John Rowan has made immensely important contributions to contemporary psychotherapy and humanistic psychology in Britain. We were therefore delighted when he expressed a wish to join us on retreat. Here are his valuable reflections on his experience. We send him our best wishes. Come again John!! (Eds)
Thursday 20th
Went to catch the 2.10 train to Birmingham-Shrewsbury-Llandrindod Wells. Got to Paddington in good time but did not see train up. Asked Information, and found it was Euston, not Paddington. No one had mentioned Euston when I booked the tickets on the phone. Went to Euston, got the 2.50 train to Birmingham, and then a quick connection to Shrewsbury. Checked and found that the last train to Llandrindod had gone. Decided to go to Craven Arms, which I thought was the nearest point to Llandrindod.
I thought Craven Arms was a major interchange, but it turned out to be just two platforms, with no stationmaster. Found a phone, but it only took BT Phonecards, which I did not have. There were two posters up for taxis. Persuaded operator to ring the first number and ask if they could take me. Operator said: "This is a reverse charge call from Rowan. Will you pay for the call?" He said: "Never heard of Rowan, no." I said to the operator: "Perhaps you asked the wrong question. If you had said "Will you take a call from someone who wants a long trip in a taxi the response might have been different." She tried that and he said: "No, we are not going out again tonight." (This was about 7.30 by now.) So then I asked the operator to try my last chance, the other taxi service. She did that, using the better message the first time, and a cheerful woman answered, who said she would take me. She arrived about five minutes later, to my great relief. I explained exactly where I wanted to go, and she drove like a demon along a multitude of country lanes, from Shropshire into mid-Wales. When we got nearer, we saw a policeman, and asked him which road to take. He told us, and we found it easily. So now we were getting warm. By this time it was about 9 o'clock, and the retreat was due to start at about 6.30. We found the pub where we had to turn left, but went past the turning, and had to come back after a couple of miles, when we found it. We then had to follow very detailed directions, including going through three or four gates, which we had to open and close. However, we arrived at the end of the track, and there was our destination. Someone with a light and a big welcome was there. I got out and extracted my luggage, and asked what the fare was. It was £55. But I thought it was money well earned, and added another £5 on to it.
I came into a group of a dozen or so people, all sitting round a fire. A place was made for me, and I was told that they had been having a go-round. Everyone had spoken but me. So I said my piece. Soon after that it was bedtime, and I got out my sleeping-bag and nightshirt. The bed was quite comfortable, and I only had one other person in my room. The house has no electricity, so everything has to be done by torchlight or candlelight, except in the main rooms, where there are hurricane lamps and the like.
Friday 21st Autumn Equinox
Up at 5am. There is no time for ablutions, so they have to be done later. We did physical exercises in the open yard, with the stars above us. I recognised some of the exercises from various strata of my life, starting with arm swinging, and toe touching, which we used to do every day at my prep school, and including neck rolling, which I remember as one of the Arica exercises in the 1970s. Then there was a mug of tea.
From 5.40 to 6.40 we sat meditating. At 6.40 we were given a 'Liturgy' to follow and chanted together various Buddhist texts in English and Tibetan. This was all in the Dharma Hall, which had a Buddha at one end, with quite an elaborate altar and some pictures. Every time we came into or left the room we had to put our hands together and bow to the Buddha. Down each side were mats and cushions, and stools for those who were using them. At the other end of the room, where the entrance was, there was a place for a timekeeper, complete with various bells and a very impressive timekeeping clock, which lit up when the right number of minutes had gone by. At this end also was a big stove with a huge metal chimney above it going through the roof.
At 7 o'clock we had breakfast, consisting of porridge and milk, bread and soya spread, and marmalade or jam or peanut butter. A Buddhist chant began and ended the meal.
Then at 7.30 the working shift started. My job was sweeping up the ash from the fires (all wood-burning), chopping kindling and laying fires. Other people had other jobs. The only paid post is the Cook, who also took part in the meditations when he was free.
8.30 was rest, so I had a little lie down, then did my teeth and shaved. At 9.15 we had a talk about the way the retreat was run. John Crook was in his robes, which he only wore during formal sessions. Basically we alternate between two kinds of activities (not counting work, rest and physical exercises), Zazen, which is the sitting meditation, and the Communication Exercise.
In the Communication Exercise two people sit opposite each other. One asks the other a question, the other answers for 5 minutes; then the roles are reversed. There are usually three alternations per session, making 30 minutes. The question is given to you by the course master, and consists of things like: Who am I? What is another? What is trust? What is my true nature? What is love? and so on. If and when you get a convincing answer, you may be given another question. My first question was: What is love?
We spent the rest of the morning meditating, which I found very hard on the legs, even though we had a break every half hour. We were allowed to use a chair, and I resolved to do this when it felt necessary.
At 12.30 we had lunch, which consisted of vegetable stew or thick soup, bread and cheeses. One o'clock was work, and I spent most of the time with an axe, chopping kindling for the fires. I learned to use gloves after nearly getting a nasty splinter in my finger.
1.45 was a rest, so I had a little lie-down. At 2.15 we went ahead with more Zazen and the exercise. At 3.30 a walk was scheduled. I walked about a mile to the nearest telephone and rang Sue, to ask her to tell one of my clients I would not be back in time to see him. Unfortunately she had switched off the answering machine! I didn't have her mobile number with me, so that was frustrating. (I have now memorised it!)
Back in time for a cup of tea and a cake.
Then at 4.45 we had chanting, which consisted of the sounds AAAAAAAAA OOOOOOO MMMMMMMMM repeated many times. Then silence, open for meditation.
At 5.15 we went into the exercise, and I faced two people (30 minutes for each) who said to me, "Tell me what love is?" I eventually got an answer, "Love is a piece of cheese frying in a pan. If you are not careful, it will get stuck to the pan, so you have to keep it moving!" This helped me with my problem of how to relate to my students and clients, and in a subsequent session I had the insight that I could write to FS (a student with problems), to ask her how she was getting on, and wish her well. When I told my insight to John Crook, he told me to carry on with the same question!
At 6.20 we had a little rest, and at 6.35 we went into a dynamic meditation, consisting of 10 minutes shaking, 10 minutes dancing to a tape, and 10 minutes resting. It reminded me of the old Osho days, when we used to do 10 minutes going mad, 10 minutes lion breathing, and 10 minutes resting! This was a bit easier.
Supper followed at 7.35 (everything was quite punctual, and in fact on the first day we had been told that there were three important rules, silence, tidiness and punctuality).
After supper the showers came on, so I took a shower and washed my hair. Rather difficult because there was no room to put clothes in the shower, and no curtain round it! But I managed.
8.45 and more of the exercise. 9.45 chanting. 10 o'clock lights out - very strict!
Every day we had the same routine. The food was good vegetarian stuff, and we had to say grace (Buddhist type) before and after every meal, chanting together.
I carried on with my question "What is love?" and as I did so I found my heart beginning to take over. That ruined my meditation, which had been quite structured. My heart did not like structure, and I was left rudderless in the meditation. I went to Simon (the assistant master) with this, and he said to just pay attention to whatever came up. As I did this, my heart seemed to take over more and more, and I had a sort of illumination where I suddenly saw everything from a heart point of view. It was a highly emotional experience, where I seemed to lose all need for structures and concepts: instead of trying to keep apart the real self, the subtle self, the soul, and all that, they more seemed to be all one. Love was the heart, and the heart was love, and that was all I needed to know! It seemed that I really knew what love was, because love had taken over!
I went to John Crook with that, and he said I seemed to have got it. Apparently I had some kind of radiance when I talked about my experience, and this convinced him. He gave me a new question: "What is your true nature?" As I worked with this, over and over again, my heart seemed to shift to my centre, the region of the hara. It there joined up with other parts, like the mind and the senses, and they all went to the centre. It began to seem to me that that was my true nature. And then the bottom opened up, and it became bottomless. It opened up to infinity. And then it seemed that infinity could blow up through that, and through me, and that I could be filled by it, but not hold on to it or stop it or get in the way of it. And so I could be me and act in the world, but also be this infinite spirit, or infinite Nature, or infinite life at the same time. So my true nature was all that. I was quite ecstatic with it all. When I went to John Crook with it, he beamed and said that what I was describing was not just Nature and my true nature, but Buddha nature. But I should carry on with my same question for the last day.
I still hadn't managed to contact Sue with my point about the client, and John kindly offered to let me use his mobile phone. He had to take me right up the hill above the house to use it, however, because apparently the house is in a kind of shadow. He managed to make it work, and rang the number for me. At first I got the answering machine, but by this time it was Saturday, and Sue picked up the phone. I gave her the details, but before I could say "I love you!" it cut off, which was a shame.
On the Sunday I managed to have another shower, this time in a second shower room which was more spacious and easy to manage. I had not known about this other room before, and would have used it the first time if I had known.
On the Monday I spent the exercise time partly in finding ways to hold on to my insight when I got home, and partly in deepening the experience. As part of the latter, I suddenly had the sense that I was all the people in the twin towers, and all the pilots of the planes as well! It was as if my heart was now big enough to contain all that.
On Tuesday it was the last morning, and I oiled all the tools with edges so that they would be OK for the next retreat, which apparently was only a few days away. I took photographs of us all, and somebody kindly took one so that I would be in it. I managed to get a lift to Bristol with a kind woman with a car, and so the journey home was much easier than the journey in had been!
Now that I am back, I have found it possible to hold on to my state of mind, certainly when I am with clients, and most of the time with students. My morning meditation has changed completely, losing all the structure which was so useful to me at first, when I was learning to meditate, and gaining instead a deep sense of love and integration. So I got a lot out of the retreat, and it was very good for me.
I do have some reservations about the Buddhism, however. I found it a bit oppressive to have to chant words I didn't understand in Tibetan, to chant words I didn't agree with in English, to bow and do prostrations which seemed to me meaningless. It was the exercise which was good for me, rather than the Buddhism. Also the place seemed unnecessarily remote and isolated. I don't see why there shouldn't be a centre accessible direct from a main road, or even a side road, rather than a track with several gates. I don't see why there shouldn't be electricity (many farms have their own generator) and a telephone. The fees are very low, and could be higher, or so it seems to me. And there could (also or alternatively) be more emphasis on donations, and more sales of books, tapes, CDs, videos and the rest. I don't mean it should become a commercial enterprise, but there is a financial side to the operation, and I don't see why that needs to be denied so strongly as it is now. The work of John and Simon was excellent, and the work of the cook also, and flush toilets have been installed, but the material underpinnings could still be improved further without, I believe, losing the spirit of the place.
