10% Happier by Dan Harris

Author:Dan Harris
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780062265449
Published: 2014-02-11T05:00:00+00:00

Chapter 7

Retreat

It was the longest, most exquisite high of my life, but the hangover came first.

Day One

Here’s what I’m mindful of right now: pervasive dread.

I’m sitting in a café in San Francisco, having what I assume will be my last decent meal before I check in for the Zen Death March. As I eat, I leaf listlessly through the mimeographed information sheets sent by the people at the retreat center. The place is called Spirit Rock, which sounds like a New Age version of “Fraggle Rock,” populated by crystal-wielding Muppets. The writing is abristle with the type of syrupy language that drives me up a wall:

“Retreats offer a sacred space, protected and removed from the world, intended to allow participants to quiet the mind and open the heart.”

The sheets request that we “take whatever room is offered,” whether it’s a single or a double. (This sends unpleasant images dancing through my head of potential roommates who are all gray-haired, ponytailed, beret-wearing, Wavy Gravy look-alikes.) The chefs will “lovingly prepare” lacto-ovo vegetarian food. We will be assigned daily “yogi jobs,” either in housekeeping or the kitchen, or “ringing bells,” whatever that means. There’s a lengthy list of “What Not to Bring,” seemingly written in 1983, which includes beeper watches and “Walkmans.” The retreat will be conducted in “noble silence,” which means no talking to one another and no communication with the outside world, except in case of emergencies.

The whole ten-days-of-no-talking thing is the detail that everyone I told about the retreat keyed in on. To a man (or woman), the people I had the courage to admit how I was spending my vacation asked something to the effect of, “How can you go without talking for that long?” Silence, however, is the part that worries me the least. I don’t imagine there will be many people at the retreat I’ll be dying to chat with. What truly scares me is the pain and boredom of sitting and meditating all day every day for ten straight days. For a guy with a bad back and a chronic inability to sit still, this is definitely a suboptimal holiday.

I call a cab for the hour-long ride to northern Marin County. As we cross the Golden Gate, I feel like a lamb leading itself to slaughter. I get an email from Sam saying he’s “envious” of the experience I’m about to have. His timing is impeccable. It’s an encouraging reminder that, apparently, these retreats can produce remarkable moments. In fact, I recently read a New York Times op-ed piece by Robert Wright, a journalist, polemicist, curmudgeon, and agnostic not known for either credulousness or mystical leanings. Wright wrote that he had “just about the most amazing experience” of his life on retreat, which involved finding “a new kind of happiness,” and included a “moment of bonding with a lizard.”

However, major breakthroughs—known in spiritual circles as “peak experiences”—cannot be guaranteed. What is almost certain, though—and even Sam acknowledged this—is that the first few days will be an ordeal.

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