I have yet to go on a meditation retreat.

The idea of going to a beautiful lodge somewhere surrounded by forest, with a teacher and fellow meditators, for a ten day ‘time out’ (or longer) sounds amazing, but quite removed from my current life and therefore not something I envisage doing in the immediate future.

I hear on podcasts and read articles on various meditation websites about how meditation accelerates during retreats, with an expansion of experiences and awareness commonly being described.  This makes sense.  Football teams go on retreats also, and experience heightened performance as a result.  Being away from normal duties, focussing on any skill development, is a recipe for accelerated success.  This method of increasing our awareness is ages old, and is described in many cultures as part of their developmental journey for spirituality or self knowledge.

For those of us yet to, or unable to, stand aside literally from our ‘day to day’ lives, the daily time of meditation or reflection becomes a smaller version of a ‘retreat’.

Perhaps not so dramatically or rapidly, but in the same way nonetheless, if we have a regular short ‘daily retreat’ into our meditation practice, we make forward strides.  Our mind comes to accept that each day, at a certain time, it is time to ‘flip over’ for a time into a completely different state of consciousness, one with benefits that feel good on many levels.

Keeping to the same time is useful, I suspect because our brains are hardwired to understand patterns.  Meditating around the same time each day seems to lead to faster progress, and as I mention in the book, an expectation develops such that our mind progressively gives us a ‘reminder call’ around the designated time!

I know that many meditators have a cushion or a chair in a certain room for meditating on, and again there is nothing wrong with this as it helps to condition the mind to make the transition rapidly into meditation consciousness when those external physical surroundings are in place.  However, with meditation, I am finding that the mind can become flexible to become adept at meditating in any place, or at any time, if there is enough quiet to allow one’s eyes to become still or to close altogether.

Is bodily stillness crucial?  Is closing the eyes crucial?  The answer to both of these questions is ‘No, but they are facilitators, especially in the early stages of meditating’.  Slow tai-chi or yoga sequences can be meditative, or walking in a labyrinth.  Having eyes open, but unfocused, can work well for meditation too.  Experiment yourself, as we are all different in our preferences for creating the necessary conditions to ‘let slip the bonds of waking life’.

So one day I look forward to getting away on a meditation retreat, but it isn’t now or even any time soon.  We can still grab moments and schedule times each day that will help us consolidate our progress to understanding this fascinating journey.