Tales from Japan and my Accidental Silent Retreat

Wakayama, Japan

October 2023

There had been an undeniable seduction in the idea of a solo exploration of remote Japan.  Even saying the words now, brings to me imagined visions of authentic interactions with local people. REAL people.  I was sure I would experience a side of Japan that you can only see far from the tourist sites. 

So it was without hesitation that I booked my intrepid solo adventure into Japan.  The stated intention for my journey was to go to remote places, and to not book tours or over-plan the details so as to create opportunity for synchronicity and surprise (the core ingredients of any “adventure”). 

And so it was to be, but like many adventures, not in the ways I had planned.  I guess it was a perfect example of the old adage; sometimes life gives you the experience you need, not the experience you (necessarily) want.

And the deck came stacked.  The journey started under the emotional cloud of a relationship ending with a man I had once believed might be “the one.”  For months I had endured the slow death of his painful withdrawal, and now, right before my Japan trip, my mother informed me that her partner of the past ten years, a gentle man with a kind heart, was getting close to succumbing to cancer.  I had managed to visit him bedside before leaving for Japan, but it was not without feeling incredibly torn.  It was the morning of my departure that my Mom gave me her blessing (via my sister), to please go. 

As my flight lifted off for Tokyo, I mourned the death of two men, and watched the clouds through tear-filled eyes. 

The arrival into Tokyo’s Narita airport happened long before I was ready to arrive.  I think I could have used a few weeks on that plane just to process my emotions, but instead I was thrust into the bustle of a busy airport and train station in one of the largest cities in the world.

Despite Tokyo’s size, I was struck by how stunningly quiet and uncrowded it felt.  There were no sounds of car horns (the antithesis to my recent visit to Cairo), and the daily commuters stood patiently at cross walks, dressed in a sea of white shirts and dark blue or black pants or skirts.  It was an orderly society. A rule following society.  And incredibly polite and peaceful.  I later concluded that much of Tokyo was happening in underground malls and the subway system, leaving the streets (at least during the daytime) incredibly calm.  The quiet continued when I arrived to my hostel, and found a self-check in process in a seemingly empty building.  It was a level of peace my tired mind and body definitely welcomed.  

(Side note:  The peace, sadly, did not last very long.  That first night in Tokyo I slept “peacefully” as I was ravaged by bed bugs as I tossed and turned in my tiny cot.  In my years of travel, this was my first bed bug assault in a hostel, and its timing felt particularly cruel.  I was glad to be leaving for Osaka in the morning).

The next day, at my hostel in Osaka; a wonderful little place filled with expats (and not bed bugs); I met several travelers (from England, Chile and Denmark).  Each of them had moved to Japan for a dream, and with a one-year work visa, and were working at the hostel while looking for other sustainable work.  A theme I heard repeated in several interactions was how difficult it was to make meaningful connections with people in Japan as an “outsider,” and as one man shared, even after being in country for 10 months, and learning some Japanese, it was difficult to have a conversation that went beyond the superficial.  Yes, it was quiet here.

After a few days of Osaka exploration, I embarked on a six-hour journey south into Wakayama, and the Kii Penninsula, which involved a subway, a train, another subway, and a 45 minute hike to my home for the next five nights, a Zen Buddhist monastery, where I would be participating in morning meditation, and porridge with the monks, and day hikes in the surrounding forest along the pilgrimage trails of the Kumano Kodo.  I walked the final 45 minutes in the rain, and upon arrival was taken to my simple room in an annex building adjacent to the temple.  My bed was a futon mattress on the floor, which was covered by bamboo mats.  It pleased me that the décor was appropriately Zen, and it looked and felt like a yoga studio.  It was perfect.

Now to begin the adventure.

Day one.  Went to sleep early and hungry as there was no food on site.  But feeling happy and accomplished.  

Day two.  Meditation and porridge. Alone. Walked 90 minutes in the rain to get groceries.  Asleep early.  No human interaction except at the store checkout counter.  Concluded there were no other guests staying at the temple.  And no monks here except the one monk who led the silent morning meditation (for a fee).

Day three.  Walked 90 minutes in the rain (again) to get groceries.  Asleep early.  No human interaction except at the store checkout counter.

Day four.  SLEEPLESS NIGHT.  Tossing and turning.  Too tired to walk or get groceries.  No human interaction.  Quiet.  Quiet.  Silent.  Wait!  Silent?

OMG.  Then I saw it.  I had un-intentionally enrolled myself in a silent retreat.  The universe was belly laughing.  Just a week earlier I had had a conversation with a lovely woman named Tara who shared her experiences with a silent retreat in India. “Not everyone could do it,” she had shared.  “Some people left early.”  I loved the idea of the challenge and personal growth, and had boldly exclaimed to Tara, “I am definitely going to do that.  I have just decided.”  I was serious, and wondered when in the far future I would embark on such a retreat.

Apparently that day arrived 4 days ago, without warning. 

As of this writing, I am currently still in Day four, with at least two more weeks of this experience yet to unfold.  And with this knowing, I am both amused and feeling a familiar shift in my energy. Feeling my mind begin to quiet.  And with a quiet mind comes unexpected clarity.

A quiet mind.   In the normal routine of day-to-day life, and the interactions with the world, there is much to distract my mind.  Some call ours a world of mass distraction.  Here, where I am now, in the quiet, there is peace, but also a gnawing discomfort.  An unease.  I recognize this feeling as the quiet discomfort that I have felt before - right before a breakthrough -when the tension is the most palatable, and all is about to give.

I remember this feeling most dramatically from my solitary Covid lockdown, and also from four years ago, when I sailed across the Atlantic Ocean in a tiny sailboat with just two other sailors.  I remember how in the early days of the sail my mind was on high alert with the constant stress of attending to safety, worrying about weather, pushing through night watches, and trying to eat when the ocean was violently tossing me and my stomach across the boat.  It was intense.  Unrelenting.  And then slowly, I reached a point where I just didn’t have the capacity to worry anymore.  I surrendered.  I got peaceful.  I became quiet.  Instead of feeling tension I began to notice how the sunlight, or at times the starlight, danced across the waves.  I began to feel a sense of peace and delight.  It was pure and total acceptance of whatever the journey was to hold.

Now, in this quiet, quiet, quiet moment at this monastery, staring down weeks more of this quietness, I knew that the threshold to accepting the gifts of this unplanned silent retreat, was close.  Last night, when I tossed and turned, and couldn’t sleep, I was putting up my last fight before surrender.

In the morning light, I began seeing all the clues that this silent retreat was part of a bigger conspiracy orchestrated by a playful universe.  First, I had clearly told the universe (and explicitly Tara) that I wanted a silent retreat.  And then, just a month ago, I had 3 days of complete laryngitis, which unfortunately coincided with my arrival to a group tour in Jordan.  I remember how frustrating it felt to not be able to communicate AT ALL, especially with those I was meeting for the first time. 

Then I had manifested an ex-boyfriend who I swear didn’t (or couldn’t) hear half my words.  Literally. It was a bit extreme. And now that I think back, he often only finished half his sentences, dropping off in mid-sentence right before the punch-line.  With this awareness, even his short presence in my life story felt a bit contrived.  And perfect.  Beautifully perfect.

So I asked myself, what did not being able to speak, and not being able to be heard mean to me? A rush of feelings flooded in.  Kid feelings.  And then I realized that a recurring theme in my childhood journey was the experience and belief that I could not (and at times, should not) be seen or heard.  It had happened countless times as a child (a child with a soft voice and a with a practical mom), until I surrendered to just being more quiet in the world.  They can’t hear me anyway. 

Wow.  And I had built a lifetime habit on that mantra and belief.  A belief that didn’t have to be that way, anymore.

So now, in Japan, away from the cities and English speakers, in a monastery hotel where I am the only guest, I have had a breakthrough moment, and I think (as soon as this retreat it OVER 😊) it is time to be heard and seen as never before. 

And no more manifesting situations and people who support an old belief system that was always false.  I get it, now.  I get it. 

I am still full of FEELINGS as I finish my farewells to two men in my life, but I do so with deep gratitude for how each has impacted my journey.  Fair winds.  Fly high.  And thank you.

And although I came to Japan to find adventure and discover the REAL Japan, what I found instead was far more valuable.  The REAL Laura Dawn, within the silence. 

And the universe smiled. 

Namaste.