Meditation Retreat and leaving Thailand (FINALLY)
Trip Start
Jan 03, 2008
1
15
20
Trip End
May 30, 2008
Chiang mai,
Thailand
Sunday, March 23, 2008
After living in a communal living situation in Pai where I was constantly surrounded by 24 other friends, working at a Bar and coming home around 4 ever morning and then waking up at 11 or 12 the next day, i decided to do the complete opposite without giving much thought to how hard the whole process of adaptation would be. After searching for the perfect temple to meditate, i was directed to Doi Suthep, the heart, soul and pride of the city of Chiang Mai. It's a beautiful temple located on top of a hill isolated, yet completely sustainable.
Doi Suthep
While it is a good hour drive from the city on 360 degree curve roads, loads of tourists still find their way up there making Doi Suthep a little city of its own with book stores, gift shops and even its very own ATM (I must admit, it was my first time seeing an ATM in a temple and I'm not sure how i felt about it). Despite the massive commercialization that has happened to this temple, I decided to do my meditation retreat here anyways since it is the home of the International Buddhist Center and provided meditation programs with strict schedules and guidance. I even had my very own Buddhist monk teacher. The Center focuses on Vippassana Meditation which believes that we need to focus on the present because the past has already happened (nothing you can do about it now) and the future has yet to happen (so no need to worry). Vippassana is meditation practice that requires one to focus on their present moment and to control the mind so that it is focused with the body on the present moment in a state of complete mindfulness. My daily schedule for the next four days looked something like this:
4:00AM Wake up
4:30 Meditation
6:30 Breakfast
8:00 Lesson on Buddhism
9:00 Meditation
11:00 Lunch (also know as "the last meal of the day so fit as much as you can in your stomach")
12:00 Meditation
3:00 Report to Teacher on your progress
6:00 Monk Chant
...more meditation until you can keep your eyes open anymore..
meals at Doi Suthep
.It was a silent retreat so added to the rigorous schedule was the inability to communicate with anyone else other than my teacher, no reading or writing, no music...nothing expect for myself... and boy is that SCARY! I think deep down inside we all have some great fear of our own inner thoughts...of ourselves. So the idea of sitting with myself with nothing to do, no one to talk to, and nothing to distract me for 4 whole days is pretty scary. Day 1 was something that resembled Hell. I woke up at 4 in the morning, even before the sun was up, and my first thought was "What the Fuck am I doing here?????" That emotion eventually went away but only after day 3. Day 3 was spent in a state of war. I finally had to face up and fight against my worst enemy, myself. As I laid in bed during my evening meditation, I suddenly felt a strong evil spirit enter the room, it was scarier than anything my mind could conjure up and at that point, I knew that I could either turn on the lights, find my Ipod and fall asleep listening to music, or I could face up to this monster. It's almost comical how scared we all are of our own inner demon. So I sat with that monster that's been living inside me that night and faced up to it for the first time in my life.
Overall, the experience was too short. They had to close the monastery because a group of Thai students will be using the area for the next month. If I had it my way, I would have stayed for at least 10 days, maybe even 21 days. For me, I felt like 4 days was only a chip off the iceburg, I had just dipped my toes in and found that maybe the water isn't so scary after all but I'm still not at the point where I can fully dive in and swim. But maybe next time, and maybe this was all that I was meant to experience for now.
