I arrived at the Dhamma Vipassana center in North Fork on Wednesday, January 1st, 2025 at 4 PM. My husband drove me there with his mother in the front and my youngest next to me in the back. I could have sat in the front, but sitting in the back with a mute teenager was good preparation. I was nervous during the week before and on the way there, though at the same time I couldn’t wait to get there. I was looking forward to escaping the noise.

My husband did the course two years ago so he knew that he would be able to talk to me only in case of emergency. (He did call when the LA fire near us started to spread, and my family had to evacuate, but was told that if our house is still standing, there is no point to interrupt me. I was glad he didn’t).

As soon as I arrived at the center—which looks like Kibbutz Nir Oz before the October 7th massacre—I felt calm. At check in I enthusiastically gave my phone away, and surrendered my sketchbook. Though I kept the Krishna Murti book in case boredom would become unbearable.

The rooms were small and spartan, but private and clean. I immediately felt at home, almost as if I were in my mom’s home, in my room.

In the evening, before the silent retreat-ment started, I met Vanessa and Catherine at the dining hall. For both it was the second time, and both said it was the hardest thing they had ever done. I thought to myself “Well, that’s because you didn’t spend the last 168 hours with your nearly deaf mother-in-law, and her son who can’t find anything, and a teenager who mistakes you for a Waymo,”

The official course began the next morning at 4 am. If Vipassana were a religion, its worshippers would never have time to commit crimes. The timetable reminded me of my military training in the IDF. 4:30-6:30 AM meditation (in your room or in the Dhamma hall), 6:30-7:15 AM breakfast, 8-11 AM meditation in the Dhamma hall with 15-minute breaks between 1-hour long meditations, 11-11:45 AM lunch, 1-5 PM more meditations with short breaks, followed by tea time at 5. Then from 6-9:30 more meditations, and instructions for the next day.

But Vipassana isn’t a religion and neither philosophy, it’s an ancient meditation technique. The word Vipassana in Pali means clear seeing. Observing reality as it is, not as we wish it to be, and understanding the impermanent nature of all phenomena. By observing your bodily sensations and not reacting, you’re training your mind not to react to cravings and aversions.

During the course you live like a monk. You eat, sleep and meditate. No speaking, reading, writing, snacking, smoking, drinking… or anything that might distract you, anytime during the course. No one checks on you; it’s between you and your conscience.

So I read the blue course pamphlet once again—by day six I could recite by heart what Vipassana is and what it’s not. Vipassana is an Art of Living that one can use to make a positive contribution to society. It is NOT a retreat, definitely not. When I was done with the pamphlet, I read my day and night facial creams, eye cream, Scott toilet paper wrapper—great information, thank you! Kleenex, you on the other hand, disappointed me with your boring tissue box. All that blank space could have been filled with stories.

When all this reading didn’t help, I broke the no-writing rule. I didn’t see how scribbling a few notes between the paragraphs of the blue pamphlet could come between me and enlightenment.

“Day 2: Friends: How was Vipassana? Me: It was wonderful but now I need a knee replacement.”

“Time moves like a wounded snail when you’re suffering. Mmm… So that’s why we suffer? To slow down time?”

“Day 2 lunch: Bengal Dal with kale, baked sweet potatoes, romaine salad with chickpeas, shredded carrots, cooked beets, and a divine sunflower seed dressing— I need that recipe, but I can’t ask for it. And divine chocolate chip cookies.”

“How not to die from boredom, the book.”

“I’ve never seen a timetable so discouraging as this one.”

“During the meditation today my body was trembling. While observing my body’s sensations I could feel and hear my white and red blood cells running around in panic, screaming, ‘what’s going on, she’s not moving?!?'”

“Goenka (The Burmese man who brought Vipassana to America) said that Vipassana got lost until Gothama the Buddha rediscovered it. I say it was banned and Gothama brought it back.”

“10 hours and 45 minutes meditation a day can’t be healthy for any organ but the brain”

“According to the law of nature everything is changing and decaying… everything and everywhere but LA, look at Hollywood”

“Sit boo-boo sit! Good mind.”

“Bliss is overrated.”

Near each precept of the course I added my comment.

To abstain from killing any being—yet you’re killing me softly with boredom.
To abstain from stealing—How about you not stealing my time.
To abstain from all sexual activity—To have sexual activity you first need sexual desire, I don’t see how I could possibly get turned on after I focused all day on my nose
To abstain from telling lies—Of course not, I hate liars!
To abstain from all intoxicants—What about my intoxicant brain?

Day 3. I meditated for at least one hour without falling asleep. Had some re-realizations: I get myself sick to avoid hard work. I rush all the time, even here, when there’s no need to rush. Time is like money, there’s so much of it. Not talking to anyone or being polite is actually amazing! I never liked small talk but now I don’t like to talk at all.

There was no way I was getting up at 4 o’clock in the morning. Luckily, we could meditate the 4:30-6:30 AM session in our rooms. So I set my alarm for 6:15 AM, fifteen minutes before breakfast time. If I’ve learned anything from being a Course In Miracles student, it’s that beating yourself up is the opposite of compassion. And let’s be real—8 hours of meditation a day is plenty for my ignorant brain.

On the third day, when Goenka announced ‘Day 3 is over,’ I had a remarkable sense of relief… until the math kicked in. You know that feeling when you’re in Paris and time flies by and you don’t want the week to end? In Vipassana, it was exactly the opposite. It was like being trapped in gravitational time dilation near a black hole. Seven days felt like seven months.

Even for a complete extrovert such as myself, the not speaking part was the easiest part. I kind of enjoyed it. What tortured me most was the boredom. I am omnipotent, I can do and be anything but bored. Suddenly I started doing things I rarely do at home. I hung my coat on the rack the moment I returned to my room. I turned my sweater right side out, folded it neatly, instead of piling it into a wardrobe installation, and put it back in the dresser. I tidied up my room every day! My mom would’ve been finally proud of me.

On day four, I was still arranging and rearranging my meditation pillows and back support in the meditation hall. Long legs are not an asset when you fly economy, nor when meditating in the Dhamma hall. I couldn’t stretch my legs without hitting Jody’s cute tuchus (I learned her name when the course ended.) No matter how many cushions I stuck under my knees they screamed.

In Vipassana, there are no repeated mantras or prayers or observing your breath. Instead, you scan your body from head to toe, back and forth, like a human MRI —I tried not to laugh when my brain started making the tatatatata MRI noises during group meditations— and observing your body sensations without reacting to them. Try to observe your itchy nose without doing anything about it.

Scanning was not effortless but doable. Not reacting though? That was a different story. Asking an Israeli not to react is like asking a Chihuahua not to bark—basically impossible. ‘If I don’t stretch my body right now, I’m going to get a blood clot!’ Every group meditation, I couldn’t wait to hear Goenka’s voice come on the speakers to rescue me from my misery, like a Shofar blast on Yom Kippur.

On day five, when my mind finally started showing signs of purification and clarity, my problem was clear: I was lazy. I’m diligent only when it comes to food, not when I have to learn how to code or take over our taxes. I was so envious of the Chinese woman who was sitting in front of me and the one who sat three pillows away from my left. They continued to meditate long after the one hour meditation was over.

If clarity sees the problem, clarity sees the solution: compete, if not with the Chinese women, with yourself. Pretend that you’re in a reality competition show. From then on, I took all my meditations in the Dhamma hall or pagoda, no more in my room where I would take naps while meditating. No more notes and no cheating. Only if it’s harmless. No one said anything about dotting a tissue paper or drawing flowers on a tote bag.

Besides that all the creations were in my head. One day I developed a thriller about a young woman who disappears during a Vipassana course and is found dead on the last day. I don’t want to give any spoiler alerts, so I would only say that the silence and everyone minding their own business didn’t make it easy for the detectives to solve the case.

One rainy day I devoted myself to designing winter boots with a removable sole —shoes aren’t allowed in the meditation hall and rooms.

I made an imaginary friendship with the Australian girl who sat diagonally from me in the Dhamma Hall. Emily. I learned her name when the course manager assigned us our own meditation room in the pagoda. We crossed many trails on our long nature walks and stretched side by side outside the Dhamma Hall. We couldn’t talk or even acknowledge each other but we were always by each other’s side, literally. Seeing her Australian leather boots outside the Dhamma hall gave me comfort— On the last day, when silence broke, I learned that Emily isn’t Australian and didn’t imagine we were besties.

I never felt lonely or sad during Vipassana, especially in nature. Every day after lunch, heavy rain or crazy wind, I would circle the trails around the pond—or as I called it, Central Pond . If jogging was allowed I would’ve probably jogged it. Until I realized there was no point in rushing. Time is abundant when your phone is locked up.

During the course I wasn’t restless, anxious or scared. Am I losing my religion? At home, I would get the chills just by stepping to the back yard in the dark to dump the trash. But there, I walked the paths of the compound in pitch black, all alone with only a flashlight to my name. I loved the dramatic changes of the weather, though having four seasons made the ten days feel like a year.

The first time I burst into tears was on the last day of the course. I wasn’t the only one. When the course manager announced that silence was over, we all cried and some of us hugged. When Vanessa asked me if I would do it again, I said, ‘Hell no.’

A week later, I was craving to go back. Perhaps as a volunteer in the kitchen, where I could get the recipe for that divine sunflower dressing and prune compote. And write my ‘Silent Food: Eating with Peace of Mind’ cookbook, inspired by the humble and nourishing food I ate in Vipassana (another idea that popped up while my mind was wandering). And escape the noise again.

Day 30: I’ve been meditating daily since I got back, at least 30 minutes in the morning and 30 minutes at night. I can tell Booboo, my untamed brain, is starting to understand who’s the real boss. I can see some improvement. The other day when I drove Alex to school, instead of honking at the son of a bitch who cut me off and wishing death upon him, I just said calmly, “what a dick.”

The path to enlightenment is paved with changes. Small, medium, large changes—it doesn’t matter, because nothing is permanent, not even Demi Moore’s youth. So all we can do is sit still and observe. Anicca, Anicca, Anicca. Change. Change. Change.