ww

w.d

ham

ma.o

rg

North A

merican V

ipassana Meditation C

enters

Courses of V

ipassana meditation in the tradition of

Sayagyi U B

a Khin as taught by S. N

. Goenka are held

around the world at established centers and also at

rental sites. For more inform

ation, schedules andapplications, please visit the V

ipassana web site at

ww

w.dham

ma.org or contact the centers directly.

U. S. A

.V

ipassana Meditation C

enter—D

hamm

a Dhara

386 Colrain-Shelburne R

oadShelburne Falls, M

A 01370

(413) 625 2160; Fax: (413) 625 2170info@

dhara.dhamm

a.orgC

alifornia Vipassana C

enter—D

hamm

a Mahavana

P. O. B

ox 1167, North Fork, C

A 93643

(559) 877 4386; Fax: (559) 877 4387info@

mahavana.dham

ma.org

Northw

est Vipassana C

enter—D

hamm

a Kuñja

P. O. B

ox 345, Ethel, W

ashington 98542-0345(360) 978 5434; Fax: (360) 978 5433info@

kunja.dhamm

a.orgSouthw

est Vipassana M

editation Center—

Dham

ma Siri

P. O. B

ox 190248, Dallas, T

X 75219

(214) 521 5258; Fax: (214) 219 5125info@

siri.dhamm

a.orgM

endocino Vipassana C

enter—D

hamm

a Manda

P. O. B

ox 1016, Mendocino, C

A 95460

(707) 964 3939info@

manda.dham

ma.org

CA

NA

DA

Vipassana M

editation Centre of B

.C.—

Dham

ma Surabhi

P. O. B

ox 699, Merritt, B

.C. V

1K 1B

8(604) 730 9877

info@surabhi.dham

ma.org

Quebec V

ipassana Centre—

Dham

ma Suttam

a1738 Scenic R

oad, Sutton, Quebec

(514) 481 3504; Fax: (514) 879-3437info@

suttama.dham

ma.org

21

ME

DIT

AT

ION

NO

W T

OU

R INF

OR

MA

TIO

N O

FF

ICE*

7557 Lake City W

ay N. E

., Seattle, WA

98115(206) 524 2978 info@

tour.dhamm

a.org*A

fter August 5, 2002 please contact the centers directly.Printed 12/01

HE T

EC

HN

IQU

E OF V

IPASSA

NA M

ED

ITAT

ION IS A

SIMPLE , practical w

ay to achieve real peace ofm

ind and lead a happy, useful life. Vipassana

means “to see things as they really are.” It is a logical

process of mental refinem

ent through self-observation.From

time to tim

e, we all experience agitation, frus-

tration and disharmony. W

hen we suffer, w

e do not keepour m

isery limited to ourselves; instead, w

e keep distribut-ing it to others. C

ertainly this is not a proper way to live.

We all long to live at peace w

ithin ourselves, and with

those around us. After all, hum

an beings are social beings:w

e have to live and interact with others. H

ow, then, can

we live peacefully? H

ow can w

e remain harm

oniousourselves, and m

aintain peace and harmony around us?

Vipassana enables us to experience inner peace: it

purifies the mind, freeing it from

suffering and thedeep-seated causes of suffering. T

he practice leads step-by-step to the highest spiritual goal of full liberationfrom

all mental defilem

ents.

Historical B

ackground

Vipassana is one of India’s m

ost ancient meditation

techniques. It was rediscovered 2500 years ago by

Gotam

a the Buddha, and is the essence of w

hat hepracticed and taught during his forty-five years ofteaching. D

uring the Buddha’s tim

e, large numbers of

people in India were freed from

the bonds of sufferingby practicing V

ipassana, allowing them

to attain highlevels of achievem

ent in all spheres of life. Over tim

e,the technique spread to the neighboring countries ofB

urma, Sri Lanka, T

hailand and others, where it had

the same ennobling effect.

Five centuries after the Buddha, the noble heritage of

Vipassana had disappeared from

India. The purity of the

teaching was lost elsew

here as well. In the country of

Burm

a, however, it w

as preserved by a chain of devotedteachers. From

generation to generation, for over two

thousand years, this dedicated lineage transmitted the

technique in its pure form. T

he invaluable gem of

Vipassana, long preserved in B

urma, is now

beingpracticed throughout the w

orld. Today ever-increasingnum

bers of people have the opportunity to learn thisart of living.

S. N. G

oenka

In our time, V

ipassana has been reintroduced by Mr.

S. N. G

oenka. He w

as authorized to teach Vipassana by

the renowned B

urmese V

ipassana teacher, Sayagyi U B

aK

hin. Before he died in 1971, U

Ba K

hin was able to

see one of his most cherished dream

s realized. He had

the strong wish that V

ipassana should return to India,the land of its origin, to help the country com

e out ofits m

anifold problems. H

e felt sure it would then spread

from India throughout the w

orld for the benefit of allm

ankind.

S. N. G

oenka began conducting Vipassana courses in

India in 1969; after ten years, he began to teach inother countries. In over three decades since he startedteaching, he has conducted hundreds of ten-dayV

ipassana courses, and trained more than 700 assistant

teachers who are conducting thousands of courses in

over 90 countries, including the People’s Republic of

China, South A

frica, Russia, Taiw

an, Mongolia, Serbia,

the UA

E, C

ambodia, C

uba, Mexico and all the coun-

tries of South Am

erica. As of 2001, there w

ere more

than 80 centers dedicated to the practice of Vipassana,

including seven in North A

merica.

Mr. G

oenka has been a guest speaker at such distin-guished forum

s as the World M

illenium Peace Sum

mit

at the UN

, and the World E

conomic Forum

in Davos,

Switzerland. H

e teaches and embodies a consistent

message: lasting happiness is only achieved by purifica-

tion of mind.

The P

ractice

To learn Vipassana m

editation it is necessary to take aten-day residential course under the guidance of aqualified teacher. Ten days of sustained practice havebeen found to be the m

inimum

amount of tim

e inw

hich the essentials of the technique can be learned forV

ipassana to be applied in daily life. For the duration ofthe retreat, students rem

ain within the course site,

having no contact with the outside w

orld. They refrain

from reading and w

riting, and suspend any religiouspractices or other disciplines. T

hey follow a dem

andingdaily schedule w

hich includes about ten hours of sittingm

editation, with m

any breaks interspersed throughout

T

As taught by S. N

. Goenka and

his assistant teachers in thetradition of Sayagyi U

Ba K

hin

INT

ROD

UCT

ION TO

VIPA

SSAN

A

MED

ITATION

34

5

the day. They also observe silence, not com

municating

with fellow

students; they may speak, how

ever, with the

teachers whenever necessary and they m

ay contact thestaff w

ith needs related to food, health and such.

There are three steps to the training. First, students

practice avoiding actions which cause harm

. During the

course they undertake five moral precepts, agreeing to

abstain from killing living beings, stealing, speaking

falsely, all sexual activity and the use of intoxicants. This

simple code of m

oral conduct, along with m

aintainingsilence, serves to calm

the mind w

hich otherwise w

ouldbe too agitated to perform

the task of self-observation.

The second step is to develop a m

ore stable and con-centrated m

ind by learning to fix one’s attention on thenatural reality of the ever-changing flow

of the breath asit enters and leaves the nostrils. B

y the fourth day them

ind is calmer and m

ore focussed, better able to under-take the third step, the practice of V

ipassana itself: theobservation of sensations throughout the body, the ex-periential understanding of their changing nature and thedevelopm

ent of a balanced mind by learning not to react

to them. O

ne experiences the universal truths of imper-

manence, suffering and egolessness. T

his truth realizationby direct experience is the process of purification.

The entire practice is actually a m

ental training. Justas physical exercises are used to im

prove bodily health,V

ipassana can be used to develop a healthy mind.

Students receive systematic m

editation instructionsseveral tim

es a day, and each day’s progress in explainedduring a taped evening discourse by M

r. Goenka. C

om-

plete silence is observed for the first nine days. On the

tenth day, students learn to practice metta (loving

kindness meditation) and they resum

e speaking, as atransition back to their ordinary w

ay of life. The course

concludes on the morning of the eleventh day.

Course Finances

All courses are run solely on a donation basis. T

hereare no charges for the courses, not even to cover the costof food and accom

modation. A

ll expenses are met by

donations from those w

ho, having completed a course

and experienced the benefits of Vipassana, w

ish to giveothers the sam

e opportunity. Neither M

r. Goenka nor

his assistant teachers receive remuneration; they and

others who serve the courses volunteer their tim

e. Thus

Vipassana is offered free from

comm

ercialization.

A N

onsectarian Technique

Although V

ipassana has been preserved in theB

uddhist tradition, it can be accepted and applied bypeople of any background. T

he Buddha him

self taughtD

hamm

a (the way, the truth, the path). T

he techniquew

orks on the basis that all human beings share the sam

eproblem

s, and that a pragmatic m

ethod which can

eradicate these problems can be universally practiced.

Moreover, it involves no dependence on a teacher.

Vipassana teaches those w

ho practice it to be self-dependent. V

ipassana courses are open to anyonesincerely w

ishing to learn the technique, irrespective ofrace, faith or nationality. C

hristians, Jews, H

indus,Jains, M

uslims, Sikhs, B

uddhists and mem

bers of otherreligions—

monks, priests and nuns as w

ell as house-holders—

have all successfully practiced Vipassana.

The m

alady is universal; therefore, the remedy m

ustbe universal. For exam

ple, when w

e experience anger,this anger is not C

hristian anger or Hindu anger,

Chinese anger or A

merican anger. Sim

ilarly, love andcom

passion are not the strict province of any comm

unityor creed; they are universal hum

an qualities resultingfrom

purity of mind. People from

all backgrounds who

practice Vipassana find that they becom

e better human

beings.

Our Troubled W

orld

Developm

ents in the fields of science and technology,in transportation, com

munications, agriculture and

medicine, have revolutionized hum

an life at the material

level. But this progress is only superficial; underneath,

modern m

en and wom

en are living in conditions ofprofound m

ental and emotional stress, even in developed

and affluent countries.T

he imm

ense sufffering arising from racial, ethnic,

sectarian and class prejudices affect the citizens of everycountry. Poverty, w

arfare, weapons of m

ass destruction,disease, drug addiction, the threat of terrorism

, epidemic

environmental devastation and the decline of m

oral

values—all cast a dark shadow

on the future of civiliza-tion. O

ne need only glance at the front page of a dailynew

spaper to be reminded of the acute suffering and

deep despair which afflict the inhabitants of our planet.

Is there a way out of these seem

ingly insoluble problems?

The answ

er is unequivocally, yes. People everywhere

are eager to find a way to achieve peace and harm

ony,one that can restore confidence in the efficacy ofw

holesome hum

an qualities and create an environment

of freedom and security from

all types of exploitation—social, religious and econom

ic. Vipassana is such a

method.

Vipassana and Social C

hange

Vipassana is a path leading to freedom

from all suffer-

ing; it eradicates the craving, aversion and ignorancew

hich are responsible for all our miseries. T

hose who

practice it remove, little by little, the root causes of their

suffering and steadily emerge from

their former tensions

to lead happy, healthy, productive lives.Ten-day V

ipassana programs for prison inm

ates andstaff have been introduced in m

any parts of India, asw

ell as in the United States, B

ritain, New

Zealand,

Taiwan and N

epal. There are tw

o permanent V

ipassanacenters in Indian prisons, w

here more than 10,000

inmates have attended courses. T

he seeds of this uniqueconcept w

ere first planted in 1975-1977 in Vipassana

courses held inside the Jaipur Central Jail and the Jaipur

Police Academ

y. They flow

ered two decades later w

ith ahuge course for over 1,000 inm

ates at India’s largestprison, T

ihar Central Jail, in N

ew D

elhi. This extraordi-

nary undertaking was docum

ented in the award-w

inningfilm

, “Doing T

ime, D

oing Vipassana.”

The Indian governm

ent has recomm

ended Vipassana

as a reform m

easure for all jails. Additionally, thousands

of police officers have completed V

ipassana courses aspart of their training at the police academ

y in Delhi.

In the U.S., V

ipassana has been an ongoing part ofthe treatm

ent program at the N

orth Rehabilitation

Facility (NR

F) in Seattle since 1997. Due to the

encouraging results of ten-day residential retreats atN

RF, the N

ational Institute of Health in 2000 aw

ardeda three-year grant to the U

niversity of Washington to

study the long term effects of V

ipassana meditation on

addictive behavior in inmates. Tw

o Vipassana courses

have also been held at the San Francisco Jail.

The civil service career of M

r. Goenka’s teacher,

Sayagyi U B

a Khin, is another notew

orthy example. A

sthe head of several governm

ent departments of the

Union of B

urma, Sayagyi instilled a heightened sense of

duty, discipline and morality in his subordinates by

teaching them V

ipassana. Efficiency dram

aticallyincreased, and corruption w

as virtually eliminated.

The H

ome D

epartment of the G

overnment of

Rajasthan w

as similarly transform

ed. And in 1996

India’s most industrialized state, M

aharashtra, beganoffering an expenses-paid leave to officials every threeyears for V

ipassana practice, to help them deal w

ith stress.

Tens of thousands of school children in India havebeen taught the breath m

editation that is the first stepof V

ipassana. Both parents and teachers report im

provedconcentration and decreased discipline problem

s among

the children who participate. V

ipassana courses havebeen organized for people w

ith disabilities, includingthe blind and leprosy patients. O

ther programs have

focussed on drug addicts, homeless children, college

students and business executives.T

hese experiments underscore the point that societal

change must start w

ith the individual. Social changecannot be accom

plished by lectures and sermons;

discipline and virtuous conduct cannot be instilled instudents sim

ply through textbooks. Crim

inals do notbecom

e good citizens out of fear of punishment; ethnic

and sectarian discord cannot be eliminated by punitive

measures. H

istory shows the failures of such attem

pts.T

he individual is the key. Each person m

ust be treatedw

ith love and compassion. E

ach must be trained to

improve—

not by exhortations to follow m

oral precepts,but by being instilled w

ith the authentic desire tochange. H

uman beings m

ust be taught to investigatetheir true natures, to initiate a process w

hich can bringabout transform

ation and lead to purification of mind.

This is the only change w

hich will endure.

Vipassana has the capacity to transform

the human

mind and character. T

he opportunity awaits all w

hosincerely w

ish to make the effort. �