An anagram of 'A Vass pain.' From thursday the 27th of december until Sunday the 6th January I was a monk near the lake of Vetten in a place with the address Ödeshög ( Fate pile) or as Mr Google translates it - 'deserted high'. This is what nearly all the days looked like: 04.00 Gong - waking up 04.30-06.30 Meditation the hall or in your room 06.30-08.00 Breakfast 08.00-09.00 Group meditation in the hall 09.00-11.00 Meditation in the hall or in your room according to the teacher 11.00-12.00 Lunch 12.00-13.00 Rest and oppotunity to ask teacher questions 13.00-14.30 Meditation the hall or in your room 14.30-15.30 Group pmeditation in the hall 15.30-17.00 Meditation in the hall or in your room according to the teacher 17.00-18.00 Tea break 18.00-19.00 Group meditation in the hall 19.00-20.15 Teacher's discourse in the hall 20.15-21.00 Group meditation in the hall 21.00-21.30 Opporunity for questions in the hall 21.30 Rest and lights out So that's a 17 hour day. 10 of them spent meditating ( or at the very least, trying your hardest to.) And it was fine really. I got used to it. I adapted. I got angry sometimes, thought it was a waste of time. Then realised it wasn't. Some pics. The mens house, the entrance to the woods, my monastic cell for sleeping and meditating (I had the red chair), a released John, expectant family! Some memories:
Day 1-2 Focus on breathing in through the nose. Feel nostril entrance, inside the nose. Diffence in feeling between breathing in n out. so focusing the mind in on a small area of the body. Day 3 Smaller area between nostrils and upper lip, feeling after sensations in the skin. Day 4-9 Vipassana. Learning to scan through the body from head to toe looking for any kind of sensation. Including back pain, butt pain. Accepting all without reaction. Saw a shooting star on New Years day. Saw six swans fly over the crescent moon. Saw some lovely sun rises. One particular one after i had sat stock still for an hour for the first time. This you were expected to do 3 times a day for an hour at a time. Really hard in the beginning. Felt almost interupted by the end! There was a real storm wind for 2 days (Day3/4?). At the same time when I lay down to sleep I had this dull, throbby lower back pain that made it very hard to drop off. Second night considered going to ask for painkillers, felt like after I'd put my back out. Fell asleep instead, next day fine. Comments are closed.
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AuthorEveryday life in Southern Sweden. Categories |
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