Day One:
Noble Silence is interesting. No words, no gestures, no eye contact. When someone cuts in line at lunchtime I want to glare at the guy, but just look at my shoes. The anger passes. So what if someone cuts in line? I want to ask my roomate a question, compare meditation experiences, but can't. When we're not meditating there's nothing to do but walk around quietly while looking at the ground, or to lie down in bed.
The meditation is a bit boring at this point, and my mind wanders a lot. Also the long hours of meditation are painful. I'm experimenting with different sitting positions. We can stretch a bit if we really need to, but I am trying to keep as still as this guy in front of me who sits like a statue of Buddha. Pain, boredom, I'm probably wasting my time but I'll see it to the end no matter what.
I am a bit depressed when dinner at 1700 is a piece of fruit and tea. I hoard a banana and smuggle it to my room.
Day Two:
One of the days that people most often run away. I have no intention of doing that.
Woke up at 0400 to the sound of a gong. It was a nice way to wake up, despite the ungodly hour.
Started meditating at 0430.The meditation is more interesting now, as we are focusing on sensations in the nostril. I often feel a nose hair move. Great success.
Nevertheless, I am probably still wasting my time here. My legs hurt, my ass hurts, my knees hurt.
Day Three:
The excitement of feeling a nose hair move is gone as we are now focusing on the little area beneath the nostrils. Sometimes I can feel the breath coming out of the nostrils and hitting the upper lip, but meditating on the inside of the nose was more exciting.
I still haven't found a suitable sitting position. I have to adjust my position every 20 minutes while the guy in front of me only moves once every 40 minutes.
My upper back is killing me. Pain, boredom. Also, lack of sleep. I've had nightmares the last two nights. I wake up at 0300 and lie there waiting for the gong at 0400.
Day Four:
After lunch we start real Vipassana insight meditation.
Goenke tells us we can't move now. We have to sit still for an hour at a time.
And the meditation is wild and wooly after focusing on the upper lip for a day and a half. We are to observe sensations throughout the body, from the top of the head to the tip of our toes. After 25 minutes I'm in pain and I want to move and I can't concentrate on sensations in little areas of my body. There is only one big sensation. Pain. After 40 minutes I am sweating profusely. I take note of this sensation to go along with the block of pain. After 45 minutes I have to move a little. It does me no good. I want to run, run. Pain, pain, pain. To hell with Vipassana. After the hour is up I unfold myself and stand and I start to black out and I am toppling but I get to the wall in time to support myself. Outside I curse under my breath for voluntarily torturing myself. I fight back tears from the pain, and from anger but also because I suddenly think of our little dog, Piglet, who was poisoned and suffererd horribly for three days before she died, and I think my one hour of pain was excrutiating but what about Piglet's pain? So I cry from compassion for all creatures suffering excrutiating pain. But mostly for myself. Just a few tears that go unnoticed.
Day Five:
At the 0800 meditation session I march into the meditation hall with the idea I'm going to kick Goenka's ass-- I'm going to sit the hour without moving-- he can torture me all he wants and I won't react to the pain.
I do it, for the most part. Once or twice I hunch my shoulders forward a little. The pain is there, but not as bad as before and what there is I keep at a distance-- it is only temporary pain, not crippling pain-- it is only pain. Go to hell pain.
By the end of the day I am sitting through the hour without moving one centimeter and I am observing the sensations throughout my body and the overriding sensation is still pain and some hard pain too but I'm pushing it farther and farther away.
I talk to myself, thusly:
"Oh, looky here, we have a block of searing pain just below the right shoulder blade, isn't that interesting? That must be very painful for our subject. But let's not linger here, let's move on to the next area. Ah. More searing pain! So very interesting. Ah, here it's just a knot of tension, and here it is numb, and here... more pain! Isn't this sensational!"
But I feel the day is a success. I showed Goenka a thing or two.
Days Six and Seven:
Observing the pain, but also finding the pain isn't as much as I had thought it was. The block of pain is actually a fingertip sized area of pain, and all around it it is tense, numb, heavy feeling... but not exactly pain. I am observing all of these unpleasant sensations with a degree of equanimity now. I feel I have really accomplished something here, though the whole process is unpleasant.
Also, I am well accustomed to the silence now. In fact, I dread the day we can speak. There will be a return to obligatory sociability. I enjoy walking around all day looking at the ground, which will be rude or weird back in the talking world.
Also, I am completely out of touch with what is happening in the world beyond, and I find this refreshing.
Day Eight:
At the morning session I am observing the pain. There's old faithful-- the searing pain beneath the right shoulder. Good morning, Old Faithful.
Then, my left hand starts tingling. Really tingling. A zippy tingling sensation then moves up my left arm. It feels very nice, but I wonder if it isn't some permanent nerve damage from all the sitting.
No matter, as it is quite a blissful sensation. As I observe the sensations all around my body, the tingling follows. Soon, I am one big tingling entity. I am tingling in space. I realize that the universe is tingly. I am tingly too. I am the universe. There is that pain, Old Faithful, but Old Faithful is far away, buried under all the tingling. I know I am smiling. Is this what it's really all about? Is this the goal? You get through the most excruciating pain and then you are rewarded with this? I am Buddha.
Then, the tape of Goenka's chanting comes on, as always, for the last five minutes of the hour. It has been my signal that I will only have to endure 5 more minutes of torture before a few minutes of freedom, but now it is an interruption. I want to keep tingling. The lights brighten, people groan, stretch, but I remain cross legged in the Burmese position, eyes closed, smiling, tingling. When I open my eyes the tingling fades, but the afterglow continues right through the break and when it is time to sit again I do so eagerly.
The teacher sitting up front wants to talk to some of us, as he does every so often to check on our progress. He asks what sensations we are feeling.
"I'm not sure if it's normal," I say, "but I'm tingling all over."
He smiles a bit, and says, "Yes, it is normal, but don't grow attached to this feeling. The pain will return."
Later that evening, at the discourse, Goenka tells us the same thing. If we are now experiencing these 'uniform subtle sensations,' do not crave them. The object is to observe pain, tingling, or no feeling at all with equanimity. Equanimity is the goal. Not 'free flow', as these uniform subtle sensations are called.
Day Nine:
Nevertheless, when I have two more big tingly sessions on this day, I'm happy about it.
At the discourse we are warned again. If we crave free flow and have aversion to pain we will simply build up more sankara-- the bad stuff-- and make no progress. we must observe these sensations-- just observe. I really dig the free flow though. But-- okay. The mission is equanimity, so the last time we meditate for the night, and the tingling arrives, I say, "You are just an impermanent sensation. Don't titilliate me, subtle sensation."
The tingling goes away and the pain returns.
I say, "You are also just an impermanent sensation, rising and falling-- anicca...anicca..."
And then I realize there is tingling but very mild, and there is pain, but ever so mild, and I could sit there all day and night in equanimity.
Day Ten:
Noble speech ends and it's just meditation summer camp now and I find myself talking and wishing I wasn't.
Epilogue:
It is a week later, and I meditate for an hour in the morning, first thing, and for an hour in the evening just before bed. The tingling is subdued, and so is the pain. It is more difficult to focus now, and my thoughts wander what with all the input from the world. My biggest enemy is no longer pain but drowsiness. But the meditation centers me, and gives me some measure of equanimity that I didn't have before.
I am on this machine far less now, and I feel more peaceful, happier, though I still get annoyed from time to time, like at that lady the other day at the supermarket who was pushing up against me at the checkout counter because she wanted to go faster-- as if things would go faster by her doing that.
I glared at her and said, "Have a little patience!"
I didn't call her any names though.
I plan on returning to Buddha land to be a server for ten days, and then I plan on returning after that.
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