A Journey To The Center Of The Self In Iceland
I was recently in Iceland for a Silent Retreat that has been organized by the Icelandic branch of NATHA YOGA CENTER in Reykjavik. This event took place from the 16th until the 23rd of January and ended with a spiral meditation in the new yoga center in Reykjavik.
‘Welcome signs from “Minniborgir”Iceland – A rainbow appeared following the first meditation in the morning’
Our meeting with the country of the four fighting elements was very warm … it is the warmest temperature in Europe now in Iceland!
Moreover we were taken from the airport directly to the Blue Lagoon, the most famous Icelandic resort for travelers. Being placed near a geothermal power unit, the Blue Lagoon is the result of the interaction between human activity of harvesting the inner power of the earth and the lava field that exist everywhere in Iceland. As a result you have surreal blue water that contains amazingly many minerals and salts, placed in the bed of lava field.
We were spoilt for a few hours in the hot highly mineralized water before reaching the yoga center in Reykjavik. This was a very warm reception in the country where ice and fire are molding the land and sea.
Softened by the Blue Lagoon we were hosted for a night in the NATHA headquarters and we took the chance to visit the new center on Boltholt 4, street (very near the center of Reykjavik).
Serafim and Magdalena (the heart-full coordinators of the yoga school in Iceland) are wonderful hosts, organizing this retreat with Danish-Icelandic precision ensuring that everyone from abroad was collected from the airport and hosted in the facilities they prepared. The yoga center is just finished and shares the same warm and beautiful simplicity that you can observe throughout Reykjavik and Iceland.
Since the last time I was in Iceland the activity of the yoga school has rapidly developed and now NATHA YOGA CENTER is an important spiritual center of the country.
At this time of year the daylight lasts only a little more than five hours a day and it is only rarely you will get the chance to see a glimpse of the sun.
You can see the picture taken 10 am when we were embarking on the silent retreat site.
This is an excellent time of the year to begin the journey into the inner world.Interestingly, not far from the Retreat site is the place where Professor Lindenbrock and the other heroes from Jules Verne’s famous “Journey to the center of the earth” began their adventure, inside of a volcano. For us today, we will begin the journey to the center of our being, theSupreme Self ATMAN in similar conditions of austerity and silence.
The barren landscape and the lava field covered with moss, marked by the chain of volcanoes is the simplest view one can hope in order to slow down the mind in its search for the outer excitement and deepen the inner experience.
The place were the retreat is being held is called “Minniborgir” and it is a small hut village just finished and made ready to receive tourists, it’s placed in the middle of a lava field that reaches for many miles around without any neighbors
At the line of horizon we have a direct view of Europe’s most active volcano HEKLA that is predicted to erupt this year 2010.
This we were told when arriving at the Retreat site!
After a short administrative meeting where everyone is informed about the retreat rules and the way it is organized everyone is ready to begin this journey.
From the solitude of Iceland I wish all of you Love and Peace
The second day of the retreat, another rainbow!
For the second day in the lunch time we have a big clear rainbow on top of our retreat site. At this time of the year, rainbows are an extremely rare phenomenon and to have them repeatedly is definitely an amazing sign. This is also the whole atmosphere in the retreat: an amazing silence full of Grace.
The daily program is the following:
9.00 – 11.00 Meditation: The revelation of the Divine Self ATMAN
11.00 – 12.30 Hatha Yoga performed in Unison. It mainly consists of those techniques that facilitate the revelation of the Divine Self ATMAN.
12.30 – 13.00 Meditation: The Revelation of the divine Self ATMAN
13.00 – 16.00 Lunch and break
16.00 – 19.00 Meditation: The Revelation of the Divine Self ATMAN
19.00 – 20.00 Hatha Yoga at the yoga hall but the techniques are performed individually (the personal tapas)
20.00 – 21.30 Dinner
21.30 – 22.00 Meditation: The Revelation of the Divine Self ATMAN
22.00 – 23.00 Conference
23.00 – 23.45 Meditation in telepathic communion with Grieg, our spiritual master
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@ Mihai,
I haven’t been on your blog for a while – and i can’t refrain from making comments 🙂
It sounds wonderful where you are, can you tell me if the location of a retreat has any impact on the outcome of the retreat – obviously it is easier to meditate if there is silence and reduced activity, but energetically if the area is barren and almost untouched it must be far easier to get into deeper states of meditation. Would it be possible for you to share your experiences there.
Thank you for the posting the program, i will join the meditations when i can , and will let you know what i feel from a distance.
Isobel
I had my lunchbreak at the same time as the last meditation. I found a quiet place and tried to connect with the meditation there, (in the hope of also experiencing the journey :-)). I created the barren volcanic landscape around me(to start in the same place as you there), the sirens from the police cars and the noises of the planes and traffic quickly faded out, and i was easily able to go inside my heart. It was a very peaceful sensation, with moments of void, the deeper i went the more i felt the exquisite beauty of my heart, i can only compare it to those feelings you have in your heart when you are falling in love – it is physical and in the same time transcending this world.
I do not know if i approached the meditation in the right way, but it was certainly a beautiful experience. It is amazing me how we are really not conditioned or limited in the universe, that when we really want we have the possibilities to connect in time and in space 🙂
Back to work !
Dear Mihai,
it seems that the nature is participating to your journey in finding the Self. The rainbows and the wonderful landscape there are inspiring to search for more inside and to search for the essence in everything.
It is so great that you can do this camp in the most quiet place from the world (which now proves to be also the warmest from the aria).
Thinking about all your group and the special conditions of the camp i am inspired to join your meditation program.
Good luck to all of you in reveling the self!
with love,
Lia
It is about the rainbow that I want to write about too 🙂
In Romania it was a similar silent retreat at the end of the year, with the same program as yours. In the morning of the last day, they were two rainbows on the sky – the symbol of divine grace. It seems we are all connected in a mysterious and amazing way. I am so happy about that!
@ cat
yes, it is the SILENCE the connect us in a mysterious way.
SILENCE is the common language that all people of the planet speak if they train a little and it is uniting all humanity. the languages and the talk is agitating the mind and make us feel different from each other but when silent people feel united and the same. here is the silent retreat there are people from some very different cultures but in SILENCE we were happily the same.
only in SILENCE you can hear the voice of the heart and can understand its words.
SILENCE is the language of Peace…
It looks great the place for such retreat. The answer you gave to “cat” was very inspired …. probably you just came back from the silence 😉
One think i don’t get: why sitting so many days in silence to learn to be silent? can’t you just shut up and mind your business and then everything fall in the right place? at least this is what i understand from being SILENT. when i start to be concerned with the whole “zoo” around me is when i start to loose it and the noise comes in.
I think silence is something you are born with and we are just spoiling it with our concerns and self importance….
thanks anyway for inspiration and great taste from Iceland. Definitely i will go visit in the summer.
@ isobel
how did you feel when you meditate with these guys in iceland in the same time?
@ carbon12
You have a good intuition and you’re right. It is possible indeed that you “mind your business” (or better said to do your business in a mindless state) and in this way to make silence appearing in your being. But not everyone can do this efficiently and every time. Indeed the problem is not that we are living in a noisy place, the problem is that we are getting noisy about the “place”. Yet there are special situations when you can induce this silence and then you can easier figure out how to stay there in silence.
It is somehow like the lab conditions that help you testing a new law and then, after you figure out how it works, you can go and apply the knowledge in the complex outside world. In a silent retreat we create “lab conditions” to figure out certain inner mechanisms (especially regarding the mind and its work). Once you have the understanding and even get the control you are able to make these operations in the daily life in an efficient way. It can be even an inner silence that will not be disturbed by the outer activity.
I hope these clarifications will answer your dilemma.
@ admin
thank you. it make sense what you say and i am content (for the moment, with what i know ;))
the comparison with the “lab” is great and makes me think that in fact one can study the inner world in this “lab” exactly as one is studying the laws of nature.
This is very interesting, i was always thinking that you can practice some stuff and get some weird results but to look at this in a scientific way… that’s very interesting. That opens another field of possibilities.
Do you have some “house experiments” i can try in my “apartment lab”?