child at Christmas feeling the magic in the air and I could see colours in the flowers I hadn’t noticed before.

Immediately After the Course:

Once the course ended, I knew I had found the practice I had been looking for over the past several years. Here was something that was free, taught me to rely on myself and was so logical. You just observe reality of natural breath and body sensations with the understanding of change. Best of all? It worked and was freely available. I had gone to counselling/tried other therapies for years, but there was always a thought in my mind of “what happen if this counsellor leaves” or “what if I can’t afford it” or “I can afford this, but what about others that cannot”. Here was a teaching that said no one else can free us, but ourselves, it was open to everyone regardless of financial status and it was something I could utilize at any time of day.

The Next Year:

My relationship with my family dramatically improved after that first course and subsequent courses of being a student or volunteer. I’m so happy to see them as the people they are now and I’m even happier to note that their behaviour (which wasn’t obscene by any means) didn’t agitate me as much. I could and actually wanted to spend time with them.

I knew from my past mental health studies that brain habits are so hard to change and yet, here was a practice that took me leaps and bounds farther than other therapies/meditation had. While I was giddy after the first course, I knew that if I went home then, I’d fall into the same habit patterns so I spent the next year away practicing this technique.

(As a random note, I was always wondering why some people were happier and good things kept happening to them. Turns out that when you put good things out into the world, kindness, patience, compassion, generosity etc., the world smiles back and good things happen. I was astonished because once I started this technique, I started attracting nicer people and better and better things started happening)

Related:

Life at home 1 year after vipassana: Blog Post #25: The Transition Back to Reality After 1.5 Years Away – Effects of Vipassana

Conclusion:

And that’s a wrap! If you want to learn more about vipassana, you can check out the vipassana page here: https://worldofwanderingminds.com/vipassana-meditation/

Or if you’re an old student, here’s some resources I discovered through word of mouth along the way: Vipassana Resources for (Newer) Old Students

Wishing you all the peace love and happiness for yourself and those around you,

Tracy

Blog Post #27: “What if I Kick the Teacher?” (Details of My First Vipassana Retreat)

Background:

Barcelona, Spain + Arrival at Dhamma Neru:

The Schedule: