This is the spiritual awakening experience of my friend Leann. Her moment of spiritual awakening happened a long time ago, and she was so kind to share her experience with us 🙂

I love how stories of spiritual awakening are so different, and yet so the same.

It shows how a moment of awakening, or a merging of consciousness, can happen to different people under very different circumstances (f.e. when I’m comparing this to my own story). Either way, the outcome is always life changing.

I hope you find this inspiring. Enjoy!

A Spiritual Awakening Experience: Leann’s Story

“A volunteer kindly showed me the square cushion on the ground that was going to be my meditation spot for about 10 hours a day, 10 days in a row. I sat down, in a hall with a capacity of over a 100 students and volunteers.

A sense of peace, a deep sigh, and the feeling “I’m home” arose. I just knew, that very first day of my very first Vipassana course (as taught by S.N. Goenka) that this was going to be something big.

By then, I had some experience with meditation for a couple of years already. I tried different techniques, traditions, and types of meditation, but I never really “got it”.

My practice was very irregular (sometimes hardly existing) and I hadn’t really felt like I actually knew what I was doing, nor where I was heading. I had read and studied a lot about yoga and self-development. I had made conscious lifestyle changes, but I was always searching for something, without exactly knowing for what.

Until I found this Vipassana meditation technique. Since that first course, I knew that I found what I was looking for. At least for now. I found a technique that resonated with me and enables me to maintain a fairly steady practice.

This doesn’t mean that Vipassana meditation is superior to any other type of meditation. It just suits me best.

During this course I worked hard, very hard. It was a tough ride. I mean, hour after hour, day after day sitting cross-legged, meditating in complete silence..

Never before did I sit still for such extended periods of time. My body was aching and my mind was wandering most of the time. But I continued to work at it very patiently, developing awareness and equanimity.

Calmly you try not to react to any experience whatsoever. May it be discomfort, distraction, or pain, sadness, hunger, memories, not even to excitement or happiness. You just observe your breath and the sensations in your body. From moment to moment you try to remain aware, observing the reality as it is, not as you would like it to be.

“Work patiently and persistently, and you’re bound to be successful”, as Goenka says.

Very soon I started to experience the reality of impermanence within the framework of my own body. I thought I already knew quite a bit about the transient character of all conditioned existence. Turns out this had mostly been an intellectual understanding.

By continuously observing the actual, physical sensations on the body, I came to experience the reality of impermanence within. I started to feel different sensations arising and passing. Some intense, solid and unpleasant, others subtle, feeble and pleasant. Some sensations seemed to stay for a while, while others vanished in the moment I tried to observe them.

At the same time I started to realize how mind and body are interrelated.

While things we don’t want, do happen, and things we wish for, don’t happen, we keep on reacting with craving, longing, aversion or hatred. This is how we keep tying knots in the mental and physical structure while being constantly dissatisfied. Continually reacting and clinging to our believes in an individual ego.

As the course progressed, I became aware of subtler and subtler sensations. Arising and vanishing. I realized how both mind and body are essenceless; I could not find anything permanent in them.

Wisdom arose by directly experiencing the ephemeral nature of the mental and physical structure. Both ever-changing.

By continuously working in this way, suddenly the apparent solidity of my mind and body disintegrated. I felt myself dissolving completely and experienced nothing but vibrations, oscillations, wavelets. Arising and passing with great rapidity.

There was nothing but a swift current. A stream of energy, in perpetual change.

“Always in a flux, always in a flow”.

Then and there I realized, by experimental knowledge, that it is meaningless to cling on to something so very ephemeral. Nor to feel any craving or aversion towards this ever-changing phenomenon I call “me, myself, and I”.

Peace, happiness and bliss suffused my being.

However, the instructions were crystal clear. No matter how delightful and insightful this stage of complete dissolution of the mind/body-complex might be, it isn’t the final goal of complete liberation from suffering. It is only a way-station.

Before you know it, you’re back in the old habit pattern of craving and aversion. So you need to keep on working, meditating, developing awareness, equanimity, wisdom.

For me, the direct experience of impermanence, unsatisfactoriness and egolessness helps me to face the vicissitudes of life in a more balanced way.

I get a little less lost in the jungle of thoughts, feelings and conditioning. Realizing everything is in a constant flux. No “me”, no “mine”.

I haven’t turned into a saintly being whatsoever. But the light of wisdom that was turned on during those days remains with me, wherever I go. Some days it shines more brightly than other days.

Sometimes I feel confused or even completely lost again, but my view on life has changed profoundly. Negativities dissolve more quickly, I feel a little more compassionate and a lot lighter.

I’m confident that pursuing this path helps me to get closer and closer to real happiness, real peace and real freedom.

If you are interested, make sure to give this meditation technique a try. It is taught for free in numerous centers around the world. Check: www.dhamma.org.“

“Be happy!”