{This is a three part series.  Part one answers the what, how, when, why of Vipassana.  Part two delves into my personal experience at Vipassana. Part three is my advice for those thinking about Vipassana}

What is Vipassana meditation?
Vipassana means insight into the nature of reality or to see things as they really are (not how you want them to be). It is one of India’s most ancient meditation techniques that helps people be free from their suffering.  The technique itself involves observing the breath and the sensations of the body. To learn the technique you must attend a 10 day retreat.

What Vipassana is not?
It is not a cult, a religion, a blind faith, or a sect. Period.

How did I discover Vipassana?
It was late 2009.  I was working at the gym talking to one of my clients and she started telling me about some ‘silent meditation retreat’ she had been to in India. I don’t recall much of her story as I couldn’t get past the idea of people going to a retreat to be silent for 10 days.  Who would do such a thing and why?  I was intrigued enough to look it up and learn more but once I discovered what was involved (such as meditating 10+hrs a day, waking at 4:30am and only a piece of fruit for dinner) I decided that kind of punishment practice was so not my thing.

When and why did I decide to go to my first 10 day Vipassana retreat?
Two-three months after I first heard about it.

The date was 4th March 2010.  I was sitting in the waiting room at the dentist and flipped open a magazine to a full spread article on the Vipassana Retreat in Pomona.  I took it as a sign.

But just to be sure, I wanted another sign.  So I went straight home and did my oracle cards and pulled the following two cards:

Convinced this was the other sign I was looking for I decided to apply for the next available course (which happened to be starting the following week).

Secretly, I hoped I wouldn’t get accepted.  But the truth was, I was miserable, depressed,confused and desperate. I was losing control of my life and my sanity. Something needed to change big time and all the signs were saying “go to Vipassana Susana”.

48 hours later I received an email saying I had been accepted.

Deep down life was about to change and I was so scared of those changes.

In the meantime, check out this AWESOME Tedx talk by Buddy Wakefield.