I am so happy to hear the retreat went so wonderfully! I did not make this one, but I plan on going to the next one. It is so exciting to see AYP growing and being appreciated. Thank you Yogani, Carson, Shanti, Katrine, Doug and anyone else that helped, for all the hard work and making this happen!
For me, the retreat was a deeply transformational experience that will be cherished always.
Thanks to all who worked so selflessly to make this happen and to the participants for a tremendous bonding experience. I give thanks everyday for the day that I discovered AYP - it has changed my life in ways I could not have expected.
Katrine - many thanks for the Insight Dialog exercise. To me, this was the most difficult part of the retreat, and yet it was what I needed the most!
Yogani - With deep and sincere reverence - Pranaam.
I am very grateful to every one of you for your incredible presence this weekend. I have difficulty finding words to express how I feel. To all the leaders, I was profoundly touched by you… in a subtle and profound way I was transformed by your presence. Shanti, you were an inspiration with your perfect display of stillness in action. Kirtanman, you gave me glimpses of the simplicity and awesomeness of simply being there in the now. Carson and Parallax, you really shown me how living with inner silence doesn’t have to be serious with your wonderful sense of humour… I had a lot of fun.
Katrine, being in your presence, or should I say That Presence, was a blessing beyond my understanding. Meeting eyes with you in Satsang filled me with something words can’t convey … a glimpse of my Self maybe.
Thanks to everyone for sharing yourself with me. A special thanks to Yogani without whom that would have been impossible. I love you all and look forward to meeting you again.
Innercall
Hi All:
Very happy to hear that the Pennsylvania retreat proved beneficial for so many of you.
On the subject of additional retreats, it will be good to do annual events – everywhere. But this will not be enough. The ideal for many practitioners will be attending retreats 2-4 times per year. They don’t have to all be in the same place, though it would be nice to have places where retreats are occurring quarterly like clockwork. Eventually it will get to that stage of development. It will evolve organically. Now that the “cat is out of the bag” that retreats really do work, there will likely be increasing demand for them. Bravo!
Speaking of which, we are now a “go” for the Kripalu March 20-25, 2011 retreat. So we have a world class facility lined up in Massachusetts, USA for a larger AYP retreat 5 months from now. Here we are on the Kripalu schedule. This information will be linked from the top left border of the AYP website and forums soon. Sign-ups will be through Kripalu.
You may have noticed me dropping a few hints in the forum recently that anyone anywhere can arrange for a facility, and we can provide the retreat leadership and help find attendees for it. Let me know if you are interested, and we can provide support.
In the course of doing more retreats here and there, it is expected that others will learn the ropes for leadership (encouraged), so we can be increasing our team of AYP retreat leaders, and keep expanding the number of retreats occurring around the world. It can grow organically like that.
Onward!
The guru is in you.
From me, deep heartfelt thanks to Katrine, Carson, Kirtanman and Shanti. Furthermore, extending the same heartfelt thanks and love to everyone else who attended.
As Yogani says - retreats do work. This one caused a significant leap ahead in my practise progress. I can now very comfortably do 10 mins of SBP + 20 minutes of DM (which results in A LOT of inner silence), whereas before this would’ve overloaded me.
On an interpersonal level, it was just wonderful to meet all of you. I was very deeply moved, and I was equally pleased to meet every single attendee of the retreat, I liked everyone. I was able to express myself on a level that I normally keep locked inside, unable to communicate. Sensitive, deep, compassionate people.
Thank you all so much.
This has been by far one of the most beautiful experiences I have ever had. 
I have so many of you to thank and yet no one to thank. How could I thank an individual, when what we experienced happened becasue we all let go in silence. Anyone could have made the arrangements for that retreat, but no one person could have made that retreat what it was as an individual… we all added our stillness into the stone building we met in and transformed it into… in Bewell’s words… paradise. So my heartfelt thanks to all.
The one thing that I do want to share, it was amazing how so many of us spoke at the retreat, but all I was hearing was happening at the level before the words… hence it was so wonderful to realize, we all say the same thing, we use different words, phrases, experiences, style, but everything that came from any of us, be it the leaders or the participants, it came from the same place, inner silence.
When Katrine spoke, I heard the words, but the essence was the exact same as when Kirtanman spoke or when Carson spoke or when Parallax spoke or I spoke. The essence was same when Kami asked a question or Rohini asked a question or Phil asked a question. The reply came from the same stillness that the question came from and the answer, no matter what it was, satisfied everyone at a level beyond the mind. The process of verbally communicating happened all throughout the weekend, but the real understanding and communication happened at the level of inner silence. The silence we all shared by being there together, being ready to drop our barriers, our fears, our inhibition and truly surrender to the process.
It truly was an experience beyond words… it was an experience in silence. Thank you./
PS: I have posted the retreat schedule that was followed over the weekend here.
This actually says what I am trying to say so much better:
Out beyond ideas of rightdoing and wrongdoing There is a field. I will meet you there. ~Rumi The "field" of inner silence. I never did see these words like this before. :slight_smile:you nailed it for me as well, cosmic.
Yes! A journey with that specific Rumi poem began for me this past August when it was offered as a gift by a new friend. As with other friendships, my conversation with her has been deepened by the the retreat. You have shown me a whole new insight on the poem: Inner silence is a that “field” where we meet beyond our limited ideas of what is even possible.
hmmmmmm!! where do I start? I don’t know what my calling is, but I want to be here for a bigger reason. Thank you Yogani, Shanti, Kirtanman, Carson and Katrine for all your love, support and guidance. Thank you everyone for all the love and sharing. We were together like one big family. I have no words to explain this hangover, this reminds me of Katrine’s poem:
Just for a moment
It doesn’t matter how surrendered I think I am
All that matters is that I surrender Now
It doesn’t matter what I did yesterday
All that matters is that I act Now
It doesn’t matter if I didn’t love you yesterday
All that matters is that I am loving Now
One moment of absolute awareness
is undoing a million years of ignorance
Always
One moment is all it takes
I let go of all the moments I forgot to be
In this instant, I forget everything I am supposed to be
This is all it takes
One moment of absolute, limitless openness
This is always the power of Now:
No matter where you come from;
no matter where you are going;
no matter how far or short you have travelled;
your Life, your Love, your Sight and your Joy
lie within your very heart
It is never anywhere else
It is closer to you than a heartbeat
You are never apart from it
Just as the warmth of the sun is implicit,
so can water never be separated from its wetness,
nor you from me
We are always one
If you are frozen – even then, I am just hidden within
Any warmth will melt me into view
Any warmth
So be available!
Let my rays touch your face
If not yesterday – then Now
Any way will do
No matter how heavy your rucksack……
you can always take it off!
Pause for a moment
Please come sit with me
Just for a moment – stay!
Lay your head in my lap
Let us be silent together
Katrine, Shanti, Kirtanman, Carson and all my dear friends…I just surrendered …complete surrender(in sanskrit-Sampoorna Saranagathi)
Just wanted to post an update on how things are going 3 days back from the retreat…
The first night I was back I was definitely still on cloud 9, but not quite in the “transcendent state” that I had experienced while we were on retreat. But that night I woke up shortly after falling asleep, and Silence was moving through my whole body, almost like it was doing a house cleaning through my whole body…very hard to describe but it was very powerful, and it definitely felt like the Silence and energy were radiating well beyond the body.
My meditation the next morning was uneventful, but when I got to work I very much had a strong feeling of the Silence, centered in the solar plexus…just radiating. My colleague (who is also very spiritually inclined) came in to hear how the retreat went and after talking for about 10 minutes, she looked at me and said “what are you doing to me?” I had no idea what she was talking about, but she described a feeling of lightness, tingling and coolness swirling in her solar plexus that started out small and got progressively bigger before subsiding…similar to what i was feeling. Interesting.
All of my subsequent meditations have been very, very deep. I’ve got the tingly minty feeling in my throat, extending down into my abdomen pretty consistently and the Silence is there in the background…not as pronounced, but still there more than its ever been in the past. I’ve also felt like in meditations I’ve got more of the Silence flowing in through the crown (even though I making a point of not focusing there), but I’ve had less of a feeling of pressure in the head, almost as if I’ve cleared a throat blockage and now the divine energy is able to flow down into the lower chakras more easily. Definitely feeling the energy more in the lower chakras than I ever have in the past, and with that has come increasing feelings of ecstasy.
So far, not overly emotional, except for the overwhelming feeling of love and connectedness with those around me and I feel like I’ve be calmer and more intuitive with the kids.
And I feel like divine love has been sparked in a way I haven’t felt before…the bhakti is in high gear!!!
Thank you all for playing a part in the unfolding… 
Much Love to You All
@Rohini, Devi, my sister…that poem makes my heart explode…thank you, thank you for sharing it
@Parallax…now I’m the envious one…I got mint envy 
Hahaha 
(inside joke, sorry everyone 
)
Figured I would give a bit of an update myself as to how things are going for me, 3 days post retreat.
I had a difficult time getting home from Newark which gave me an awesome opportunity to watch emotions/thoughts arising (emotions/thoughts like “I want to get home to my wife and daughter NOW!” and “I hate Air Canada!” ) but really, there was very little agitation. And being in the airport or on an airplane for basically 24 hours, with nothing to do, gave me lots of opportunity to just be with myself and be silent. It was actually quite nice, despite how badly the mind wanted to jump in and “take over.” The mind was quietly watched and was not identified with much, if at all.
When I did finally get home the reunion with my family was ecstatic and a bit overwhelming…it was hard not to cry and gush and explode with love and devotion…wanting to share (words) was noticed, and dropped, as sharing of the Silence/Presence was infinitely more powerful then any words could have been.
And then, today, I went to work for the first time…had to miss a day due to my flight delays etc. When I got there I realized that no one had done anything while I was away, and that I had 4 days of “catch up” to do. Normally this would have also made the mind want to explode and take over, emotions boiling over and harsh words being said. This didn’t happen at all. I just let go, did what I could, and things flowed more smoothly then I could have ever imagined. To add to this, I had a new AYP Level 1 class start this evening. These classes take a fair amount of preparation and I really didn’t have the time I needed to get it all done as well as do my regular job. But I released the intention into Silence and it all happened, without any extraneous effort on my part.
Just before leaving work this afternoon I spent a little bit of time talking to Katrine on FB chat. This conversation really opened me up. I won’t go into too much detail, but just talking to her online had my body filled with energetic heat (as opposed to physical heat) and had me going into overload. Katrine was kind enough to take some time to help me release the overload and soon my ajna, crown and heart were buzzing with energy…more then usually felt while sitting at my desk at work especially. The mind went completely silent and I fell into samadhi, resting in deep silence. I came home to Deanna (aka Luci, aka “the wife” ) and she noticed it right away. She said; “You’re so…quiet!” And indeed I was. I spent a few minutes finishing my prep for the class this evening, spent a couple of minutes connecting with some company that arrived, and then headed for the yoga room to do my practices.
Up until the retreat I had not been practicing samyama regularly, it was too powerful, pushed me into overload too easily, and I rarely was able to finish the sutras in less then 20 or 30 minutes. But during and since the retreat I have added it back in to my routine and have found myself finishing then sutras at exactly 10 minutes and have not felt overloaded from the practice at all. This afternoon’s practices were especially wonderful and I felt very ready to being this next Level 1 class. I finished my practices, spent half an hour connecting with Amrita and then was off to the yoga studio.
Tonight’s class was, well, perfect. I have all new students, none of which have been to any of my classes before, and several of whom have never even been into a yoga studio before. I love it when people come with a “beginner’s mind”…they always seem to gain more for some reason. Anyways, the class was ultra smooth, the practices incredibly silent, and the response was beautiful. The whole lesson just flowed off of my tongue without any effort or thought required.
I can’t thank each of you enough for what you brought to the table at the retreat. It really wouldn’t have been the same without any single one of you. I feel deeply blessed to have connected with each person there, and I can’t wait until we can do it again. And a special thanks to Katrine for taking the time to help me today…my whole head is buzzing just thinking of you.
Love!
Wow, I’m so happy for you all! I hope that in the future, we’ll have some of these retreats in Europe as well.
Hi everyone. It took me a bit longer to get home, and after catching up on work this morning, the first time I get to read what you all have said about the retreat.
I do not have words. I can only say amen to all the comments you have already made about the retreat. It was truly an amazing experience for me too.
One of the things that I have experienced was this feeling of being “home”. I have never before felt so welcomed and totally accepted in any other setting before. Everything said in the group discussions, and in private conversations, resonated deeply within me as “truth”.
I took some photo’s and short video of part of a group discussion that I want to put into a special private Blog of the event. Only those who attended will receive the blog’s address. I want to ask anyone that have photos and video or sound recordings that I could perhaps also post there, to send to me.
Thanks again for everyone there, Shanti for inviting me and for Yogani who made eveything possible.
Sounds something like the jail yoga classes yesterday. The quality attention in the room, the eye contact, when I shared about the ayp retreat and the basics of “deep meditation” was palpable. I found myself discussing the options for coming back every day and helping create a kind of retreat. I also thought about what it would be like if our retreat was illegal and we were all put in jail together – wouldn’t that be great!
As we discussed over dinner one evening, part of the work there is gaining rapport with the guards, and yesterday might have been the best ever. One of the guards asked about what the yoga practices involve, and I quoted you, Carson, saying, “accept and relax.” And that is when she opened up and said that her doctor had recommended yoga because she has been recently diagnosed with MS.
Hey bewell, hope you arewell
I too have found that the “quality of presence” has drastically increased since the retreat. Not only evident in my classes, but at home with “the wife and kids” and other relationships (like work ones) as well. I credit learning Insight Dialogue mostly for this, but obviously that is not the only reason things have become more “alive” with Presence.
Never before have I thought of going to jail as “great”, but there is a first time for everything… I would indeed love to be “locked up” with all of you.
Awesome. Just. Awesome.
I’m sure that you are just the man for the job out there. May you continue to help spread the beauty of Inner Silence through your work.
Love you man
Love!
Most of the participants have already seen this. But for others that wants to get a slight flavour of the retreat, have a look at this Photo Blog: http://aypretreat2010alburtis.blogspot.com/
The asana pics are very funny =P 1-2 of them look like you were doing maha mudra, is it correct?
And yeah, who was the camera “man”? ^^ the one even witness to the practice phases =)
Hi Holy
We were doing a bit of a combination between maha mudra and janu sirsasana. We would start with janu sirsasana and then finish with a short maha mudra. The cameraman was Rattan. Asanas were optional to participate in so not everyone was doing the asana portion of the practices. Everyone did the sitting practices though.
Love!