HIYA!

Last year at Google, I went to a class on "Mindfulness". This is a form of meditation where you concentrate on something very simple like the in-flow and out-flow of your breath, and then observe how your mind starts to run away with different thoughts/ memories and start to learn to control it so that you focus only on the here and now. Mindfulness has been proven to relieve stress, depression etc and a lot of big corporations (especially in the US) are starting to introduce it to their employees. The talk was really interesting and I decided I'd like to try it out - I am terrible at over-analysing things and find it really hard to switch my brain off when I go to bed, for example! Shortly after that, however, my relationship broke down and I broke down a little bit too. Perhaps mindfulness would have helped in some ways, but it was the last thing I could think about and I soon forgot all about it. 

Almost a year later, Kirsty (the other volunteer at BTS) started talking to me about her own experiences with meditation and it occurred to me that as the birthplace of meditation, India would be a good place to explore it a little more! I started looking into it and found that most meditation courses/ retreats were tied in with yoga. I had tried yoga a couple of times in the past and couldn't really get to grips with it but again, I was open to giving it another try! 

In the end there were too many other things I wanted to see and do in India, but I found myself with some extra time in Nepal and I booked myself in for 5 days at the Himalayan Yoga Academy (HIYA), which is located on a hillside overlooking Kathmandu. We had a choice of staying inside the main house or in a tent and I opted for the tent! It was cheaper and I quite like sleeping outdoors (now and then!). It wasn't luxurious of course but it was nice to wake up and go to sleep to the sounds of nature... which on two occasions involved a huge thunder and lightning storm and torrential downpour... luckily the tent was under a straw shelter!

My home for 5 days...

The programme was 1.5 hours of yoga each morning, an hour of breathing exercises and yogic sleep (!) in the afternoon and one hour of meditation before dinner. There were also alternative therapies each day: Abhyanga (Ayurvedic) massage on the first day, Shirodhara on the second (dripping hot oil on the forehead?!), Reiki on the third and a herbal steam bath on the fourth (where I had to sit in a wooden box full of steam, with my head sticking out of the top!). 

There was also some other slightly weird stuff like nasal cleansing after waking up each morning. This involved tipping a little teapot of warm salt-water up one nostril, until it came running out of the other. I had to let the water run through for about 2 minutes per nostril and then basically blow my nose out all over the ground. I hated it! There was also a philosophical discussion before bed which included a few minutes of "tratak": gazing at a candle without blinking. Hmm...

The yoga itself grew on me as the days went on. Sometimes I found it a bit mind-numbing (I'd often find myself staring out of the window and day-dreaming while holding this or that position), but overall I like the idea of stretching out your body and becoming more flexible (it was quite satisfying to hear different joints clicking as they were stretched out for the first time in months!). The meditation was a bit of a struggle though and I think that's mainly due to the teacher. It was difficult to understand him, partly due to his accent and partly because of all the philosophical twaddle he kept coming out with! He was far too earnest for someone as cynical as me and I just found it really hard to open myself up to it all. I found myself getting restless and fidgety through the sessions. And don't even get me started on blinkless gazing at the candle!!

Still, I was happy to spend 5 days there and that's because the place itself was really beautiful, surrounded by peaceful gardens with wind-chimes tinkling and prayer-flags fluttering in the breeze. There were lots of comfy chairs and shady spots where I happily sat and read my book during the many hours of free time. We also had the most delicious vegetarian food (vegetable curry, chilli paneer, fresh fruit salad with mango and pomegranate...) and the most wonderful teas (just hot water with fresh mint, lemon, honey or ginger). So I felt very cleansed at the end of 5 days without alcohol, meat, caffeine or sugar!

The view from my tent...

I will definitely give yoga another try when I get home and will look into Mindfulness again too. However in the end I think learning about these things in a more secular environment will actually suit me better!