I recently completed my first 10-day Vipassana Meditation course. It has been perhaps the most intense 10-day experience of my life. I have been doing meditation for over 25 years and have followed “Art of Living” (founded by Sri Sri Ravi Shankar) for the past 15 years. However, nothing can prepare you for 80 sessions and 100+ hours of meditation across 10 days, with each day starting before 4 am and ending at 10 pm, and off course maintaining complete silence through the period (all mobiles, laptops, reading or writing material are taken away at the start of the course)!! Clearly the path of pure Dharma is not for the faint-hearted!!
Many friends and colleagues have been asking me about the Vipassana course. I thought I would share my understanding of the key concepts and personal experiences from the course.
Vipassana meditation’s objective is to purify the mind and to do so by getting to the root cause of our miseries (e.g., cravings, aversions, obsessions, ego centricity). Many forms of meditation use verbalization (e.g., mantras) or visualization (e.g., some image or other focusing forms) that help you get to a meditative state quickly and feel a state of bliss and calmness. Vipassana takes the tougher but perhaps purer route of just focusing on natural breath and body sensations. Its core philosophy is that you are responsible for your own salvation and you have to do that within the framework of your body. You start by observing your breath at the tip of your nostrils. As the mind starts getting calm and more attentive, you start observing body sensations (which are always there but the mind is not tuned to observe them) and progressively their intensity and flow through their body increases.
Vipassana is the meditation technique discovered and taught by Gautam Buddha over 25 centuries back in India. From India Vipassana traveled to other parts of the world along with Buddha’s teachings. While Buddha’s teachings have largely been preserved in many parts of Asia, the Vipassana meditation technique in its pure form survived only in Myanmar (Burma). From Myanmar, an Indian industrialist based there, Shri S.N. Goenka learnt this technique and brought it back to its country of origin India after 25 centuries.
Key concepts of Vipassana
Every evening over the 10-day course there was a 1.5 hours video talk by S.N.Goenka where he shared in a simple yet compelling way some deep lessons about the philosophy and concepts of Vipassana and Buddha’s teachings. I took away the following 5 key concepts from these talks and introspection over the course:
- Focus on Dharma. Buddha’s philosophy’s anchor is ‘’Dharma’’, which can be interpreted both as the universal law of nature and doing good. The philosophy is not based on any religious dogmas, does not talk about any creator God, and does not even reference or acknowledge the soul within. Its focus is Dharma, which Buddha has summarized to mean 3 things: 1) not harming others, 2) doing wholesome actions, and 3) purifying your mind.
- Sheel-Samadhi-Prajna. The eight-fold path of Buddha can be divided into 3 parts, ‘’Sheel’’ or conduct, ‘’Samadhi’’ or meditation, and ‘’Prajna’’ or wisdom. Sheel or the right conduct is the first platform on which progressively the other two are built. The right Sheel enables Samadhi (e.g., discipline enforced during the course is a key enabler of meditation), and Samadhi further leads to Prajna or wisdom. While there is a sequential flow between the three, there is also a recursive relationship between them. Samadhi leads to better Sheel, similarly Prajna leads to better Samadhi and Sheel. Furthermore the focus is that these aspects especially Prajna (wisdom) has to be not just at an intellectual level but at an experiential level.
- aspects of the ideal mind. Through almost every meditation session and his discourses Goenka ji talks about the ideal nature of mind. It has 3 aspects – a calm & quiet mind, an alert & attentive mind, and balanced & equanimous mind. These are the essential requirements of good meditation and also the outcome of the same.
- Sensations as the root to overcoming miseries. The path’s objective it to eradicate life’s miseries (e.g., cravings, aversions, obsessions, ego centricity) at their root. Buddha’s great insight was that these miseries are because of our reaction or addiction to sensations. It is this link between sensations and miseries that Vipassana seeks to sever by developing a dispassionate and accepting view towards all sensations whether good or bad.
- Impermanence. Almost every meditation session over the 10 days finishes with the call ‘’Anicca’’ or impermanence. This is a core belief about the nature of existence in the Buddhist philosophy. It is the realization of impermanence that is the root of Prajna or wisdom. It is realization of impermanence that allows you to develop a dispassionate view towards sensations, good or bad and thus eradicate your obsessions.
My personal experiences in the Vipassana course
Vipassana is a very tough course. Sitting for such long hours in meditation and maintaining silence and no contact with the external world is a tough process. Goenka ji in one of his first talks mentioned that the 10-day Vipassana course is like a deep surgery. Well, it certainly felt that way and led to some deep, moving experiences.
- Taming of the monkey mind. It is amazing how much garbage is filled in our mind, and when you sit in meditation for long hours that garbage starts coming out and you feel lighter. Mind also keeps flitting between past and present. Again, sitting in meditation for long hours forces the discipline of being in the present moment. Moreover, sitting at stretch and that too without changing posture was a huge test and development of my will power. There were moments most days when I questioned myself why I was putting myself through such a tough process. But I feel good that I preserved and completed the process.
- Overcoming cravings and obsessions. Over the 10 days, I was able to get to the root of many deep-rooted insecurities and limiting patterns. And, this happened without forcing myself to do so. The most dramatic change that happened was in my craving for food. I love to eat and it is perhaps my comfort spot. Over the 10 days my diet progressively reduced to less than 1/5th of my usual intake. By the end of the 10-day period my diet was a light breakfast at 6:30 am, lunch without rice at 11 am, and lemon water with a banana at 5 pm. This would have been unimaginable for me earlier!!
- From Gross to Subtle, there is always another level. Almost every day the intensity of the meditation process kept getting raised. From observing your breath, to doing so in a narrower area, to observing sensations progressively across the body, to eventually feeling a flow of vibrations across the body – you traverse quite a journey in 10 day. Two powerful realizations happened in the process. First, vibrations always exist in our body, but normally we feel only the gross sensations like pain and itching. It is only when our mind gets calm and attentive are we able to go from gross to subtle and observe these vibrations. Second, the process keeps surprising you. You always keep on discovering a next level of subtlety in your body that one could have never imagined.
- From intellectual to experiential. I like to understand things at an intellectual plane. That can be exciting but concepts can remain abstract. Vipassana approach allows you to experience vividly deep, seemingly abstract concepts. One of the core concepts of Vipassana is impermanence (mentioned in the section above). This came alive for me across meditation sessions. The nature and intensity of sensations you experience changes significantly across sessions and often within sessions. Initially there was a feeling of disappointment with that (not being able to feel subtle vibrations in a sustained manner). But it did drive home the concept of impermanence and that we should maintain equanimity across all situations.
Vipassana was a tough process and it did not always bring the feeling of calm and bliss that one often gets some other meditation techniques. But I really appreciated that it is a very intellectually honest process. There is little hype, no leap of faith or reliance on the divine. It is a scientific, practical and down to earth process. It does not promise a ‘quick fix’ and sets expectations clearly that the 10-day course is just the beginning of a long journey of self-observation, purification and realization.
I am too new with Vipassana to have definitive views on its efficacy but I do feel compelled by my first experience to give the technique a fair try. It is recommended to practice meditation every morning and evening for an hour each, and to do a 10-day course once a year. I hope I can live up to this!!
My final thought is a sense of wonder about the progress ancient India had made in the science of human existence and what a wealth of concepts and techniques they created for human advancement. Being a long-time practioneer of “Art of Living”, I always felt it was such a brilliant synthesis of ancient Indian thinking and practices. Vipassana has exposed me to a different but equally powerful powerful technique and set of concepts. Truly, Spirituality and Meditation as its primary vehicle are India’s great gift to the world. I pray that all of us discover meditation in our daily lives, whether this form or another!!
Be Happy!!!
