Tips for doing long solo retreat and other stuff

[mcoolio]

Anyone ever say, fuck it. And just go somewhere in a quiet place and do nothing but practice and study spirituality stuff for at least a year or more. So I guess what I mean is a retreat or something.

 

Edit: Okay, after thinking about it a little bit more, maybe a long solo retreat is not necessarily the best option. So what I'm really looking for is to take a significant time of from working. Probably leave my home country, been here to long. And I want to go deeper into spirituality. I have to admit that I'd rather do some exploration on my own rather than have some teacher, but I know that's probably a dumb idea. So yea, solo retreat seems like an obvious option but there might be other good ways to do this. Any ideas is appreciated.

 

Edited June 7, 2023 by mcoolio

[Taoist Texts]

11 hours ago, mcoolio said:

solo retreat seems like an obvious option but there might be other good ways to do this. Any ideas is appreciated.

https://terebess.hu/zen/mesterek/the-secrets-of-chinese-meditation.pdf

page 175, the author describes his solo retreat in detail. 

if you decide to go to a foreign country the main difficulty is the language and culture barrier. in case you can cope with it this is a fabulous place https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moldova

[Kojiro]

14 hours ago, mcoolio said:

Anyone ever say, fuck it. And just go somewhere in a quiet place and just sit and do nothing but sitting for at least a year or more. Of course need to get food sometime, and perhaps some light movement and walking, but other than that only sitting. So I guess what I mean is a solo retreat or something.

 

Edit: Okay, after thinking about it a little bit more, maybe a long solo retreat is not necessarily the best option. So what I'm really looking for is to take a significant time of from working. Probably leave my home country, been here to long. And I want to go deeper into spirituality. I have to admit that I'd rather do some exploration on my own rather than have some teacher, but I know that's probably a dumb idea. So yea, solo retreat seems like an obvious option but there might be other good ways to do this. Any ideas is appreciated.

 

man, I like your idea!

[Gerard]

Solo without a teacher you'll last a couple of days.

 

Please advice:

 

-Full date of birth. So I can suggest the best method for you.

-Willingness/chance/resources to travel abroad to learn from a teacher. English instruction is available.

 

 

[Taoist Texts]

3 hours ago, Gerard said:

to learn from a teacher.

erm to learn what exactly? 

[liminal_luke]

4 hours ago, Gerard said:

Solo without a teacher you'll last a couple of days.

 

Please advice:

 

-Full date of birth. So I can suggest the best method for you.

-Willingness/chance/resources to travel abroad to learn from a teacher. English instruction is available.

 

 

 

I agree that a year without a teacher sounds hard.  Why not try 10 days with a teacher first?  A ten day silent vipassana retreat is a lot of sitting (more than enough for most) and can be quite illuminating.

[C T]

I started off doing a sort of semi retreat at a couple of Buddhist retreat centres in Europe. 

 

Semi means volunteering in some capacity with what positions were available at the time, in exchange for partial board. Got lots of free time to participate in group meditation, or not. Sometimes teachers would visit and the option to enrol for their teachings is offered, usually at a reduced rate.

 

Durations of stay may vary from 2 weeks to even a year, depending. There have been instances where extensions of stay were offered, and accepted. This usually happens over the summer when activity is brisk. For the first semi-retreat, I'd initially only planned a 3-month sojourn, but ended up remaining for another 9 months. 

 

At one of the centres, i was assigned to assist with running the hostel under the guidance of the hostel warden. Mainly housekeeping work, plus managing bookings. Easy work. Was given a free bed, one free lunch per day, and free use of the meditation hall. It was very interesting, all in all. Naturally, all the volunteers would render additional assistance when & where necessary. Like many times I'd help out in the kitchen whenever big retreats took place. Always a good buzz though. 

 

Many retreat centres offer such exchange programs. Information usually found on their websites. 

 

This approach will be a good eye opener. Then you'll get a taste what retreats entail without having to burn any bridges... yet. After that, you can decide if you want to take it to the next level. Most of these centres are supervised by seasoned retreatants who'll likely be all too happy to share their own experiences once the connection has been made. 

 

All the best.

Edited June 7, 2023 by C T

[Taomeow]

1 hour ago, C T said:

I started off doing a sort of semi retreat at a couple of Buddhist retreat centres in Europe. 

 

Semi means volunteering in some capacity with what positions were available at the time, in exchange for partial board. Got lots of free time to participate in group meditation, or not. Sometimes teachers would visit and the option to enrol for their teachings is offered, usually at a reduced rate.

 

Durations of stay may vary from 2 weeks to even a year, depending. There have been instances where extensions of stay were offered, and accepted. This usually happens over the summer when activity is brisk. For the first semi-retreat, I'd initially only planned a 3-month sojourn, but ended up remaining for another 9 months. 

 

At one of the centres, i was assigned to assist with running the hostel under the guidance of the hostel warden. Mainly housekeeping work, plus managing bookings. Easy work. Was given a free bed, one free lunch per day, and free use of the meditation hall. It was very interesting, all in all. Naturally, all the volunteers would render additional assistance when & where necessary. Like many times I'd help out in the kitchen whenever big retreats took place. Always a good buzz though. 

 

Many retreat centres offer such exchange programs. Information usually found on their websites. 

 

This approach will be a good eye opener. Then you'll get a taste what retreats entail without having to burn any bridges... yet. After that, you can decide if you want to take it to the next level. Most of these centres are supervised by seasoned retreatants who'll likely be all too happy to share their own experiences once the connection has been made. 

 

All the best.

 

Hey CT, way back when I did something similar volunteering at the Open Center in NYC.  Because it is "open," meaning eclectic, I got exposed to many modalities -- everything and the kitchen sink can get thrown your way at the seminars and workshops.  Lectures on all manner of "spiritual" topics, hands-on practice classes -- could be reiki, foot reflexology, zen meditation, you name it.  Things I had to do as a volunteer were easy menial work -- arrange the chairs and/or tables and/or demo materials/props for the event, do something with brochures (don't remember what -- hand out? mail?) and troubleshoot along the way, in exchange for free access to the events. 

 

Of course I approached everything with an open mind, ready to learn, make discoveries, or suffer disappointments.  And it so happened that this way I gradually weeded out absolutely everything being offered "out there," for lack of genuine resonance with my own nature, and was able to leave most of it well alone for the rest of the foreseeable future.   A negative experience is also experience, and giving something in return ( like easy menial work, in this case) is only fair.  

[mcoolio]

9 hours ago, Gerard said:

Solo without a teacher you'll last a couple of days.

 

I've been training on my own for a while now. In the beginning I was really thinking about how I need to find a teacher. But to be honest, I love trying to figure things out on my own. For me, the practice is like a kind of research. There must be some people in the world for who going teacherless is the way. Maybe I'm one of them ...

 

I modified my original post such that instead of only sitting, I mean just practice and study all kinds of spirituality stuff. That might of course include periods of only sitting meditation, but in general, I like to study all kinds of stuff.

 

Also, it doesn't have to be a solo venture per se. Another idea would be to live together with 1 or 2 other people that are also practicing spirituality. Or some other kind of spirituality community type of thing where you still have freedom to practice your own stuff and where you at least have your own room to retreat into. Anybody got experiences with that?   (@C T your idea is not bad at all, gonna explore that a bit as well)

Edited June 7, 2023 by mcoolio

[C T]

Example of a UK-based retreat centre's open invitation to volunteers. I think this particular centre is not tradition-specific. 

 

https://openpathwaycentre.org/volunteer-2/

[Mark Foote]

10 hours ago, liminal_luke said:

 

I agree that a year without a teacher sounds hard.  Why not try 10 days with a teacher first?  A ten day silent vipassana retreat is a lot of sitting (more than enough for most) and can be quite illuminating.
 

Some opinions about Vipsassana retreats:
 

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21979485

 

Unfortunately the lead article, "Adventures at the Enlightenment Factory" by Karan Vasudeva, is incommunicado at the moment, but there are some interesting opinions on the page linked above.

 

 

[liminal_luke]

4 minutes ago, Mark Foote said:

Some opinions about Vipsassana retreats:
 

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21979485

 

Unfortunately the lead article, "Adventures at the Enlightenment Factory" by Karan Vasudeva, is incommunicado at the moment, but there are some interesting opinions on the page linked above.

 

 

Years ago I did several silent vipassana retreats -- not Goenka style.  For me it was a great experience, difficult but great.

[johndoe2012]

Study Chen style Tai Chi, free tutorial on YouTube 

 

Dharma events gruop on Telegram for Buddhist events, some are free

 

Damo Mitchell MCO course or SFQ small universe 

 

Flying Phoenix meditations, this alone can take a long time 😀

 

Self inquiry, look at Gary Weber, happiness beyond thought or Awakening to Reality 

 

Hatha yoga or Yantra yoga (Tibetan) 

 

Maybe read Taiji Bums practice advice

Or Internal Alchemy for Everyone book 

 

Etc etc 

 

 

 

 

Edited June 8, 2023 by johndoe2012

[Mark Foote]

16 hours ago, liminal_luke said:

 

Years ago I did several silent vipassana retreats -- not Goenka style.  For me it was a great experience, difficult but great.

 

 

Friend Karan in India took care of his site:

Adventures at the Vipassana Enlightenment Factory

 

 

The news from Goa this morning:

 

The weather in India has been very strange this year. Up North where it should have been hot as Hades for two months now, it is mostly March weather with a lot of rain (which is unprecedented, pretty much; it usually does not rain more than a couple of times between January and July). Here in Goa the monsoons are nowhere in sight; they should have been here at least a week ago, and the wet bulb temperature is actually greater than in the North (which is also unprecedented). The only upside is that the water table underground is being restored somewhat, which may prevent or delay the gradual desertification of the Northern plains. Things are bad for our farmers though as they depend on the established climactic patterns to know what to cultivate and when to harvest.

 

 

Karan says that he has been practicing with a Vajrayana teacher for half a year, but he's going back to Vipassana-style meditation for awhile.

 

 

Edited June 8, 2023 by Mark Foote

[C T]

15 hours ago, Mark Foote said:

Karan says that he has been practicing with a Vajrayana teacher for half a year, but he's going back to Vipassana-style meditation for awhile.

 

Karan may not be aware of the twinned threads of vipassana and shamatha that bind all Buddhist praxis, across all traditions. If there's a school or sect that claims otherwise, it's not Buddhist. 

[Mark Foote]

11 hours ago, C T said:

 

Karan may not be aware of the twinned threads of vipassana and shamatha that bind all Buddhist praxis, across all traditions. If there's a school or sect that claims otherwise, it's not Buddhist. 
 

What can I tell Karan, about "the twinned threads of vipassana and shamatha", especially if you are associating shamatha with Vajrayana?

Thanks, C T.

[C T]

1 hour ago, Mark Foote said:

What can I tell Karan, about "the twinned threads of vipassana and shamatha", especially if you are associating shamatha with Vajrayana?

Thanks, C T.

 

In essence, shamatha practice is simply training the coarse, everyday mind to settle. I think it means the same in Vajrayana as well as Mahayana and also among the various Theravadin traditions. Only the approach and methods tend to somewhat differ.

 

In Vajrayana, its said that a settled mind will eventually reveal its true, undefiled nature. Much like clearing dust over a mirror simply returns the mirror to its natural function, which is to reflect. No need to engage in the futile effort to try and polish the mirror to improve its innate reflective quality. Yet people attempt this all the time. 

 

As for vipassana (vipasyana?), here's one vajrayana perspective: 

[Mark Foote]

On 6/9/2023 at 1:44 PM, C T said:

 

In essence, shamatha practice is simply training the coarse, everyday mind to settle. I think it means the same in Vajrayana as well as Mahayana and also among the various Theravadin traditions. Only the approach and methods tend to somewhat differ.

 

In Vajrayana, its said that a settled mind will eventually reveal its true, undefiled nature. Much like clearing dust over a mirror simply returns the mirror to its natural function, which is to reflect. No need to engage in the futile effort to try and polish the mirror to improve its innate reflective quality. Yet people attempt this all the time. 

 

Clarification from Karan:

 

I read C T's comment about Vipassana (and Shamatha) being an essential part of all Buddhist schools including Vajrayana, and of course I agree that that is the case. Perhaps I should have chosen my words better. What I meant was that I will be going back to cultivating Shamatha with the breath as object and will incorporate Vipassana as it was discussed in the Early Buddhist texts. What I won't be doing for a while is the deity visualisation, the Bodhisattva aspirations and the practices derived from Yoga that are distinguishing features of Vajrayana practice.

 

 

My response to Karan, revealing my full ignorance of Vajrayana (no doubt):

 

It's only recently that I’ve become aware how much of the Tibetan tradition was drawn from particular teachers in 10th-11th  century northern India, principally Naropa and Tilopa.  They had, I believe, a six-yoga practice, very different from early Buddhism.

 

More from Wikipedia, under Naropa:

 

The six dharmas are a collection of tantric Buddhist completion stage practices drawn from the Buddhist tantras. They are intended to lead to Buddhahood in an accelerated manner. They traditionally require tantric initiation and personal instruction through working with a tantric guru as well as various preliminary practices. The six dharmas work with the subtle body, particularly through the generation of inner heat (tummo) energy.
 

The six dharmas are a main practice of the Kagyu school (and was originally unique to that school) and key Kagyu figures such as Milarepa, Gampopa, Phagmo Drugpa and Jigten Sumgon taught and practiced these dharmas. They are also taught in Gelug, where they were introduced by Je Tsongkhapa, who received the lineage through his Kagyu teachers.

I’m thinking the generation of inner heat has to do with the ligaments of the sacrum, but I can’t practice it, I’m totally guessing.  Working those ligaments is important in Tibetan Buddhism, I know that—one of their practices is hopping in the lotus posture, I’ve seen videos of modern practitioners with lots of gymnastics matts doing this.  To do that, a person has to have muscles that work in conjunction with the ligaments of the sacrum to achieve stretch, strength, and balance.  At least, that’s the way I see it.

 

The ligments of the sacrum are important in my sitting too, these days, but I come back to the advice of Hida Hiramitsu, as I wrote in my latest post:

 

We should balance the power of the hara (area below the navel) and the koshi (area at the rear of the pelvis) and maintain equilibrium of the seated body by bringing the center of the body’s weight in line with the center of the triangular base of the seated body.

 

(Hida Haramitsu, “Nikon no Shimei” [“Mission of Japan”], parentheticals added)

 

Keeping the effort with the sense of gravity, and shifting the center of gravity, has been really helpful to me, provided I can relax the muscles of the lower abdomen and pelvis and keep the tailbone involved.

In the end, I come back to that peculiar coupling of “one-pointedness” of attention and a center of gravity that shifts. 

I’m sure that’s why Ch’an and Zen put the emphasis on person-to-person transmission, because it’s as much a physical experience as a mental one and yet we are all caught up in our minds.

 

 

 

 

[Mandrake]

On 06/06/2023 at 7:09 PM, mcoolio said:

Anyone ever say, fuck it. And just go somewhere in a quiet place and do nothing but practice and study spirituality stuff for at least a year or more. So I guess what I mean is a retreat or something.

 

Edit: Okay, after thinking about it a little bit more, maybe a long solo retreat is not necessarily the best option. So what I'm really looking for is to take a significant time of from working. Probably leave my home country, been here to long. And I want to go deeper into spirituality. I have to admit that I'd rather do some exploration on my own rather than have some teacher, but I know that's probably a dumb idea. So yea, solo retreat seems like an obvious option but there might be other good ways to do this. Any ideas is appreciated.

 

 

This is as vague as it can get. Before any advice can be dispensed, what are your goals? What is your background? What are you going to practice and study, and why?

 

In the spiritual traditions/sciences a reatreat is a specific thing, and not something that is improvised. But maybe what you are looking for is more of a break in order for you to allow for time to study, reflect, and deepen your general knowledge?

 

 

M

[Mark Foote]

On 6/7/2023 at 10:40 AM, mcoolio said:

 

I've been training on my own for a while now. In the beginning I was really thinking about how I need to find a teacher. But to be honest, I love trying to figure things out on my own. For me, the practice is like a kind of research. There must be some people in the world for who going teacherless is the way. Maybe I'm one of them ...

 

 

I'm guessing that's true for the majority of the 'Bums.

Zen teacher Kobun Chino Otogawa once said, "take your time with the lotus."  By that, I assume he meant that the lotus has a lot to teach.  

I keep a return to the lotus in mind, but I sit a sloppy half-lotus or burmese, these days.  Dennis Merzel, a Zen teacher associated with the L.A. Zen Center, said he started out sitting half-lotus, then spent a couple of decades sitting lotus, and now has spent years sitting Burmese.

 

I also don't sit 40 minutes any more, my knees are happier with 25.  I do switch off left leg on top and right leg on top.  The L.A. Zen Center, where Merzel was, does 35 minutes in sesshins (or did, last I checked).

 

I myself have tried to find some Western kinesthetics that might guide my practice.  I also read the first four sermon collections (Nikayas) of the Pali Canon, and there's a thread through those sermons that is downright secular and compelling, when it comes to practice.  

I think I got something out of the presence of a lot of teachers, but a practice that can more or less be repeated to find peace in the world, that for me is complicated and simple in equal measures.

Kobun said, "no one masters zazen."  He also said that he came to the USA, not because of what he had to offer Westerners, but because something was going on here that he thought he could learn from.

Edited June 17, 2023 by Mark Foote