vipassana

[Guest guest]

Hi Judy,

I have attended the 10 day Vipassana course. The schedule

involves 10 day complete silence and meditation from 4 am to 9pm in

sessions of 1 hr with 5 min breaks after each session not including time

for refreshments. Most people, for the first few days, find it quite

difficult to sit still for long periods. Further, the practice involves

observing the sensations in your body without reacting to them. On a

purely practical understanding, this is supposed to train ones mind not to

react to good and bad experiences in life. Philosophically there is much

more to it, which I suppose you could find it in their web site. So, there

will certainly be quite painful as well as pleasurable sensations in your

body. As for my experience, for the first few days there was unbearable

pain in my thigs, but one learns to look at the pain dispassionately with

out reacting, and it vanishes!. It is certainly worth attending. At the

center in Bangalore where I attended, they provided cushions for sitting

in meditation, bed on floor with mosquito nets blankets etc, clean rest

rooms, and ofcourse excellent veg food. For the elderly who have problems

in sitting cross legged on cushions, or people with back problems they

allow sitting in chairs. They also give good personal attention by

discussing with each meditator his/her experience everyday. All this is

for free, but you are free to give some contribution at the end of 10 days

if you feel like, and invariably they end up with such good collection

that the entire huge organisation is run by this contribution and the

efforts of volunteers who have benefitted from the practice. Hope this

will be of help to you

 

with regards

Raj.

 

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Baburaj A.Puthenveettil,

F.M.Lab, Indian Institute of Science

Bangalore-12

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