Solo retreat reflections

Here is a collection of reflections written as I left my week-long silent, solo retreat at the Hermitage:

• It’s remarkable how much time I spend telling myself what I like and dislike and then having endless hypothetical discussions with other people about those likes and dislikes.
• I’d neglected to notice the depth of this mind-wandering over the last few years, but the retreat setting brought it into clear relief. My previous philosophy had been something like “see the impermanence and emptiness of the whole show.” This was powerful, but somehow it doesn’t address rumination on the right level. Empty thoughts still proliferate.
• It’s remarkable how powerful it is to gently interrupt these internal narratives and drop back into a wide-angle, present-moment awareness. Sometimes it’s easy to overlook this space as a waiting room for the next thing. But this unremarkable middle is your open, groundless nature.
• Present moment awareness is powerful for 2 reasons: 1) it reveals incessant change, and 2) it disrupts the narratives that constantly narrow your sense of being.
• I can see more clearly how popping up into thought is often an exit strategy when there are difficult feelings (unease, stress, fear) in the chest.
• Stop watering old seeds, and the rest takes care of itself.
• It feels like 90% of my practice is returning to things as they are (and welcoming them warmly) vs any kind of “seeing through”—basically, the opposite of how I used to practice. What I notice is that when I take care of the welcoming, the realisation and revelation take care of themselves. I think TRE has been a huge help in allowing me to inhabit my body and experience more fully.
• I’m increasingly sceptical of meditative claims of attainment that mean you’ve seen something “for good” or that you’re “done” in any sense. All of this stuff has to be tended. Whatever your nature, you’re still a distractible, fallible human who is likely to try something stupid within the next 30 minutes. This retreat was transformative for me, and all of it came about through returning to simple practices with sincerity and fresh eyes.
• I hereby relinquish any and all attainment claims I’ve made in the past.
• Being best friends with myself is the alpha and omega of practice. That means welcoming the restless, tired, fearful, anxious, irritated, embarrassed and distracted selves.
• Besides the Pema-inspired practice, I was also working with shi-ne, or “remaining uninvolved.” This has a very different flavour from the Vipassana I used to practice. I noticed that I have to explicitly welcome the many strands of my experience for some time before I can authentically settle into remaining uninvolved. “Not out but through.” If I try and skip this, there tends to be all kinds of subtle denial and resistance still in play. In other words, my sense of what I’m accepting is way off. Explicitly welcoming anything uncomfortable, even if you think you’ve already done that—and seeing how the weight of your experience changes—is a powerful way of seeing where you’re still holding on.
• Notice when you’re craving The Big Stuff like Being or Stillness or Emptiness, in some abstract way. Wanting the one simple, safe step.
• Instead of reifying no-self, just notice how any apparent selfing process is discontinuous from moment to moment. Just random thoughts joining the dots post-production.
• I thought leaning into tightness would never result in spaciousness. I was wrong. I thought that what felt like 3 super-magnets lodged in my throat, forehead and crown would need to power down to experience sublime peace. I was wrong. It was my resistance to the magnetic density that kept me stuck.
• One lingering reflection: I want to get out of my own way. So much of this inner narration is meaningless, judgmental stuff that no part of me believes or wants to pursue.
• “The only opposition is the next thought” — Adyashanti, somewhere. No thought can distort or clarify the fundamental nature of this. No thought is coming to save you. This is terrifying and liberating once grasped.
• So avoid nothing and don’t buy into any thought.