I knew before my arrival that the vipasana meditation retreat I was attending was not the only dish on the Bodh Gaya spiritual menu in January. His Holiness, the Dalai Llama was also cooking up a little karmic feast called the Kalichakra. While HH annually serves up teachings in the winter months, I recall them being in December (allowing plenty of time for digestion between courses should one have the appetite for both). My comprehensive ignorance on the subject includes no idea of what the Kalichakra initiations are (let alone if my spelling is even close), how this set of teachings differs from others or why the dates were changed. But, upon arrival (weeks prior to Kalichakra) it was clear (through any level of density), that something was coming and it was gonna be big. Where I had seen him speak to maybe 10,000 people a couple years ago, there were to be 100-200 THOUSAND attendees this year (the vast majority of whom showed no outward embarrassment at having chosen the same maroon- robed outfit).

In western terms a 100,000+ person event usually implies inflated hotel rates and advance reservations required at good restaurants. In Bodh Gaya, it meant building places for all of them to sleep, eat and shit (the irony being that many of the venues created for the prior purposes were previously used for the latter). This is a one-road village where a 20-minute walk gets you from one end to the other (if your marketplace chai break is reasonably expedited) and the local population already overburdens the limited infrastructure. Everywhere, ground was being leveled and tarp-tents were being erected. Were it not for the complete disregard for environmental impact, this mass frenzy of spontaneous urban sprawl would have made any resident of Black Rock City (the annually reconstructed-from-scratch home of Burning Man) proud.

In theory, none of this should have mattered to those of us peacefully minding our own spiritual business in the sanctuary of the Thai monastery. Parallel logic would suggest that one might not have noticed the Winter Olympics during your February ski getaway to Salt Lake City. The carnival outside our gates (literally; Ferris wheel and all) was a welcome neighbor compared to the live entertainment stage erected behind the back wall or the incessant (and unfortunately well-amplified) Hindi pop music invading from the North. But I must admit, none of this was as distracting as the noise generated by my mind, nor was it as penetrating as the amazing peace within the monastery. If anything the juxtaposition of the external noise made our communal silence even more powerful and showed that silence is more than just the absence of sound.

Fittingly, it is impossible to capture in words the incredible support and inspiration that came from not speaking. Though I knew a few of the contemplative conspirators from prior years, most were complete strangers with whom I had never even spoken. Still, I trusted each of them completely after the eternity of time we spent together in just the first few days (and in many cases over the subsequent few months). We were each on our own odyssey of self-exploration (demons and all), but we were in it together and we knew it. If my knees started to hurt or my back got sore, I needed only to glance at 90-year-old Sugata, sitting on the floor to my left to put the slightly unpleasant sensations in perspective. When I was tired and struggling, I found flower pedals on my meditation cushion. When I was feeling alone and un-loved, a contraband cookie magically found me during evening tea. I drew special strength from my immediate neighbors in the meditation hall. It was rare that any of us missed a sitting. There were times (usually optional late-night sittings) when that dedication and devotion was enough to convince me to attend. There were other evenings when I ignored the escape of my warm sleeping bag just to return that same support.

While those of us demented enough to stay the entire 28 days considered it one retreat, there were technically 3 consecutive retreats (nine, nine and 10 days, respectively). The short (6-hour) breaks between retreats were interesting lessons themselves. While these intermissions were a disruptive jolt to the well-cultivated peace and rhythm, part of me anticipated them as a sailor looks forward to shore leave (but instead of sex, booze and gambling, my vices of choice were sweets, e-mail and Tibetan momos).

Even with the breaks, the redundancy of my situation reminded me of the movie Groundhog’s Day. Every morning, Bill Murry’s character woke to the exact same thing (in my case a basement full of often-snoring men separated only by mosquito nets) and faced the exact same events. As in the movie, my first days were explorations into making the ordeal as comfortable, interesting and survivable as possible. It wasn’t until later in the movie that the character opened to the endless range of personal growth possibilities that his situation presented him. In my personal drama, it wasn’t until about the 22nd day that I found myself fully settled into the rhythm of the retreat (though I had long-since realized there was nowhere else I would rather be).

Figuring that the schedule wasn’t quite long enough for me, I began my yoga routine at 5:00 (a half-hour earlier than most, though I wasn’t the only crazy one). The cool mornings induced a strip-tease element not often found in traditional Hatha practices. First off was the fleece jacket, followed a few exotic positions later by the sliding off of the wool socks. Eventually, the gloves came off one sensual (warm being the optimal sense) finger at a time. And, if I was really into it, I even tossed my fleece cap aside for final effect. The remainder of the day was six or seven (45-minute) sitting meditations separated by scheduled periods of walking meditation, standing meditation, eating meditation and listening meditation (AKA dharma talk). There was also a little personal time for events such as squatting meditation (where the letting go philosophy took on a more physical meaning) and lying meditation (when the post-lunch lawn looked like a scene out of Jonestown).

If this sounds intriguing in some warped way, it was. But, before you book your flight for next January, make sure you read the fine print. I slept only six hours a night on a squeaky cot of the vintage 70’s lawn furniture style (others chose the straw mats on concrete floor alternative that seemed too intimate with the resident rodent population for my liking). We ate only two meals a day, which varied only slightly from one day to the next, but were none-the-less, anticipated and appreciated greatly. The outside toilets (which concurrently served as the location for our bucket showers and home to infinite mosquitoes) were built with the assumption that no one over 5’10” should stand and pee. This height restriction could have proven especially problematic at night, but because these toilets were nowhere near our dungeon/dorm, the men were provided a communal “pee bucket” to satisfy our mid-evening needs. Worst of all, we were deprived of as many mental escapes as possible (speaking, reading, writing, drinking, smoking...) leaving us mercilessly undistracted to focus on the meditative task at hand.

It is fair to ask, “What was the meditative task at hand?” What did I hope to “gain” from a month of mindful attention to the present moment? “Nothing” is a standard answer that works for both questions. One teacher (from a different retreat) summarized the meditation process as “mental flossing”. And when you haven’t had a good flossing in a while, you never know what might come out.

Unknowingly, I went into the retreat with the feeling that a critical part of my personal construct (who I am) was missing. Specifically, the part of me that might previously have been labeled “loving partner” no longer existed. Somewhere in the kangaroo court of my subconscious mind, it had already been determined that this void was something that needed to be filled. This slowly became evident (actually even obvious) as my scattered mind began to calm. With that clarity also came some honest inquiry. Was I really a lesser person alone? That just didn’t ring true (if anything, I feel stronger and healthier than I have in years). So I began contemplating. If “loving partner” wasn’t a defining part of who I am, but rather just something I had done in the past (and arguably could do in the future), maybe other aspects of who I thought I was were also simply internalized experiences (“traveler”, “loyal friend”) or self-defined elements of who I was “supposed” to be (“productive employee”, “responsible adult”). Soon the single void that was to be filled became a spacious environment in which I could actually live and grow.

Not all the personas discarded were of the favorable “display-window” variety discussed above. The internal house cleaning also included an entire basement stacked full of faults, flaws and imperfections. Each had been stored out of sight with some vague notion that I would (“should”) return and correct it later. This basement wasn’t a particularly fun place to visit, but it was incredibly rewarding to purge. While I didn’t dig thru each box in detail (most just got tossed because they were far too historic to bother with), there was one that (not surprisingly) required some attention.

I knew I was still grappling with strong emotions from the dissolution of my marriage, but in a stereotypical male way, I had no idea what they were. Time, meditation and the process of elimination eventually identified the culprit as guilt. The root cause was a feeling that by not making certain decisions and actions (children? settle? what to do?) I had passively (and perhaps even purposefully) contributed to the deterioration of the partnership. An amazing freedom occurred when I realized that by not mentally deciding or acting, I did help forge (force?) the path I am currently traveling, but it was one I internally knew to be honest and true. My frequently unconsulted heart had put its figurative foot down and wouldn’t let me “think” my way thru something that required feeling. This moment of clarity was quite powerful, the relief immediate. The fact that this all came out in a public inquiry where I was on stage with one teacher in front of the other 100 yogis added to the drama of the realization, but did nothing to cloud the truthfulness.

It was surprisingly easy to bare my soul in front of a room of trusted strangers. Though unquestionably better prepared for such events, I imagine the Dalai Llama’s public revelation of a few days earlier was far more difficult. He greeted the vast and excited audience at the opening ceremonies of the Kalichakra with the news that he was not physically well and that the whole 10 day program was cancelled (go back to the Olympics analogy and imagine how well that would have gone over). If silence is indescribable and chaotic clammer somehow powerful the sound of countless monks chanting endlessly until dawn for the health of their beloved spiritual and political leader was simply unforgettable.

None of us are all of anything. All of us are part of everything.