‘If spoken to harshly, keep yourself as silent as a broken gong which is no longer resonant; non-retaliation is a sign of freedom.’ ~ Gautama Buddha
It is often said that silence can be more powerful than words. Perhaps this is nowhere more true than on the path of practicing meditation. Meditating at Pyramid Valley International, Bangalore is a powerful way to experience stillness and integrate the numerous benefits benefits of meditation in your daily life.
Over the years, Pyramid Valley International has been a catalyst of spiritual change for hundreds of thousands of people. Dhyana Sadhana Saptaham, a seven-day silence retreat with intensive meditation, is one of our flagship programs. With an intention to inspire and encourage many more people to embark on the path of meditation and spirituality, we share some of their testimonials.
At the time he joined the Dhyana Sadhana Saptaham program, Chandra Prakash from Bangalore had already had some prior experience in meditation. He described himself as an irregular meditator who loved reading spiritual books written by renowned sages and masters. But in spite of his sincere wish to make meditation a regular practice, he had struggled to make a commitment.
He says that the seven-day experience at Pyramid Valley has helped him connect spiritually to his inner self. Being in silence for more than ten hours a day has brought him a significant insight. ‘It is us who break our own silence, not others,’ he says. ‘Silence speaks a lot. It shows what we are. It even teaches us anger management.’ Moving forward, he intends to meditate at least for two hours every day.
Srishail from Bangalore entered Dhyana Sadhana Saptaham with no prior experience in meditation. At the start of the program, he too found silence to be enormously difficult. For two days, his mind was playing the usual tricks known to everyone who has attempted stillness. Innumerable thoughts crossed his mind, making him doubt if joining the program had been the right thing to do. He started thinking of all the pleasurable things he was forsaking, such as attending parties with his friends on weekends. He found this environment to be totally opposite to the corporate culture of pressure and deadlines, to which he had been so accustomed. ‘I intuitively sensed that better life is possible,’ he says, and adds that the program at Pyramid Valley made him push his personal boundaries and gave him the foretaste of amruta, the divine nectar.
On the first day of the program, Sri Satya from Vijayawada faced her first meditation challenge - what do do with all those thoughts that flooded her mind once she closed her eyes. ‘So many thoughts were running through my mind,’ she says. It took her a few days to get used to keeping her eyes closed. But after the third day of committed practice, she began to experience calmness and certain degree of control over her thoughts.
‘In the past, even when I was I was silent from outside - when I was not speaking - I was having so much of inner chat,’ says Milind from Belgaum, another program attendee. He found this internal talking to be quite overwhelming. After coming to Pyramid Valley, his internal chat reduced drastically. Silence has now gained a new meaning to him - ‘Apart from not speaking, silence now means stillness of the mind,’ he concludes.