Yesterday I did a one day Vipassana retreat.
How fortunate I am to have this strong sangha of meditators in this tradition that has had so much impact on the practice of meditation in North America. Almost 40 years ago S.N. Goenka visited Montreal, his first North American lecture. The community he seeded grew into this strong and resilient charity that runs a beautiful retreat center an hour outside of Montreal, and then these one day retreats in the East End of the city.
Despite the 10 day retreat I did back in September, the two hours a day that I've been doing, and the one hour group sitting that's a 10 minute walk from my apartment, yesterday I feel like I finally "got" it.
Goenka's technique attunes you to the sensations flowing through the body, and cultivates the ability to look at these constantly changing sensations with calm alertness. I also cultivates the ability to see where these sensations are rigid, giving the impression of solidity and permanence.
Developing this intuitive relationship with our sensations, in their true impermanent and continuously changing state, helps us to develop emotional and intellectual agility. We make emotions out of our sensations, and then our sensations respond to these emotions. It's how we get into these ruts. Goenka's technique effectively deconstructs our emotional patterns so that we can start again.
This morning a 2 hour meditation flew by, largely because I was focussed on just being present and directly aware of the the flow of sensations. I had some moments where my mind flew off and started working out some work problems. When I returned to my body, all I had were these weak solid little spots of sensations and it became so clear how much the overthinking of life damages our ability to just feel it.
When it become more habitual to sit quietly with sensations, face them with equanimity, and be willing to be with whatever arises--be it warm sparkly vibrations of warmth and ease, or rock solid terror--then we are truly free to live.
