Why a 10 day Vipassana silent mediation retreat works

I’ve been on two 10 day silent meditation retreats in the past 2 years at the Dhamma Dipa Centre in Herefordshire. I’ve spent a lot of time in the past months, since returning from my second retreat, reflecting on my experiences, trying to nail down why I and so many others find it so uniquely valuable. These are just some of the reasons based on my experience.

• Mental focus/discipline — Have you ever spent 10 hours a day, for 3 days, focusing on one thing? Nope, me either until this course. You spend the first 3 days just focusing on you breathing, which is as intense as it sounds. Your brain rebels and you get lost or distracted constantly but eventually it learns how to focus for longer stretches to time which works wonders in the real world when you need to get shit done.
• 10 days developing 1 skill /practice— I also can’t remember the last time I spent approx. 100 hours in such a short space of time focusing on learning one skill/practice. This depth and intensity of learning was so powerful. My mind and body feel like they have ‘muscle memory’ for meditation now. ‘You learn by doing’ as a philosophy is becoming fully embedded in my mindset. I’d love to learn other skills in this way.
• Complete digital/notification detox — These 2 x 10 day retreats have probably been the only extended periods of time in the last 10 years where I haven’t had access to the internet or notifications/a mobile device. My hands and brain were hardwired to check various apps for notifications completely unconsciously and react to them. Since returning, I’ve actively removed as many notifications from my phone and laptop and feel much less habitually dependant on devices.
• Consistent, healthy food — for 10 days I ate a purely vegetarian diet. I got at least 5–7 portions of fruit and veg each day and drank 1–1.5l or water a day. I try my best to do this at home, but its rare that I get a 10 day streak! My body felt healthy. I’ve re-established a baseline for what good looks like.
• Intermittent fasting — Breakfast is at 6:30am, lunch is at 11am. Thats it. You can eat as much as you want during meal times, but for 18 and a half hours of each day you don’t eat any food. There is all kinds of research to support why this can be great for our bodies which I’ve been exploring recently. As a component of a 10 day Vipassana sitting I found it a really beneficial as a light touch experiment on its effects on me personally.
• Rest — physical, mental, emotional, social rest. I slept. A lot. Again, resetting my baseline for what I feel like when fully rested has done wonders. I’m at my best, most pro-active, creative, productive, resilient, compassionate self when I’m properly rested. So now I know that, its become easier to prioritise rest and recovery without any guilt in my day to day life.
• No intoxicants — no alcohol, no cigarettes, no drugs, no pollution, no meat, very little sugar, no external stress, (there is still tea & coffee though!). I still eat meat, eat cake, drink, get stressed etc. in my day to day life, but stripping them all out for a complete detox for 10 days can’t be a bad thing. I’m more sensitive to all of the above now so I’ve massively cut my alcohol intake down over the last 2 years. My body just can’t take it and the negatives currently far out weigh the positives.
• Mind and body connection — Its easy to intellectually understand that there isn’t a separation between our minds and our bodies. What we do to bodies affects our minds and vice versa. On a Vipassana sit however, you really connect with this concept with your own experience. How fear, anxiety, pain, joy, excitement, anticipation, exhaustion are both thought about and how they manifest in your body. I don’t think I can underestimate how fundamental that shift was in me personally. I’ve gained a new respect and love for my body and listen to it more, knowing that often it is aware of things that I haven’t yet consciously thought about.
• The power of silence — No voices, no music, no traffic, no nothing. All that you can hear, at this centre at least, are the sounds of nature (birds, animals, weather) and your own thoughts. That might sound scary to you. It did to me too. It also filled me equal parts curiosity and excitement. What does my mind, uninterrupted, not distracted, not influenced by others say, want, do, create? Some things were heartbreaking, painful, angry, destructive, for sure. Things I hadn’t given the space to work out. But in tandem with allowing the bad and the ugly out, so many good, beautiful, creative things also emerged. So many ideas had the space to blossom and evolve. I left feeling that so much had been resolved and that I had space, energy and the ideas to move forward with clarity.
• The power of routine — Every day is almost exactly the same on the course. The discipline and structure allows your mind and body to fall into flow with the routine (after a few days of adjustment!) and unlock better results from the meditating itself which you experience over the course of the 10 days. Discipline and structure enable creativity and connection. This much I’m beginning to learn and I’m experimenting with my evening and morning routines to help me get the most out of my days.
• Minimalism — I took 1 bag with me. For 10 days. I used everything I had and needed not a single thing more. A true lesson in minimalism and what I really need to survive and be content. I didn’t miss any of my possessions. To know I could survive and even thrive on so little in practice as well as in theory was liberating. Its helped me mentally overcome blockers to the pretty drastic cut in finances over the last 3 months, getting rid of or using up as much of my ‘stuff as possible, solo travel and how I’d like to live in the future (tiny house please!).
• Learning to be alone — As human beings we are fundamentally alone. Its easy to forget, bury or distract ourselves from this uncomfortable fact. Learning to love your own company can paradoxically help you connect and be present with others and create lasting, meaningful relationships. I’m also never bored anymore. When I find myself with time to spare I can tune into a level of awareness and fascination of my surroundings and patience to sit in the stillness that I never had access to before.
• Being present — You can’t write, read, draw, record the experience, communicate etc. in any way during the 10 days except for management needs or for further guidance on the meditation technique. This is against everything I instinctually feel about interesting experiences. I immediately want to capture and share whats happening and I really struggled not writing. What is does though, is force you to be fully immersed in the present moment and get really comfortable in it. As your mind drags you away into the past and throws you into the future you realise that the only thing that truly exists is right now and all you actually control is your awareness and presence. As hard as it is to pull yourself back, like any muscle it strengthens over time and once you can consistently bring your awareness into the present over time, I believe that is where the magic happens.
• Deprivation — Although all our basic human needs were met with care and compassion at the centre, we were effectively deprived of everything we knew and loved from our real lives. This had a couple of interesting side effects. Firstly, it made me realise how many parts of my life I really didn’t care about maintaining. Certain relationships, certain obligations, habits etc. barely even crossed my mind. They were just a reaction to external pressures/influences and I began to release my attachment to them. On the flip side, there were people, projects, places, experiences etc. that I truly missed and the short term deprivation made me value them even more. When I came home I was filled with overflowing gratitude for having them back in my life.

10 days might feel like a really long time to essentially do what feels like nothing. I always had my suspicions that there was more going on. Hopefully, you can see that there is in fact a lot more going on during those 10 days than it may seem at first glance. Part of me feels certain that 10 days is actually the shortest amount of time that I could have spent to bring about the many obvious and more subtle changes I’ve experienced first hand.

I’ll be continuing to experiment with meditation and Vipassana courses in the future and would love to hear your experiences! If you’re curious to find out more get in touch. letapamir@gmail.com.

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