台北德貴

【社青禪修營 】黃可兒

2017-06-12

心得分享

【  Tannan 5day retreat  】

◆Tea meditation

Description: Tea meditation is not only tea tasting, but it is a way to relax, to clear your mind and to be thankful for what you have. The tea meditation was guided by an experienced volunteer. It was started from learning all the teaware and steps of brewing tea through a live demo, following by practices on a beautiful grassland with great sunshine. Everyone had a chance to be the host to serve tea as well as a tea taster to enjoy the smooth green tea.

Comment: Tea meditation was a wonderful experience. The amazing thing is how the instructor guided us during the activity. I have learnt tea brewing before but the adventure in the camp was totally different. Tea brewing focuses on the method of making a good tasting tea, however, the tea meditation led me to feel grateful to the tea farmers, families and people we met. This is what I have to remind myself all the time. The power of gratitude.

◆Silent Meditation

Description: After learning the basic of seated meditation and doing some relaxation exercises on the first 3 days, it was time to practice mindfulness in a silent environment. On the fourth day of the camp, attendees were prohibited to talk to and even had eye contact with others. All you needed to do is to focus on every single movement of your body no matter when you were eating, walking or meditating.

Comments: At the beginning, most of the attendees believed that it is impossible to keep silent for the whole day. However, no talking is one of the most inspiring activities according to the feedback at the end. One student in my group told us that her room was so cold and she could not sleep at night. She only realized that the window was widely opened on the fourth day during the silent meditation. Keeping quiet is an excellent mean for us to live in the present moment.

◆Dinner on the grassland

Comment: Happiness is very simple. What I need is a yoga mat, a packed dinner with full of love and a peaceful environment. I found all of them at Tannan Monastery. Preparing dinner for more than 80 people and serving in a regular room is not easy but people in Dharma Drum Mountain do not mind giving you extra. They prepared our dinner in boxes with soup and dessert which were delivered to the grassland. Yoga mat was also ready for us to sit and enjoy our meal with the trees and the blue sky. The only reason for them to do all the additional work is to make us, the teenagers, to practice Chan in way which is more suitable for us.

◆Yoga

Description: The camp was started by doing yoga on the first day. It helped relax our body and mind at the same time.

Comment: I am not a yoga lover but yoga did relieve my shoulder tension in these few days. My body experienced serious muscle shaking at the beginning as I paid too much attention to the painful area. Following the nun’s instruction to focus on the breathing, I felt more relaxed and could hold the position much longer.

◆Q&A

Comment: Q&A section is very useful as it answered most of the common questions on meditation that beginners have. What I have learnt is that training meditation is similar to reducing the waves of a sea. We could only notice what are inside if it is calm. It is just like our heart.