Vipassana Meditation

In our own words....

'Silence Is Golden' by Leonie

For 7 years I had been planning and putting off going to Vipassana, I had booked it twice in the past and both times I had cancelled it, the first time was due to my grandfather passing away and the other time was because I couldn’t ‘seem’ to find the time to take off from work.

Most of you who know me I taught asana full time, bending, stretching, balancing and helping others get into the zone - ‘their zone’, but not much time was spent on myself as i worked and put all my hard earned money into the ‘Aum mobil’. 

I had 18 classes of asana to teach, some classes has 5 people while others had up to 30 people in the class, when you do the tally thats a lot of people, a lot of energy and great deal of talking!!! 

10 days of Silence!!! 10 days of not eating meat, 10 days of BEING MINDFUL, 10 days of being in the moment!

O.K i was ready, I was burnt out, agitated, sore all over from working too much and above all I was well and truly over hearing the sound of my own voice, it was time to check myself into this meditation centre.

I had no idea what to expect.

Dom and I turned up together, and within 1 minute of us being there and before we had a chance to check in, they separated us. Men & women had their own areas. It was time to get serious. I missed him though, I wondered if he missed me?

Its difficult to give a run down of each day, even though each day was structured the same.  

There was no way I could keep a diary for everything that came up for me, the experience was broad, deep, raw, & beautiful. It wouldn’t be possible to gain this experience from asana, no-way! Western asana looks more like aerobics compared to what you gain from 10 days of Vipassana.

In the 10 days, I can tell you that I went deeper into myself, or as i like to call it now, my 

‘cell-f’, It felt like I had opened my cell-f up into millions of little pieces and dissected each and every part. 

Sometimes it felt orgasmic and other times it felt as though I had a million bullet wounds all over my body. What ever I felt, we were taught to feel equanimous towards every feeling, thought and experience. To feel orgasmic was the same as feeling miserable, both requires the same amount of energy. They are the same.

I made peace with people in my life that I felt had burnt me, I found love for those I thought  i had none for, but above all I found a love for myself that surpasses the word ‘love’ its self. There was no ‘I‘ ‘me‘ or ‘mine‘ there was only energy moving. Pure and simple, I heard it, felt it and experienced it and to explain how all this came to be in the moment wouldn’t do it justice, its something that you would have to find for yourself. 


'Vipassana Will Change My Life' by Dom

A bold statement…but one I can clearly attest to.

This was the most challenging thing I’ve done in my life so far. Ten days of silence, but even more frightening…Ten days of meditation and looking at myself. I mean really looking at myself. 

I relished the chance to keep silent for ten days to be honest, as I’ve come out of eight years of talking, talking, and talking in my chosen work field. Working as a personal trainer, working as a yoga teacher, working as a shop cashier, all I did was talk talk talk for a living. Talking for the sake of it? You bet. This I needed a break from and I knew it.

This was not too bad for me to be honest, but it was the being aware and being equal and observant of everything around me that was the really difficult bit. We look at others, we judge, we make up decision in our head about what kind of person they are, about what kind of person we are. Our thoughts tick over, all day, all night, all the time. And here we were learning to observe and be aware only! To tame ourselves and learn to be here and now…not where we were, not were we want to be in the future, but really right here right now, and see things as they truly are, not what I'd like them to be.

It was well explained to us that our 6 senses receive the information (something we see, hear, smell, touch, etc), then another part of the brain identifies what this is, then a third part decides what the reaction from us will be (will we like it or not, will we want more, etc). This is where it starts to make a lot of sense when you look deeply at it. Say you experience sex for the first time, you love it, you create a craving inside for it. You then get addicted to the feeling that comes from the sex, not the sex itself. Then you spend your life chasing it, being miserable if you cannot get it, thinking you are happy (all be it temporarily) when you do get it, you hurt others so you can get it, You then dream about times in the past where you had great sex and you think about that experience and create a craving for that as well. These cravings continue, get buried deep inside, get covered by more and more cravings…and you get miserable. Vipassana helps one let go of these cravings, and realise that these have made us miserable and learn to be equal with all we experience.

Women and men were separated at all times (so to not be distracted from ourselves) and there was lots and lots of meditation where you sat still in silence just observing yourself, no judgement, no attachment, nothing. During the simple meals, the times to yourself, the bush walks, we were urged to just observe ourselves. Observe what comes up, but remain ‘Equanimous’ as they say.

On the last day when we were allowed to break our noble silence, it was a little strange and difficult to hear my own voice again, and to even approach others and start up a conversation. The lessons are different for everyone. What I’m learning is to be more aware of my reactions, to find myself in that moment before my reaction and break some of those patterns that make me miserable and make others miserable around me.

I believe Vipassana is something that everyone should experience at least once in their lives. It is an incredible practice. No religion, no sectarianism, open to people of all faiths, equal for all…and available for all.

For those of you wishing to do a 10 day Vipassana Meditation Course, or find out further info.....check this link out