Transcript

Are any of these close friends of yours? The critical mind that judges yourself and others. The anxious mind that stops you from feeling really safe in the world. The doubting mind that stops you from doing what your heart is calling you to do. The comparing mind that reminds you that you’re just not ever good enough. The vengeful mind that secretly comes up with ideas to get people back. The controlling mind that ends up pushing people away. The seeking mind that’s never satisfied. The grasping mind that holds on too tightly and is afraid of change, or the worst-case scenario mind, or the FOMO mind. If any of these are still playing too loud in your head, there is one spiritual practice above all that is going to help you to calm the system down, to calm the noise and the fear and the anxiety that really the psychological structure, the ego creates. It creates havoc on your life. What is that practice? It is silence.

Have you ever thought about going to a silent meditation retreat? If you are committed to your spiritual awakening process, I believe that a silent retreat is non-negotiable.

Hi, I’m Rachael Jayne Groover, and in this video, I’m going to share with you what silence actually does, which might shed a lot of light on what is the spiritual awakening process about. What is enlightenment and how it actually works and happens? I’m going to share with you why I feel that a multi-day silent retreat is non-negotiable if you are wanting to end suffering for yourself. And I’m going to give you the five things that you need to research before going to a silent retreat if you want the maximum benefit and to not waste time. And stay to the end for a powerful contemplative question that you can take into your spiritual practice this week, that’s going to help you to quiet the mind.

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My first silent retreat was for one day. I was in my mid-twenties and I think I spent most of the day in Head Bob mode. If you know about meditation for long times, you know about the Head Bob. I heard of Buddhist retreat, silent retreats, but I heard of horror stories of you’ve got to sit up straight and your posture’s got to be right. And my sister-in-law even went to one where it was like, you’re going to kind of get little tap on the back or a slap on the back if you’re not sitting up straight. We probably all heard of those. And I had a bad back, that scared the shit out of me because I didn’t know if I could sit there all day.

And as my spiritual awakening process was happening and I was doing other events and workshops and the inner work that we all do, the desire or the intuitive knowing for silence over a longer period of time, it kept growing. And that led me to, in 2018, doing a long silent retreat with Adyashanti. It was seven days. And it was such a profound experience for multiple reasons. I had time to just not have to focus on anything else. It was completely unplugged, but there was contemplative time, which is why I want to give you this contemplative question at the end and explain why that’s so important. There was time to dialogue with Adya if there was things coming up. It was a great learning experience with a lot of silent meditation, but enough guidance and enough opening and flexibility to let the experience take you where it went.

And from that time on, I decided to bring the silent meditation retreats into The Awakened School. So I do two silent retreats that are very different in how we lead up to it and how we integrate afterwards. And I’ll put the link below so you can find out more about that if you want.

So silence, why is it so critical? Spiritual awakening is more about unwinding something than finding something. Spiritual seekers are trying to find a new level of consciousness, they’re seeking for that essential nature so they can stabilize in that and live in their essential nature, not their mind. But your essential nature is already present, it is already there in what I feel like the background. There’s the foreground and the background. The width, the infinite presence of your essence is always there. So when we’re seeking to find it, we get stuck, we get trapped, we move away from it.

So a good thing for you to think about is how am I still on this path of trying to find enlightenment, find a new level of consciousness. And how do I do that in sneaky ways, or how does the mind do that in sneaky ways? But I think of the foreground and the background as a good analogy because, in the foreground, the mind is contracting. It’s contracting on things like thoughts and emotions and to-do lists and what did that person say and comparing and what might happen, and all of those things. And in the background, there is spaciousness, there is presence, there is the essence of who you are, and it’s already there. And so what we need to do is unwind the contraction versus find something that’s going to raise us to the next level dimension of what we are here to do.

So keep that in mind. I’m trying to unwind the contraction that pulls my mind forward, and I’m trying to relax that system. So given that, doesn’t it make sense to not have anything to contract on, like the phone, the TV, the to-do list, all the things that you have to move aside when you do a silent retreat, whether that’s a silent retreat you’re doing on your own for a day or two, or you’re going to one that is led. Even if you’re in a silent retreat, the name of the game is don’t touch it, don’t touch that thought. Don’t be in a place of, oh, why did I have this thought, oh, there I am not good at meditation anymore. You’re just not touching it and letting it move through. And when you can do that hour after hour after hour, wow, I don’t think there is anything more powerful in my experience on my progression of spiritual awakening than anything else because spiritual awakening is more about unwinding something than finding something that you don’t have already.

Now, of course, this process is not just about sitting there closing your eyes and doing nothing, you’ve got to bring intention, you’ve got to bring presence. This takes embodiment, intention, focus, not just sitting there. And that leads me to my next point of the five things a spiritual retreat should have if it’s going to work for you and be in the process of unwinding your contracted mind.

Number one, you should have direction from the leader. Don’t just be where I was in my mid-twenties hoping that something was going to happen as they just chimed, and now you’re off on your own doing meditation, trying not to have your Head Bob. You want to have instruction because the mind can take you in a direction that is going to put you into an ego trap. So in our silent meditation retreats, I do a short talk each morning, give you the instruction for the day, and a short contemplative practice or question. So you’re lined up for a focus that’s going to help unwind the contraction of not only mind but body and gut center that kind of wants to control or keep you anxious. So make sure you have some guidance from the leader.

Number two, you should have time to dialogue with what’s happening for you during the retreat. There needs to be some feedback, there needs to be some coaching involved because you’re about to go on a journey that you haven’t been on before. Or maybe you’ve had some spiritual awakening experiences, but it has not stuck because the ego traps come back in and contract, and there you are back in where you were before. So have some time. Like a great tennis player needs a check-in with their coach about their grip, about their game, or a singer with their vocal coach, you need that in order to be not going down a rabbit hole that is going to keep these things in place that you’re trying to unwind.

Number three, be completely offline and unplugged from any activity that you usually do. I mean, this is no reading, no journaling, no social media, obviously no speaking. In our silent retreats, all of this is off-limits. We want to create a space for you that you’re not having to come back into thought about anything. And this might sound a little challenging to some of you, but I promise you at the end of the retreat, people aren’t saying, oh my gosh, that was so hard, they’re saying, I want to go for another day. Let’s do this for another few days. Because it’s putting you, if directed well, putting you in a state of expansion and peace and joy and spaciousness that you have not experienced before. We don’t want it to end.

Number four, get follow-up support after the retreat. When you go through an experience like this, your perception has changed. The dimension of consciousness that you are stabilizing in is different, which means you perceive the world in a different way. And this can be discombobulating in the beginning because your identity is changing. Who am I? Your old striving and pushing and grasping is releasing, and that can be a little unnerving as you’re moving into something different. There might be emotion that arises afterwards. It’s a clearing-out mechanism. But if you don’t have support of what this is, it can again easily contract back on itself, and we don’t want that.

And number five, don’t worry about posture or breathing technique. Hallelujah. This is not that important. When you experience your divine infinite essential nature, it’s not about getting the sitting position right. You can have this experience of being this way when you’re swimming, when you’re walking, when you’re running, when you’re hiking, when you’re making love, when you are working, when you’re hunched over or when you’re sitting up straight.

Now, having a good posture helps with concentration, helps with embodiment, helps with focus, it’s absolutely going to support the process. But any spiritual teacher who really understands the spiritual awakening process, they know that the end of suffering, the end of this ego contraction that makes you think that you are this person, they know there is no tool, no method, no mantra that gets you there. These are the things that can help, but they don’t get you there. Because all of these things, tools, methods, mantras, postures are things that the essence of you is focused on and you are the essence that is aware and focused on all of it. So it’s really again about coming back to that which silence does. If you’re enjoying this video, please would you mind clicking the like button here? It helps out the channel. I really appreciate it.

Now, to the contemplative question that I promised you. What remains when there is nothing to do or think about? What remains when there is nothing to do or think about? Write that question down and pause and really feel into that at least once a day this week. Put it on a post-it note somewhere that you’ll remember it. And what this question does is it helps you pull back into the silence, into what is seeing all of the things that you do, do, do, do, do, have to say, say, say, say, say, have to fix, fix, fix, fix, fix. That’s a hard one to say. And comes into what is there when all of that is gone.

Now, I’d love to hear from you, after listening to this video, what draws you to a silent meditation retreat? Is it that you don’t have to talk to anyone? Is it the contemplation of your essential nature? Is it time away and just to be? Is it really about your commitment to end the suffering that the mind is causing in your life? And you can see it causing issues in relationships and again, doubting yourself of what you’re really here to do, or can you do it, all of those kinds of things. What draws you to a silent meditation? Post below, I would love to hear and comment on that. For me, it was all of those things. But right at the end of why I do this now at The Awakened School is it is the number one absolutely essential practice for unwinding this ego contraction that you have. And I am absolutely committed to living in this body with this mind, this earth suit as a peaceful and joyful person and helping other people do that as well.

I have a ton of other videos to watch on YouTube, but the next one that I would recommend you watch is called Spiritual Awakening – What it requires of you? And it’s going to take this conversation to the next level. And if you want even more awesome resources that are going to help you awaken, go to TheAwakenedSchool.com. And you can sign up to be a free member and get our free membership, which is masterclasses and a lot of great resources to help you awaken you, awaken your impact, awaken humanity.

And we also have our free Unwavering Stillness mini-retreat that you can do from anywhere in the world. So I’ll put that link below. And that will give you some time with me on some energetic practices, some silence, and really these important distinctions of just sitting and meditating versus being in the essence of who you are so the contractions of your mind, body, and gut, and your life, they unwind and melt so you can really experience peace and joy and fulfillment the way that you know you can do. So I’ll put that link below as well. Unwavering Stillness, which is a free mini-retreat with me. And we’ll see you in the next video.

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