Pressing pause

When life gets too loud or too fast or too much, I am learning to press pause.

My husband left last night for a trip that will last over 14 days - 10 of which he will spend in silence, rising at 4am, sitting in meditation and getting re-acquainted with the sound of the bell that dictated our actions when we did this same retreat together in 2008. This is the longest we have ever been apart - this is the longest he will be away from the nugget.

When we told most people that he was going back to Thailand, most responded with support, though it may have masked their slight scepticism. Others quickly followed with, "Well when do you get to go?" And it made me smile - that they wanted things to be fair - for me to have the chance and the time to re-set, re-charge, re-center. And with all sincerity, I replied that my turn would come and I believe that with every bone in my body.

What I often didn't say is that my husband's time in silence, without his computer, without the news, without his IPhone - directly impacts the "we" and the "us". It can't not. So yes, he is doing the work right now, but we are a unit, and what deeply affects one of us, affects us all.

So, yes he is on retreat and I am home, with an 11 month old baby. But somehow, I too feel as though I am on a different kind of retreat - that even here at home, with dishes and recycling to carry out and laundry to fold and a baby to put to sleep, I too can re-set, re-charge and re-center.

This time alone, for me, right now, is me pressing pause.

Pressing pause

What would it be like to spend 10 days in silence, without words, books, and music? Without sweets, dairy, wheat, meat, coffee? Without sheets and duvets and down pillows? In two words, life changing.

On the eve of January 31, 2008*, at a monastery in Thailand, my husband and I stopped talking, not sure what we were really about to get into or what life would look like on the other side. We would be apart and yet together, sleeping apart, eating apart and experiencing meditation apart and it would in the end change us as a couple forever.

So today, on this 2nd anniversary of the first day of our visit, we commit to making the next 10 days as mindful, simple and contemplative as possible. First major difference: we have a 10 month old nugget. 2nd major difference: we don't have a staff of 5 cooking divine vegetarian Thai food everyday. 3rd major difference: we're sleeping in a bed instead of a concrete slab. 4th major difference: our 4am wake-up is a baby not a beautiful gong. 5th major difference: life.

But we will do our best. For what I realized after those 10 days in 2008, is that I have the ability to press pause, whenever life starts to move too fast.

And today, I am pressing pause. See you in 10 days.

*To read about our experience at the 10-day Silent Retreat in Suan Mokkh, Thailand - follow this link