I am doing a 7day solo retreat in 2 weeks. Any tips?

[Rigel]

Ego Backlash

• After day 4 I went out & bought a fat joint.
• Numbed myself with internet & weed for a few days.
• I am not proud of how the retreat ended. I am ashamed of it to be fully transparent. Which is the reason I took so long to come back here & write about this.
• I know my vices & have been battling them for years. 
  • When I stopped the retreat I was so cognizant of how dysfunctional & foolish it all is.
  • The course of action is to drop them. There’s absolutely zero doubt in my mind that it has to happen at some point but I think I’ll have to pace myself more. Cause my inner child is emotionally retarded. Which is a funny way to talk about something that has tormented me for years. And I am doing it to myself. How twisted.
  • The tragedy is they don’t even work to numb the suffering. I was still suffering, I was just looking the other way.
• All the insights from higher states fly out the window during ego backlash. Memory of an insight is worthless without the state of consciousness that accompanies it.
  • Got thoroughly disillusioned with the theory. I have enough theory for the next 10-20 years at least. It’s all a distraction as well to me at this point.
• Distraction, distraction, distraction. That’s all it is. There is something that requires my attention here & I look over there.
• Even though I was having a huge backlash there was still a degree of detachment from the retreat. It was very obvious that every behaviour I was indulging in was a mistake. I wasn’t fooling myself that I did 4 days & so deserved a reward for my hard work. Distraction is no reward. It’s like I go running a marathon & to reward myself I cut my own foot at the end of the race with a rusted saw. It makes zero sense. 
• I am a slave to my own mind. Most of my life has been reactive not proactive.

I am no longer in the thick of this backlash but I’ll need a bit more time to report how I clawed my way out of that. I am pretty much at baseline right now. I’ll write the third part soon. 
Thanks for reading you guys. I like this place. Appreciate y’all.

This work is no joke. The mountain is huge.

 

[Rigel]

16 minutes ago, UnbornTao said:

Being bored for days at a time, the ultimate spiritual practice. And the most painfully mundane. 

Is there a light at the end of the tunnel?

I was hoping for it. I was expecting it. I talked to my friend who has quite a bit of experience doing vipassana about all this & he pointed out that that might have been a mistake.

[UnbornTao]

2 hours ago, Rigel said:

Is there a light at the end of the tunnel?

I was hoping for it. I was expecting it. I talked to my friend who has quite a bit of experience doing vipassana about all this & he pointed out that that might have been a mistake.

I wouldn't frame it as a negative per se. Leisure and socialization have their place -- to a certain extent they're necessary.

Life might consist mostly of mundane moment after mundane moment. Here's a great quote that relates to this sentiment:

Quote

"If you have ever inquired deeply about yourself, you will have come to experience loneliness, a state of deep isolation. This despairing feeling, consciously or unconsciously, we are always running away from. In our flight from that extraordinary feeling, we are driven by a deep urge that is everlastingly seeking fulfillment, through books, music, work, activity, position, prestige or power. If at any time you have felt that sense of utter loneliness, or consciously, deliberately encounter it, you have known that you want to deliberately run away, to escape from it. You got to a temple, worship a god, talk everlastingly, meditate, explain things away, turn on the radio. We all do this if we are conscious about ourselves.

To realize that escape in any form will never satisfy this deep urge for self fulfillment, to see that it is insatiable, a bottomless pit, you must be aware of it totally, which means that you must see the truth that escapes have no reality. You may escape through God or alcohol, but neither is more sacred, they are both the same. You have to understand this hidden urge and go beyond it. You cannot go beyond it if you have no tasted that extraordinary loneliness, that darkness which has no way out, no hope. Hope comes into being when there is despair. A mind is in despair only because it is frustrated in its hope. To understand this deep urge, this hidden want, you must perceive it totally, as you would see a tree or flower, then go beyond it. You will find there is a complete aloneness, which is entirely different from being lonely. But you cannot discover that state of complete aloneness without understanding the deep urge to fulfill yourself from loneliness. It is intimately related to daily living as daily living is filled with an everlasting striving to be to become something, which is a hidden outcome of deep urge, this hidden want. It is filled with suffering. On the surface is a level of self control and discipline, but it is all nonsense unless you understand this hidden want that is driving you.

That state of aloneness is essential because our minds are worn out by constant effort. What is your life? To become like this or that. You are making endless effort are you not? Isn't it a miserable effort? Our life is one of strife and turmoil. A mind like that can never be fresh, young, new. Is such effort necessary to live in this world?

All you know is effort, strife, you are perpetually driving yourself to be something. And your outcomes are as a result of this hidden want."

By J. Krishnamurti.

Edited March 29 by UnbornTao