Letters To Myself Before & After 10 Days of Silence
Reflections from my Vipassana meditation courses in California & Nepal
December 12th, 2021
I went on a first date the other day, and he told me about a completely free 10-day silent meditation course that he went to.
Although I don’t want to see him again, I do really want to sign up for the meditation course.
No talking. No phones. No responsibilities.
Just focusing on the ancient meditation technique from India, Vipassana, to look inward and see things for what they really are.
It sounds like a dream.
I’m ready to fully surrender myself and let go. I think it’ll offer me some much needed clarity and a chance to recenter my focus to this short life that we are living.
I think there’s a meditation center a few hours away from my apartment—I’ll see when the next one is.
Hopefully they have a spot for me.
Letters To Myself Before & After Each Course
March 1st, 2022
Dear Zahabiya,
You’re about to embark on a 10-day silent meditation course.
I’m feeling pretty centered and organized after having the evening to myself. I spoke with my best friend on the phone for hours and talked to my mom for a bit as well. I was able to deep clean underneath my bed, which has been on my list for so long.
I wrote my final work emails and said my goodbyes. It feels like I’m embarking on this major journey, which in a way, I am.
I feel truer to myself than I have in ages.
I’m incredibly grateful for this opportunity. I love being disconnected and I’ve been craving an escape from society. I know we’ll be in in nature and there will be no talking, so I’m excited about that.
I really hope meditating will unlock a sense of peace and oneness within me. I hope to be more centered and able to witness the world in a different light.
I only want to invest in people and experiences that I am aligned with. I’m already finding so much peace in just preparing for this trip and taking the steps to get there.
It’s finally happening and I’m so curious as to how it will be. I’m working towards a clean lifestyle in nature—nourishing my body, mind, and soul.
Love,
Zahabiya
March 13th, 2022
Dear Zahabiya,
I had absolutely no idea what I was signing up for. At every turn I was astonished by all the discipline and how serious the Vipassana meditation technique was.
This was no retreat—it was a dedicated center focused solely on liberating people from suffering. It was a transformative experience and I want to remember every detail of how I felt from the arrival day to the completion of the course.
I’m buzzing with this happiness that I can’t really put into words right now.
I feel so centered and at peace with the past and future, laser focused on this current moment with my pen carving out these words on a blank page.
I can feel the exhaustion coursing through my body, and yet I also feel so wired and energized. I know I have a full day of work tomorrow, and that it’ll be an adjustment from the life I have grown accustomed to the past few days.
I will miss the sweet people, the peaceful pond, the silence, the chill in the air, and the evening fruits & tea under the setting sun.
This experience will stay with me for a lifetime and I am oozing with gratitude and harmony and peace and happiness.
May all beings be happy :)
Love,
Zahabiya
3 years later…
May 18th, 2025
Dear Zahabiya,
I wanted to write you a love letter to open after your 10 day silent Vipassana meditation course in Nepal.
I’m so proud of you for singing up for difficult things and challenging yourself. For pouring so much effort and care into your own wellbeing journey.
It’s been a powerful few years of self discovery and adventure, and I’m grateful for each and every moment that has helped me reach this point.
I get to trek through the Himalayas, dance freely to live music, develop deep relationships with locals and travelers, and spend quality time with the sweetest kids at a children’s home.
It’s not always easy, but you’ve made it your focus to be very intentional on how you move around Nepal.
Now, we embark on a new chapter. Vipassana. The entire reason you came to Nepal, the birth place of the Buddha, in the first place.
I know it probably wasn’t a piece of cake, but I do know you stuck with it the entire 10 days. Even though that really tough Day 6 keeps bubbling up—you just breathed through it.
And with Daniella, our travel buddy—did you end up making eye contact or laughing at all?
I can’t believe our paths crossed at a hostel in Kathmandu and we discovered that we had both separately signed up for the same exact meditation course later in our trip.
That overlap in our plans bonded us together, and we’ve been traveling together since for 38 days—the longest I’ve traveled with anyone in my entire life.
Even though we’ll be at the meditation course together, I know I’m going to miss debriefing every little thing with her, sharing every meal, and laughing at all of the awkward interactions we have with strangers together.
I’m glad to have her support—it’ll be my first time doing this course with someone I’ve become very close to. I hope she has a positive experience.
So… did you end up meeting any cool new people? During the last two courses, we met people that really opened our horizons. I’m sure you met a few cool people.
But even if you didn’t, who cares? We have Daniella. And Sresta (a new local friend I’m excited to hang out with more) when I get back to Kathmandu.
I hope you gave yourself grace during the tough moments. Let yourself breathe.
You have so much love to give to this world. That’s never a bad thing. Remember how accepted and celebrated you felt with the new group of friends you made in the mountains—they really made me feel like me.
There’s no need to shut down and change and not let people in for fear of rejection.
Let them. Get rejected. It’ll open up room for people that actually matter. Their loss.
I really hope when you’re reading this we have fully let go of energy that no longer serves us. It’s beautiful that I have the ability to care so much. And now we pour that into ourselves.
This time we have is such a privilege and a special experience. Do take time to cherish the here and now. Take time to readjust to the hustle and bustle of Kathmandu when you get back.
One day at a time.
I love you,
Zahabiya
May 30th, 2025
Dear Zahabiya,
I read your letter to me and cried. I was sitting on the rooftop of my apartment, freshly showered and in my brown dress.
You were right—it was challenging—and in exactly the ways you predicted it would be.
My thoughts were always fluttering back to the past (positive and negative).
The first few days I kept getting mad at myself and setting deadlines on when my thoughts would finally be free of the toxic loops I was putting myself through.
How silly that was! The more I got mad at myself, the deeper I suffered.
Finally on Day 6 (haha, you predicted it), the teacher talked to me and said to be kind to myself. To smile and not attach myself to any thoughts that would pop up.
The intensity of the thoughts slowly faded with time, but what really woke me up was one of the nightly lectures by the renowned teacher of Vipassana meditation, Goenkaji:
“When we talk of addiction, it is not merely to alcohol or to drugs, but also to passion, to anger, to fear, to egotism: all these are addictions. All these are addictions to your impurities. And at the intellectual level you understand very well, ‘Anger is not good for me. It is dangerous. It is so harmful.’
Yet you are addicted to anger, you keep generating anger. And when the anger is over, you keep repeating, ‘Oh! I should not have generated anger. I should not have generated anger.’ Meaningless! The next time some stimulation comes, you again become angry.
You are not coming out of it, because you have not been working at the depth of the behavior pattern of your mind.
The anger starts because of a particular chemical that has started flowing in your body, and with the interaction of mind and matter—one influencing the other—the anger continues to multiply.
Whether you are addicted to craving, or aversion, or hatred, or passion, or fear, the addiction is to a particular sensation that has arisen because of the bio-chemical flow… when you say that you are addicted, you are actually addicted to the sensation.”
It felt like he was staring into my soul. I needed to hear that.
My mind can keep me busy for days. It’s truly quite amazing how vividly I can imagine scenarios that don’t exist.
This isn’t the purpose of Vipassana, but I did indulge in my daydreams here and there. Sometimes of the future, sometimes of the past. I couldn’t help it.
The bed was a slab of wood (I later found out they forgot to give me a mattress, but because I was silent, I didn’t know we were supposed to have one, so I didn’t ask) and the showers were ice cold (apparently there was one stall with a hot shower, but the girls who discovered that couldn’t communicate it to the rest because, well, we were silent).
My stomach was eating itself with the lack of dinner (no meals after 12pm for old students). The pagoda cell (a tiny room where you sit in complete darkness for an hour) made me sleepy. The painful sensations on my back after meditating for hours quickly became unbearable.
It almost felt like I was wasting my time being there because I was so distracted and I couldn’t focus on getting into any deep meditative state.
But then in another nightly lecture Goenkaji emphasized that time is precious and you can still take full advantage of the few days left.
I did everything I could to immerse myself in the present moment and carefully listen to his instructions on how to meditate. I knew this was a valuable time to build my tools so that I would have the strength to continue this practice when I got home.
As the days passed, the hard bed and cold showers didn’t bother me anymore. It all slowly faded in the background as I worked on laughing at how much I am ruled by the sensations I feel on my body—constantly craving something (food after sunset) or avoiding something (sitting for hours with no back rest while my legs fall asleep).
When the course ended, we finally got to talk to the other meditators. It filled my cup so much. I was so overwhelmed with emotion and gratitude from everyone—they all had such positive and warm energy.
It almost felt like my meditation practice get deeper once I was able to connect with others.
Talking to other “old students” (those who have completed at least one previous course) helped me realize that it’s completely normal if the second course feels even more difficult than the first—partly because we carry certain expectations of what our experience should feel like from our first time.
I really want to take my family to a course. They keep saying “one day” but I hope that day comes sooner rather than later. I want them to experience this life changing journey for themselves so that they can find peace throughout all of the inevitable ups and downs of life.
On the final day before we left, they showed us the documentary Doing Time, Doing Vipassana.
I wiped away tears as I watched how Goenkaji brought this meditation technique to the largest (and toughest) prison in India. People who were forgotten and discarded by society finally had someone who was taking a genuine interest in their wellbeing.
One of the last scenes is an inmate tightly hugging his own guard while sobbing. That will stick with me for a long time.
I deeply admire Goenkaji for his dedication to spread love, peace, and harmony to the entire world. He’s truly an example of someone who is solely invested in the goodwill of others.
At the World Peace Summit in the year 2000, he said:
"There cannot be peace in the world when people have anger and hatred in their hearts. Only with love and compassion in the heart is world peace attainable."
He inspires me to share these letters, in the hopes that even one person may become curious and sign up for a meditation course near their home (it’s completely free, run by donations from old students).
It’s only 10 days. What are just 10 days of silence, if it can offer you even a tiny bit more peace and happiness that you can spread to others for the rest of your life?
And our world desperately needs as much peace as it can right now.
With all my love,
Zahabiya
P.S. Please leave a comment or message me privately if you have any questions. I’m always here to listen and talk through anything you have on your mind.
