September 2, 2024 • 55 mins
In this episode I am taking you to the area of Dharamkot in Dharamshala around the Himalayas in the north of India.
It was here in June 2024 that I met Richa while I was doing a 10-day Vipassana meditation course. Richa was volunteering her time and energy as a server during the course.
This is not Richa's first time volunteering, and I quickly discovered the passion, peace and wisdom Richa holds from her path in practicing Vipassana meditation and volunteering in the courses with such love and joy.
For those who know me, you would know how much I love vipassana meditation and the benefit I have gained from this practice, so I hope you enjoy hearing Richa share her experience and wisdom.
For more information on Vipassana meditation:
Vipassana Research Institute - https://www.vridhamma.org/What-is-Vipassana
For more information on Vipassana courses:
https://www.dhamma.org/en/index
Documentaries about Vipassana taught in prisons:
Doing Time Doing Vipassana: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WkxSyv5R1sg
This is the story of an ancient meditation technique named Vipassana, which shows people how to take control of their lives and channel them toward their own good. It is the story of a strong woman named Kiran Bedi, the former Inspector General of Prisons in New Delhi, who strove to transform the notorious Tihar Prison and turn it into an oasis of peace. But most of all it is the story of prison inmates who underwent profound change, and who realized that incarceration is not the end but possibly a fresh start toward an improved and more positive life.
Dhamma Brothers: https://youtu.be/phHib5VaCeE?si=sLZ-_H-36JA-zHF6
A documentary film about a group of prison inmates in the US who participate in a 10-day Vipassana retreat. The film asks "is it possible for these men, some of whom have committed horrendous crimes, to change?". This film has the power to dismantle stereotypes about men behind prison bars.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Welcome to Ripples of Humanity, where I'm sharing interesting stories from people who
(00:11):
are committed to creating change that can ripple within humanity.
For this episode today, I am taking you to the area of Dharmakot in Dharmchalar, around
the Himalayas in the north of India.
This is such a magical area above the clouds, with snow-capped mountains as a backdrop,
and eagles soaring peacefully.
(00:32):
It was here in June 2024 that I met Richard Paliel, while I was doing a 10-day Vipassana
meditation course.
Richard was volunteering her time and energy as a server during the course.
This is not Richard's first time volunteering at a Vipassana course, and I quickly discovered
the passion, peace and wisdom Richard holds from her path in practicing Vipassana meditation,
(00:57):
and volunteering in the courses with such love and joy.
For those who know me, you would know how much I love Vipassana meditation, and the
benefit I have gained from this practice.
So I thought it would be really insightful to pick a bit of Richard's experience and
wisdom and share this with others.
So let's get into it.
(01:21):
Hi, Richard.
Hi, Richard.
Thank you so much for chatting with me.
I'm so excited to talk to you about Vipassana meditation.
I met you in June 2024 in Dharmchalar.
I was doing a 10-day Vipassana meditation course, and you were one of the volunteers,
which is called a server, on the course.
There was 40 women on that course, and three volunteers and an assistant teacher, and I'm
(01:48):
so grateful that you were there.
You guided me when I needed it the most to stay the course, and really gave me insight
and deeper insight into the Vipassana meditation.
So grateful.
I really wanted to chat with you today because I felt like Vipassana fits in with the podcast
(02:13):
I'm trying to bring, and it's also from the perspective of serving on a Vipassana course
as well, because I think that's such a beautiful way to give back to spreading the teaching.
So let's start.
I think it would be helpful to explain a little bit just briefly, because I think we could
(02:33):
talk for hours, and we have talked for hours and hours about what Vipassana meditation
is and how experience is.
If you can just give a really brief overview of what Vipassana meditation is and what a
10-day course is.
Okay.
Thank you for those kind words.
(02:53):
And about Vipassana, the Vipassana you and I are doing, it's taught by our Guruji,
S. N. Goenka, and he was the one who brought it to India, back to India actually, from
Myanmar.
And as he was here in India to teach his mother that Vipassana course, but they were like
(03:15):
12 people who attended that course.
And from there, like other people who requested him for more and more courses, and that's
how now we have like centers of our Vipassana all over the world.
There is, there's centers everywhere in the world.
There's about six or something in Australia.
(03:35):
How many are in India?
Do you know?
There's hundreds.
I think 300 or something.
300.
I'm not sure.
I'm not sure.
I read, I think I read somewhere.
And you know, they're like, they're constructing new, always they're constructing new centers,
local centers are there.
So there are many kind of centers.
Earlier they used to rent some kind of religious place, and then people started donating lands
(04:00):
and they had this money, you know, they have enough money so they could buy lands.
Yeah, so it's still growing.
The Pashana is still growing.
Yeah, also in India, they're like more than 300 or something.
Yeah.
Okay.
So yeah, Vipassana is actually is kind of a meditation.
And the Pashana word means it's come from two words.
(04:22):
V means it's a show from the fish, which means being texting or special.
And Pashana means to look or you can say to observe.
So the Pashana word becomes to observe oneself.
And in Pashana, we are working with the sensation.
So you can say it's to observe oneself through the sensations on one's body.
(04:44):
That's the word we Pashana for you.
And it's a wonderful meditation.
There are many kinds of meditation if you heard about them.
So the Pashana comes under the category of mindful meditation.
And in this meditation, we are working on mostly on sensations on the body, the just
(05:05):
the surface of the body and how it's a connection between how these small things really lead
to your, it's called like your neuro system.
It really works so deeply when you're just working just over the surface of your body.
So that's the question for you.
Okay.
(05:26):
And what makes the Pashana so special compared to and so popular compared to other types
of meditation?
Well, I have heard about like this, this transitional meditation.
They are religious meditations, right?
And then they are mindful meditation in, but we are practicing in the Pashana.
(05:49):
It comes under the mindful meditation.
And I'll tell you somewhere that we Pashana is the highest form of awareness.
It is the highest form of awareness because in the Pashana, we are not taking support
of any tool like any mantras, any, any kind of outer things.
We are just doing a very pure meditation.
(06:11):
And because of it's very pure, you don't, you won't have any tool to help.
That's make it very tough.
And sometimes people are, they just find it very difficult to concentrate.
But if once you learn the Pashana, once you keep practicing it, your mind gets focused
(06:32):
very easily.
That's the thing about Pashana.
So we say with the Pashana and the aim of the meditation is the focusing on the body
sensations and then it's being not identifying with the, with the pain.
If something feels amazing, you're not craving the good sensations.
(06:56):
And if something feels bad and you're in pain, that you're not averting those sensations.
You're being a quantumist to both of those and you're practicing that over and over
again.
That, you know, to summarize it.
So in the Pashana, we are working on sensations and through the sensation, we goes to the
deep in our body, deep in our mind actually.
(07:19):
The thing is, we are so unaware of what's going on in our body and Pashana make it,
make us aware of it through the help of sensation in our body because whatever happens with
us.
If someone says, for example, someone says something, someone says something nice to
us, we have some good sensation, which can vibration, we can, and we can say vibration,
(07:41):
right?
So there's some good vibration on your body somewhere.
If someone is praising you, someone is saying some good things about you.
And then someone is like, they're criticizing you.
Someone is like abusing you.
They're using some curse word.
You feel, you have a bad sensation, a bad vibration somewhere on your body.
And we were, we are like, our own, like whole life, we were not able to see that and Pashana
(08:10):
make it aware about it.
And that when we focus, when we can actually, what the word is, when we can look at it,
we can easily target it and we can easily able to get out of it as soon as possible.
That's how we,
So by being just by awareness, just by being a corner, not the story of it.
(08:35):
Exactly.
So the motive about what I have learned about Pashana, what my teacher, Rina Hooda Ma'am,
she was the first, she was my first assistant teacher.
And I have to tell you this, that our Guruji, as in going, who started with Pashana, he
passed out in the year 2013.
And I started practicing Pashana in the year 2020 during COVID.
(08:56):
And it was led by one of his assistant teacher, assistant teacher, someone, Guruji himself
or his staff has trained to be at the centre because the course is completely audio visual.
Right?
Yeah.
Yeah.
If we have audio, we go back to that.
So when, when Goenka, he brought the Pashana to the, to the world, might promote it to
(09:22):
the world, but it existed before him.
Yes.
But the teaching had been lost.
And so he, and it kind of, it had been retained in Myanmar.
And then he then, when he brought it to the world, did it as videos of his self-teaching
so that it would remain pure and remain the same consistent teaching.
(09:43):
And to this day, it's still the same in every single centre in all over the world.
It's the same.
Yeah.
It is.
The same table, everything.
So, if you have time to go to the 10 day course then to explain, explain that.
Okay.
So in a 10 day course, a 10 day course is a step by step procedure of learning your Pashana
(10:07):
because it's something that you do meditation and the focus is, you need to focus like your
focus should be really clear and conscious.
So they have the Guruji, you decide it was like divided into 10 days.
Every day you are taught something new.
So the first three days, like they have, whenever you attend one of these fours, you just not
(10:31):
learn one kind of Pashana, one meditation.
There's like three meditation in one course.
So the first three days, you will be doing Anapana meditation in Anapana.
Anapana means what comes and goes.
So you just observe your breath as it comes and as it goes.
So that's Anapana.
And it's also important, Anapana, it's very easy to do.
(10:55):
You can find on YouTube guided meditation from Sengo Inka.
But for Pashana you have to attend a course.
Okay.
So the first three days, whenever some person like us, you know, we are from cities, we
are working 9 to 5 jobs and all, it's very difficult for us to sit because in these courses,
we are supposed to cut off from the world.
(11:17):
There are no phones.
There are no contact outside your world.
You cannot talk to anyone.
You are supposed to only talk, you are supposed to tell your, the progress in your meditation
to the teacher.
And if you need some kind of help, you can talk to the server.
Like I was the one who was serving while you attended that course.
So you have, like people don't know when first time they come here, they don't know how to
(11:39):
read.
You can't even read and you can't even, you can't bring in reading.
Yeah.
You're not supposed to have a pen with you.
You can't write.
You can't read.
No, I can't.
I can't read.
So you don't know how to sit with yourself, right?
So first three days are just to be sit.
You all have to just sit and observe that.
(12:00):
So first three days are just to be sitting and learn how to just sit doing nothing.
You're doing something.
You're doing really important work, but not the other work.
So that's what really vashna is.
And those three days are important to sit with yourself.
It's a very important thing.
If you are ever hurt, you know that how to heal thing, you have to sit with yourself.
(12:23):
So Anna Pana, they teach you to how to sit with yourself, learn to sit with yourself,
just sitting.
Yeah.
And then the fourth day is called the vashna day.
Vashna is taught and every single day they add one more step to it, how to practice it.
And whatever is vashna is, there are like audios and videos from Guruji, as in Goenka.
(12:46):
And those are not available anywhere.
To learn vashna, you have to attend a course.
You can do anapan on your own, but the vashna part you have to be in a center.
So anapanas serve as a base.
It's a base of your meditation, your samadhi.
Then we start doing vashna.
(13:07):
And on the last day, the 10th day, we are taught one of these meditations called metta
meditation.
Metta means loving kindness.
So many of Buddhist people, monks, they are saying, they say we are doing loving kindness
meditation.
It's actually metta meditation.
So metta meditation is only told the last day and after that our noble silence is over.
(13:31):
And people think that it's not that important.
But metta is the most important thing.
As there was a story that someone asked Buddha that why you're teaching metta, it's not that
important.
Buddha said, metta is the most important meditation.
We are doing vashna, we are doing anapanas for metta itself.
(13:53):
So metta is loving kindness in which we pray for ourselves, we pray for others.
We share the merits we have gained from this meditation, vashna meditation.
So that's the 10 days course.
And also with the course, it's free in a way.
(14:16):
Can you explain the payment concept and then the volunteer concept of it as well?
So the concept about this course is that you have to live a big shoe life.
You have to live a monk life.
This kind of meditation was actually started for people like the household people, people
(14:37):
who has a family.
Normally any kind of meditation is done by monks only, monks and nuns only who are the
clues who have given up their family life.
But this was this meditation was introduced to family people also, people who have their
families, people who have households.
So when you come to a course like this, as you ask, you have a family, you are not a
(15:01):
monk or nun, this course provide you 10 days experience of living as a monk or a nun.
As Goyangar Guruji says that we are not making you wear like monk clothes, we are not making
you shave your heads.
You have to live a monk life from your heart, from intentions and a monk doesn't earn, a
(15:25):
monk doesn't has his own money, a monk begs.
So you have to leave the ego of I earn my own money.
This is my money.
So whenever you go to a course, you say, oh, I spend the money.
Oh, I have paid for this thing.
I deserve this thing because I have paid for this thing.
So you have to leave that ego that I have paid for this thing.
(15:45):
Guruji decided to make this course completely free of cost.
The course here run on the donations given by people who have already the previous course
done by other people.
So when their course was completed, they donated the money and this is the course, but you
are attending, I am attending, it was like sponsored by the previous meditators.
(16:11):
So yeah, you are supposed to donate money as much as you can and there is no one tells
you how much to pay, what to pay, you have to do it on your own.
So as your pocket allows you.
So yeah, Guruji kept it completely free of cost so you can leave the ego of having the
(16:31):
money.
Whatever is given to you, it's like monks have their bow, whatever put in the bow you
accept.
So living in the, in like living with the acceptance of the nature, whatever is given to you, you
accept it.
You are not the one judging it.
You are not the one who paid for it.
You just leave the ego and someone given to me.
(16:54):
I just take it with gratefulness and mind you that if you have been to any or any centre,
they serve the most delicious foods and the services they provide.
Like most in most of their like many local centres, which doesn't have many services,
but they are majority of centres, they really like they have this, I'm sorry, I'm using
(17:18):
the word like resort wipes.
And you can feel that the food and everything has been made with love and metta.
Yeah, and you know when we are serving a course, we have a special metta session at every night
in the end of the day.
Like during a course whoever is coming for the first time, they have metta session on
(17:40):
the last day only.
But as you have, you're supposed to give service only if you have like attended like three
courses.
You know every Parshana already, you are practicing it already.
So at night we have this matri in which we says that if I had done anything which made
(18:02):
someone upset and if someone upset me, I forgive them and they forgive me.
We have to sit there and really have this intention with us every day, every end of
the day.
And those cooks, those staff member, they also come and they also sit there during this
metta session.
(18:22):
So you have to have a pure heart.
Your heart should be pure.
For the next day you have to restart with a pure heart again.
Because when you're serving, there are people and people get really emotional in these places
because you know you are cut off from the world and you are made to sit with yourself.
It's so difficult to sit with yourself.
You know, I have heard in the last video that talk about power vulnerability.
(18:48):
Yes.
These are two things which don't let us enjoy our life.
So when we sit with ourselves, those things that shame and guilt comes over.
So how many courses in total have you done and how many have you served on?
(19:09):
I think, I don't remember completely.
I think I have attended seven 10 days courses.
Then I have served three 10 days courses.
Then I did one Satipatan and I have done two 20 days courses.
Okay.
Wow.
And Satipatan, sorry, what's just, is that extra learning?
(19:32):
Satipatan is actually just, it's an advance.
It's not advance in the, in context of the meditation technique.
The main meditation technique is whatever is taught in the 10 days course.
That is the main.
You are learning, we have to, you know, when you do long courses, you have to come back
to attend or serve a 10 day course again and again because these are the basis.
(19:56):
And Guru Ji, Goyankar Guru Ji has given so much knowledge in those discourses at night
would happen during these 10 days courses.
So the knowledge he has part in these 10 day course is, it's really important and they
are the base of the question and they are more important.
Yeah.
Yeah.
When you say the discourses, just to clarify that, that's the, at the end of each night,
(20:21):
there's about an hour long discourse where Goyankar discusses the technique and some
of the philosophy behind it and everything goes into more depth into that after you've
done the whole day, 10 hours of meditating, you then have to, you then listen to an hour
of that.
So just to add that in.
Yes.
So yeah, that's my courses.
(20:41):
Okay.
That's a lot.
Yeah.
And so obviously it's working for you.
You find a lot of benefit from it.
I wanted to, I mean, maybe we can move into what are the key things you've learned in the
Vipassana courses that you can share, I know that probably a very broad question.
Yeah.
(21:02):
When you go to any meditation, you have some expectation from it, right?
So when I went to my first course, which I attended in 2020, my expectation was that
I used to be in good at math and now I'm, my brain battery is completely exhausted and
I need to restart my life.
So I was looking for something that, which meditation has a great way to calm your mind
(21:30):
to make you concentrate.
So I was looking for something which can help me focus on my life, focus, improve my focus
and I can, you know, do better with my life.
So my main motive came when I came to for my first course in Vipassana was to just learn
(21:51):
the technique.
I was there to just learn the technique so I can focus my mind.
That's all I was looking for.
I was not looking, I didn't even expect it to change my life and I'm really thankful
for that teacher that I'm there.
My first teacher and I called her Guru Ma, her name is Reena Hooda Ma'am.
She is the one who taught me all those things because of her.
(22:14):
The things Vipassana gave me are first most important things Vipassana taught me is true
unconditional love, unconditional love first for my own self.
I need to love myself and then to others, everyone else, my friends and my family, everyone,
everyone in my life.
So that's the one thing I learned.
(22:37):
And the second thing I would say how I should be my authentic self, to be myself.
You know how people pretend to be what they are not, people who are being mask, we are
a mask, we want to hide ourselves from people.
So Vipassana gave me this confidence to be myself, to accept whoever I am and be true
(23:02):
to myself, say the thing truthfully, this is me and not just unapologetically, being
authentically real.
You know, not being toxic, this is who I am, you have to accept me.
No, no, no, I know who I am.
These things are wrong and I need to change them.
I should work on them and I'm working on them.
(23:23):
So proud of myself on that thing.
So I become more authentic.
I judge myself being very neutral.
What is whatever is wrong with me, it's wrong.
I need to change whatever is right.
It is right and I should concentrate on it more.
So that's being authentic for me.
And I think, can I share something that I feel like I learned from you that I think
(23:50):
you maybe learned from your course was a crying, how to cry.
Yeah, that's that.
Yeah, it comes under being your authentic self.
So I was a person who, yes, I was very egoistic.
Okay, I had attitude.
(24:11):
You know what you say attitude, people have attitude.
Yes, I had attitude.
And with me, I've been, it's like, I was a very stressed teenager.
My journey, my relationship with stress is something that I was always stressed.
I was stressed as a teenager and I was stressed as a grown up.
And for me, life was getting harder and harder every single day.
(24:35):
And I was like completely cut out with the concept of peace of mind.
I didn't know what was it.
And just add something in there like, we won't go into it now, but you've shared with me
very kindly the path of your life.
And you know, like everyone, there's been a lot of pain, but you've particularly experienced
a lot, a lot of pain in your life.
(24:56):
I just wanted to say that.
So yeah, that's obviously been carried through.
Yeah, it's like, yeah, I know life happens to everyone.
And it happened to me.
And sometimes, you know, it's not like I'm crying with him, but yeah, things happen to
me and that things really made me stressed out.
(25:18):
My nervous system was always on alert.
I have lived for a very long time in like survival mode.
So I didn't know I could be happy.
I had no idea.
I'm trying to, my whole life, I craved to have normal things, everything.
I never had normal.
I never had average.
And my craving is to be normal.
(25:40):
My craving is not to be extraordinary, not to be out in the shining light.
I just want to be normal, you know, lost in the crowd.
And that never happened to me.
And it's a good thing.
And now I know I'm grateful because I know how to deal with those things.
I have dealt with myself.
So when I see someone going through it, I know how to help it.
(26:02):
And I'm really much there to help them.
That's really what my pain, what my journey, my struggle had made me.
So yeah, so when I did my first post, I was already very rigid.
And I had this that I have to show, you know, they say, take it till you make it.
So I always show up as a strong person.
(26:25):
I really believe that I have to keep working on.
I have to keep doing.
I have to keep showing up.
So in that way, I was really hard on myself.
I was always hard on myself.
And the person who taught me self love, I have to accept myself and I have to give myself
love.
And I'm really grateful for Rina for that.
(26:45):
Because I went to her crying, I was about to cry and I was really getting it in myself
and saying my complaint to her and I was in myself and she said, you know, first thing
you need to just are you feeling like crying?
Let your tears come down.
Let them roll out.
Don't wipe them out.
Just let them come out.
Look at your breath.
Anna Parna in which we just look at her breath.
(27:06):
So she said, don't look at my breath.
Let my tears to roll out and say what I want to say.
It was my first time that I was able to express my feeling without controlling out anything.
So yeah, you did that.
I was so grateful that you passed that one to me.
I think there was a moment in the course that I was in.
(27:28):
I was crying and I had my hands covering my face.
I had my hands covering my face.
Yeah.
And you and you were like, don't do that.
Don't do that.
Let it out.
Lift your head up.
Let the tears come out.
Lift yourself.
Accept your tears.
Accept your pain.
And I will always remember that.
Because I've been there.
It's not because I've seen something.
(27:49):
I've been there.
I know how it feels like.
And the good thing is I know how to feel from it.
That's what my teacher, what going to Guruji and other assistant teachers, especially
Reena, who the ma'am, what they have taught me is to deal how to deal with these things.
Not to suppress them, to have a closure with them and then let them go.
Yeah.
That's the most important thing.
(28:11):
So yeah, that's what I call unconditional love.
Yeah.
So when I started practicing and I was mostly about technique, but then I'm discovering
love for myself.
I'm discovering being authentic.
That was really big deal.
And when I completed my first course, I told you I came home and I saw myself in the mirror
(28:31):
and I said, my life is hard.
It's never been easy and it's open.
So when I accepted that thing happened from that day onward, it's been four years now.
From that day on, my life is very, very easy.
It's very easy.
And that happened because I accepted the hard part.
My life was not all hard.
(28:53):
Some nice, some easy things were happening, which I was not concentrating on.
The Prasanna made me be grateful for everything, for the hard things and the easy things.
Yeah.
So I started being grateful for easy things.
You know, they say whatever you be grateful, it expands.
So I started being grateful for easy things and those easy things expanded.
(29:16):
And yes, I have this.
There was change in my nature.
There was change in my looks too that people now, they are always there to help me.
Whenever I got into some situation, like I got punched, my vehicle got punctured.
They were like strangers came and they helped me without expecting anything from me.
(29:38):
So I always get help from strangers.
I get, yeah, I get really good price when I go out to buy something.
I really like you, you know, I don't give you on this price.
So these things really change.
People's behavior change.
You know, they say your vibe, attack your pride.
So when you, when you clear out your vibes, repression is actually it's like, it's a
(30:02):
tendency in Hindi we call tapasya, tapana, tapana means to, to heat, to burn.
So when you're doing any kind of penance, the tapasya, you are burning out all the
negative karma, the negative vibes in you.
And when all the negative things are burned down, only purity is left.
It's like having a pure goal.
(30:23):
So when you, the persona help you become pure, it's there to purify yourself, it purify
your mind, just not just your mind, your mind body and soul.
Yeah, that's so nice.
Yeah.
So that's what I do.
Yeah.
And then when we, when we go to the serving part, so obviously you did three courses,
(30:45):
your 10 day courses, and then you decided you wanted to give back and be a server.
Could you tell us about that experience and what you've learned from, from serving?
So when I completed my first course, I was really grateful.
I had so much, so much great, I was so much, you know, I had this to be grateful for.
(31:11):
I was so thankful to my teacher, Rina Lam and Guruji, Gowenika Guruji.
And that's what happened on the last day, on the 10 day.
They show us this special discourse on, on serving people.
Do you remember that?
There's a special.
Yeah, yeah, at the end, you feel very, you feel so alive and elated and you just, you
(31:32):
want to, you want to share, share that with others.
So it's a good time.
So Guruji, yeah.
So Guruji, in that, in that discourse, Guruji has appealed that if you benefited from the
Parshana, I know people donate money.
It will be very helpful if you donate your service, you donate your actions.
So it's like serving from your hands.
(31:53):
You have, if you serve it, it'll be more than donations, more than money can help.
So I was like, I really want to do it.
I really want to help.
If Guruji says that service is somehow you can repay, I am so much grateful for Guruji.
I'm so grateful for Parshana.
It made me live my life happily.
I was living earlier, you know, we all are living, but we are not happy.
(32:16):
So Parshana was there to make me, how to live happy life, right?
So, and I wanted to repay back.
Somehow, somehow I paid back and Guruji said it will be good if you serve.
So for my first day onward, I was like, I wanted to serve, but it was not, they said
that you have to do, you have to attend 10, actually three courses, then only you can
(32:39):
not serve.
Right.
I think that's pretty good.
I think that's pretty good.
I think in Australia, you only need to do one 10 day course and then you can serve.
Yeah, I heard it.
In UK also.
Yeah.
You can do two stages from UK and they even allow you to serve before attending a course.
That's also happening.
I think that's not in Australia.
I think in Australia, you have to do one 10 day and then you can serve.
(33:00):
But yeah.
Yeah, in India, we are supposed to, yeah, because I applied for service just after completing
my first course and I got a mail from the administration, the, and they said, you know,
thank you for applying, but you only completed one course.
They're supposed to do three courses only then you can allow it.
I was like, okay, I'll do three courses and I did three courses back to back, like after
(33:23):
like three months and all.
So I could serve.
I was so eager to serve on that courses and about service.
This, the service I was doing that volunteering is very basic.
It's very basic service.
There are other people who are like, they have done it.
They are like, they have devoted their life for Dhamma for this meditation.
Oh yeah.
So when you say Dhamma, because it's, that's a common word in the, the passion, meditation
(33:46):
and Dhamma, what can you just briefly say what, what is, what does Dhamma mean?
DHA, MMA.
Dhamma actually is a Pali word which in Hindi is called dharma, dharma, dharma.
And it's not, it actual word meaning is religion.
It's not religion here in the Pashana.
Dhamma means as going to Guruji has explained, it means the law of nature.
(34:10):
When we are doing the Pashana, it's, it's like Buddha practiced it, Buddha didn't invented
the Pashana, the person was already there.
So Buddha did like eight types of meditations.
And then he came to the fourth one, which is which was the Pashana.
And through the Pashana, he was able to achieve enlightenment.
(34:31):
Okay.
So in the Pashana, we are working with the law of nature.
Some people say universe.
So in the universal, this is a universal thing, it's called law of nature is there.
So, you know, they're like so many law of nature, like gravity is one of law of nature.
So what the law of nature is that if you fall from a 10 story building, gravity, the law
(34:57):
of nature is not going to judge you.
If you are a man or a woman, if you're a child or a, or a old person, if you fall from 10
story building, you're going to hit the ground, you're going to die.
That's the rule.
But what happened is sometime law of nature bend its rule and that's called miracles.
(35:18):
Miracles happens, right?
And other time, if we can bend these rules, if we, if we work with these law of nature,
there are so many laws, if you work with it, like for, for example, in gravity, if you
study gravity, people jump from not just 10 story, people jump from 100 story building
with the help of parachutes.
They're doing paragliding, free falling and all.
(35:40):
So if we study, so dhamma is actually, the person is actually like studying, gaining
the knowledge about law of nature.
And we are mostly work with the things called the cause and effect, law of cause and effect.
It's called karma.
If you do good, good things will happen to you.
If you do bad, bad things will happen to you.
The law of nature is not going to let you go free because you are some woman or man or
(36:04):
you are some disability.
No law of nature is going to judge you equally.
So that's dhamma.
That's law of nature.
Okay.
So there are so many people who have devoted their life for to dhamma through vashna.
Like there's always, there's always this manager in, in every center who is always there.
(36:28):
Even the post is not conducting that person.
They are always there and they are maintaining the center.
They are providing for the needs of meditator.
If there is some, you know, renovation, something need to be fixed.
So they are there helping and they do not, they are not getting any kind of monetary
financial payment from it.
(36:50):
Nothing.
They have benefited from dhamma so much.
They devoted their life and I have met so many people like that.
There are like trustees who are there to decide things and they are also serving.
Everyone is serving.
Then there are people like on zero day, the first day when you come to attend the post,
that post starts the next day, right?
(37:10):
So the first day when you enter, there's someone sitting on registering for you, alloting your
room.
They are also, they are serving and then you find someone serving on the 10th day.
So there are so many people serving and I wanted to be part of that service and Guruji
gave me a way to be a part that you can come and serve at any cost.
(37:31):
So my service is different from them in just one category is because I was supposed to
be with you 24 seven.
If you, the people who are meditating, if they need something, they can come to me and
they can look at my door even at night.
So that's also different, but I think that dhamma server being is the basic service.
(37:51):
There are other people who are really, who have devoted their lives and they're working
hard and I would say that I'm the minimum, I'm the least on that service.
There are so many people, even the assistant teacher, the teacher sitting on the chair,
they, there's some teachers, they're so humble and they say, I'm doing a seva, I'm serving.
(38:15):
I am not leading this course.
I'm serving this course.
Yeah, so assistant teacher is also so.
So that's a, so what's the one of the key things you've learned from service that might
have been that you might not get from doing the course.
It's just a 10 day course.
(38:35):
What do you, what's different about serving?
Well, you know, the teacher met on the last day and then they are serving.
We are given this orientation, we're given special a lecture by Guruji, a special discourse
happens and Guruji said, you need to have metta, you need to have love and compassion
in your heart when you serve.
And there are people in 10 day courses, there are people who are coming their first time,
(39:00):
they have no idea what kind of meditation it is.
They don't know the rules.
Sometimes in like, they don't know, you know, unknowingly they break the rules.
So we have to make them aware and you know, you're not supposed to do this.
And there are some time people who think that it's easy, it's okay to break the rules.
So we have to, you know, tell them that you're supposed to do this things and that things
(39:22):
and their people, they need some kind of help.
It's not really about technique because for technique teacher is there and other than that,
it's not personal technique.
Then other things, then a server is supposed to handle those things.
Like if someone's like a window that the glass plates in the window, there's some spider
(39:44):
in the room, there's some Scorpio in the room.
So we are supposed to go in and have them.
It was definitely Scorpion in people's rooms.
You should know that I'm from Delhi.
I'm a city person, like I'm a city rat.
And I haven't seen these kind of things.
And I saw Scorpio first time in my life and I was, I was like, I can't handle, I don't
(40:06):
know how to handle Scorpio.
So I had to ask the staff there.
So I called in the staff and they came and they had the Scorpio out of that, that meditators
room.
So that, that's a service.
What I have learned is, you know, to not be judgmental.
(40:26):
It's, it comes with practice.
You have to practice it.
It's to, you know, even people are there.
And again, I have to say that my first teacher, I did my first service under Rina Ma'am.
And Rina Ma'am really gave me, she really guided me just not just in Hrishwasana also
when I'm serving.
So she said this thing, but do during my first service, she said, you know, when people,
(40:50):
these places are really good.
They are very beautiful places, well maintained, but then you are, you are like, you are bound.
You're just inside that, that area.
You cannot go out.
You cannot talk to anyone.
It feels like a prison, right?
So people feel like they're in a prison and they get, and they are making them to sit
(41:12):
with them.
It makes them really, really emotional.
They are as good as you say, these standard courses actually, they are, they are opening
your heart.
It's an open heart surgery.
So when their heart is open, they are really fragile.
They are really emotional.
And we have to really handle them with care.
We have to handle them and Rina said this thing.
See it's on you, how you want to treat them.
(41:33):
You want to treat them like jailer or you want to treat them like a guardian because they
only you are there here to help them.
So you need to be really careful with your words.
We need to be really caring for these people.
So I always keep that in my mind that I'm the guardian.
I'm the one here to take care of these people.
And they are people, sometimes they are so emotional that they burst out and, you know,
(41:57):
they are yelling at us.
So at that time also, we have to be in love and compassion.
We have to understand that they are going through.
This is also part of the process of purifying.
So we have to handle that too.
Sometimes people are really angry.
It's all about, you know, practicing love and compassion while dealing with people.
(42:18):
So there's always people who came here for the first time.
They had no idea.
They want some guidance, not about technique for the technique teacher is there.
And apart from technique, a server is there to help you if you have any problem regarding
food, you have any problem regarding, and you know, it seems like very small things,
but then people are really emotional.
It's there.
(42:39):
They really, they really mind even your tone.
So you have to be very careful with that.
So so service servicing people have taught me to be gentle, to be kind.
Yeah, that's right.
And you're practicing love.
We have to keep practicing.
Yeah.
And then I, then people give this feedback that you made, like you said this thing that
(43:02):
you made a, made a, what did you say?
Yeah, you, you, there are, there are times where you, you said a couple of things that
might have been one sentence out of your mouth, but it made me stay.
Yeah.
That was my ultimate goal that time that I, I was like, I figured out like there were
like three people who were supposed, who were like, they wanted to leave.
(43:25):
And I was like, I want to help them stay and complete the course.
I am there to help them complete the course.
So I was like, if I could motivate you in some way, if I could cheer you up in some
way, that was, that I felt like it was my job to do when I, I'm happy that I did my
job.
And then people then in the end of the course, when people come to me and they say, it's
not just you, I have heard it so many times that, you know, you helped me a lot.
(43:49):
You inspired me.
And this is very common.
I heard here all the time.
I never get bored of it that you inspired me, which are you inspired me?
Thank you for being there.
It inspired me even when I was attending a course and just doing my, my meditation.
I got to my fellow meditation on the future.
When you sit like this, you inspired me.
I should also sit like this.
Yeah.
(44:10):
So it's a big motivation.
Yeah.
That's beautiful.
Yeah.
And there's so much, I feel like there's so much hum and people who serve a very, a very
humble and just a genuinely giving with like giving up 10 days of their life.
Yeah, I must exactly.
And I must add.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I must add that I'm very impressed.
This was my third service.
(44:30):
Even during my second service, this happened in the mail site, the mail server, they were
kids.
They were like 20 years old, 25 year old, and they were serving it for the first time
and they were no old servers.
Someone who has experience of serving.
They had no idea how to serve, but they had intention to serve.
You know, they were just 20, 20, 20-year-old boys.
(44:51):
Yeah.
They are there to serve.
And I had, I have huge respect for those guys.
And I know one day they'll be great men.
They'll be a great team.
Yeah.
Yeah.
And even during this course, the mail servers, they were serving for the first time.
Yeah.
And I really feel so happy about, you know, there's a hope for humanity.
(45:15):
The people are there to serve.
That's beautiful.
Yeah, that really helps this final kind of question I wanted to ask you was, how do you
think the Parshana could help humanity?
See, as Guruji said, this is the art of life.
I'm telling you my own experience.
(45:37):
Yeah.
I'm telling you my experience.
I was surviving life.
I was being strong.
I was in the survival mode.
See, your brain is designed and your brain is the one who, most of the time, we serve
and struggle.
We fight the problems which are imaginary, like future.
No one knows about the future.
(45:57):
Future is a myth.
And we are so scared of future.
We are so worried about future, future, future, future, future.
And then we are talking about past.
We have so much regret.
We have so much shame, whatever we have done in the past.
So we are always living in past and in the future.
We are not in the present.
So being in the Parshana, you are being aware.
Sati, Sammasati.
(46:18):
Sati means to be aware.
And when you are aware, you are in the present moment.
So when you are in the present moment, your present moment becomes more fruitful.
You know, I have, like, I've heard somewhere that most of the time, 80% of our day in 24
hours, 80% of our day, we are on an autopilot mode.
They're just doing things.
We have no idea what we're doing.
(46:39):
Like you're in a kitchen, you go, you're cutting your vegetable, you're cutting a vegetable.
Because you went on autopilot.
And that means that then you're reacting.
You react to emotions and things that you don't know what's going on.
And you can, it's unhealthy.
Yeah.
You are completely lost in your thoughts.
That means you're completely lost in your thoughts.
And about reacting, I must say, as Veena Man has said, that it's not, we cannot control
(47:04):
people how they are going to behave.
We cannot control how people are going to be good to us, how they're going to be bad
to us.
We can only control our reaction to their actions.
Yeah.
And it doesn't matter how, whatever they said, it hurt us.
But when we are hurt, it's ours.
And now it's our, ours to be.
(47:25):
So the question helps us to, when we have this love and kindness, when we are aware
in the moment, we know this thing, we should not take it to our heart.
We should not react on it.
Because when you react, you are, you know, you are spending it.
There's a chain reaction will start and it will become a big thing.
So when you do not react, you let it just go away.
(47:47):
So that's one thing.
And the other thing is how it can help, the question again, helping humanity is, see,
there's, from the time there is mankind, if you, from the time history books are written,
there's always some kind of war is going on in the world.
There's always some kind of natural calamity happening in the world or some tragedy is
(48:07):
happening.
There's always some kind of tragedy happening in some corner of the world.
There's always something negative is happening from the time of the beginning.
Right.
So yeah, I'm a firm believer in global peace.
I believe in world peace.
But I also know it's impossible to have a completely peaceful earth.
There's always something negative going to keep happening in the world.
(48:30):
The thing is we need to work if you want world peace.
First, we need to work on inner peace.
If I myself work on myself, I have done my part.
I cannot change other people.
I can only change myself.
So when if I take responsibility of changing my behavior, changing myself of the good part,
and other people also do this thing, only then the world can be a peaceful place.
(48:55):
So this is how a person I can help.
Yeah, thank you.
Yeah, that's beautiful.
And I caught you when in three weeks time, you're going to be doing a 30 day Vipassana
course.
And so I'd really love to speak with you after you do your 30 day course as well.
(49:19):
Just to see what what are the insight or anything you can share.
Even though I know it's an experience and a personal experience, it would still be really
beautiful to speak to you.
But how are you feeling now about the 30 day course?
This is going to be my first 30 day course.
And I'm feeling really nervous.
(49:40):
And let me tell you one thing that I am doing this course.
You know, some people have asked why you're doing so many courses so fast, because the
people who only do 10 days for say they don't go for long courses.
And I'm going to give you a very honest answer that my I read this book, Sabians.
Have you heard the book, Sabians, the author, Yuvan Nova Harare.
(50:02):
So I actually I had this book with me before Vipassana.
But then I started studying this book after like doing my two courses.
I've already done my 10 day two courses.
And somehow I started reading this book.
I only read like first few chapters and I was really impressed.
So I googled who this author is and I came across a video in which the host was introducing
(50:25):
Yuvan Nova Harare that he just came out of a silent retreat 60 days repression of course.
And I was like, what?
There's a 60 day course to.
Yeah, I got to from that video, I got to know there's a 60 day repression of course.
And Yuvan Nova Harare is doing that course and I was really impressed and I searched
how to do a 60 day course.
(50:45):
So my aim is to do a 60 day course one day.
And it doesn't happen in you are not just allowed to be like that in India, especially
you're supposed to do like couple of you have to do many 10 days courses, then couple of
20 days, then couple of 30 days courses, then couple of 45, then you can do an in between
you have to keep attending 10 day courses.
(51:07):
And there's a chance you might become a teacher assistant teacher because for 60 days you
are supposed to be an assistant teacher by that time.
So my my aim is to do a 60 day course.
And now I decided I know it's going to be hard.
But I'm built for it.
I have a very strong willpower.
I know I can do it.
But now as I am supposed to go for a 30 day course, I'm giving my honest answer.
(51:31):
I am really nervous.
I'm really nervous.
Yeah, because going away from home for this long time, I have firm faith in Dhamma.
I know Dhamma take care of everything when I'm not here.
So you know, you know, you know, Dhamma will take care of everything.
So you mean like teaching the the what do you mean when you say Dhamma will take care
of everything?
(51:51):
Dhamma is the universal that universal law of nature.
The nature will be there.
I mean, I'm not there to take care of my family, my father, my sister, my niece, my
daughter at that time, that nature that universe will be, you know, keeping them protected.
Yeah.
So I don't have to be scared that when I'm not there, you know, I will be able to know
(52:16):
what's going to happen to them.
So I have this focus that nothing wrong will happen to them.
I think about, yeah, yeah, well, I look forward to speaking with you at the end of the 30
day course.
And I think when you do reach that 60 day course, I think you will be an amazing assistant
teacher.
I think I will.
I think I will.
(52:36):
I think.
I think I will.
I think.
I think.
I think.
I think.
I think.
I think.
I think.
I think.
I think.
I think.
I think.
I think I can do it, but that's, that's easy to do in a way.
But the actual experience of it is where the change happens and what was so incredible
(52:59):
when I went.
I did the course was just like, wow, you can only experience this, you can't process
it.
But for people who may not be ready to do a course or wanting to do a course.
You have any resources that you recommend to people to understand capacity, a bit more
get some benefit from it.
(53:20):
Resources.
Maybe if there's a documentary or...
Oh yeah, there is a very good documentary.
Yeah, it's Kiran Bedi, she was, now she's retired.
She was jailer in this Indian prison, which has really bad conditions.
So she, because you know, there were criminals who were coming again and again.
(53:44):
They were released, they came, they do, they've made some kind of sign, they were again back in
the prison. So she started the Parshina course in this really big jail in Delhi, Pihar jail,
and there's a documentary about it and the name of that documentary, it's on YouTube.
The name of the documentary is Doing Parshina, Doing Time.
(54:05):
Okay, I think I'll link to that in the, in the notes for this episode.
So yeah, and if there's any other resources you think of, just send them to me and I can link
them as well. Yeah, sure.
There are so many and there are a lot of studies that have been done in Vipassana.
Now, before we wrap up, Richa, do you have any final words?
I would say that if you want to practice, if you want to know what love is, what unconditional
(54:28):
love is, if you want to feel love, for me Vipassana is unconditional love.
So anyone who wants to feel that real true love, you need to do this course, you need to attend
one of these courses. It's hard, but it will teach you, it will teach you the hard truths about
life and the truth about yourself. Yeah, for me, it's just like not to be hard on myself.
(54:51):
It's a good way to end, I think that's beautiful. That's nice way to end. I think with the,
for me, it was the hardest thing I've ever done, or the best thing I've ever done.
Yeah, yeah, I can write.
I think that's how I always summarise it.
Thank you so much for your time, Richa, and sharing your experiences, and I just,
(55:11):
I can't wait to hear from you after your 30 days and stay in touch.
Thank you for having me, and yeah, I look forward to that one too.
Welcome to Ripples of Humanity, where I'm sharing interesting stories from people who
(00:11):
are committed to creating change that can ripple within humanity.
For this episode today, I am taking you to the area of Dharmakot in Dharmchalar, around
the Himalayas in the north of India.
This is such a magical area above the clouds, with snow-capped mountains as a backdrop,
and eagles soaring peacefully.
(00:32):
It was here in June 2024 that I met Richard Paliel, while I was doing a 10-day Vipassana
meditation course.
Richard was volunteering her time and energy as a server during the course.
This is not Richard's first time volunteering at a Vipassana course, and I quickly discovered
the passion, peace and wisdom Richard holds from her path in practicing Vipassana meditation,
(00:57):
and volunteering in the courses with such love and joy.
For those who know me, you would know how much I love Vipassana meditation, and the
benefit I have gained from this practice.
So I thought it would be really insightful to pick a bit of Richard's experience and
wisdom and share this with others.
So let's get into it.
(01:21):
Hi, Richard.
Hi, Richard.
Thank you so much for chatting with me.
I'm so excited to talk to you about Vipassana meditation.
I met you in June 2024 in Dharmchalar.
I was doing a 10-day Vipassana meditation course, and you were one of the volunteers,
which is called a server, on the course.
There was 40 women on that course, and three volunteers and an assistant teacher, and I'm
(01:48):
so grateful that you were there.
You guided me when I needed it the most to stay the course, and really gave me insight
and deeper insight into the Vipassana meditation.
So grateful.
I really wanted to chat with you today because I felt like Vipassana fits in with the podcast
(02:13):
I'm trying to bring, and it's also from the perspective of serving on a Vipassana course
as well, because I think that's such a beautiful way to give back to spreading the teaching.
So let's start.
I think it would be helpful to explain a little bit just briefly, because I think we could
(02:33):
talk for hours, and we have talked for hours and hours about what Vipassana meditation
is and how experience is.
If you can just give a really brief overview of what Vipassana meditation is and what a
10-day course is.
Okay.
Thank you for those kind words.
(02:53):
And about Vipassana, the Vipassana you and I are doing, it's taught by our Guruji,
S. N. Goenka, and he was the one who brought it to India, back to India actually, from
Myanmar.
And as he was here in India to teach his mother that Vipassana course, but they were like
(03:15):
12 people who attended that course.
And from there, like other people who requested him for more and more courses, and that's
how now we have like centers of our Vipassana all over the world.
There is, there's centers everywhere in the world.
There's about six or something in Australia.
(03:35):
How many are in India?
Do you know?
There's hundreds.
I think 300 or something.
300.
I'm not sure.
I'm not sure.
I read, I think I read somewhere.
And you know, they're like, they're constructing new, always they're constructing new centers,
local centers are there.
So there are many kind of centers.
Earlier they used to rent some kind of religious place, and then people started donating lands
(04:00):
and they had this money, you know, they have enough money so they could buy lands.
Yeah, so it's still growing.
The Pashana is still growing.
Yeah, also in India, they're like more than 300 or something.
Yeah.
Okay.
So yeah, Vipassana is actually is kind of a meditation.
And the Pashana word means it's come from two words.
(04:22):
V means it's a show from the fish, which means being texting or special.
And Pashana means to look or you can say to observe.
So the Pashana word becomes to observe oneself.
And in Pashana, we are working with the sensation.
So you can say it's to observe oneself through the sensations on one's body.
(04:44):
That's the word we Pashana for you.
And it's a wonderful meditation.
There are many kinds of meditation if you heard about them.
So the Pashana comes under the category of mindful meditation.
And in this meditation, we are working on mostly on sensations on the body, the just
(05:05):
the surface of the body and how it's a connection between how these small things really lead
to your, it's called like your neuro system.
It really works so deeply when you're just working just over the surface of your body.
So that's the question for you.
Okay.
(05:26):
And what makes the Pashana so special compared to and so popular compared to other types
of meditation?
Well, I have heard about like this, this transitional meditation.
They are religious meditations, right?
And then they are mindful meditation in, but we are practicing in the Pashana.
(05:49):
It comes under the mindful meditation.
And I'll tell you somewhere that we Pashana is the highest form of awareness.
It is the highest form of awareness because in the Pashana, we are not taking support
of any tool like any mantras, any, any kind of outer things.
We are just doing a very pure meditation.
(06:11):
And because of it's very pure, you don't, you won't have any tool to help.
That's make it very tough.
And sometimes people are, they just find it very difficult to concentrate.
But if once you learn the Pashana, once you keep practicing it, your mind gets focused
(06:32):
very easily.
That's the thing about Pashana.
So we say with the Pashana and the aim of the meditation is the focusing on the body
sensations and then it's being not identifying with the, with the pain.
If something feels amazing, you're not craving the good sensations.
(06:56):
And if something feels bad and you're in pain, that you're not averting those sensations.
You're being a quantumist to both of those and you're practicing that over and over
again.
That, you know, to summarize it.
So in the Pashana, we are working on sensations and through the sensation, we goes to the
deep in our body, deep in our mind actually.
(07:19):
The thing is, we are so unaware of what's going on in our body and Pashana make it,
make us aware of it through the help of sensation in our body because whatever happens with
us.
If someone says, for example, someone says something, someone says something nice to
us, we have some good sensation, which can vibration, we can, and we can say vibration,
(07:41):
right?
So there's some good vibration on your body somewhere.
If someone is praising you, someone is saying some good things about you.
And then someone is like, they're criticizing you.
Someone is like abusing you.
They're using some curse word.
You feel, you have a bad sensation, a bad vibration somewhere on your body.
And we were, we are like, our own, like whole life, we were not able to see that and Pashana
(08:10):
make it aware about it.
And that when we focus, when we can actually, what the word is, when we can look at it,
we can easily target it and we can easily able to get out of it as soon as possible.
That's how we,
So by being just by awareness, just by being a corner, not the story of it.
(08:35):
Exactly.
So the motive about what I have learned about Pashana, what my teacher, Rina Hooda Ma'am,
she was the first, she was my first assistant teacher.
And I have to tell you this, that our Guruji, as in going, who started with Pashana, he
passed out in the year 2013.
And I started practicing Pashana in the year 2020 during COVID.
(08:56):
And it was led by one of his assistant teacher, assistant teacher, someone, Guruji himself
or his staff has trained to be at the centre because the course is completely audio visual.
Right?
Yeah.
Yeah.
If we have audio, we go back to that.
So when, when Goenka, he brought the Pashana to the, to the world, might promote it to
(09:22):
the world, but it existed before him.
Yes.
But the teaching had been lost.
And so he, and it kind of, it had been retained in Myanmar.
And then he then, when he brought it to the world, did it as videos of his self-teaching
so that it would remain pure and remain the same consistent teaching.
(09:43):
And to this day, it's still the same in every single centre in all over the world.
It's the same.
Yeah.
It is.
The same table, everything.
So, if you have time to go to the 10 day course then to explain, explain that.
Okay.
So in a 10 day course, a 10 day course is a step by step procedure of learning your Pashana
(10:07):
because it's something that you do meditation and the focus is, you need to focus like your
focus should be really clear and conscious.
So they have the Guruji, you decide it was like divided into 10 days.
Every day you are taught something new.
So the first three days, like they have, whenever you attend one of these fours, you just not
(10:31):
learn one kind of Pashana, one meditation.
There's like three meditation in one course.
So the first three days, you will be doing Anapana meditation in Anapana.
Anapana means what comes and goes.
So you just observe your breath as it comes and as it goes.
So that's Anapana.
And it's also important, Anapana, it's very easy to do.
(10:55):
You can find on YouTube guided meditation from Sengo Inka.
But for Pashana you have to attend a course.
Okay.
So the first three days, whenever some person like us, you know, we are from cities, we
are working 9 to 5 jobs and all, it's very difficult for us to sit because in these courses,
we are supposed to cut off from the world.
(11:17):
There are no phones.
There are no contact outside your world.
You cannot talk to anyone.
You are supposed to only talk, you are supposed to tell your, the progress in your meditation
to the teacher.
And if you need some kind of help, you can talk to the server.
Like I was the one who was serving while you attended that course.
So you have, like people don't know when first time they come here, they don't know how to
(11:39):
read.
You can't even read and you can't even, you can't bring in reading.
Yeah.
You're not supposed to have a pen with you.
You can't write.
You can't read.
No, I can't.
I can't read.
So you don't know how to sit with yourself, right?
So first three days are just to be sit.
You all have to just sit and observe that.
(12:00):
So first three days are just to be sitting and learn how to just sit doing nothing.
You're doing something.
You're doing really important work, but not the other work.
So that's what really vashna is.
And those three days are important to sit with yourself.
It's a very important thing.
If you are ever hurt, you know that how to heal thing, you have to sit with yourself.
(12:23):
So Anna Pana, they teach you to how to sit with yourself, learn to sit with yourself,
just sitting.
Yeah.
And then the fourth day is called the vashna day.
Vashna is taught and every single day they add one more step to it, how to practice it.
And whatever is vashna is, there are like audios and videos from Guruji, as in Goenka.
(12:46):
And those are not available anywhere.
To learn vashna, you have to attend a course.
You can do anapan on your own, but the vashna part you have to be in a center.
So anapanas serve as a base.
It's a base of your meditation, your samadhi.
Then we start doing vashna.
(13:07):
And on the last day, the 10th day, we are taught one of these meditations called metta
meditation.
Metta means loving kindness.
So many of Buddhist people, monks, they are saying, they say we are doing loving kindness
meditation.
It's actually metta meditation.
So metta meditation is only told the last day and after that our noble silence is over.
(13:31):
And people think that it's not that important.
But metta is the most important thing.
As there was a story that someone asked Buddha that why you're teaching metta, it's not that
important.
Buddha said, metta is the most important meditation.
We are doing vashna, we are doing anapanas for metta itself.
(13:53):
So metta is loving kindness in which we pray for ourselves, we pray for others.
We share the merits we have gained from this meditation, vashna meditation.
So that's the 10 days course.
And also with the course, it's free in a way.
(14:16):
Can you explain the payment concept and then the volunteer concept of it as well?
So the concept about this course is that you have to live a big shoe life.
You have to live a monk life.
This kind of meditation was actually started for people like the household people, people
(14:37):
who has a family.
Normally any kind of meditation is done by monks only, monks and nuns only who are the
clues who have given up their family life.
But this was this meditation was introduced to family people also, people who have their
families, people who have households.
So when you come to a course like this, as you ask, you have a family, you are not a
(15:01):
monk or nun, this course provide you 10 days experience of living as a monk or a nun.
As Goyangar Guruji says that we are not making you wear like monk clothes, we are not making
you shave your heads.
You have to live a monk life from your heart, from intentions and a monk doesn't earn, a
(15:25):
monk doesn't has his own money, a monk begs.
So you have to leave the ego of I earn my own money.
This is my money.
So whenever you go to a course, you say, oh, I spend the money.
Oh, I have paid for this thing.
I deserve this thing because I have paid for this thing.
So you have to leave that ego that I have paid for this thing.
(15:45):
Guruji decided to make this course completely free of cost.
The course here run on the donations given by people who have already the previous course
done by other people.
So when their course was completed, they donated the money and this is the course, but you
are attending, I am attending, it was like sponsored by the previous meditators.
(16:11):
So yeah, you are supposed to donate money as much as you can and there is no one tells
you how much to pay, what to pay, you have to do it on your own.
So as your pocket allows you.
So yeah, Guruji kept it completely free of cost so you can leave the ego of having the
(16:31):
money.
Whatever is given to you, it's like monks have their bow, whatever put in the bow you
accept.
So living in the, in like living with the acceptance of the nature, whatever is given to you, you
accept it.
You are not the one judging it.
You are not the one who paid for it.
You just leave the ego and someone given to me.
(16:54):
I just take it with gratefulness and mind you that if you have been to any or any centre,
they serve the most delicious foods and the services they provide.
Like most in most of their like many local centres, which doesn't have many services,
but they are majority of centres, they really like they have this, I'm sorry, I'm using
(17:18):
the word like resort wipes.
And you can feel that the food and everything has been made with love and metta.
Yeah, and you know when we are serving a course, we have a special metta session at every night
in the end of the day.
Like during a course whoever is coming for the first time, they have metta session on
(17:40):
the last day only.
But as you have, you're supposed to give service only if you have like attended like three
courses.
You know every Parshana already, you are practicing it already.
So at night we have this matri in which we says that if I had done anything which made
(18:02):
someone upset and if someone upset me, I forgive them and they forgive me.
We have to sit there and really have this intention with us every day, every end of
the day.
And those cooks, those staff member, they also come and they also sit there during this
metta session.
(18:22):
So you have to have a pure heart.
Your heart should be pure.
For the next day you have to restart with a pure heart again.
Because when you're serving, there are people and people get really emotional in these places
because you know you are cut off from the world and you are made to sit with yourself.
It's so difficult to sit with yourself.
You know, I have heard in the last video that talk about power vulnerability.
(18:48):
Yes.
These are two things which don't let us enjoy our life.
So when we sit with ourselves, those things that shame and guilt comes over.
So how many courses in total have you done and how many have you served on?
(19:09):
I think, I don't remember completely.
I think I have attended seven 10 days courses.
Then I have served three 10 days courses.
Then I did one Satipatan and I have done two 20 days courses.
Okay.
Wow.
And Satipatan, sorry, what's just, is that extra learning?
(19:32):
Satipatan is actually just, it's an advance.
It's not advance in the, in context of the meditation technique.
The main meditation technique is whatever is taught in the 10 days course.
That is the main.
You are learning, we have to, you know, when you do long courses, you have to come back
to attend or serve a 10 day course again and again because these are the basis.
(19:56):
And Guru Ji, Goyankar Guru Ji has given so much knowledge in those discourses at night
would happen during these 10 days courses.
So the knowledge he has part in these 10 day course is, it's really important and they
are the base of the question and they are more important.
Yeah.
Yeah.
When you say the discourses, just to clarify that, that's the, at the end of each night,
(20:21):
there's about an hour long discourse where Goyankar discusses the technique and some
of the philosophy behind it and everything goes into more depth into that after you've
done the whole day, 10 hours of meditating, you then have to, you then listen to an hour
of that.
So just to add that in.
Yes.
So yeah, that's my courses.
(20:41):
Okay.
That's a lot.
Yeah.
And so obviously it's working for you.
You find a lot of benefit from it.
I wanted to, I mean, maybe we can move into what are the key things you've learned in the
Vipassana courses that you can share, I know that probably a very broad question.
Yeah.
(21:02):
When you go to any meditation, you have some expectation from it, right?
So when I went to my first course, which I attended in 2020, my expectation was that
I used to be in good at math and now I'm, my brain battery is completely exhausted and
I need to restart my life.
So I was looking for something that, which meditation has a great way to calm your mind
(21:30):
to make you concentrate.
So I was looking for something which can help me focus on my life, focus, improve my focus
and I can, you know, do better with my life.
So my main motive came when I came to for my first course in Vipassana was to just learn
(21:51):
the technique.
I was there to just learn the technique so I can focus my mind.
That's all I was looking for.
I was not looking, I didn't even expect it to change my life and I'm really thankful
for that teacher that I'm there.
My first teacher and I called her Guru Ma, her name is Reena Hooda Ma'am.
She is the one who taught me all those things because of her.
(22:14):
The things Vipassana gave me are first most important things Vipassana taught me is true
unconditional love, unconditional love first for my own self.
I need to love myself and then to others, everyone else, my friends and my family, everyone,
everyone in my life.
So that's the one thing I learned.
(22:37):
And the second thing I would say how I should be my authentic self, to be myself.
You know how people pretend to be what they are not, people who are being mask, we are
a mask, we want to hide ourselves from people.
So Vipassana gave me this confidence to be myself, to accept whoever I am and be true
(23:02):
to myself, say the thing truthfully, this is me and not just unapologetically, being
authentically real.
You know, not being toxic, this is who I am, you have to accept me.
No, no, no, I know who I am.
These things are wrong and I need to change them.
I should work on them and I'm working on them.
(23:23):
So proud of myself on that thing.
So I become more authentic.
I judge myself being very neutral.
What is whatever is wrong with me, it's wrong.
I need to change whatever is right.
It is right and I should concentrate on it more.
So that's being authentic for me.
And I think, can I share something that I feel like I learned from you that I think
(23:50):
you maybe learned from your course was a crying, how to cry.
Yeah, that's that.
Yeah, it comes under being your authentic self.
So I was a person who, yes, I was very egoistic.
Okay, I had attitude.
(24:11):
You know what you say attitude, people have attitude.
Yes, I had attitude.
And with me, I've been, it's like, I was a very stressed teenager.
My journey, my relationship with stress is something that I was always stressed.
I was stressed as a teenager and I was stressed as a grown up.
And for me, life was getting harder and harder every single day.
(24:35):
And I was like completely cut out with the concept of peace of mind.
I didn't know what was it.
And just add something in there like, we won't go into it now, but you've shared with me
very kindly the path of your life.
And you know, like everyone, there's been a lot of pain, but you've particularly experienced
a lot, a lot of pain in your life.
(24:56):
I just wanted to say that.
So yeah, that's obviously been carried through.
Yeah, it's like, yeah, I know life happens to everyone.
And it happened to me.
And sometimes, you know, it's not like I'm crying with him, but yeah, things happen to
me and that things really made me stressed out.
(25:18):
My nervous system was always on alert.
I have lived for a very long time in like survival mode.
So I didn't know I could be happy.
I had no idea.
I'm trying to, my whole life, I craved to have normal things, everything.
I never had normal.
I never had average.
And my craving is to be normal.
(25:40):
My craving is not to be extraordinary, not to be out in the shining light.
I just want to be normal, you know, lost in the crowd.
And that never happened to me.
And it's a good thing.
And now I know I'm grateful because I know how to deal with those things.
I have dealt with myself.
So when I see someone going through it, I know how to help it.
(26:02):
And I'm really much there to help them.
That's really what my pain, what my journey, my struggle had made me.
So yeah, so when I did my first post, I was already very rigid.
And I had this that I have to show, you know, they say, take it till you make it.
So I always show up as a strong person.
(26:25):
I really believe that I have to keep working on.
I have to keep doing.
I have to keep showing up.
So in that way, I was really hard on myself.
I was always hard on myself.
And the person who taught me self love, I have to accept myself and I have to give myself
love.
And I'm really grateful for Rina for that.
(26:45):
Because I went to her crying, I was about to cry and I was really getting it in myself
and saying my complaint to her and I was in myself and she said, you know, first thing
you need to just are you feeling like crying?
Let your tears come down.
Let them roll out.
Don't wipe them out.
Just let them come out.
Look at your breath.
Anna Parna in which we just look at her breath.
(27:06):
So she said, don't look at my breath.
Let my tears to roll out and say what I want to say.
It was my first time that I was able to express my feeling without controlling out anything.
So yeah, you did that.
I was so grateful that you passed that one to me.
I think there was a moment in the course that I was in.
(27:28):
I was crying and I had my hands covering my face.
I had my hands covering my face.
Yeah.
And you and you were like, don't do that.
Don't do that.
Let it out.
Lift your head up.
Let the tears come out.
Lift yourself.
Accept your tears.
Accept your pain.
And I will always remember that.
Because I've been there.
It's not because I've seen something.
(27:49):
I've been there.
I know how it feels like.
And the good thing is I know how to feel from it.
That's what my teacher, what going to Guruji and other assistant teachers, especially
Reena, who the ma'am, what they have taught me is to deal how to deal with these things.
Not to suppress them, to have a closure with them and then let them go.
Yeah.
That's the most important thing.
(28:11):
So yeah, that's what I call unconditional love.
Yeah.
So when I started practicing and I was mostly about technique, but then I'm discovering
love for myself.
I'm discovering being authentic.
That was really big deal.
And when I completed my first course, I told you I came home and I saw myself in the mirror
(28:31):
and I said, my life is hard.
It's never been easy and it's open.
So when I accepted that thing happened from that day onward, it's been four years now.
From that day on, my life is very, very easy.
It's very easy.
And that happened because I accepted the hard part.
My life was not all hard.
(28:53):
Some nice, some easy things were happening, which I was not concentrating on.
The Prasanna made me be grateful for everything, for the hard things and the easy things.
Yeah.
So I started being grateful for easy things.
You know, they say whatever you be grateful, it expands.
So I started being grateful for easy things and those easy things expanded.
(29:16):
And yes, I have this.
There was change in my nature.
There was change in my looks too that people now, they are always there to help me.
Whenever I got into some situation, like I got punched, my vehicle got punctured.
They were like strangers came and they helped me without expecting anything from me.
(29:38):
So I always get help from strangers.
I get, yeah, I get really good price when I go out to buy something.
I really like you, you know, I don't give you on this price.
So these things really change.
People's behavior change.
You know, they say your vibe, attack your pride.
So when you, when you clear out your vibes, repression is actually it's like, it's a
(30:02):
tendency in Hindi we call tapasya, tapana, tapana means to, to heat, to burn.
So when you're doing any kind of penance, the tapasya, you are burning out all the
negative karma, the negative vibes in you.
And when all the negative things are burned down, only purity is left.
It's like having a pure goal.
(30:23):
So when you, the persona help you become pure, it's there to purify yourself, it purify
your mind, just not just your mind, your mind body and soul.
Yeah, that's so nice.
Yeah.
So that's what I do.
Yeah.
And then when we, when we go to the serving part, so obviously you did three courses,
(30:45):
your 10 day courses, and then you decided you wanted to give back and be a server.
Could you tell us about that experience and what you've learned from, from serving?
So when I completed my first course, I was really grateful.
I had so much, so much great, I was so much, you know, I had this to be grateful for.
(31:11):
I was so thankful to my teacher, Rina Lam and Guruji, Gowenika Guruji.
And that's what happened on the last day, on the 10 day.
They show us this special discourse on, on serving people.
Do you remember that?
There's a special.
Yeah, yeah, at the end, you feel very, you feel so alive and elated and you just, you
(31:32):
want to, you want to share, share that with others.
So it's a good time.
So Guruji, yeah.
So Guruji, in that, in that discourse, Guruji has appealed that if you benefited from the
Parshana, I know people donate money.
It will be very helpful if you donate your service, you donate your actions.
So it's like serving from your hands.
(31:53):
You have, if you serve it, it'll be more than donations, more than money can help.
So I was like, I really want to do it.
I really want to help.
If Guruji says that service is somehow you can repay, I am so much grateful for Guruji.
I'm so grateful for Parshana.
It made me live my life happily.
I was living earlier, you know, we all are living, but we are not happy.
(32:16):
So Parshana was there to make me, how to live happy life, right?
So, and I wanted to repay back.
Somehow, somehow I paid back and Guruji said it will be good if you serve.
So for my first day onward, I was like, I wanted to serve, but it was not, they said
that you have to do, you have to attend 10, actually three courses, then only you can
(32:39):
not serve.
Right.
I think that's pretty good.
I think that's pretty good.
I think in Australia, you only need to do one 10 day course and then you can serve.
Yeah, I heard it.
In UK also.
Yeah.
You can do two stages from UK and they even allow you to serve before attending a course.
That's also happening.
I think that's not in Australia.
I think in Australia, you have to do one 10 day and then you can serve.
(33:00):
But yeah.
Yeah, in India, we are supposed to, yeah, because I applied for service just after completing
my first course and I got a mail from the administration, the, and they said, you know,
thank you for applying, but you only completed one course.
They're supposed to do three courses only then you can allow it.
I was like, okay, I'll do three courses and I did three courses back to back, like after
(33:23):
like three months and all.
So I could serve.
I was so eager to serve on that courses and about service.
This, the service I was doing that volunteering is very basic.
It's very basic service.
There are other people who are like, they have done it.
They are like, they have devoted their life for Dhamma for this meditation.
Oh yeah.
So when you say Dhamma, because it's, that's a common word in the, the passion, meditation
(33:46):
and Dhamma, what can you just briefly say what, what is, what does Dhamma mean?
DHA, MMA.
Dhamma actually is a Pali word which in Hindi is called dharma, dharma, dharma.
And it's not, it actual word meaning is religion.
It's not religion here in the Pashana.
Dhamma means as going to Guruji has explained, it means the law of nature.
(34:10):
When we are doing the Pashana, it's, it's like Buddha practiced it, Buddha didn't invented
the Pashana, the person was already there.
So Buddha did like eight types of meditations.
And then he came to the fourth one, which is which was the Pashana.
And through the Pashana, he was able to achieve enlightenment.
(34:31):
Okay.
So in the Pashana, we are working with the law of nature.
Some people say universe.
So in the universal, this is a universal thing, it's called law of nature is there.
So, you know, they're like so many law of nature, like gravity is one of law of nature.
So what the law of nature is that if you fall from a 10 story building, gravity, the law
(34:57):
of nature is not going to judge you.
If you are a man or a woman, if you're a child or a, or a old person, if you fall from 10
story building, you're going to hit the ground, you're going to die.
That's the rule.
But what happened is sometime law of nature bend its rule and that's called miracles.
(35:18):
Miracles happens, right?
And other time, if we can bend these rules, if we, if we work with these law of nature,
there are so many laws, if you work with it, like for, for example, in gravity, if you
study gravity, people jump from not just 10 story, people jump from 100 story building
with the help of parachutes.
They're doing paragliding, free falling and all.
(35:40):
So if we study, so dhamma is actually, the person is actually like studying, gaining
the knowledge about law of nature.
And we are mostly work with the things called the cause and effect, law of cause and effect.
It's called karma.
If you do good, good things will happen to you.
If you do bad, bad things will happen to you.
The law of nature is not going to let you go free because you are some woman or man or
(36:04):
you are some disability.
No law of nature is going to judge you equally.
So that's dhamma.
That's law of nature.
Okay.
So there are so many people who have devoted their life for to dhamma through vashna.
Like there's always, there's always this manager in, in every center who is always there.
(36:28):
Even the post is not conducting that person.
They are always there and they are maintaining the center.
They are providing for the needs of meditator.
If there is some, you know, renovation, something need to be fixed.
So they are there helping and they do not, they are not getting any kind of monetary
financial payment from it.
(36:50):
Nothing.
They have benefited from dhamma so much.
They devoted their life and I have met so many people like that.
There are like trustees who are there to decide things and they are also serving.
Everyone is serving.
Then there are people like on zero day, the first day when you come to attend the post,
that post starts the next day, right?
(37:10):
So the first day when you enter, there's someone sitting on registering for you, alloting your
room.
They are also, they are serving and then you find someone serving on the 10th day.
So there are so many people serving and I wanted to be part of that service and Guruji
gave me a way to be a part that you can come and serve at any cost.
(37:31):
So my service is different from them in just one category is because I was supposed to
be with you 24 seven.
If you, the people who are meditating, if they need something, they can come to me and
they can look at my door even at night.
So that's also different, but I think that dhamma server being is the basic service.
(37:51):
There are other people who are really, who have devoted their lives and they're working
hard and I would say that I'm the minimum, I'm the least on that service.
There are so many people, even the assistant teacher, the teacher sitting on the chair,
they, there's some teachers, they're so humble and they say, I'm doing a seva, I'm serving.
(38:15):
I am not leading this course.
I'm serving this course.
Yeah, so assistant teacher is also so.
So that's a, so what's the one of the key things you've learned from service that might
have been that you might not get from doing the course.
It's just a 10 day course.
(38:35):
What do you, what's different about serving?
Well, you know, the teacher met on the last day and then they are serving.
We are given this orientation, we're given special a lecture by Guruji, a special discourse
happens and Guruji said, you need to have metta, you need to have love and compassion
in your heart when you serve.
And there are people in 10 day courses, there are people who are coming their first time,
(39:00):
they have no idea what kind of meditation it is.
They don't know the rules.
Sometimes in like, they don't know, you know, unknowingly they break the rules.
So we have to make them aware and you know, you're not supposed to do this.
And there are some time people who think that it's easy, it's okay to break the rules.
So we have to, you know, tell them that you're supposed to do this things and that things
(39:22):
and their people, they need some kind of help.
It's not really about technique because for technique teacher is there and other than that,
it's not personal technique.
Then other things, then a server is supposed to handle those things.
Like if someone's like a window that the glass plates in the window, there's some spider
(39:44):
in the room, there's some Scorpio in the room.
So we are supposed to go in and have them.
It was definitely Scorpion in people's rooms.
You should know that I'm from Delhi.
I'm a city person, like I'm a city rat.
And I haven't seen these kind of things.
And I saw Scorpio first time in my life and I was, I was like, I can't handle, I don't
(40:06):
know how to handle Scorpio.
So I had to ask the staff there.
So I called in the staff and they came and they had the Scorpio out of that, that meditators
room.
So that, that's a service.
What I have learned is, you know, to not be judgmental.
(40:26):
It's, it comes with practice.
You have to practice it.
It's to, you know, even people are there.
And again, I have to say that my first teacher, I did my first service under Rina Ma'am.
And Rina Ma'am really gave me, she really guided me just not just in Hrishwasana also
when I'm serving.
So she said this thing, but do during my first service, she said, you know, when people,
(40:50):
these places are really good.
They are very beautiful places, well maintained, but then you are, you are like, you are bound.
You're just inside that, that area.
You cannot go out.
You cannot talk to anyone.
It feels like a prison, right?
So people feel like they're in a prison and they get, and they are making them to sit
(41:12):
with them.
It makes them really, really emotional.
They are as good as you say, these standard courses actually, they are, they are opening
your heart.
It's an open heart surgery.
So when their heart is open, they are really fragile.
They are really emotional.
And we have to really handle them with care.
We have to handle them and Rina said this thing.
See it's on you, how you want to treat them.
(41:33):
You want to treat them like jailer or you want to treat them like a guardian because they
only you are there here to help them.
So you need to be really careful with your words.
We need to be really caring for these people.
So I always keep that in my mind that I'm the guardian.
I'm the one here to take care of these people.
And they are people, sometimes they are so emotional that they burst out and, you know,
(41:57):
they are yelling at us.
So at that time also, we have to be in love and compassion.
We have to understand that they are going through.
This is also part of the process of purifying.
So we have to handle that too.
Sometimes people are really angry.
It's all about, you know, practicing love and compassion while dealing with people.
(42:18):
So there's always people who came here for the first time.
They had no idea.
They want some guidance, not about technique for the technique teacher is there.
And apart from technique, a server is there to help you if you have any problem regarding
food, you have any problem regarding, and you know, it seems like very small things,
but then people are really emotional.
It's there.
(42:39):
They really, they really mind even your tone.
So you have to be very careful with that.
So so service servicing people have taught me to be gentle, to be kind.
Yeah, that's right.
And you're practicing love.
We have to keep practicing.
Yeah.
And then I, then people give this feedback that you made, like you said this thing that
(43:02):
you made a, made a, what did you say?
Yeah, you, you, there are, there are times where you, you said a couple of things that
might have been one sentence out of your mouth, but it made me stay.
Yeah.
That was my ultimate goal that time that I, I was like, I figured out like there were
like three people who were supposed, who were like, they wanted to leave.
(43:25):
And I was like, I want to help them stay and complete the course.
I am there to help them complete the course.
So I was like, if I could motivate you in some way, if I could cheer you up in some
way, that was, that I felt like it was my job to do when I, I'm happy that I did my
job.
And then people then in the end of the course, when people come to me and they say, it's
not just you, I have heard it so many times that, you know, you helped me a lot.
(43:49):
You inspired me.
And this is very common.
I heard here all the time.
I never get bored of it that you inspired me, which are you inspired me?
Thank you for being there.
It inspired me even when I was attending a course and just doing my, my meditation.
I got to my fellow meditation on the future.
When you sit like this, you inspired me.
I should also sit like this.
Yeah.
(44:10):
So it's a big motivation.
Yeah.
That's beautiful.
Yeah.
And there's so much, I feel like there's so much hum and people who serve a very, a very
humble and just a genuinely giving with like giving up 10 days of their life.
Yeah, I must exactly.
And I must add.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I must add that I'm very impressed.
This was my third service.
(44:30):
Even during my second service, this happened in the mail site, the mail server, they were
kids.
They were like 20 years old, 25 year old, and they were serving it for the first time
and they were no old servers.
Someone who has experience of serving.
They had no idea how to serve, but they had intention to serve.
You know, they were just 20, 20, 20-year-old boys.
(44:51):
Yeah.
They are there to serve.
And I had, I have huge respect for those guys.
And I know one day they'll be great men.
They'll be a great team.
Yeah.
Yeah.
And even during this course, the mail servers, they were serving for the first time.
Yeah.
And I really feel so happy about, you know, there's a hope for humanity.
(45:15):
The people are there to serve.
That's beautiful.
Yeah, that really helps this final kind of question I wanted to ask you was, how do you
think the Parshana could help humanity?
See, as Guruji said, this is the art of life.
I'm telling you my own experience.
(45:37):
Yeah.
I'm telling you my experience.
I was surviving life.
I was being strong.
I was in the survival mode.
See, your brain is designed and your brain is the one who, most of the time, we serve
and struggle.
We fight the problems which are imaginary, like future.
No one knows about the future.
(45:57):
Future is a myth.
And we are so scared of future.
We are so worried about future, future, future, future, future.
And then we are talking about past.
We have so much regret.
We have so much shame, whatever we have done in the past.
So we are always living in past and in the future.
We are not in the present.
So being in the Parshana, you are being aware.
Sati, Sammasati.
(46:18):
Sati means to be aware.
And when you are aware, you are in the present moment.
So when you are in the present moment, your present moment becomes more fruitful.
You know, I have, like, I've heard somewhere that most of the time, 80% of our day in 24
hours, 80% of our day, we are on an autopilot mode.
They're just doing things.
We have no idea what we're doing.
(46:39):
Like you're in a kitchen, you go, you're cutting your vegetable, you're cutting a vegetable.
Because you went on autopilot.
And that means that then you're reacting.
You react to emotions and things that you don't know what's going on.
And you can, it's unhealthy.
Yeah.
You are completely lost in your thoughts.
That means you're completely lost in your thoughts.
And about reacting, I must say, as Veena Man has said, that it's not, we cannot control
(47:04):
people how they are going to behave.
We cannot control how people are going to be good to us, how they're going to be bad
to us.
We can only control our reaction to their actions.
Yeah.
And it doesn't matter how, whatever they said, it hurt us.
But when we are hurt, it's ours.
And now it's our, ours to be.
(47:25):
So the question helps us to, when we have this love and kindness, when we are aware
in the moment, we know this thing, we should not take it to our heart.
We should not react on it.
Because when you react, you are, you know, you are spending it.
There's a chain reaction will start and it will become a big thing.
So when you do not react, you let it just go away.
(47:47):
So that's one thing.
And the other thing is how it can help, the question again, helping humanity is, see,
there's, from the time there is mankind, if you, from the time history books are written,
there's always some kind of war is going on in the world.
There's always some kind of natural calamity happening in the world or some tragedy is
(48:07):
happening.
There's always some kind of tragedy happening in some corner of the world.
There's always something negative is happening from the time of the beginning.
Right.
So yeah, I'm a firm believer in global peace.
I believe in world peace.
But I also know it's impossible to have a completely peaceful earth.
There's always something negative going to keep happening in the world.
(48:30):
The thing is we need to work if you want world peace.
First, we need to work on inner peace.
If I myself work on myself, I have done my part.
I cannot change other people.
I can only change myself.
So when if I take responsibility of changing my behavior, changing myself of the good part,
and other people also do this thing, only then the world can be a peaceful place.
(48:55):
So this is how a person I can help.
Yeah, thank you.
Yeah, that's beautiful.
And I caught you when in three weeks time, you're going to be doing a 30 day Vipassana
course.
And so I'd really love to speak with you after you do your 30 day course as well.
(49:19):
Just to see what what are the insight or anything you can share.
Even though I know it's an experience and a personal experience, it would still be really
beautiful to speak to you.
But how are you feeling now about the 30 day course?
This is going to be my first 30 day course.
And I'm feeling really nervous.
(49:40):
And let me tell you one thing that I am doing this course.
You know, some people have asked why you're doing so many courses so fast, because the
people who only do 10 days for say they don't go for long courses.
And I'm going to give you a very honest answer that my I read this book, Sabians.
Have you heard the book, Sabians, the author, Yuvan Nova Harare.
(50:02):
So I actually I had this book with me before Vipassana.
But then I started studying this book after like doing my two courses.
I've already done my 10 day two courses.
And somehow I started reading this book.
I only read like first few chapters and I was really impressed.
So I googled who this author is and I came across a video in which the host was introducing
(50:25):
Yuvan Nova Harare that he just came out of a silent retreat 60 days repression of course.
And I was like, what?
There's a 60 day course to.
Yeah, I got to from that video, I got to know there's a 60 day repression of course.
And Yuvan Nova Harare is doing that course and I was really impressed and I searched
how to do a 60 day course.
(50:45):
So my aim is to do a 60 day course one day.
And it doesn't happen in you are not just allowed to be like that in India, especially
you're supposed to do like couple of you have to do many 10 days courses, then couple of
20 days, then couple of 30 days courses, then couple of 45, then you can do an in between
you have to keep attending 10 day courses.
(51:07):
And there's a chance you might become a teacher assistant teacher because for 60 days you
are supposed to be an assistant teacher by that time.
So my my aim is to do a 60 day course.
And now I decided I know it's going to be hard.
But I'm built for it.
I have a very strong willpower.
I know I can do it.
But now as I am supposed to go for a 30 day course, I'm giving my honest answer.
(51:31):
I am really nervous.
I'm really nervous.
Yeah, because going away from home for this long time, I have firm faith in Dhamma.
I know Dhamma take care of everything when I'm not here.
So you know, you know, you know, Dhamma will take care of everything.
So you mean like teaching the the what do you mean when you say Dhamma will take care
of everything?
(51:51):
Dhamma is the universal that universal law of nature.
The nature will be there.
I mean, I'm not there to take care of my family, my father, my sister, my niece, my
daughter at that time, that nature that universe will be, you know, keeping them protected.
Yeah.
So I don't have to be scared that when I'm not there, you know, I will be able to know
(52:16):
what's going to happen to them.
So I have this focus that nothing wrong will happen to them.
I think about, yeah, yeah, well, I look forward to speaking with you at the end of the 30
day course.
And I think when you do reach that 60 day course, I think you will be an amazing assistant
teacher.
I think I will.
I think I will.
(52:36):
I think.
I think I will.
I think.
I think.
I think.
I think.
I think.
I think.
I think.
I think.
I think.
I think.
I think.
I think I can do it, but that's, that's easy to do in a way.
But the actual experience of it is where the change happens and what was so incredible
(52:59):
when I went.
I did the course was just like, wow, you can only experience this, you can't process
it.
But for people who may not be ready to do a course or wanting to do a course.
You have any resources that you recommend to people to understand capacity, a bit more
get some benefit from it.
(53:20):
Resources.
Maybe if there's a documentary or...
Oh yeah, there is a very good documentary.
Yeah, it's Kiran Bedi, she was, now she's retired.
She was jailer in this Indian prison, which has really bad conditions.
So she, because you know, there were criminals who were coming again and again.
(53:44):
They were released, they came, they do, they've made some kind of sign, they were again back in
the prison. So she started the Parshina course in this really big jail in Delhi, Pihar jail,
and there's a documentary about it and the name of that documentary, it's on YouTube.
The name of the documentary is Doing Parshina, Doing Time.
(54:05):
Okay, I think I'll link to that in the, in the notes for this episode.
So yeah, and if there's any other resources you think of, just send them to me and I can link
them as well. Yeah, sure.
There are so many and there are a lot of studies that have been done in Vipassana.
Now, before we wrap up, Richa, do you have any final words?
I would say that if you want to practice, if you want to know what love is, what unconditional
(54:28):
love is, if you want to feel love, for me Vipassana is unconditional love.
So anyone who wants to feel that real true love, you need to do this course, you need to attend
one of these courses. It's hard, but it will teach you, it will teach you the hard truths about
life and the truth about yourself. Yeah, for me, it's just like not to be hard on myself.
(54:51):
It's a good way to end, I think that's beautiful. That's nice way to end. I think with the,
for me, it was the hardest thing I've ever done, or the best thing I've ever done.
Yeah, yeah, I can write.
I think that's how I always summarise it.
Thank you so much for your time, Richa, and sharing your experiences, and I just,
(55:11):
I can't wait to hear from you after your 30 days and stay in touch.
Thank you for having me, and yeah, I look forward to that one too.
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