How context changed my narrative
Lessons learned in an Indian ashram
It was 4 in the morning and I was at the airport desperately searching for a strong cup of coffee.
As a proud workaholic, I managed to gather a total of 12 hours of sleep in the past three days, and in that very moment, I cared for nothing but some well-deserved rest. It was ridiculous, really, since this was an escape I’ve been planning for almost one year. I used to survive by counting the days and imagining myself there. Two months, by myself, in India.
I was waiting for the boarding to begin and my existential nihilistic crisis was not showing any signs of improvement. This got me worried for a moment as the words of one of my friends came to my mind — “I just don’t believe that running away can help you.” Well, damn.
What if she was right and everything was just a waste of my time and money?
But I wasn’t a coward in the sense of running away from my problems. My life up until that point hasn’t been the finest piece of cake and the last couple of years didn’t help in my recovery, but I did fight. Therapy, psychology books, time off, trips, spending time with friends and family, and so on.
In the end, there’s so much one can take before burning out completely. It felt like running away from an uncontrolled fire, doing the most natural thing I could have done. Running away to save myself.
Got to my seat, put my headphones on and as the airplane was speeding up, slowly starting to take off I finally started to feel something. Numbness in my legs, butterflies in my stomach, heart-pumping into my head.
It’s happening. I am leaving.
Running away
My choice was to fly 5000 km away from home and hide for the first month in an ashram in India, following a Yoga teaching program. It was the perfect choice as I knew very well that I needed this for my health, both mental and physical.
I also enjoy making my life more complicated than it actually is and the ashram seemed like a personal challenge.
Oh, and it was..
We had 1 hour of (very shitty) internet all day, sometimes not at all. Connecting with my friends and family to gather some sense of belonging was not an option. We weren’t allowed to talk during meals and sometimes, had to have full silence days. In these days, we had to refrain from any kind of social interaction. Not even eye contact.
We were keeping a disciplined schedule by going to bed at 10:30 and waking up at 5 AM every day. Sometimes at 4:30 AM, to prepare the morning tea. We had to practice, attend lectures, write essays, do Karma Yoga (community work) — all that for about 9 hours every day, excluding the self-study time.
As you can imagine by now, after the first week both my mind and my body were in continuous pain.
Our food was good but basic. We couldn’t have caffeine (tea included), processed sugar, spices (yes, in India). To sum it up, anything that might make us disturbed or lose focus was not advisable.
Privacy was the ultimate treat. We were sometimes up to 6 people living in the same room. We ate together, slept together. Did chores around the ashram, lectures, Yoga, everything.
I used to walk up to the hill behind the ashram when everyone was having dinner, just to have the privacy of a mental breakdown and some sense of space.
I can’t tell which part was the most effective or how did it all work, but for me, in particular, the process was quite intense. I was out of comfort zones I never thought I had, stripping off my ego and losing any sense of personal identity.
In a place like this, you have to forget all the ways that you used to define yourself before. You cannot be “George the managing director” or “Mary the working mom”. None of that matters in a place where everyone was equally small and unimportant. This threw me off in the middle of an identity crisis where all those what-ifs began to surface.
What if I stop pushing myself in everything I do?
What if I forgive myself for having limited potential?
What if I want a simple, mediocre life?
What if I am enough as I am?
What I knew very well was that pain is information and thoughts like that should be documented for further analysis. After all, this was why I was there. This was an opportunity to understand more, after being neck-deep in psychology books and therapy until then.
It was the change of context that had the power of changing my perception as well, and provide a broader range of conclusions.
Untangling my mind
These are 5 of my many thoughts and reflections at 3 AM, written in a journal. Most of them might seem pretty obvious and simple to grasp, but they’re actually something I’ve been trying to learn for a while now. And not only learn, but fully experience in spite of my coping mechanisms.
Authenticity makes me more responsible
I can best describe authentic people by their willingness to stand their ground when challenged on something they believe in. A hard task to have, I’d say, since many times you end up being hurt in this process.
On the other hand, by constantly exposing yourself you learn to become more responsible for your choices. By practicing your arguments, debating even with the most aggressive people, understanding yourself. Having nothing to lose. Your position can get only stronger and stronger, in time.
In the ashram, I was surrounded by people from all over the world that valued authentic self-expression more than anything. They got there not from an easy life, but from constant exposure to change. They knew best how a difficult path can seem even harder when you are not being true to yourself.
Responsibility and authenticity are both expressions of a mature self. You can only be responsible if something you approve of and vice-versa. An unhealthy relationship between these two can mean living in conflict with yourself. In my experience, this lack of balance goes as far as romantic relationships and full-time jobs. Because many times, the decisions we make don’t actually belong to us.
People that truly understand the necessity of authentic self expression will not be asking of anything less from you. This leads further on to healthy relationships.
A life with no spiritual beliefs can be challenging
I’ve never fully identified myself with any type of spiritual or religious practice and being this distant got me very lonely in there. Painfully lonely I’d say since I was in a spiritual place with no roots to ground myself with, while everyone else had a different type of experience.
This explained part of my experiences back home as well. When confronted with the death of loved ones, health problems, heartbreak, and otherworldly matters where people instinctively turn towards some higher being for some sense of protection and security — my experience was like full-frontal crash with no airbag.
As I learned in Viktor Frankl’s book — believing in destiny, a divine presence or just having the assurance that “things work out the way they’re supposed to” can be equivalent to finding the purpose of your suffering. In times of despair, this is an important element to have at hand.
Sometimes, fear asks for understanding, not courage
I will quote Alan Watts on this one, “If the mind is in pain, the mind is pain. The thinker has no other form than his thought. There is no escape. But so long as you are not aware of the inseparability of the thinker and thought, you will try to escape.” I figured that…
The moment I decide that I’m being brave when facing a difficult situation I dedicate myself to an action and not a process.
An action implies having a reaction, but the process would make me understand why I’m having it in the first place. Further on, understanding leads to less and less unexplained fear and finally, maybe even in removing its root cause.
Distractions are painkillers for my mind
When dealing with trauma, people develop different types of coping mechanisms. Mine was avoidance.
I already knew that I was a functioning workaholic, but what I didn’t realize is was how many other things I was doing in order to avoid sitting quietly with my own thoughts.
In the ashram, especially during silence days, I had the chance to observe this closely. With no internet, social media, movies, or even music, projects to work on, people to complain to, ways to pin my thoughts elsewhere — my mind wandered in the darkest places bringing to life many uncomfortable thoughts. It hurt, but then I began to understand and listen.
My silence is not always silent
When we aren’t expressing how we feel, whether it is frustration, anger, joy — we are silencing ourselves as we would do in real life. And I’m not encouraging throwing tantrums in the middle of the street, but acknowledging our mental state as it is and accepting it, without avoiding emotional manifestations.
When I had my silence days in the ashram I kept thinking of this because every time I had something to share with the group, I couldn’t do it. If I wanted to express some appreciation for another colleague, to debate when I felt that I had something so say in some matter, to share a funny moment, nothing.
Speaking or any kind of social interaction was prohibited the whole day on your silence day. It made me angry at times as I kept thinking how unfair it is to keep this all in. But then I realized I’m doing it all the time with everything else.
Leaving the ashram felt like I was leaving my most comfortable pair of shoes to get back to those pretty and rigid ones. The ones that always hurt for a while until my feet went numb and I didn’t feel the pain them anymore.
It felt like I was making an effort, one to put on a mask that I was already tired of and now, since I knew how life felt without one, I wasn’t willing to do it any longer.
Finally, running away did something good for me, in spite of what my friend thought. It doesn’t mean that is the best thing to do when you are having a rough time. It just means that we shouldn’t underestimate our instincts and choices that we intuitively make when the need for survival is at its highest point.
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