cut and pasted from email written end of december 06...
a note to say i'm back in the real world (whatever that is!..presently in chiang mai)... i finished the vipassana process after 17 days. thanks so much for all supportive emails - i received them after but felt them during!... i sent you all billions of blessings everyday... thanking you all for helping me to be where i am and sending you love for your own jouneys. the retreat was incredible.. intense... really hard... very rewarding.. there were so many times i thought about quitting but i kept telling myself to trust the process and i'm glad i did. it feels like quite some journey i've been on. i now feel more grounded in thailand and more able to follow my heart, wherever that leads me. and i'm very happy to be in the present just now which feels good!!
the experience was pretty surreal... a rollercoaster of emotions is probably an understatement. there were times i looked at myself... pacing in a line up and down a white room, wearing white, at 4 o'clock in the morning, acknowledging 'feeling tired, feeling tired, feeling tired'... 'feeling hungry, feeling hungry, feeling hungry'... 'feeling fed up, feeling fed up, feeling fed up'... then i would laugh at how funny it all seemed and would have to acknowledge that too ('laughing, laughing, laughing'...) and that would make me laugh more.
there was a beautiful lake nearby which i walked to some mornings (slowly, acknowledging every step 'left, right, left, right'..) to see the most magic sunrise ('seeing, seeing, seeing'). the first time i saw it, i cried ('crying, crying, crying'...you get the picture) which was the first of many times that taught me to carry tissues everywhere!
meal times were also memorable. in fact they were the highlight of the long days... breakfast at 6 then lunch at 11. no food except soy milk after that (although i was informed on about day 7 that 'soy milk' meant anything non solid.. which somehow included chocolate and cheese!!..?!)...the food was amazing - always delicious, much appreciated and usually unidentifyable. you wouldn't believe how alike the vegetarian 'meat' was to the real thing. often a little too much for comfort (how do you make soy products/mushrooms become chewy, stringy and meat-flavoured? hmmm..) and you also wouldn't believe how much people would serve themselves. i remained astounded everytime i saw a nun 1/3 my size and 3 times my age with a plate piled higher than her head. impressive!
there were animals everywhere. dogs would bark and cats would cry like babies through the nights (and often directly outside my window). by the end i understood why no one ever did anything about it - when you acknowlege it's there ('hearing, hearing, hearing...), it eventually stops bothering you! magic. i also sent them all many blessings. the first time i sent the cats merits, later that day there were about 5 of them hanging around my door trying to get in! it took more to get rid of the ants in my bathroom though... they were there until they no longer made me angry!! nb mosquitos don't bite you if you send them merits.
so.. i'm proud of making it through and happy with where i'm at. i catch a night bus to bangkok this evening then i'll join chris and tui further south for the exhibition (not sure what's going on but that's fine by me!). after some time on an island and crossing the malaysian border to extend visa i want to go to ko lanta to do some yoga. wahee..!
sending love sending love sending love to you all... thank you for being!!!!!!!!!!!! and happy christmas and new year.
george xoxo (unsure about change to ana as it seems to turn into anna too often for comfort.. will keep posted!)
another poem from pai poems:
what's behind us, by garuda
i am looking straight ahead.
i turn around.
again i am looking straight ahead.
is what i saw before still there?
with no eyes in back of my head,
how can i be sure?
and if i turn around again,
the question still remains.
i suppose it's best
not to fret over what's behind us!