What a truly magical experience. This retreat was a holiday for my brain and my soul. I had no idea that there was so much healing in silence, and that silence in fact is full of beauty, love and nurturing energy. In silence there are no masks, no identities, no stories, no pretences. We just are.
This past year has been particularly difficult and I was deeply called to retreat into silence and to go within. I also wanted to soothe a lot of the pain I experienced over the past three years. Yet, leading up to the retreat, I was also dreading it. I feared something within me was broken. I worried that I would fall apart, cry endlessly and completely unravel. But to my surprise, most of the experience turned out to be the opposite.
To my amazement, I mostly found love and gratitude for everything in my life. I also discovered a sense of grounding and an unshakable resilience within me. But there was also a lot of sadness. A deep sorrow for all the years I spent living according to the wishes of others, striving to please, to fit in, to be recognised, when all I truly wanted was to follow my own path. Reflecting on this past year, I confronted my reluctance to let go. My need to control everything. My attachment, perhaps even addiction, to past hurts and stories, and how focusing on these only brings me pain, anger and frustration.
Sitting in silence with my fellow retreatees, I realised the comfort in shared silence. You owe nothing to each other. No explanations, no remarks, no posturing. You simply exist together. Initially, I couldn’t fathom how 30 people could live and eat together for eight days in silence. How would we navigate the food queue, the washing up, the bathroom schedule? Yet it all worked seamlessly. There was a silent coherence, a harmony and blissful coordination that words cannot describe. Logistics, I’m convinced, worked even better because we were silent. There was an unspoken energy of understanding and genuine kindness. Everything just flowed.
In the weeks running up to the retreat, I was building up a lot of expectations. So many things I wanted clarity on. So many past hurts I wanted to heal. But thankfully a close friend remarked: “if none of this happens, what will happen then?” And I realised that if I didn’t get the answers or healing I so desperately wanted, I might just have another meltdown! So I came with zero expectations. Just a curiosity of what it’s like to be in silence with 30 other beings and to give myself a very much needed break. No talking, no phones, no distractions. Just me, myself and I.
And it was magical.
One of the most profound realisations I had was about a question I’ve repeatedly asked myself over the past decade: Who am I? And I realised that perhaps I’ve been asking the wrong question. Maybe the more powerful inquiry is: What am I? And what am I not?
Shifting the focus from who to what takes the pressure off.
“Who am I?” implies I must embody something or be someone. But when I strip it all away, I’m simply a being.
We place so much importance on our identities: I am a writer, I am a business owner, I am a consultant, I am an entrepreneur, etc. These labels attach so much weight, meaning and pressure. But silence strips them all away. I don’t have to be anything for anyone. I don’t need to wear masks, explain myself, or fill any awkward silent gaps. Silence gives my inner people-pleaser a well-deserved break. I get to live the human experience and to stay open and curious without boxing myself into labels.
As the days passed, I noticed a profound shift. The pain in my body disappeared. No ringing in my ears. No backache. No digestive issues. Everything melted away. On one hand, I was relieved, it meant I wasn’t sick. But on the other hand, I felt a heavy sadness because it meant my stress was making me ill. The way I live my daily life is making me unwell. In silence, my mind and body found respite. No expectations, no deadlines, no phone calls, no responsibilities. And my aches vanished. Realising this, I started to get nervous as the retreat was coming to an end because I would have to face the real world again, and I was determined to not go back to my old ways.
So now is the time to reconnect with resilient and compassionate Sophie. To let go of the stories. To silence the self-criticism. To embody my true self. There’s nothing broken. There’s nothing to fix. I am perfect as I am. What’s left is learning to release painful memories, to let go of the past, to let go of expectations, to let go of the need to be perfect, to let go of my self imposed limitations, and to fully embrace who I am in this present moment. To peel back the onion layers and find my way back to my centre.
This retreat wasn’t going to fix anything. It didn’t magically resolve all my problems or provide instant answers. That is not the purpose of this retreat. And if anyone is coming hoping for a quick fix, they will be very disappointed. What it did do was to remind me that everything I need is already within me. We constantly look outside ourselves for healing, answers and quick solutions. When in fact we hold the key to our own happiness and our own healing. When we stop distracting ourselves, just for a moment, and sit in silence, our inner knowing begins to whisper.
And if we truly listen, we will hear it.
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