VMC Day 0

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Shelburne, Mass - I arrived this afternoon in Shelburne - two hours west of Boston - for a 10-day course at the Vipassana Meditation Center. It's a pretty impressive facility, housing and feeding about 80 students, while we sit in silence and meditate for 10 days straight. The students pay nothing; the course is offered for free to ensure that the teaching is available to anybody who is interested. And the entire place is run by volunteers. Most of the individuals that are cooking and serving our meals are meditating in their spare moments, also using this 10-day period as an opportunity for self-reflection and purification.

VMC was founded by SN Goenka, a teacher from Burma. Goenka claims to teach the method that was used and taught by Gotama the Buddha 2500 years ago. Apparently this method was used widely back in the day, but over the years it was changed and adapted, while the "pure" form all but disappeared. Except in Burma. Now Goenka is teaching this method and establishing Vipassana Meditation Centers all over India and around the world.

So who comes to a place like this? I drove out from Boston with two guys. One is a former computer programmer, probably about 30 years old, who is now writing a book about people who give up stable careers to pursue dream jobs and happiness. The other slightly older guy used to be a psychoanalyst, until he quit is practice, rented out his house and set out to see the world. That was six years ago.

Once we arrived, we were segregated by gender (as we would remain for the rest of the week). Amongst the female students I met several freelance writers, a massage therapist, a singer/dancer, an aeiralist (eg, trapeze artist) and at least one itinerant traveler. My roommate was a police officer. Interesting.

Most of the students were white Americans (or Europeans), but there were a handful of Indian and Chinese students as well.

We were allowed to chat until after dinner. Then we were ushered into the dark, warm meditation hall to begin the course. "Noble" silence began. That means no communication whatsoever with other communicators. There was an assistant teacher whom we could address with questions about the meditation technique, and a course manager who attended to any physical needs. But otherwise, students were to act as if we were going through the week in solitude, without interfering with our neighbors.

Everyone had a designated spot in the meditation hall. We made ourselves comfortable with various arrangements of cushions and blankets. Then the lights dimmed and the course began.

We had to take a pledge to follow the Five Precepts, or Sila, during this 10-day course:

- to abstain from killing
- to abstain from stealing
- to abstain from sexual misconduct
- to abstain from speaking lies
- to abstain from intoxicants

It seemed reasonable enough to me.

We also had to pledge that we would honor and respect the teacher SN Goenka, as well as refrain from practicing any other meditation techniques or religious rituals while attending the course. This seemed rather authoritarian, but I guess I can understand how praying the rosary or doing yoga might interfere with getting a true introduction to a new technique. Personally, I don't have any other meditation techniques or religious rituals that I do on a daily basis, so I didn't really have a problem taking the second pledge either.

All of these instructions were coming at us from the teacher Goenka via audio recording. He has this deep gutteral voice, which he uses to chant in Pali, an ancient language of India. When guiding meditiations, he speaks slowly and dramatically with a thick Indian (or Burmese?) accent, repeating phrases to drill them into your consciousness and drawing out the ends of sentences for dramatic effect.

To be honest, I found that part of it pretty weird at first. But anyway, I came here with an open mind. I was willing to go along with it for 10 days, just to hear what Goenka had to say and to experience firsthand how it would work for me.

After that, we retired to our rooms. In silence, police officer roommate and I brushed our teeth and washed our faces and turned off the light and went to bed. We would start the next morning at 4:30am.

Next: VMC Day 1