Retreat Reports: Silent Illumination Retreat

…Day two. Koan day. I eventually plumped for one that, rather arrogantly, I believed I could answer. Hah! Silliness. We sat, the Koan playing in my mind as I searched for an answer. After a few sessions, Simon brought in a communication exercise whereby each retreatant sits with another and takes it in turns to answer a question on their Koan. I was coupled with the most open and honest individual…

No internet, no phones - is Joy!
Practicing in silent harmony with others - is Joy!
The Mind becoming still with the passing days - is Joy!
Chopping Onions - is Joy! (and some tears)
Sweeping the kitchen floor - is Joy!
Sarah’s food - is Joy!
Tea and Cake at 4.15pm - is Joy!
No real coffee - is temporary suffering!
Discovering Earplugs - is Joy!
Knocking on the door of the cave of the heart, and finding it…

I have come back from my first retreat with a sense of a body; my arms, legs, knees and feet have all become solid, living parts of me. My body has become a refuge from tumbling, terrorising thoughts and can now bring me, moment to moment, into the world. Prior to the retreat I felt like a wandering head-on-a-stick, a ‘teetering bulb of dread and dream’, looking outwards through dimmed eyes and…

Extracts from Rebecca Li’s report on her breakthrough retreat 2010

I continued to hear the silence and maintain an open awareness of body, mind and environment. I found them to be arbitrary categories, none carrying more weight than the others. They arose like bubbles or ripples in a body of water and disappeared without a trace, leaving the mind back to silence. Yet I noticed a thought that…

At the age of fifty-six I have found myself in an insecure and troubled place for many reasons: broken long-term relationship, empty coffers, career collapse and a recent bereavement. Chronic insomnia was placing my problems on the brink of mental illness, of hopelessness; my troubled mind shouting loudly all the time to come up with solutions and not succeeding. My mind was so chaotic, troubled…

The first day was just awful really. Sitting there, facing myself. It was like torture. No distraction, no ‘phone a friend’, no reading, no internet, no work, no walking the dog, no watching tv. Just sitting there, having to face what emerges in my mind. I found it unbearable. I really did think I could not bear to stay and started thinking about how I could just leave. I was cold; it didn’t…