December 2011 7 Day Retreat

N.M. Center for Meditative Inquiry and Retreat

Preference for this retreat will be given to full time participants and early applicants. Applications will be accepted starting July 1. Call for details.

Retreat Facts and Application

Writings About Going to Retreat:

About Deciding Whether to Go To Retreat

Personal Reflections on Retreat

What keeps us from freedom?

Retreat - Waking to Undivided Being

Is the retreat based on certain traditions?

Top

Why Retreat? Why 7 Days?

I'm particularly happy to be able to offer a seven day retreat. Up to recently we have had only four to five days. I feel that there is an important and even critical quality to seven days of retreat that is not found in five days. For most people it takes the first three days of retreat for the mind to even begin to be done with its ordinary preoccupations and to quiet down and open up.

In another day or two there is a freshness and energy of presence that becomes possible. However, it is often not until the sixth or seventh day that our deep habitual pattern of perception through thinking may begin to break up, like an iceberg drifting into warm water. Another way to say this is that the deep blindness that dominates what we usually are cannot maintain itself, cannot hide itself into the sixth and seventh day. There is a deep healing that can take place at this time.

I don't mean to present this as a formula that such and such happens on such and such day of retreat. However, I have always felt that stopping at day five loses a precious opportunity.

Why retreat? We only need to sit still for a bit and consider our lives to answer this, I think. Underneath the concerns, the fears, the memories of so much difficulty, struggle, conflict, are old rememberings of, what? Something simple? Something direct? Something not bound by time? A different energy of presence that
we have only the most fleeting taste of. A bottomless presence that we permit ourselves to touch but are not able to abandon ourselves to. Retreat is the withdrawing from everything that turns us away from this bottomless presence and in seven days this presence may, for an instant, reveal itself clearly and brightly for the first time in our life.

It is very helpful, and important, I feel, to point out that meditative work, that long retreat, is not just about getting a quiet break from the storm of our lives. It is more that the whole focus of how we see our lives is questionable, is off, and yet the ability to see life simply and directly does not easily and readily give birth to itself. This simple seeing is a complete radical shift of focus which does not come from will power or intention, nor does it come from gradual cultivation of qualities. It comes on its own when, in a moment, the old way blinks out, gives up the ghost, which may happen if the futility of it is seen and felt sensitively again and again and a wondering begins to grow if there really is something different.

I had wanted to quote from a delightful little book, written in 1970 I believe, by a woman named Flora Courtois, who as a young woman was grabbed by questioning the meaning of life, the way to live directly. She read books, talked to people and nothing that she came across touched her directly. Nothing anyone said satisfied her as real. And yet something continued to grab her attention. She was not able to let go of this, despite the demands of school, family and life. As she bumbled through the details of her daily life, gripped by her concern, her real life turned itself thoroughly over to this unknowing and unknowable wondering.

One day, at home "alone in my room, sitting quietly on the edge of my bed and gazing at a small desk, not thinking of anything at all, in a moment too short to measure, the universe changed on its axis and my search was over."

Yasutani Roshi, one of the most prominent Japanese Zen teachers in the latter part of the 20th century, after visiting with her years later, wrote this poem for the beginning of her book:

In youthful days
You had a doubt about this life

No teacher found
And went alone

At the moment of glancing at the desk
The doubt disappeared, the mind in peace

You lost your way and now
The way has extended in all directions

Seven days of retreat is our rare and precious opportunity to lose our way thoroughly, immersed in not knowing, and wonder and observe moment by moment what this world is other than the fear and confusion that most of us human beings live in most of the time. This is itself enough, complete. And yet it is true that at a moment there can be a turning around of the mind, an opening, that reveals beyond all doubt the simplicity and completeness of existence. Can this be discovered for oneself? We could say that five days of retreat is a retreat with a bottom but a seven day retreat is bottomless, as is life itself.

As always, the things written here may have been put unclearly or may be off, so please let me know if you want to question something said here.

Retreat versus Daily Sitting.

I am considering right now a hypothetical comment that someone might make - "Doesn't meditative work in our regular life do the same thing that retreat does, just more slowly and steadily over time, with gradual progress?" My response is, no, it doesn't. In our daily life there is rarely, maybe never, the still, sustained energy of presence required to bring the deeper patterns of fear and identity thoroughly into the light. In daily life there is usually one pattern or another of clinging that is reinforcing itself, including the mistaken pattern of thinking that things will get better gradually in the future. In long retreat there is the possibility - though not the guarantee - that such a pattern can be seen for what it is, maybe for the first time. This kind of seeing is the essence of healing. Even the deepest traumas may be touched by this healing.

But it is not a matter of time or gradual improvement. It is a matter of the thoroughness, the emptiness, of the seeing at this moment. This is what is usually missing in daily life - the seeing is not thorough. It's partial, mixed with confusion, tied up by anxieties. Years and years of partial seeing do not add up to thorough seeing. Going to long retreat is the act of stepping out of our context, the context that we use to define our lives, into the unknown of a week of silent listening. We might say that a lifetime of trying to patch up our context is not at all the same as stepping out of it. Stepping out is not just for a moment of respite but it is stepping out heart and soul into that which is beyond context - to take a week to find out what it is to thoroughly step out of all of the contexts that human beings are caught up in.

Maybe this description is a little dramatic. Maybe for you it is just a single, simple step from confusion to presence. That's all. But my personal feeling is that this is radically transformative and for most people will only come about in a long retreat. In thinking about signing up for retreat, one easily feels the incredibly strong pull of our contexts. Context doesn't want to be interrupted or threatened. It wants to put that off until "later". Once one is in retreat, the possibility of simple presence becomes the stronger energy in a very natural way.

A Reflection On Retreat

Snow falling softly, silently, drifting in the air, the car rounds the last bend of country road on the way to the retreat center. Even though I have been to dozens, hundreds maybe, of retreats over 30 years or more, the mouth is dry with anxiety. Over what? Is it because I am turning my back on my usual activities? No phone calls to friends when I'm lonely. No book to read. No music to listen to. No clients to call me for help. No projects to work on. Nothing to do. I remember the dread of not being able to think of something to do when I was a child.

The thought jumps into the mind that no one will penalize me if I decide I don't want to do the retreat. For a moment I'm excited, thinking that I can do something more fun than retreat. I'm free to just say, "Forget it," and spend the week ... hmmm, doing what? Visiting friends? Going for walks? No. I need the retreat. Memory reminds me that after a day or two of transition, the depth and silence of long retreat is exactly what makes going for a walk really alive. It's what makes being around other people truly connected. It gives rise to a deep and thorough refreshing of the nervous system far better than a vacation. It allows the walls of separation and dissatisfaction to drop away and for a thorough sense of being at home to arise. No, retreat is where I want to be, even though the mind is anxious and frightened about the upcoming change.

To be able to make it here today I have planned four months in advance. I've told clients far in advance that I won't be available. I've taken care of other work obligations. I've avoided planning anything during this time. Life has worked itself around this schedule. The one or two critical calls that still need to be made can be done the first two evenings of retreat. Memory tells me that despite my anxiety about getting away from work, when I return it is usually as though no one has even missed me.

Entering the retreat building, I greet old friends and other friends with whom I've attended retreat maybe once or twice before. Something about sitting together in silence for a week leaves a feeling of knowing each other well. Getting settled into my room, setting up towels, toothbrushes, arranging clothes, finding a place to sit in the big sitting room. I feel like a dog sniffing at all the corners in order to feel at home. At dinner before the formal start of retreat, lots of socializing, talking with new and old friends. Soon all the sniffing has been done and each person seems to withdraw from the usual social contact into the silence of the next 7 days. Is it my imagination or is everyone's mouth dry with anxiety?

A final meeting together as a group to go over retreat guidelines and then the silence formally begins. The need to make eye contact fades away. Also the need to exchange greetings, to acknowledge another's presence. No one looking at me or talking with me, complimenting me or making me feel accepted. Is that why my mouth is dry?

Sitting through the evening, the body is struggling a little to find an easy position. Memory provides that this is always true at the beginning and that later on in the retreat, the body begins to be at ease, to become light and transparent. Sleepiness comes and goes, sometimes being nearly asleep for a whole round. This is also only a part of the beginning of retreat.

Suddenly the clarity of this still dark country land is right here. The timelessness of this vast space. Sitting here silently, this group of silent human beings, motionless, it is all here. The busy world a faint dream. The reality is only This. This cool, dark space of silent presence, extending to the stars above and caverns below. This space of presence that predates humanity, predates life, predates time. All is well. All is right here this moment.

The final bell of the evening rings. Getting up, anxious about making the phone call that needs to be made tonight, thoughts torn between not wanting to talk and needing to do the call. Someone else is in the phone booth. Now what?

Later, the call is done. A snack before going to sleep. Most people already settled in for the night. Outside the sky is dark, moonless. Snow is still blowing across the fields. Day seven is so far away that I can forget about time. What a wonderful relief. I notice my mouth is not dry any more. I am glad to be Here.

What keeps us from freedom?

When I talk to people about retreat (and when I think about going for myself!) it seems clear that the inertia of our daily lives is incredibly strong. It sometimes seems nearly impossible to consider removing oneself from that routine for a few days or a week. I don't think it's just our own personal routine that holds us in this iron grip. It seems to me that this is the collective self-enclosure of humanity, the rigid defense of what the human mind believes needs to be protected at all costs. Most of us go to the grave locked in this rigidity, which we think of as the comfort of our routine. There is sometimes a rare glimpse of the freedom beyond this rigidity. But such a glimpse often only makes the mind more defensive than before.

To attend retreat is to purposely put oneself beyond the reach of most of our routine. It allows the possibility of opening into moments of freedom, of simple presence. It allows the possibility of a radical shift in energy from defensive living to genuine, intimate, timeless contact with our moment to moment life, with nothing to lose. For this reason, there is often deep and subtle resistance to going to retreat.

I am writing this because I feel it is extremely important to be honest about this issue. I personally feel a very strong need to get to retreat at least two or three times a year because, in part, it is the one place in our suffering world where the increasingly relentless grip of human fear and defensiveness cannot get a hold. How can there be any sanity, any healing, any love in my life if there is not at least an occassional opportunity to live outside of the grip of fear, which runs all of human institutions that bind our lives?

I am concerned that as the population increases, as the complexity of human society grows, this iron grip is making it harder and harder for even sensitive people to break out of it, even for a few days or a week. The voice of habit always says "I can't get away. I have too much to do. I have other things scheduled. I need to catch up on things. It's too hard to arrange. It'll just be worse when I come back. It's a bad time of year. Maybe next time."

It's not that these things might not be true. Evidently they are true because I hear them over and over, year after year, from people. Maybe we can just raise the question, "Is there something that is far more important than the massive inertia of my life, running constantly, endlessly, to try to secure the future, escape the past, meet the endless demands of just trying to live - demands that are really the collective efforts of everyone to secure their futures? Is there anything else? Is there a need to find out? Is there the will and the energy to step out of this stream of endless struggle for a day, two days, a week? While I still have the health, the energy, the physical flexibility to do so?"

I've put a lot of work into trying to provide an opportunity for retreat that is affordable, close by and open enough for each person to find their own way. It's here, waiting for you with open arms. My hope is that together we will learn not to be fooled over and over, year after year, by the voice of collective human fear and isolation that says, "Don't dare go someplace where my grip will loosen. Don't dare go someplace where you may find out there is the possibility of living freely. Don't dare go someplace where you may see me for what I am and be done with me for good."

Let's dare, together. When simple Presence shines through, it becomes clear that the world of endless anxiety about the future and about myself was like a dream. It has its relative reality but it is also possible for it to completely give way to the fullness of timeless, perfect Presence moment to moment. Let's discover this together.

RETREAT - Awakening to Undivided Being

From my own experience over the past 40 years now, I can say that attending retreats - often three or four or more a year - has been the single most transformative thing in my life.

At the beginning of a retreat, the retreat is a much needed refuge from the overwhelming pressures and anxieties of our regular lives. It's a chance to recover and to regain some energy and vitality. But if that were all that retreat offered, the benefits would be pretty short lived.

Retreat offers a possibility to enter into the very neglected depths of our own existence and for the deepest obstacles, fears, anxieties, ingrained blindnesses, built-up burdens of the past to come to light in a direct way and to begin to heal and to lighten.

But retreat is also more than just the endless processing of old stuff - as critical and healing as that is. It also allows the waking up to the deep timeless stillness of being, the ocean of Presence on the surface of which all of these confusions, conflicts, anxieties of life seem to constantly churn and foam. This deep, undivided still Presence is something that our poor nervous systems have lost the abiity to be in touch with.

Retreat is the opportunity to open to this still Presence deeply. When this happens, our life is transformed from a constant concern with our difficulties, alternating with attempts to get a break from them, to a deep stillness full and complete in itself, in which difficulties may unfold on their own in the intimacy and fullness of the present moment - the beating of the heart, the warmth of air on the skin, the resonant sound of birds.