We have a Yoga retreat coming up soon (22/3 – 24/3/24) at our usual monastery in Springbrook, QLD. A Silent Yoga Retreat, two days of Noble Silence, filled with yoga, breathwork, sound healing, guided meditations, forest bathing and mindfulness. But why Silence? Yogis say silence is the common language of communication between living and non-living beings and silence is considered the very heartbeat of the Universe. The Vedic scriptures call this inner silence Mouna.

Our modern world is saturated with the ceaseless noise that issues from every corner of our lives and this noise pollution triples every 30 years. In an age when at least a third of Earth’s natural ecosystems have gone quiet to the point of “aural extinction,” all kinds of sounds; mechanical, human and informational noise have been amplified. What does this deluge of sound and information do to us – our bodies, our brains and our happiness? It erodes your consciousness. It makes it harder to focus on what’s in front of you, to manage your mind’s impulses, to notice, to appreciate, and to preserve open space in your mind. The open space of silence. And without this silence we are distracted, stressed, anxious and make bad decisions.
So we will be using these two days to plug into the real you, the wise voice in your head, which up till now has been drowned out by noisy, modern life. For students of yoga seeking clarity on a decision, trying to find the core of a life challenge, trying to find joy in an increasingly unstable world or trying to move forward in a new direction – this is the perfect yoga retreat. In the hush of silent solitude, we’ll find the space needed for undistracted reflection and we can then focus on picking up on our internal signals and listening to our own urgent broadcasts. In Silence we’ll discover meaning, real joy, peace and an inner self-reliance.
Many in the Western world view silence as something empty, something negative and something lonely.
This misunderstanding is very much prevalent because very few people have ever experienced real silence. Generally, all that we have experienced in the name of silence is an absence of sound or noiselessness. Yogic silence is a totally different experience. It has a strong presence and it’s not empty. It is overflowing with insight and great inner joy. It is not something unreal, there is huge realness in the present moment. Our inner world has its own fragrance, its own flavour and its own light.
Choosing to enter a period of Silence is one of the quickest ways to access your flow state. In the yogic world, being in a flow state means following the path that you are supposed to follow. It will be a fun, deeply introspective, life changing two days.
Margot Wagner
Yoga Under the Bodhi Tree
(Find and like articles similar to this on my Facebook Page: Yoga Under the Bodhi Tree)