2023: My year of Vipassana
I heard of Vipassana for the first time in 2018 during an internship at a startup named HyperVerge (where I work now). The founders and several employees used to regularly practice it. I could sense an air of calmness around them and a clarity of thought that I’d rarely seen before. Our CTO summarised the essence of Vipassana as one of equanimity: a state where you don’t react to your sensations.
What does that practically mean? Let’s take a very dumb (but practical) example. Say you’re going about your day as usual. Suddenly, you feel an itching sensation in your left wrist. As you direct your perception towards it, you notice a mosquito. The default reaction is to move your hands in Brownian motion to make the insect go away for the itching to stop. Instead, an equanimous person would not react and let the mosquito be. Eventually, it will fly off on its own.
Since then, I’ve been fascinated by it. The catch: it can only be learned in a 10-day residential course where one has no access to the outside world, no devices, nothing to read and you can’t even keep a notepad. From 2018 to the start of 2023, I kept working in environments resembling that of an early-stage startup where getting a 10-day break at a stretch is hard to come by. Even when I had a rare opportunity, I took it to recover from my frequent burnouts.
But when I decided to quit my previous company, I was determined to take those 10 days out, come what may. It is important for me to share why. I was very confused about the direction I am heading in. I had no clarity on what should I be doing next, grappling with questions like: What do I value? Why? What is the reason for my existence? Does anything really matter?
(TW: suicide) Why should I (or anyone) not commit suicide if life feels terrible? I know the people I leave behind will be pained but I will be spared the sadness of losing them when their time comes to go. Yes, this is a very selfish thought and I was hesitating to openly share it. But there it goes.
I read the stories of those who went for Vipassana and noticed a few common themes: a spiritual grounding, clarity, strength to face their inner demons and gratefulness for having come across it. A strong symbol of its impact: all the centres run entirely on donations. One doesn’t have to pay for anything during those 10 days (for accommodation, food, etc.). Those who come out of the course find it so transformational that they want others to experience it.
When my day arrived, I was ready to give it my all. I had nothing to lose.
I went to Dhamma Naga, one of their centres in Nagpur, along with my mom. She’d been going through some confusion in her life as well and she loves visiting new places. So, we figured it cannot hurt for her to give it a shot. There was a funny moment when we were going through the timetable for a given day. She’s a foodie, so naturally her priority was checking out the meal timings. Breakfast - 6:30 am (check), Lunch - 11 am (a little early, but check), Snacks - 5 pm (great, check). “Where is dinner, beta?”, she exclaimed. As we scrolled our eyes up and down the time table a couple more times, it dawned upon us that there is no dinner post snacks. This became a major source of her anxiety about being able to complete the course.
We reached the centre at around 6 PM the day before the course began. It was a plush campus, located far from the main city. The first thing we noticed was a standstill silence. Throughout the 10 days of the course, one needs to practice “noble silence”, where we are not allowed to speak to anyone, except the volunteers for any logistical doubts and the teacher for any doubts related to the theory/practice. Not even to make eye contact. There is a purpose to this which I will come to later.
For anyone who’s curious, you can read more about what a day looks like, the goals of the practice, the code of conduct during the 10 days and apply for the course here.
There are several concepts in Vipassana around which the practice is grounded. It is important to understand both. Firstly, it is a technique that was discovered by Gautama Buddha in the process of gaining liberation (nibbana or nirvana). Since then, he and his lineage of teachers have preserved and spread the technique to help others walk on the path to liberation. The most recent in this lineage of teachers is S. N. Goenka. His audio and video recordings are played throughout the course.
Let’s go over the key concepts now!
The 4 noble truths:
Suffering exists everywhere: Life is a suffering. Everyone is miserable. The moment we observe our misery objectively, it becomes a noble truth.
The cause of suffering: experientially observing the deep cause of our misery instead of the surface-level external cause. We tend to think that our misery is caused by things outside us but misery starts inside.
Eradicating the cause will remove the suffering
The path of going to the depth of our mind and eradicating the cause of the misery
The unconscious mind is inaccessible to most of us. We often consciously tell ourselves what is right for us. But when the moment of action arrives, we tend to revert back to our patterns.
And where do those patterns originate? In the unconscious mind. So, there is a wall between the conscious and the unconscious mind. What the conscious mind says to the unconscious is mostly ignored, but the conscious mind is often unable to ignore the instructions given by the unconscious.
We need to break that wall. Breath is the bridge. It is the only thing that is both conscious (we can choose to speed it up or slow it down) and unconscious (we continue breathing even when we’re not actively thinking about it).
The Eightfold Noble Path:
sila (morality)
right speech: impure speech includes lying, using harsh words, backbiting and purposelessly talking; everything else is pure
right action: any action that harms others is impure; one that helps is pure
right livelihood: if our work harms others or encourages harming others or if our motivation is wrong (e.g. to exploit others), it is not the right livelihood; right livelihood is one where we want to use our skills to contribute to society
samadhi (concentration)
right effort:
get rid of unwholesome qualities
don’t take on new unwholesome qualities
preserve and multiply existing wholesome qualities
stay open to new wholesome qualities
right awareness: awareness of the reality of the present moment pertaining to our own physical and mental structure
right concentration: concentration must be developed from a base of purity, without any ignorance, illusion, craving or aversion
paññā (Wisdom)
right thoughts: removing defilements at the surface level of the mind and having healthy thoughts as opposed to craving, illusion, and aversion
right understanding: understanding reality as it is, not how we want it to be
One cannot move to a higher stage without mastering the ones that come before it. A strong base of sila is required to develop samadhi. Likewise, a strong base of sila and samadhi paves the way for paññā.
To develop a strong base of morality, a new learner needs to follow 5 precepts during the course (and if they want to maintain the practice beyond it). One needs to abstain from: killing, stealing, sexual misconduct, telling lies, intoxication
During the course environment, it is easy to follow all but one: telling lies. It can be tempting to exaggerate one’s experience if allowed to speak to others (“ooh, I felt a wave of electricity going down my body today”, “I saw a divine light”, etc.). This is why “noble silence” is enforced.
Given this base of sila, day 1 starts with samadhi. Day 1-3 marks the first phase of the course: “anapana”, the precursor to Vipassana. Broadly, it involves the observation of breath as it is. No control (unlike, say pranayama), just observation. The goal is to develop an ability to detect sensations on a particular spot on the body.
30 hours later, done diligently, this is the first superpower that one unlocks. This is when I was first able to sense vibrations. This step is crucial. Without this ability, one cannot begin learning Vipassana.
Once the base of samadhi is developed, Day 4-9 is when the actual technique of Vipassana is taught, with the aim to develop paññā (wisdom). There are 3 types of wisdom that we’ll understand through an example of a sick man getting a prescription from his doctor:
suta-maya pañña: wisdom acquired by hearing or reading the words of someone else, without any questioning (the sick man has a lot of faith in his doctor and he recites the prescription every day)
cinta-maya pañña: intellectual understanding when one rationally examines what one has heard or read, to see whether it is logical, practical, or beneficial; if so, then one accepts it (the sick man asks his doctor for the explanation of the prescription; once satisfied with it, he starts reciting the prescription every day)
bhavana-maya pañña: experiential wisdom, the wisdom that one develops within oneself; this is real wisdom (the sick man takes the pills following the prescription and gets cured)
suta-maya pañña and cinta-maya pañña existed before Gautama Buddha as well. His main contribution was bhavana-maya pañña. Vipassana is the technique to see reality as it is and develop experiential wisdom. Turns out that the key is sensation.
I found what follows to be mystical when I first heard it as well. But my reservations went away (still not completely) through my experience.
Buddha, through his practice, figured out the root cause of suffering as illustrated in the diagram below:
Since this is fundamental, I want to clarify it further. Suffering is caused by attachment, which develops from momentary reactions of liking/disliking turning into craving/aversion, reactions which are bound to arise due to bodily sensations that occur when there is contact between any of our senses with objects in the outside world. As long as our senses exist, sensations will arise. Our senses are present the moment we are born. We are born because the universe is involved in a continuous process of becoming. When we die, even though our body disintegrates, the flow of consciousness moves to another body. This flow of consciousness occurs because our mental reactions leave deep imprints on the mind. These imprints are called "sankhara”.
There are 3 types of sankhara:
a) one that leaves no impression (like writing on water)
b) one that leaves a temporary impression (like writing over the sand on a beach, it eventually gets washed out)
c) one that leaves a deep imprint (like inscribing on a piece of rock, very hard to undo)
Even in a single day, we leave multiple deep imprints (e.g. due to jealously, anger, ambition etc.). Throughout a lifetime, we accumulate many such deep imprints.
At the time of death, our deepest imprint rises up, is picked up by the flow of consciousness and carried over to the next body.
Why do these reactions happen? Ignorance. We do not know what we are doing. As long as there is ignorance, suffering will remain.
The key insight by Buddha was finding out how to break this cycle, i.e. at the level of sensation (vedanā). All our sensations are impermanent (anicca, अनिच्च), they are bound to change. If we don’t react to them with craving or aversion (i.e. if we can be equanimous), we can prevent ourselves from accumulating new sankhara. Once we stop generating new sankharas, our old sankharas start rising up. If we are equanimous to them, they start getting eradicated as well.
There are 4 stages of liberation based on how much of one’s sankharas have been removed. The state of total liberation (nirvana) is when all our sankharas have been removed, which will stop the continuous process of becoming as the flow of consciousness will have nothing to pick up at the time of our death. Thus, we won’t be born again and the suffering of life never begins. We can break the cycle.
There is much more depth to this which I won’t get into. But this is the bare minimum needed to understand the technique.
TL;DR: as soon as we come in contact with anything via our senses (thoughts and feelings being a sense input as well apart from vision, sound, smell, taste, touch), we make an analysis (whether it is good or bad) and generate a reaction (sankhara, e.g. anger, craving). If we can be equanimous to our sensations, we can prevent accumulating new sankharas. Eventually, the old sankharas will come up and get eradicated as well. Once all our sankharas are removed, we are liberated.
Okay, that was a lot. But what is the actual technique you might ask. I will oversimplify it here because the only way to learn it is through a 10-day course. It is a form of body-scanning, where one needs to scan every part, from head to toe and back, for sensations. Once a sensation is picked up, we have to be equanimous to it. There are many layers to this, each revealed incrementally every day, which we then practice for 10 hours so that the next layer is accessible to us.
Eventually, if practiced diligently, one is able to sit for an entire hour without moving any part of the body. This is called “adhiṭṭhāna”, or strong determination. It is meant to prepare us for the stage when we are ready to sit in meditation until we are liberated, just like the way Buddha did.
These 6 days (4-9) were full of ups and downs. In many sessions, I felt I was not progressing. Thanks to the teachers, I got daily feedback on my technique and was able to correct my mistakes. Once in a while, I would experience something that I cannot quite describe as anything but mystical and it gave me the necessary motivation for the struggles ahead.
By day 6, it became natural for me to be very attuned to my senses. I started realising I’m always running to the next thing, never present in what I’m doing. Even for something as simple as closing the door, I would rush and slam it because I was focused on getting out. While eating, I was in a rush to complete the food. Then, the connections to my regular life became evident. Wisdom started emerging.
On some days, during the breaks between sessions, I just lay on my bed and tears would start flowing. A lot of memories that I had repressed from my childhood started coming back. I realised the mistakes I’ve made and how ungrateful I’ve been. There was a newfound appreciation for life, every single person in it, especially for my mother and my family, for bearing with me all these years. I resolved back then to sing the song “Maa”, from the movie Taare Zameen Par, for my mother on her birthday in November this year (which I did). Occasioning, the crying was more of an outburst. I had kept a lot of stuff stuffed inside.
Every day I was also asking myself two questions:
do I want to leave everything to become a monk or keep working in a job?
do I want to continue being in a relationship with my girlfriend at the time?
By day 7, I realised the main causes for my misery: ego, fear, imagination, wanting to be a hero and severe attachment to my mother. Excited, I went to my teacher explaining how I’d uncovered all my issues. Now I needed him to tell me what I needed to do to eradicate them. By then, the concepts had not sunk in as neatly as they are now. To my disappointment (at the time), he said, “Just keep practicing, everything will heal”. Even though I was apprehensive, I kept my faith. By day 9, I could readily sense that the intensity of each of these sources of misery had reduced considerably.
Onto the last phase that is taught on day 10, also the day when the oath of “noble silence” is lifted: metta-bhavana. Here, we pray for the well-being (mettā) of every person in the world, for everyone to find the will to resolve all their defilements and come out of their miseries. It acts like a soothing balm after Vipassana.
I had not spoken to my mom in 10 days, even though I saw her every day. I was naturally very excited and anxious to hear her experience. Her first reaction was, “It is remarkable how they manage to feed 200 people in 30 mins”. She felt very happy about the experience, which was a huge relief for me. The first thing she needed, once we left the centre, was a good cup of chai (tea). Even at 4:30 am, on our way to the airport, she got the auto driver to stop somewhere. I usually don’t drink either tea or coffee. But that morning, I had one cup with her, with Parle-G. And damn, what a combination. Chai + Parle-G has become my go-to occasional indulgence when the weather is right, and every time, some part of me goes back to that morning. By the way, my mom drank 5 cups in one go.
I came out of the course with a renewed hope for life. I had found my spiritual path. As clichéd at it might sound, it left a huge impact on me. There are a few reasons why I chose to follow it:
It is logical and scientific. I skipped a lot of the science here for the sake of brevity. There are many things that would seem mystical to someone new (and many still do to me) but because of the things I experienced, I realised how much I don’t know about my own body and mind. I cannot let my ignorance hold myself back and it’s better to be open to seeing where the path takes me.
It emphasises that the only path to liberation is by every person putting in the work required to get rid of their own miseries rather than by relying on some external entity keeping a record of all our sins and virtues to determine whether we go to heaven or hell.
(TW: suicide) It gave an explanation for why one shouldn’t commit suicide. Briefly, piggybacking on the concept of sankharas, when we die, the deepest imprint on our mind is picked up by the flow of consciousness and carried to the next body. Anyone who commits suicide has to leave a very deep imprint (due to intense anger, hate, sadness etc.), which forms the base for the next life. Thus, we might think that we are ending our misery but we really aren’t. Of course, I don’t fully believe this yet but I don’t know enough to falsify it either. What mattered for me is this question being acknowledged and answered, which I’ve not found anywhere else. Of course, this is a very sensitive topic and I have no qualification whatsoever to talk about it. These are just my interpretations.
Finally, there is no imposition that this is the only path to liberation or that it is the supreme path, better than everything else. One is urged to give it a fair trial, inspect it for themselves and if it doesn’t work for them, they can reject it. Any true spiritual path cannot involve an imposition in my view.
It has been more than 9 months now. There are various ways a practitioner is asked to integrate Vipassana into their lives:
practice for 5 mins before sleeping and after getting up
practice for 1 hour each in the morning and in the evening
practice mindfulness throughout the day, while walking, eating, talking, etc.
The only thing I’ve been able to maintain is a 45-60 min practice almost every day. It is one of the things I’m genuinely proud of myself for. It was the first healthy habit I’ve developed in my life. Soon others followed suit. The benefits of practicing it have only compounded. Almost every aspect of my life has improved. I still get triggered now and then, but I am able to recognise that earlier and take the necessary corrective action sooner. I have a deep understanding of my values. I’m very happy with my own company and am able to own who I am instead of pretending to be someone else to please others or to fit in. I’ve become better at fighting my natural impulsive instincts that have traditionally been a source of misery. The idea of “balance” always seemed boring. Now, that’s what I strive for.
Another very important learning about myself: I’ve derived a lot of my self-worth over the years from how others perceive me. I still do today, to a much lesser extent though. It is embarrassing for me to admit how much it influences my actions sometimes. But now I’m aware.
Of course, there are days where I miss my practice. But I don’t beat myself up for it. I come back the next day. I’ve realised that some things just need to be done without thinking too much about it. If I try to rationalise whether I should do my practice on a given day, I’ve already lost. Instead, the moment I just begin without overthinking, it flows naturally.
The goal of writing this elongated post was to document my journey and use it as a medium to reflect on a crucial element of 2023 as the year comes to an end. A secondary goal is to share this with everyone who has asked me about my journey. I’ve hesitated from talking a lot about it because any answer would be insufficient without everything I’ve shared here. I am sure there are people who are both curious and skeptical about Vipassana. My hope is that this post can serve as one more feather (among many) that helps you decide whether you want to take the flight.
This is just the start of my journey. I’m looking forward to how I progress in the future. I’m aware that there are many roadblocks that I will be facing on this path. Because of which, this post is also a means for me to reinforce my identity as a Vipassana meditator so that I can conquer them more effectively.
If you have any thoughts on the post or if you want to share anything else with me, I’d love to hear from you. You can just reply back, leave a comment or reach out to me at “aman dalmia 18 at gmail.com” (without any spaces).