Silence and the Spider

A 10-Day Vipassana Retreat

The first thing I surrendered to silence was my phone.

It happened in a dining hall in the rural Texas town of New Ulm, population 396. One by one, after checking in, we placed our devices, wallets, and keys into plastic bags. The bags were sealed and locked in a safe where they would remain for the next ten days.

When my turn came, I handed over my iPhone.

The moment it left my hand, a pocket of space began opening around me, widening my peripheral field. Without the gravitational pull of the phone—the possibility of checking, scrolling, searching—the day suddenly had more room in it. My attention loosened and drifted outward, like something that had been gently untied.

I had come to attend a ten-day Vipassana meditation retreat. Vipassana means “to see reality as it is.” The technique is ancient, rediscovered by the Buddha more than 2,500 years ago. 

Its premise is simple but radical: by carefully observing the sensations of the body and the movements of the mind, one can see how suffering arises—and how it dissolves.

The method for learning this wisdom is straightforward.

Sit still.

Observe.

Repeat for ten hours a day.

For ten days.

In silence.

The Last Words

The silence had not yet begun, so the afternoon still carried the gentle murmur of conversation.

We were instructed to write our names on the piece of masking tape beneath a tray where we each sat. That tray would be our place for the entire retreat. The system felt oddly comforting—part monastery, part summer camp.

Across from me sat two women.

One was in her late sixties and from Austin, like me. She told me she had divorced ten years earlier, become a registered nurse, and moved to Alaska. The other woman was Chinese, probably in her forties, with the quietest voice imaginable and lives in Singapore.

I told them that before leaving home, I had explained to my husband, “Only call if it’s a matter of life or death. And not even if World War breaks out.”

We all shrugged, and their eyes widened.

I sighed deeply, feeling a ripple of regret as the words left my mouth.

A few days later, the United States and Israel began strikes against Iran.

But for now, the outside world would pause.

Entering Silence

That night, we took the traditional Buddhist refuge vows:

Refuge in the Buddha—the possibility of awakening.

Refuge in the Dhamma—the universal law of nature.

Refuge in the Sangha—the community of practitioners.

Years earlier, while studying Tibetan Buddhism at the Shambhala Center in New York, I had declined taking formal vows. At the time, they felt like a commitment to one spiritual path when my curiosity was still wandering through many.

Here, however, the vows felt different.

Vipassana is presented as non-sectarian. You can believe in God, believe in nothing, or believe in astrology, angels, or astrophysics. The technique does not ask for belief.

It asks for observation.

Along with the vows, we agreed to five precepts: no killing, no stealing, no lying, no sexual activity, and no intoxicants. We also committed to staying the full ten days.

Men and women were strictly separated during the retreat to create a quiet, distraction-free environment for deep introspection. I wondered about non-binary participants and later learned that the centers will work with prospective students to determine the most comfortable arrangement for each person. The practice is open to everyone.

In short, you are encouraged to behave as though you are entirely alone.

No talking.

No eye contact.

No note-passing.

No hand gesturing.

No books.

No writing.

No music.

No jogging.

No yoga.

Stretching quietly in your room is allowed, but the idea is to give the Vipassana technique an uninterrupted chance to unfold.

The instructions are quite clear:

“Only those who feel they can honestly and scrupulously follow the discipline should apply for admission.”

Then the silence began.

The Schedule

For the curious—or the brave—here is the daily timetable:

4:00 AM – Wake-up bell

4:30–6:30 AM – Meditation

6:30–8:00 AM – Breakfast

8:00–9:00 AM – Group meditation

9:00–11:00 AM – Meditation

11:00–12:00 PM – Lunch

12:00–1:00 PM – Rest / teacher interviews

1:00–2:30 PM – Meditation

2:30–3:30 PM – Group meditation

3:30–5:00 PM – Meditation

5:00–6:00 PM – Tea break

6:00–7:00 PM – Group meditation

7:00–8:15 PM – Teacher discourse

8:15–9:00 PM – Meditation

9:00–9:30 PM – Questions

9:30 PM – Lights out

The Spider

The bell rang at 4:00 AM the next morning as promised.

In the hallway outside my dorm room, a laminated sign labeled BUG RELOCATOR sat beside a clear plastic cup. The retreat organizers stressed relocating insects over killing them.

I loved that.

Sadly, I would fail the system on the first day.

A small spider shared my shower.

He was a lively little creature, the sort of spider who looked like he had opinions about things. The night before, I had simply left him be.

But that morning, he darted across the floor, and I decided it might be safer to escort him outside.

I retrieved the bug relocator kit.

Following the instructions we had been shown, I lowered the cup.

At that exact moment, the spider sprinted.

The rim of the cup landed on him.

And just like that, only hours after vowing not to kill, I had killed.

A Small Storm

It may sound silly, but I was completely unnerved.

I apologized to the spider profusely and sincerely.

Then I gave him what could loosely be described as a water burial.

On to the meditation hall.

Thirty minutes in, sitting on my cushion, I broke into a cold sweat so intense I wondered if I had contracted the flu. My heart raced. My skin felt electric. A strange wave of anxiety moved through my body.

Eventually, I slipped quietly out of the hall, regrouped in my room, and returned once the sensations subsided.

Later, I told the teacher what had happened.

She smiled kindly and said, “Intention is what matters.”

But she also touched upon other parts of the teachings.

The body constantly produces sensations—heat, pressure, vibration—created by the interaction of the four classical elements: earth, water, fire, and air. Suppressed or unconscious emotions or mental activity can trigger sensations. Our unconscious habit is to react automatically to these sensations.

Vipassana trains us to do something radical.

Notice the sensation.

And do nothing.

If we react, we create new conditioning.

If we observe calmly, old conditioning dissolves.

Looking back, I think the spider tragedy marked my initiation into the practice.

The end of his tiny life triggered a cascade of sensations—heat, trembling, guilt, reflection.

An entire psychological storm sparked by a creature no bigger than my pinky nail.

Perhaps he had excellent karma after all.

Digital Withdrawal

The effects of having no devices quickly became apparent.

Several times in those first days, a thought would arise, and I would instinctively reach for where my phone would have been.

To look up a word.

Check a fact.

Set a timer.

I do those things—a lot.

But something even stranger happened that first afternoon.

Exhausted, I fell asleep briefly during a break. When I woke up, I looked down at my body and saw a glowing image of my laptop hovering above my legs like a complete hologram.

It lingered for several seconds before dissolving.

Apparently, the nervous system has its own relationship with black mirrors.

Suddenly, people’s “no phones at the dinner table,” “no phone by the bed,” and digital detox retreats sound all the wiser.

The Mind Wants to Edit Reality

Each evening we watched recorded talks by S. N. Goenka, the teacher who reintroduced Vipassana to the modern world.

During the first lecture, I found myself thinking:

Why don’t they edit out the background coughing?

Why don’t they crop the image?

AI could fix this footage.

Then I caught myself.

There it was—the mind trying to edit reality.

Vipassana is about seeing things exactly as they are.

Not as we think they should be.

Although I still maintain that a giant 3D projection of Goenka giving talks in the meditation hall would be extremely cool—just saying.

Sharpening Perception

After completing a ten-day course, students are called “old students.”

I was surprised to learn that some of the young women I thought were new were actually returning practitioners.

One young woman walked across the meditation hall with such grace that I thought she must have been a queen in a past life. She glided—like someone floating down the aisle at a coronation.

When the silence lifted on the final day, I told her about my impression.

She looked surprised and said someone else had told her the exact same thing.

Ten days of silence sharpens perception in unusual ways.

For me, being silent wasn’t difficult.

It was harder not to write, make eye contact, or offer simple gestures like a smile.

Occasionally, practical communication was unavoidable. At one lunch, a woman began choking, and the nurse from Austin and I locked eyes, ready, just in case.

It’s remarkable how much can be communicated without words.

On Day 8, while resting in my room, I thought I heard sirens, but knew I must be dreaming. When I returned to the group, my friend from Austin was gone. Part of me wondered if the sirens I imagined reflected her difficulties. This retreat would be extra tough for anyone dealing with serious physical pain, which I suspect was her case.

The Living Landscape

Outside the hall, the natural world continued undisturbed.

Wild turkeys gobbled in the woods. One afternoon, I saw a magnificent turkey strutting behind the dormitory, his bright red snood swinging proudly.

Ant highways crossed the pathways, marked with sticks so meditators could step carefully over their route.

Across the dirt road, black Angus cattle watched our slow-moving procession with steady curiosity. The large bull seemed particularly fascinated by us.

It felt as though the land itself was participating.

What Remains

The retreat did not reveal cosmic secrets or mystical visions. Nor is it meant to.

Instead, it revealed something quieter.

Most suffering arises from the mind’s constant habit of reacting—grasping at pleasant experiences, pushing away unpleasant ones, endlessly trying to rearrange reality.

Even when reality is a failed spider rescue.

Or a coughing student on a grainy video.

Or the absence of technology.

Vipassana reminds us of a quieter possibility:

Notice what arises.

Let it pass.

And somewhere in the small space between sensation and reaction, a surprising peace begins to grow.

A Gift

On the final day of ten days of deep inward work, noble silence ended, and we were introduced to Mettā, a loving-kindness meditation.

After so many hours observing sensations with quiet discipline, the practice turns outward. From a calmer, more balanced mind, we begin silently offering goodwill to others—friends, strangers, those we struggle with.

It felt like opening the windows of the heart after a long winter.

All that inward attention, all that quiet untangling of the body and mind, suddenly had somewhere to go.

Lovingly outward.

Into the world.

Afterwards, a large group of women gathered on a walkway to share experiences.

I felt so proud of everyone there.

We did it.

Taking Vipassana Home

There is so much to be said about the Vipassana teachings, but I will close by saying this: 

The Buddha may be the greatest life coach who ever lived.

And perhaps the spider offered the final lesson.

For ten days, I practiced noticing sensations without reacting, watching thoughts arise and dissolve, learning how easily the mind creates storms from the smallest disturbance.

And yet there, on the very first morning, a tiny creature managed to reveal the whole drama of the human mind.

Craving.

Aversion.

Fear.

Compassion.

I find myself thinking about that little spider.

And I rest well knowing that Mettā includes him.

*Curious about the cost of a Vipassana retreat? They are 100% free.

New Ulm, TX - Black Angus