My Vipassana Journey

How I Found Vipassana

I'm a tech person through and through — 20+ products built, 3 hackathons won, a startup exit. My life was fast-paced, constantly optimizing, always building the next thing. Vipassana found me at a point where I realized I was good at building things outside of myself, but had no tools for understanding what was happening inside.

Someone recommended a 10-day course. I was skeptical — 10 days of silence sounded like either a cult or a waste of time. But I'd tried apps, books, and weekend workshops, and nothing had stuck. So I signed up.

The First Course: Survival Mode

I'm not going to romanticize it. The first course was one of the hardest things I've ever done.

Day 1: Okay, this is fine. Sit, breathe, observe. Simple.

Day 2: My knees are screaming. My mind won't shut up. I've replayed every conversation I've had in the last 5 years. I want my phone.

Day 3: Existential crisis. Why am I here? This is pointless. I could be shipping code right now. I seriously considered leaving.

Day 4: Something shifted. The technique deepened. For the first time, I could feel sensations throughout my body that I'd never noticed. It was like discovering a new sense.

Days 5–9: A strange oscillation between profound peace and intense discomfort. Not always pleasant, but always interesting. The evening discourses by Goenka became something I genuinely looked forward to — the man has a wonderful sense of humor.

Day 10: Silence breaks. Talking felt alien. I realized how much noise I normally fill my life with. A deep sense of gratitude for the experience.

Why I Kept Going Back

After my first course, I felt different — calmer, more aware of my reactions, less caught up in the constant mental chatter. But like any skill, it fades without practice.

I went back. Six times now, for a total of 60 days of courses. Each time is different. Some courses are peaceful. Some are deeply uncomfortable. Every one has taught me something I couldn't have learned any other way.

What keeps me returning is simple: it works. Not in a mystical way. In a very practical, observable way. I react less impulsively. I'm more present in conversations. I sleep better. When something difficult happens, I have a brief moment of space between the event and my reaction — and in that space, I can choose.

Daily Practice: The Real Work

The courses are powerful, but the daily practice is where the transformation actually happens. 881+ days of sitting, morning and evening. Some days it's 20 minutes. Some days it's the full hour. The important thing is continuity.

As a tech person, I appreciate that Vipassana is essentially a debugging tool for the mind. You observe your mental processes with the same rigor you'd apply to debugging code. No stories, no interpretations — just direct observation of what's actually happening.

The hardest part isn't the sitting. It's the consistency. There are mornings when the alarm goes off at 5 AM and every part of me wants to skip it. But like any practice — running, coding, writing — the compound effect over time is extraordinary.

What Changed

What I'd Tell Someone Considering It

Just go. Stop reading about it (after this page, obviously), stop analyzing whether it's right for you, and just sign up. The intellectual understanding of Vipassana is worth nothing compared to the experiential understanding.

It will be hard. You will want to quit. Days 2–4 are genuinely rough. But if you commit to staying the full 10 days and following the instructions, you will leave with something valuable — not because anyone told you so, but because you experienced it yourself.

That's the whole philosophy of Vipassana: don't take anyone's word for it. Practice and see for yourself.