Retreat Reports: Western Zen Retreat

Holidays are a complete waste of time!

That's a bit harsh, but you know what I mean. Two days back at work, and where did that wonderful, relaxed 'holiday essence' go? Just like last year, it slipped through your fingers again.

How about if it hung around for a bit longer?

It was with something like this on my mind (and considerable trepidation) that found me driving to Maenllwyd, a remote…

A few miles from the Maenllwyd I telephone home. I squirm like a little girl as I sign off with my partner who reassures me that I'll be OK. Going up the track I pass a departing taxi driver who clearly feels a kindly amusement at my foolishness. I pull into the yard and draw up my handbrake as I look at the seated men in my rear view mirror promising myself that I am not going to get out. With my…

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…

It was the first time in seven years that I had been back to Maenllwyd. I had not seen the new Chan hall and was very impressed with the conversion. Sleeping arrangements had improved vastly though the slightly hillbilly, unkempt hay barn look had sadly disappeared.

As to the retreat. Sitting was not bad at all. Slightly more formal than in the old upstairs room. But plenty of zafus. Not much…

In the yard, after the rain, every step makes mud. Why do I hate the squelching?

Mixed-up youth, far-out experiences. I first read about Zen, as a 15-year-old in 1966, in Alan Watts' "The Way of Zen". I was immediately attracted by the sense of the Zen masters knowing something that was wonderful yet ordinary in that it was always present. From that time, for perhaps 7 years, I read much about…

I felt an immense sense of fear and trepidation when I sent my cheque in for my first WZR. Previous to this my record at sitting was about 12 minutes, during which I would usually get terribly restless and my ankles would hurt due to the amount of sport I have played. On the other side I had spent years devouring books on Buddhism and quite a few other ‘isms’ too. My father had always been…

I arrived at Maenllwyd, in the deepest despair I have ever known - the 'dark night of my soul'. Having been to an Introductory Chan Retreat a few months previously, I had some dim awareness that this was a place where I could safely be, that is, be allowed to be, in that dark night.

And indeed, I was in a place, and with people, who accepted my existence well before I could.

I had spoken to…

The opening words of the retreat "Where the path stops, you go on into the snow alone" have an enormously powerful effect on me and the combination of the clear Welsh air, the burning incense, the peace, and the clarity of the bell bring tears to my eyes and a lump in my throat so that I am unable to join in the words myself.

The retreat begins, the guest master cheerfully and conscientiously…

We arrived after an incredibly long journey from the north with scattered brain experiences and a chip shop repast. Was this my last meal as a normal human being? The farmhouse seemed a ridiculously long way from the road. And those gates! We seemed tobe travelling deeper and deeper into the mountain but perhaps I was entering more deeply into myself. Voices, torchlight. I recognised John…

Previous Western Zen Retreats have been enormously powerful and emotional experiences and I brought with me all sorts of expectations.

My koan was "What is life?" The aspect of my life that came up over and over again was to do with my work, specifically the job I am doing now, which involves four hours travelling a day and is turning out more and more to be not what I want to do.

Last summer on…

I felt very much at home sitting around the fire on the first evening, happy I'd come and ready for the retreat. I'd taken a bit more care than usual to prepare myself with additional meditation and tried not to arrive too tired. My wife and I have had a lot of sadness in the last few years, which has beaten us down, and the retreat was a chance to emerge from this. I also wanted to explore the…

I find I'm still struggling with my Koan. The retreat was a "great privilege". That is the expression I find myself using most when I'm trying to explain it for other people. The privilege lay in the opportunity to do such deep work and to be supported and feel quite safe and surrounded by calm and beauty while doing so. The greatest beauty for me lay in the lights, the assortment of candles, oil…