5 Anxieties About a 10-Day Vipassana Meditation Course: Dispelled

First and foremost, I want you to know: I’m not going to wax poetic about the philosophy, experience of, and insight gained from vipassana meditation here.

These things will be familiar to those who have attended the 10-day course already, so it will read mundane and pointlessly dejavu. Besides, the full practice in that way can only really be understood through a personal knowing, by experiencing it yourself (and its fundamental to the approach, not simply a pretentious “you don’t get it” pretentious generality).
Going on about the teachings, technique, subtleties of vipassana will miss the depth and profundity for which the practice substantiates most its value and power. So, I won’t talk about anicca, sankaras, and doha and the like, and preach preach preach. I won’t validate why it make philosophical and spiritual sense for me.

Instead, what I want to share here are anxieties I had about the ten days of vipassana, which initially kept me from seriously considering doing the course — and which all proved to be quite misguided.

I am sure there are many people like myself who freaked out when looking at the course details initially, thinking it was “too much” or “too intense”. The atmosphere required to immerse yourself in the vipassana technique renders the course just plain scary for most. And that’s understandable. The regimen is rigid, strange, unfamiliar.

But I want to dispel this anxiety — so that people, in their consideration of whether to try vipassana or not, are not solely diverted away because of its mechanics, its rigid schedules, rules — and length.

Whether you do much research on the meditation practice itself or not (I didn’t), any inquiry into taking a course will eventually make a stop at the intimidating daily schedule, to be repeated ten days over in complete silence:

4:00 Morning wake-up bell
4:30–6:30 Meditate in the hall or in your room
6:30–8:00 Breakfast break
8:00–9:00 Group meditation in the hall
9:00–11:00 Meditate in hall or in room according to teacher’s instructions
11:00–13:00 Lunch break, rest, interviews with the teacher
13:00–14:30 Meditate in the hall or in your room
14:30–15:30 Group meditation in the hall
15:30–17:00 Meditate in hall or in room according to teacher’s instructions
17:00–18:00 Tea break
18:00–19:00 Group meditation in the hall
7:00–8:15 Teacher’s Discourse in the hall
20:15–21:00 Group meditation in the hall
21:00–21:30 Question time in the hall
21:30 Retire to your own room — Lights out

Fears will arise. At least, they surely did for me. I wouldn’t have gone had it not been for the support of a few key friends who had “survived and lived to tell the tale” (it was positive).

Here are the initial reactions I had when mulling over the decision of whether to try vipassana.

In case you’re having some of the same thoughts, consider my experience. Of course, each person’s experience will be different, but perhaps reading this will put you at ease and clear up enough anxiety so you don’t dismiss the idea too fast.

1. Complete silence. Won’t I go insane?

This was the first thing that struck me. It’s unnatural, I thought. Won’t I lose my mind, go into thought loops and have an existential crisis with only my voice to listen to? Nope. I was surprised how quickly I fell into it, and it became natural. The silence is conducive for deeper contemplation and turning inward without extra stimuli to distract you. And it works.

2. The day starts at 4 AM….? That’s before the sunrise you realize…

Yes. And you’ll find, that given the pace of each day, the mental effort, and likely, the fact that you don’t eat very late, you’ll be ready to hit the pillow at 9pm, and you won’t need very much sleep. Most mornings, I was awake 10–15 minutes before the gong sounded.

3. The last meal, you say, is at 11…AM?

And it’ll be enough. In fact, you’ll be wise to decrease your portion sizes, because you won’t need as much energy. For the most part, remember, you’re sitting a lot. And in silence — so you’ll feel your digestion and become more attune to what you need and want inside your stomach. And like I said, it will be enough. (And it will be delicious.)

4. TEN days?! That’s 240 hours. Straight.

There will undoubtedly be hard days. Days you count incessantly, waiting for the number to near 10. Days you feel emotional lows that creep up on you and bring you to tears. Days that feel neverending, broken down into blocks of meditation sittings upon meditation sittings. But as you learn the technique, you’ll find yourself more and more equipped to move through the days with poise, and this number will become less daunting, and the low points less discouraging. For me, on the eighth day, I kind of wished we had a few extra more to go.

5. I can’t read, write, dance, do exercise…. What on earth can I do?!

You’ll meditate.

Believe it or not, for whatever reason, the fact that I’d be meditating for close to 11 hours a day didn’t even strike me as weird or strange or scary. This was likely an uncommon thought, especially as someone who hasn’t really meditated much in the past. I figured it was a lot of sitting around. Relaxing, breathing, waiting. When in fact, this is the one thing that was truly difficult.

Meditation was the hardest part of the course — the real work. (This to me came as a sort of surprise, which is kind of silly, but in my defence, I’ve had had little experience in meditation.) However, thanks to the course atmosphere and the same rules that initially scared me (see: 1, 2, 3, 4), this, too, became easier to do — to concentrate, working on the technique. Not because it was not difficult — but because once I forged past the first 3 days, it became something I wanted to spend time doing. Any time I had to sit and meditate, I felt fortunate to have. By day 8, I wished that we had more hours in the day, in silence. I didn’t hunger for entertainments. My thoughts were enough — and meditation provided an avenue to have a break from the frenzy of thoughts and nonsense that often is in our minds.

Whether or not you find the spiritual/philosophical/psychological solace or benefits in vipassana that many who take the course do, I think it would be a loss for any person to miss giving it a fair trial because they were afraid of an atmosphere, misguided by false expectations. Don’t fear it because it’s different. Fear it if you think it will bring you harm — and in my experience, and the experience of thousands of people, it does the complete opposite of that.