Dear Leni, dear Tomáš,
eight months have passed since I did my dark retreat with you, and only now am I seeing how the darkness has affected me and my life.
I want to thank you once again from the bottom of my heart for what you do.
On the dark retreat I found deep calm and love
After coming back “from the dark” I was filled with deep calm and love for about a month. I felt reconciled. Everything I had lived through and seen in the dark was still echoing inside me. As time went on, I began to feel a longing to live through it all again and to find and understand the meaning of things I hadn’t understood. On the other hand, a little voice inside kept whispering that I already knew everything I needed to know. I was convinced I knew the answers and that I had mastered my ego, while in the meantime it was slowly starting to master me. But I wouldn’t admit that to myself, so I needed to go through a little lesson 🙂
The ego can’t be mastered
Several situations happened that opened my eyes again. It was a process lasting several months, full of groping in the dark, re-evaluating and tears, and at the end of it relief was waiting for me in the form of an insight: I know that I know nothing.
At last the humility came, the humility I had found in the dark and then lost again in everyday life after coming back. Actually, it wasn’t possible to lose or find anything, only to become aware of it, because becoming aware is now both the darkness and the light of my life.
Sometimes I miss the darkness, its velvety embrace full of calm, those beautiful visions, and then I remember the two nights when I experienced fear so deep that it paralysed me, and I realise that the most beautiful and most important thing I took away from the dark was finding myself and understanding that what really matters is living consciously and enjoying every moment of every day to the full.
The darkness helped me find inner calm and peace, become aware of myself and understand that there is no need to be afraid of being alone. It helped me come to terms with the passing of my loved ones, and it revealed beautiful truths and insights to me that were so deep that I misread them in my own way and didn’t understand their beauty.
All of it is still echoing inside me to this day, and I am endlessly grateful and happy that I had the chance to live through it all.
Before the dark retreat I was full of worries
People tell me I’ve changed, that I radiate calm, and I feel it myself too, and that makes me happy, because before the retreat I was full of worries, expectations, restlessness…
I’m not better or wiser, just at peace and somehow free. I no longer feel the inner tension I used to, and trivial things don’t wind me up so much. At last I feel happy for no obvious reason. Now and then I catch myself with rubbish running through my head and mindless nonsense coming out of my mouth, but luckily at least I notice it now 😀
I’ve realised that at any moment I really can decide what my life will be like. Or rather, how I will look at it and at everything that happens in it.
A dark retreat gives everyone exactly what they need. My inner need – my longing – was to find inner calm and peace.
Thank you for making it possible for me, through you :-))
From my heart and with respect for what you do
Lenka
