Day 8.
Silence and boredom don't exist.
So in the lead-up to my 10-day silent Vipassana retreat,
I was telling people about it.
I was saying,
Hey,
Yeah,
I'm going away to a place where I won't have access to my phone,
Or to reading material,
Or writing material.
I won't be talking,
I won't be interacting,
I won't be touching,
I won't be communicating in any way with other people.
I'll be meditating for 10 plus hours a day.
I'll be sitting in silence.
I will be with my thoughts.
And the response that I got back,
To say the least,
Was interesting,
Concerning,
From the majority of people.
The ones that have done a Vipassana course before,
And the meditators amongst my followers and friends and family,
Sort of understood and were jealous of the experience.
But that was a distinct minority.
The vast majority of people were concerned,
Or in disbelief,
Were highlighting the fact that they would be tremendously bored,
Or overwhelmed,
Or confronted,
And they couldn't fathom the thought of doing such a thing.
They thought and suggested that I was crazy for doing it,
That it would be one of the worst experiences,
Very boring,
Very overwhelming,
Very confronting,
Very,
You know,
Insert reasons that they couldn't do it.
And,
You know,
Fair call.
What we're doing here,
People that have done these sort of courses and these sort of silent sits,
It's the life of a monk,
And this is the life of a very selected,
Specific sort of person.
Not everyone can do such a thing,
And particularly if you live in modern society with access to the internet and,
You know,
Phones and podcasts and distractions and busy,
Busy,
Busy lives and people and all of these sort of things,
You know,
Families.
I've got two young kids,
I've got hobbies,
I've got work,
All of these things,
And,
You know,
We all do.
But the one thing that people sort of came up with was like,
Oh my god,
How will you deal with the silence and the boredom?
Well,
A couple of things happened in practice,
Because I didn't know.
I just knew that I had a calling to do such a sit.
I knew that for the entirety of my life,
I'd not really ever had any time of prolonged silence.
You know,
As a kid,
You sort of get almost more time to be in silence,
Sort of thought and play and contemplation,
But then you go to school,
And then you get friends,
And then you get tech,
And then you get a job and partner and desires,
And,
You know,
You need to work and you want to improve yourself,
And all of these things happen,
And you're like,
It doesn't feel like you can justify sitting in silence,
Sitting with your thoughts,
Because what's the point?
You've got all of these other things to do,
Far more interesting things.
But then you get the little seed planted of meditation,
And you start to sit,
And you start to realize that,
Oh god,
It's a hard,
It's a challenge to sit for one minute in silence.
And,
You know,
Prior to doing this course,
Or prior,
You know,
The fact that you're listening to this on an app that is meditation-based suggests that you're at least somewhat interested.
And we've been sitting in relative silence for these sessions together for one minute,
But I encourage you to consider,
You know,
What amount of time would feel confronting to you.
Can you sit for five minutes,
Ten minutes,
An hour,
Three hours,
A day,
Ten days?
What is the limit where you're like,
Oof,
That would be a challenge?
Because for a lot of people,
Most of the people I talk to,
Interact with,
Work with,
Even five minutes seems confronting and overwhelming and an impossibility.
They get confronted by this thought of like,
What will I do with myself?
What would arise?
Oof,
This is tough.
But to me,
That itself inspires curiosity,
That itself inspires the desire,
The need to do something about it.
I need to,
Well,
Deal with this,
Because if we look back from an evolutionary perspective,
We didn't evolve to have such distractions constantly.
A lot of early humans' lives would have been in relative silence.
Just nature.
So what is modern society doing to the mind of the human?
What is it doing to my mind?
Why do I feel uncomfortable sitting in silence?
So I wanted to explore it.
And over the days,
As I've discussed,
I realized that well,
Silence doesn't really exist.
Silence actually is not a real thing,
Because the mind is constantly chattering.
The body is constantly sending up thoughts.
And,
You know,
If you just sit outside and listen,
You'll notice that you can hear sounds all the time.
And even if you get yourself away from the traffic,
You know,
The wind is blowing,
The trees are rustling,
There's birds and animals and other things just making sounds.
There is always things to listen to if you're there and curious about it.
What there isn't is this sort of pushed entertainment.
You know,
There's not music or podcast or videos or all of these things sort of pushing the silence away,
But there is still things to listen to,
Internal and external.
And extending from that,
I also discovered that,
With a caveat,
Boredom doesn't exist.
Boredom doesn't exist if you take the approach of curiously exploring the sensations arriving in the body.
If you curiously listen to what appears,
If you're just there for the present moment.
And if boredom does arise,
You look at it and you investigate it in the same way that you would pain.
You consider it in the same way you would anything else that arises in the body.
What is boredom?
What is its component parts?
Does it have a correlative feeling in the body?
Does it arise in your belly as numbness,
For example?
Where is it?
What does it feel like?
And almost like the act of discovering,
Exploring and looking into boredom itself,
That act itself helps to alleviate the boredom because you're doing something.
Can you be curious about it?
And to be clear,
There is a distinct difference between tiredness,
Sort of sleepiness,
Energy dropping and boredom,
Although they tend to come together until you investigate it.
So this session,
This talk here,
I want to,
Rather than talking more,
I want to just encourage you to sit in silence with me for a bit longer.
And this time,
Rather than focusing on the breath or the sensations of the body,
I just want you to be there for it for five minutes,
Just five.
And if that sounds like a little long to you,
Be curious about that.
Be interested about that.
Be like,
Why am I feeling a bit overwhelmed by the idea of five minutes?
If it seems doable,
Then let's do it.
If it seems overwhelming,
Then challenge yourself.
If you need to return to the breath,
You can.
But instead,
I encourage you to just be there and simply do nothing.
Thoughts will come.
Mental phenomena will come.
Feelings will come.
Sounds will come.
Things will arise.
Things will pass away.
And just be there for it.
Just notice what happens.
And just let it go.
And let's see if there's any insights to arise.
Let's begin.
So,
How did you go?
Today we looked at the idea of silence and boredom not existing.
And I hope that that sitting of five minutes of just silent observation of thoughts,
Of feelings,
Of sounds,
Was insightful.
And if it was,
I encourage you to continue that practice,
Either after this session or each day.
Just find a time that seems a little longer than you're comfortable with.
If you handled the five minutes well,
Try 10 or 20 or an hour or longer.
You know,
Just be there for it and see what arises.
You can always stop.
But to me,
There's a curiosity that comes from the idea of exploring what is arising.
Exploring the idea that you may be afraid of silence.
That you may be afraid of boredom.
That you might have some aversion there.
Give it a try.
As always,
I encourage you to sit with any thoughts and feelings and insights that arise.
And take some time to explore the practice.
And if you have any questions or like some further clarifications,
Or have an insight you wish to share,
Please do so in the classroom.
There I'll be able to give you a voice response and be able to read the questions and answers from other students.
This is an opportunity for deep learning,
Further introspection and insight.
So please don't miss out.
I look forward to seeing you in the next session.
Thank you.
This track was taken from the course,
The Path Within.
Lessons from a 10-Day Vipassana Retreat.
It's out now on Insight Timer and available through my profile.
I invite you to check it out.
