I SPENT 12 days and 11 nights in a mango orchard in Dasmariñas, Cavite this March reflecting on my miseries and learning a meditation technique to bring back the balance in my life.
I spent 10 of those precious days and nights hugging trees, picking flowers, avoiding eye contact and literally not speaking a word, eating only vegetarian meals twice everyday (no more meals after noon, just tea and fruit at 5pm) and meditating at least 8 hours a day.
I didn’t know that learning how to meditate properly would be this lonely and difficult but I was determined to do it and have been signing myself up for this 10-day course for the last 2 years so I knew what I was getting into.
Now, 14 days later, I’m happy to report that I got more than what I bargained for.
The technique I’m talking about is Vipassana meditation. The word Vipassana is a Pali term (a language spoken in Northern India during the time of Siddharta Gautama) which means “seeing things as they really are.”
The technique teaches us to use “insight” –– to look inside ourselves and how we directly experience the world and to use this to cultivate personal wisdom.
Read more: http://www.dhammaweb.net/dhamma_news/view.php?id=274
