10 DAYS OF SILENCE. My invaluable experience of a Vipassana meditation retreat.

LIFE AFTER THE RETREAT

It was quite a transition coming straight back into busy London life, I was getting headaches after spending just half an hour on my phone and it felt like everyone was operating at 700 miles per hour whilst I was going at a snails pace. I was getting tired, really tired…

So I’m meditating every morning now for an hour, there’s no way I’m letting this practise slip. I’m going to endeavour to do a silent retreat every year now, you can hold me to that!

Oh and my health issue, (which was a thyroid one) improved. Most diseases and illnesses stem from stress so I knew calming my mind would be the best cure for it. And Voila it was!

Practising mindfulness meditation requires work, and as my teacher kept reminding me the mind is like a muscle, the more you train it the stronger it becomes. HOW crazy that we live in a society that is so focused on training the body yet we completely neglect the mind; the one thing that causes all of our suffering but equally the only thing that will set us free and provide us with true inner happiness.

I’m not saying 10 days will change your life. I’m certainly no monk and I still have that inner critic and negative thoughts, I’m a human, ‘a thinking being’ but what it has allowed me to do is quieten those thoughts by accessing the present moment. I can look at my thoughts objectively as not being my own, which for me was liberating! (Sounds easy to be present, right? I thought I was totally present until I did this course. Trust me, not until you train your mind can you fully appreciate what it’s like to be living in the now.)

I know how much this will benefit everyone reading this especially in our society that places so much emphasis on finding happiness on the outside world whether through a job, a relationship, a new outfit, a bit of botox, but that only buys temporary happiness until it’s over, you wrinkle, you loose that job, you dump your partner…

Have you ever been constantly drained, tired or depressed from all the mind chatter constantly dictating the way you feel and in turn changing the way you perceive the world? ‘Ah I need to loose more weight’ ‘Ah I need to get that promotion’, ‘Ah I’m getting too many wrinkles.’ We lose the present moment by constantly having these thoughts, our ego thrives of negative thoughts so we get caught up and forget about the here and now, THE ONLY TIME WE WILL EVER HAVE!

This has honestly been one of the best tools I have received, if it can help me it can help you and if there is one thing I can encourage you guys who are reading this, it’s not just to buy the latest bikini I’m promoting or lust over the last holiday I’ve been on because, non of that matters if you aren’t truly at peace on the inside…(I know) because it’s temporary, it’s fleeting it’s short lived and it isn’t the happiness (I PROMISE) that you are consciously or unconsciously searching for. It’s to get up go book a Vipassana retreat (for those committed ones) or if you’re not ready yet start making meditation a part of your daily routine, sit with yourself and stop running away from your thoughts. It will be the greatest gift you give yourself and a step closer to finding an inner peace, an inner calm you didn’t even know existed.

“Change your thoughts and the world around you changes.”

Jordan xxx

The Temple I went too:

WATRAMPOENG –

For those that don’t want to jump the nest, here are a couple a little closer to home… (I haven’t trialled and tested these so I don’t know how good they are.. )

UK VIPASSANA RETREATS

Dhamma Dipa

GAIA HOUSE

An insightful reading list that has helped me on my journey

The Power of Now- Eckhart Tolle

A New Earth – Eckhart Tolle

The Secret – Rhona Byrne

The Power – Rhona Byrne

The Monk Who Sold His Ferrari – Robin Sharma

The Four Agreements – Don Miguel Ruiz

Becoming Supernatural – Dr Joe Dispenza

You Are The Placebo. – Dr Joe Dispenza