Meditating with monks: day six (in which she is very mindful)

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By Gabrielle Jackson

7am: This morning I sat through the sitting meditation session for a full hour. I only moved once but I’m not going to say it was easy. It hurt. A lot. But every time I thought about giving up and going to sit in a chair, or even open my eyes to look at the clock, that bloody Michael Phelps was in my ear. Curse on him! But I did it, so now I am going to reward myself by sleeping through the first hour of the next session.

This morning I noticed that they guy who says grace at meal times is not Sayadaw, who I thought it was for the past five days. And apart from the words, ‘breakfast’ and ‘lunch’ I don’t think he is speaking in English, which would explain why I can’t understand it. I don’t actually think they look that much alike, apart from the fact they’re both tall, bald, Asian men with glasses and brown robes.

Yesterday they fertilised the garden and this morning the air is heavy with the stench of manure. I didn’t even stop to smell the frangipani. But I did try to be mindful while sitting on the toilet. Well, that’s not entirely true. I remembered when I stood up, so I pulled on my pants with great thought.

11.36am: The sweet floral aroma has returned to the air. In spite of this, sitting meditation is still agony. I think the bruising in the foot I hurt four months ago has returned. Is that even possible?

Today I was wandering slowly back from lunch. Did you get that? Wandering slowly. I caught myself in the act! I was wandering slowly. I wasn’t noticing much, because I was engrossed in thoughts of my bruised foot and how it could still be bruised four months later, but I was going pretty slow!  

Another thing I’ve noticed: unless he’s sitting in the interview chair, I don’t know who Sayadaw is. There seem to be quite a few tall balding Asian men with glasses in brown robes here. It is another puzzle I must solve.

There is something seriously wrong with the resident cat. It makes the loudest sharp barking noises, all day and night. It barks. It’s a barking cat. Or maybe just barking.

4.17pm: I can barely walk and in the last sitting hour I only managed to sit still for 26 minutes. This time, when I was about to give up, I had Amy Winehouse singing in my ear, ‘I cheated myself, like I knew I would.’ Talk about having voices in your head from opposite ends of the spectrum. Not that modesty is usually the way I roll, but I’ve got to say I obviously don’t have the talent of either Michael Phelps or Amy Winehouse, so why am I torturing myself with their voices? I’m more like that Australian rower woman who stopped rowing in the Olympic final when they were in the lead. But again, an Olympian. Why? Why can’t I just face I’m not that good at anything and give up?

Today I noticed that the electricity pylons are made of concrete. While noticing I fell off the path into the mud. This is why noticing is not good for me. I need to watch where I am going. I fall over. Maybe that’s what they mean by mindfulness – watching where you’re going, not looking around at everything else. Hmmm. I must enquire about that.

9.30pm: Another torture session. My left hamstring is killing. My right groin aches. My feet and ankles are swollen etc etc.

I had terrible trouble concentrating today. I just couldn’t stop thinking. How can you do that? I would become really determined and say to myself, ‘Right, no thoughts.’ And then I would say (in my head), ‘That’s a thought! You’ve failed already.’ That’s when I was actually thinking about not thinking. When I forgot to think about not thinking I was planning the party I might have for the Olympics opening ceremony. Then I remembered it will be about 4am in Australia so the hour I’d spent planning it was basically wasted. This went on all day.

All the rain has really brought the frogs out. You should hear them, it’s ridiculous. It sounds like a flipping frog farm, if such a thing exists, which I imagine they must do in France, where they eat them. I would not like to live near one.

I finally washed my hair since it was so itchy. I think I found an ant in it. It’s amazing how not itchy it is now. There are no mirrors in this entire complex so I have no idea how bad it looked. But who cares?

Today I saw a lady in the dining hall pick up an ant off the floor on a piece of paper and take it out to the garden. Seriously, I couldn’t make this stuff up. 

What happens next? Read day 7 here

Don't miss the previous days' diary entries. 

Read DAY FIVE 

Meditating with monks: day five (in which I break a precept)

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By Gabrielle Jackson

7.01am: I’ve just done something terrible. I killed a spider. I deliberately killed a spider. I didn’t take much pleasure in it, but that’s hardly a defense, is it?

11.30am: This morning I sat for half an hour. My feet went numb and my back ached. But the thing is, I could stand it. I did not move once. It was amazing! I felt high. I mean, it really works. This is the breakthrough I’ve been looking for! It can happen! It works!

It’s still a battle to control my thoughts and I had to have a talk to myself about this diary. I spend a lot of time looking around and thinking what I’ll say about it here. For instance, the lavender hospital clothing they’ve got us in is compounded by the fact that everybody moves around so slowly. We really do look like we’re in a psychiatric hospital, especially at meal times. This thought makes me laugh.

It’s at meal times that I spend the most time thinking about what I’ll write when I get back to my room. This is bad. I should be thinking about what I’m eating and being mindful. I really am trying at that. Every day I make sure I smell the frangipanis outside the dining hall. Today I smelt the Singapore orchids as well (the frangipani smells better). I walk around the red ant colony making absolutely sure not to stand on any. But I simply cannot walk slowly. I’ve slowed down, compared to my normal pace, but the slowness kills me. I can’t do it. I just can’t.

Meanwhile there is a fly in my room that has been here for two days. My attitude towards it is not very zen. Today, when I was in the zone during my meditation, a fly landed on me and I was able to let it go. I didn’t move, I just let it crawl over me and then it flew away and didn’t come back. But then as soon as I got back here and started stretching, my room fly is doing its landing on me routine again and I am getting seriously worked up about it. I just yelled at it to fuck off. This is not good. I clearly have a lot of work left to do.

4.42pm: Well, I’ve had a breakthrough. My back doesn’t even hurt so much anymore. My core stays strong even when I’m not thinking about it and I don’t have to go and do loads of stretching to relieve it afterwards. My legs still go numb and need a bit of massage before I can get up, but I can sit still for half an hour without moving, even when a fly is crawling up my arm and sweat is dripping down the small of my back. At the same time.

Speaking of flies, the fly in here is really asking for it. Every time I enter the room it swarms around me like it’s happy to see me. I have left the door open for it to leave. It refuses. Every time I try to chase it out it hides from me until I close the door again. It’s driving me nuts.

So although I have broken through the pain barrier I have not conquered the mind control game. Today I spent at least an hour writing (in my mind) an episode of the sitcom Bindi and I are working on (kind of) while I was supposed to be meditating. I was cracking myself up and had to use a fair bit of mental energy not to laugh out loud. Then Cassi walked past, looking like she was having a pretty tough time of it, and the hospital-issue white baggy trousers she had on had a big brown stain on the bum. I couldn’t control that laugh.

9.28pm: I take it all back. I have not broken through any pain barrier. That last session was torture, and it didn’t even involve the Dhamma talk.

I wish I hadn’t read Michael Phelps’s biography before coming here. I keep setting myself challenges and saying, ‘Michael Phelps wouldn’t have quit here’ or reciting to myself sayings that his coach says to him about training, as if I’m actually going to try to swim in the Olympics. I just want to sit still and not think. But Michael Phelps is at me, every time I want to get up and say it’s too hard. I was in so much pain tonight that when I got up the room was spinning. My head was so fuzzy that I couldn’t even see straight. It was like I’d taken four Valium (I hadn’t. I seem to have lost them).

9.38pm: Great, there’s a cockroach in my bathroom. I hate my bathroom. It stinks and every other night, it seems, when I get home from the torture session and all I want to do is have a shower and go to bed, there’s another nasty surprise waiting for me that I can’t kill. Maybe I was wrong on the first day saying it would be easy to keep precept number one – not to kill things. Why are there so many insects and spiders and cats screeching and dogs howling and spiders and cockroaches in my bathroom! Argh! I’m only half way through. Why am I here? Why am I doing this?

Today I noticed that ears get itchy a lot. It’s my most itchy spot, other than my head, but that might have something to do with the fact I haven’t washed my hair in over a week. 

What happens the next day? Read Meditating with monks: day six here.

Have you read the first four days of the Meditating with monks diary? Read them here:

Arrival day, day one, day two, day three, day four 

Meditating with monks: day four

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11.40am: Last night, the spider won. I tried to scare it and it ran up to the window and was just about to run out when a lizard approached. Good, I thought, it will eat the spider, then I can have a shower and go to bed and not feel guilty about having had anything to do with it. The stand off, however, between the lizard and spider, was going for a quite a long time, so I tried to push the spider out, helping the lizard along only a teeny bit, with the end of a broom, but my attempt failed and the spider ran in the other direction. The spider was then on my roof. Exhausted, I closed the door and went to bed without a shower. That’s what happens in Buddhist retreats.

It was hot, however, and I had been enduring immense physical pain for the past 18 hours, the result of which is I stunk. I was sticky and smelly and in incredible pain and I could not sleep. I also have a bird nesting right outside my window. I thought birds slept at night? This one has other ideas. Its chirping sounds like someone tapping against glass with a key. It’s annoying. I was awake well past midnight and so when the bell went off at 3.30am, upon which I was supposed to get straight up and shower – hoping the spider had found another place to live in the meantime – I went back to sleep and dreamt about showering. You can imagine my surprise therefore when I woke up at 4.50am (50 minutes late) still in bed without having showered. I jumped up, had the world’s quickest ever shower and still made it in time to sneak in and pretend I’d been doing the walking meditation for the past hour.

I think my breathing is improving but the pain is still intense. This morning I pulled a hamstring in my right leg while bowing to the Buddha. I don’t even know who Buddha is! I only bow to him so often because it relieves the pain in my back for a few seconds! My knees are still stiff and my left leg now goes numb in every session.

After lunch, I noticed the gate. The exit gate. There were people standing at it and I wanted to be them. What am I doing here? What do I hope to achieve?’

I noticed that I have not killed a lot of ants.

4.30pm: In my interview with Sayadaw I said, ‘Is it supposed to be this hard?’ and he said, ‘No pain, no gain.’

I’ve looked around a lot at the other women today. Cassi and I are the only non-Asians. Everybody else is either from Thailand, Vietnam or Laos. I’m, like, double the size of the average woman here. My legs simply do not cross the way theirs do. I look at their little miniature legs all wrapped up nicely and feet tucking in snugly and I try it, but it just doesn’t fit in the same way; I’ve got too much leg!

I thought I had a breakthrough today. (Do I think this every day only to realise later that I haven't?) I felt the rising and falling of the abdomen really intensely. I got a head spin and then my body starting rocking forward and back to the rhythm of the rise and fall of my abdomen. It was as though I couldn’t control it – my body was just working in harmony with itself (very unlike me). For those moments I really did forget the pain and it was wonderful. But then I looked at the clock and only one minute had passed.

9.29pm: The evening session is torture. When I say torture, I am not using the literary tool of hyperbole, which I usually employ to such fine standards. I am being serious. I now know that I could stay a torture session should I ever be put under for my secret knowledge of kebabs.

The woman who sits behind me, and is at least 100 years old and falls asleep during her meditation at least seven times a day, gets up easier than I do. I want these people to know we do not come from a sit-on-the-floor culture. The last time I sat on the floor I was in primary school.

My feet and hands are so swollen that my toes look like loaves of bread dough in a furnace and my fingers look like sausages. 

Do things improve on day five? Find out here

Don't miss the earlier diary entries for Meditating with monks:

Arrival day

Day one

Day two

Day three

 

Meditating with monks: day three

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By Gabrielle Jackson

11.38am: It’s getting worse, not better. Half an hour into my second sitting hour of the day, I was in so much pain I decided to go and take a 10-minute break on one of sofas.  I know I took a vow to train myself to refrain from sitting on such high and comfy objects, but I’ve seen other people do it so I went and sat on it, meaning only to stay there for 10 minutes. I woke up 45 minutes later, drooling, with my head in my knees. What’s more, I’d chosen the sofa outside the interview room for my little rest, which means Sayadaw had seen me as well as all the people coming and going from his room every 10 minutes.

I am trying to observe and notice more, instead of always thinking about something else, but even when I am noticing, I am thinking, ‘I should write this down. It sounds quite nice. I wonder if I could turn it into a poem? I’ve never written poetry. Daniel writes beautiful poetry. I bet he’d love something like this. No, he wouldn’t, he’d hate it.’ etc etc. I decided to make a better effort.

For example, today I noticed the smell of frangipanis. The path is cracked and there are mounds of stray cement causing bumps, which I feel beneath my yellow Havaianas. There is a bush with dead green leaves that have started to curl inwards. I wonder why they’re dead when it rains every day? There is a tree with tiny red flowers. I don’t know what it’s called. A tile has been left abandoned on a ledge.

4.50pm: I just don’t know if I can do it. I can’t see how this is going to suddenly stop hurting. Today, during a sitting session, when I was moving positions, one of the nuns came up to me to show me how to position myself correctly in the cross-legged position. Of course I know how it should be done BUT IT STILL HURTS! I looked over to her position and she has a little mounted bum cushion! It would be so much easier if I had that. 

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4.55pm: I’ve just discovered I plugged my camera charger in instead of my laptop when I left earlier. There’s only one power point in the room and when I’m in I need it to plug the fan in. See, if I’d being doing that with mindfulness I would have noticed. Now I am going to go and lie down and rest my back and knees for an hour – with mindfulness.

5.35pm: The Dhamma talk is painful. The minutes seem interminable while Sayadaw’s words are being translated into Thai. And when he’s speaking in English, I can’t follow even half of it. I have no idea what he’s talking about most of the time. I was considering taking a Valium for tonight’s talk, but considering my performance asleep on the interview couch this morning, I think I’d better not.

When I signed up to this, I imagined not eating for 18 hours a day and not talking would be the difficult parts. I was a little hungry on the first night, but that doesn’t even bother me. I just didn’t imagine I would be in so much physical pain. 

I was reading Michael Phelps’s biography when I arrived and it made me determined to be great at this. For the first two days I kept setting myself Phelps-inspired goals. I would say, OK, you can sit here for 20 minutes, then move. I achieved every goal and I was proud of myself. But now I can't get past that 20-minute mark. I could never be an eight-time Olympic-gold-medal winner. I’m hopeless!

Then again, maybe that’s the problem. Maybe I have the wrong attitude now. I have to believe I can do it. Break through the pain. Zone it out.

9.22pm: Just back from evening torture to find a spider in my bathroom. It looks nasty and dangerous. Since I’m at a Buddhist retreat and I’ve made a vow not to kill, I resisted the temptation to wash it down the drain, but what do I do? I know I should pick it up and take it outside, but what if it bites me? 

A spider to greet me

 I think the nun has taken a liking to me. This evening when I arrived in the hall, she came over and rolled up a cushion to put beneath my bum so now I have some ever-so-slight height under my rear. I thought, ‘You beauty, now it’ll be easy.’ It wasn’t. I did manage to sit for half an hour without moving, by which time riga mortis had set in. My left foot was completely numb. I could neither move nor feel it. I had to physically pick it up and move it. My knees were locked in position. Now I know why these people move so slowly – they’re stiff, stiff as boards! It hurts to move any faster.

Why am I doing this?

Better face the spider and get some sleep so I don’t fall asleep again tomorrow in front of the whole congregation. 

Read yesterday's diary here: Meditating with monks: day two
Read tomorrow's diary here: Meditating with monks: day four

Meditating with monks: day two

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Being mindful outside my room, with a new broom

By Gabrielle Jackson

11.45am: Couldn’t sleep last night and then fell asleep about a thousand times in meditation. I even dreamt. Once I nearly fell over while walking. 

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Have I, in spite of all that however, had a major breakthrough? In the last sitting meditation (the third for the day) I just broke through the tired barrier. I ended the session feeling happy. And not even in that much pain.

4.20pm: Just back from dinner (a juice box) and have to report that no, I have not made a breakthrough. That session (one hour sitting, one hour walking, one hour sitting) was just as painful as yesterday. At least yesterday I was able to sit still for 34 minutes. Today I could only manage 20. 

I had an interview with Sayadaw. My first question was, ‘When will the pain go?’ He basically said that I will learn to concentrate so well that I block it out. Are you kidding me? I thought the pain would STOP.

-->The trouble is, once the pain gets bad, I can’t concentrate at all, so I don’t see how I’m going to get to the point where I concentrate so well I forget about the pain.

If there is such a thing as a pain barrier, it’s pretty damn high. 

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Oh well, must go sweep since it’s personal chores hour and I’ve slept through the other two today.

5.12pm: Oh shivers, my outdoor broom just fell apart. Why don’t they make the handles longer on the Asian continent? From the Middle East, through the Sub-Continent and all the way through south-east Asia, they have the tiniest handles of the brooms so that you have to lean over to sweep. Don’t these people have back problems? Or is that an affluence disease?

9.47pm: That last session – two-and-a-half hours sitting and one hour standing – was a killer. I am in pain. Sayadaw told me I’d notice a change on day four or five. That means I’ve got another two, potentially three, days of this pain to sit through. Apparently if you get really good at this you can live forever. We even chant about it. I don’t want to live forever, but I would like to die in old age free from pain. So yes, I can do it. The question is, do I want to? 

Read on for day three
 
Don't miss Meditating with monks: arrival day

or Meditating with monks: day one 

Meditating with monks: day one

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By Gabrielle Jackson

Having arrived yesterday afternoon, this was my first full day at the retreat.

7.01am: So much for mindfulness. I woke up at 3.30 when the bells chimed for the four o’clock start, thought, ‘I don’t need half an hour to get ready’, promptly fell back to sleep and woke up at five minutes to four. I ran to the hall buttoning up my shirt as I ran, counting on the fact that everybody else would be there and not notice me not noticing. I did notice, however, that buttons are incredibly hard to do up while running.

11.30: I think ‘mindfulness’ means ‘go slow’. When eating you take a mouthful and then put your utensils down. You have to chew everything and only once you’ve swallowed every last bit may you pick up your fork again. No wonder breakfast takes an hour and a half! When I saw there was an hour-and-a-half for breakfast and two hours for lunch, I thought I’d have loads of free time. Not likely! I’ve never seen people eat so slowly. I find it incredibly frustrating. My whole family eats like our lives depend on finishing first. We blame our mum, who was one of eight kids in a really poor family. Whoever finished first got first dibs on seconds. Hardly fair, but that’s the way the Chudleigh family did business.

Then there is the pain of sitting cross-legged for an hour. The pain starts in the mid to lower back and works its way up. About 18 minutes in, my left leg starts to ache. By 20 minutes, there are pins and needles, and before the half hour is out the foot is completely numb. As hard as I try I cannot feel it or wiggle a toe. By this time my right knee is sore and my right foot is starting to go. By the end of the week, we’re supposed to be able to sit in one position for the full hour. How can I concentrate on my abdomen rising and falling, which is what one does while meditating, when I’m in so much pain?

Now I know what Sayadaw was talking about when he said yogis feel ‘upset, angry, agitated and itchy’. I must be a yogi!

9.45pm: Well, that was one of the hardest days of my life. Up at 3.30 (or 3.55 as the case may be), breakfast at 6, lunch at 10.30 and no food since then. I have sat on the floor meditating for a total of seven hours. I have walked for four hours. Every bone in my body aches. My joints feel like they might just break apart. Everything itches since we’re not allowed to scratch. I have sweat dripping all over my body. I’m tired. I’m frustrated. I’m hungry. I’m going to bed. 

Read about the arrival day
and Day two

Meditating with monks: arrival day

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By Gabrielle Jackson
 
When my friend Cassi and I first thought about learning Vipassana meditation, I immediately jumped in with a hugely enthusiastic ‘yes!’ despite the facts we knew including no food after midday and 10 days of no talking.

I’m incredibly lazy so the thought of sitting around doing nothing for 10 days didn’t seem like a tall order to me. In fact, it seemed like a pretty good idea. And then, add to the mix, thinking about myself all day, every day. Hello? Heaven! What could be more interesting or entertaining, I wondered? What’s all this about ascetics? This is hedonism in its purest form, I thought.

And then I got here.

Before we started, we had to agree to follow eight precepts:

1. I undertake the rule of training to refrain from killing any beings.

2. I undertake the rule of training to refrain from taking what is not given.

3. I undertake the rule of training to refrain from sexual intercourse.

4. I undertake the rule of training to refrain from false speech.

5. I undertake the rule of training to refrain from drinks and drugs which fuddle the mind and reduce mindfulness.

6. I undertake the rule of training to refrain from taking food at improper times (after midday).

7. I undertake the rule of training to refrain from dancing, singing, music, shows, from wearing garlands, perfumes, cosmetics, adornments and ornaments.

(Oh shivers, I just killed a bug. I think it was a mosquito, or a flying ant. It landed on my computer and I squashed it. Have I failed? I thought number one would be easy to keep.)

8. I undertake the rule of training to refrain from using high and luxurious seats.

Do we have to consciously stick to these things on purpose, I wonder, or do we still get credit if it just so happens that we fulfill our duty by default? Because I’m pretty sure I can stick to 1 (apart from my little indiscretion just now) 2, and 4 and, since my iPod is broken 7 as well, and I seem to be doing pretty well at number 3, though not necessarily by choice. And since we’re on a retreat in the middle of nowhere, I can’t get food or alcohol if they don’t give it to me, so 5 and 6 should be OK. The bed in my room is literally a wooden slat, and since I’m not travelling with a Sealy Posteurpedic in my backpack, number 8 appears to be in the bag as well.

So, after very little consideration, we agreed to these precepts and were accepted into a Buddhist retreat somewhere in Thailand to learn Vipassana meditation from a Burmese monk.

Our first task was to go to our cabins and check our clothes for appropriateness. It was discovered that I had two bottoms and no tops that were appropriate for wearing here. This could be difficult given the hot, humid conditions. The lady in charge brought us back some pale lavender cotton numbers that look like hospital-issue pyjamas. But at least they look cool.

After I’d showered and changed into my mental asylum gear, we had to go to the hall for a ‘Dhamma talk’. It went for almost one-and-a-half hours. The gist of what I understood was that yogis are coming and go, coming and go, coming and go. Towards the end I picked up that they have feelings – they feel upset, angry, agitated and itchy.

Next, we had an interview with Sayadaw, the teacher (that’s a literal translation of his name). He advised us to be mindful of everything we do – to notice everything – our breathing, walking, the smells, what we touch, how we react. I noticed the hall had lovely parquet flooring and several clocks that didn’t work.

Apparently, when meditating (which is 10 hours a day here) you’re not supposed to think about anything. AT ALL. Not yourself, not the imaginary relationship you’re having with a man who knows nothing about it, not your book, not your holiday, not your home, not where you’d like to live, not – if you had to choose – whether you’d choose to write a great book or meet a great man. Nothing. Nada. Not even about the fly crawling up your leg.

This might not be as easy as I thought. 

Read the rest of the Meditating with monks diary:
Day one
Day two 
Day three
Day four
Day five
Day six
Day seven
Day eight
Day nine
Day 10  

Orphans, circuses and shoes excite this young reader

By Ellen Francis

I was describing one of my favourite childhood books to a friend the other day. It was about a pair of children who are orphaned and run off to find their long lost uncle Gus who is a circus performer. They find him, the boy becomes an elephant trainer, the girl becomes an acrobat, the reluctant uncle learns to love them (as does the whole circus) and they're allowed to stay. A quick Google reveals this is Circus Shoes by Noel Streatfeild and reminds me I also loved her books Ballet Shoes and White Boots, stories about sisters who become brilliant ballet dancers and ice skaters respectively. 

I also loved the Secret Garden, with its precocious child prodigy; I enjoyed Anne of Green Gables, who made a happy life from a difficult beginning; I ploughed through the adventurous Swallows and Amazons. It does appear I preferred books with strong female characters, although I hadn't realised this before. Perhaps it is also telling to look at what we didn't enjoy in comparison to our peers. I never liked any of the Enid Blyton type books: all too wholesome. And I couldn't get to grips with school-set fiction like Mallory Towers: too obviously idealized.

I'm not quite sure what all this says about me. I’d love to be brilliant at something but at 36 I've yet to discover an untapped talent (to my great chagrin). I haven't run away to join the circus but I probably am a bit of an escapist/fantastist; the positive spin would be that I am an adventurous, unconventional type. One analysis is clear to me: these favourite characters were all fiercely independent and individualistic often with fairly dysfunctional/absent families; and that I could (and still can) definitely identify with.
 

If I were a child today I'd be reading heaps about orphaned child prodigy Harry Potter, no surprises there.

Published as part of Not The Style Page's SpeedBlog series